Republican gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton has intensified his attacks on rival Xavier Becerra, presenting new allegations from a whistleblower who claims Becerra’s leadership at the Health and Human Services Department led to inadequate safeguards for unaccompanied migrant children.
A video shared with The California Post features an anonymous whistleblower who stated she worked at the Pomona Fairplex, one of three California intake sites used to process a surge of unaccompanied minors under the Biden administration. The whistleblower alleges that workers who attempted to protect these children faced retaliation, and that the focus was on rapid processing rather than child safety.
According to the whistleblower, she discovered that the sponsor of a 13-year-old child from El Salvador had an international arrest warrant. A federal employee investigating the case was reportedly escorted out and subsequently fired, the whistleblower claimed. "Mind you, she’s working for the government. She’s trying to protect these children," the whistleblower stated in the video. "And she got escorted out. She got fired. That was the, I guess you could call it the culture at the Pomona Fairplex."
In another instance, a worker reportedly conducted a background check on an address where over 200 migrant children had been sent. Upon checking Google Maps, the worker found the location consisted of shipping containers rather than homes and contacted an anti-trafficking hotline. The whistleblower asserted that this worker was terminated the following day.
The whistleblower further alleged that Becerra was aware of these issues but only visited the Fairplex for photo opportunities. "They knew exactly what was going on. Their concern was speed," she said. "They wanted the children out right away rather than the concern for safety of the child. So it’s speed over safety." She added that after Becerra's visits, pressure on staff to release migrant children increased.
Hilton's campaign previously released allegations from a whistleblower claiming some children were later subjected to sex or labor trafficking. Hilton stated, "These children were trafficked as a direct result of Becerra’s personal instructions to eliminate proper vetting of the adults these migrant children were being sent to."
Becerra’s record has drawn scrutiny throughout his time in the Biden administration. A February 2023 investigation by The New York Times found that thousands of unaccompanied minors were placed into exploitative labor situations after being released from federal custody.
During a congressional hearing, Becerra stated that his agency's legal authority over unaccompanied migrant children ended once they were placed with an approved sponsor, unless Congress granted further authority.
A spokesperson for Becerra’s campaign responded by suggesting Hilton should focus on former President Donald Trump, a supporter of Hilton's. The spokesperson stated, "Where Sec. Becerra rebuilt the child protection systems Trump gutted, Steve Hilton has proudly allied himself with the president who put those children in harm’s way—who illegally sent a father to a foreign prison, whose separation policies continue to take children away from their parents, and whose ICE agents shot two fathers dead this month."