Bay Area transit agency sent 57,000 license plates to ICE despite ‘sanctuary’ policy

The Sacramento Bee reports:

In June 2017, Bay Area Rapid Transit directors adopted a “Safe Transit” policy forbidding cooperation with federal immigration authorities, according to The Mercury News.

But directors did not know security cameras at an Oakland, California, BART station had already sent photos of tens of thousands of passenger license plates to a database open to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, KTVU reported.

The cameras, which BART directors had ordered shut off in April 2016, fed photos to the database from at least January 2017 until August 2017 — two months after directors adopted the policy forbidding such contact, The Mercury News reported.


In all, more than 57,000 license plate photos were sent to the database, about 20,000 after June 2017, reported KPIX. A citizens coalition called Oakland Privacy made the discovery after filing an unrelated public records request, the station reported.

“It’s disappointing to me because our values have been around sanctuary and safe transit for individuals,” BART director Bevan Dufty told KPIX. “They ignored a unanimous board vote not to do that and they did it anyway.”

In a statement, BART said the cameras were deactivated and removed in November when agency police discovered they were still operating, reported KTVU.

Imagine that.