What’s in the letter LA leaders delivered to White Memorial after ICE activity?

After an hourslong, late-night standoff between Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and community members outside Adventist Health White Memorial over the weekend, local leaders are demanding answers from hospital leadership. 

The hospital has previously faced scrutiny over claims that its administrators have allowed federal immigration agents to interfere in patient care. 

On Saturday, state Sen. María Elena Durazo marched with community members from Mariachi Plaza to the hospital to hand-deliver a letter to White Memorial President Daniel Fontoura. The letter, signed by elected officials and community leaders, calls for an end to any collaboration that may exist between the hospital and federal immigration agents. 

The night before, ICE agents clashed with protesters near the hospital and blocked the hospital’s ambulance entrance. According to White Memorial, ambulances were diverted for about two hours during the incident. Two U.S. citizens were also detained by federal agents. 

Federal immigration agents were at White Memorial Friday night because someone in their custody had been taken to the emergency room, according to hospital officials and the Los Angeles Police Department. 

“What happened last night was unacceptable,” Durazo told Fontoura in the parking lot of White Memorial, steps away from where ICE agents had been standing shoulder to shoulder just hours earlier. “It’s unacceptable that ICE would go into our healthcare facilities. But we also believe that White Memorial can and should do more.”

Fontoura told the group that the hospital has “no special relationship, no special contract” with ICE. “When they show up, they show up,” Fontoura said, referring to the federal agents. 

Fontoura said hospital staff took care of the person who was brought in by ICE and claimed they denied the agents’ request to “break protocol” and be in the same room as the patient and their physician. “We said no,” Fontoura said. 

Boyle Heights Beat asked White Memorial whether these privacy protections are standard practice and whether federal agents follow them while at the hospital. The hospital did not respond before publication. 

Last year, Adventist Health released a six-point statement outlining its policies to protect detained patients and support staff, but doctors and advocates at the time said it was not enough. 

Now Durazo and others are calling for more accountability and stricter guidelines from the hospital on how they respond to ICE activity. 

Here are the demands listed in Durazo’s letter:

1. Provide a detailed, written account of what happened, explaining why agents were allowed to block the ambulance entrance, what measures hospital leadership took to address their presence, and whether emergency access or patient care was compromised.
2. Implement and enforce procedures to prevent immigration agents from obstructing emergency entrances, address their presence on hospital grounds, and restrict access to patient rooms and nonpublic areas.
3. Clarify the hospital’s coordination with ICE and ensure that immigration agents do not interfere with medical decisions, patient privacy, or communications between medical professionals, patients, and their families.
4. Provide doctors, nurses and hospital staff with nurses, and hospital staff with clear written protocols, training and administrative support when they advocate for their patients.
5. Issue a public statement in both English and Spanish reaffirming the hospital’s commitment to caring for its patients, regardless of immigration status.

Download PDF

The letter requests a written response from hospital leadership by Nov. 21. It is signed by Durazo, Assemblymember Mark Gonzalez, Mayor-elect Nithya Raman, Councilmember Ysabel Jurado and other community leaders from Proyecto Pastoral, CHIRLA and more.

White Memorial has not responded to Boyle Heights Beat’s request for comment on the letter.

If the concerns remain unresolved, those who signed the letter say they will ask the California attorney general to review White Memorial’s compliance with state law.

“For ICE to show up the way they did, it takes a much higher level of consciousness and determination by the hospital to stop them from doing this,” Durazo told Boyle Heights Beat after the rally on Saturday. “We don’t have absolute power over ICE, we know that, but we do have some power over ICE.”