California Lawsuit Tracker: Tariffs, ICE Detention, Eaton Fire

A California lawsuit tracker in 2026 has a lot of ground to cover. Attorney General Rob Bonta has filed more than 60 suits against the Trump administration since January 2025, the federal government has filed its own suit against California over in-state tuition, private and government plaintiffs are pursuing Southern California Edison over the Eaton Fire, detained immigrants have won a preliminary injunction against ICE at California City, and the state is in court trying to overturn a Shasta County ballot measure before the November election. Here is where the major cases stand.

Tariff Lawsuits: IEEPA, the Supreme Court, and Section 122

California’s most consequential litigation against the federal government began on April 16, 2025, when Governor Gavin Newsom and Attorney General Bonta sued President Trump, the Department of Homeland Security, and U.S. Customs and Border Protection in the Northern District of California. The case, State of California v. Trump (No. 3:25-cv-03372), challenged executive orders imposing broad tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, including country-specific duties that reached 145% on most Chinese imports.¹²

The state’s core argument was that IEEPA does not grant the president tariff power. The provision the executive orders relied on, Section 1702(a)(1)(B), does not mention tariffs, import duties, or taxes, and California argued that the Constitution reserves tariff authority to Congress under Article I, Section 8.³

On June 2, 2025, Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley dismissed the case, finding that the U.S. Court of International Trade held exclusive jurisdiction. California appealed to the Ninth Circuit, which stayed proceedings on September 12, 2025, pending Supreme Court resolution of two related challenges.⁴¹

On February 20, 2026, the Supreme Court ruled in the consolidated Learning Resources and V.O.S. Selections cases that IEEPA does not authorize the president to impose tariffs. The Court held that IEEPA’s grant of authority to “regulate” importation does not include the power to tax, noting that no president had invoked the statute to impose tariffs in its fifty-year history.⁵

By December 2025, Customs and Border Protection had collected approximately $133.5 billion under the invalidated authority. The Penn Wharton Budget Model projected that reversing the tariffs could generate up to $175 billion in refund claims; importers have 180 days after goods are liquidated to file protests and seek refunds.⁶

The Section 122 Replacement Tariffs

Four days after the Supreme Court decision, on February 24, 2026, President Trump imposed a new 10% global tariff under Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974. Section 122 caps tariffs at 15% and limits them to 150 days without congressional extension, setting an expiration of July 24, 2026. The proclamation exempted USMCA-compliant goods from Canada and Mexico, products already subject to Section 232 duties, critical minerals, pharmaceuticals, and energy products.⁷⁸

California helped lead a 24-state coalition that sued in the Court of International Trade, arguing the tariffs did not meet Section 122’s “limited circumstances” conditions and violated the statute’s nondiscriminatory-application requirement because of exemptions for certain countries and 84 pages of product exceptions.⁹¹⁰

On May 7, 2026, a three-judge panel of the Court of International Trade ruled 2–1 in State of Oregon v. Trump that the Section 122 tariffs were “invalid” and “unauthorized by law.” The court dismissed most state plaintiffs’ claims for lack of standing, finding allegations of indirect consumer harm insufficient, and granted a permanent injunction only to successful private-party plaintiffs and the State of Washington.¹¹ The Trump administration appealed to the Federal Circuit, which issued an administrative stay on May 12, 2026, keeping the tariffs in place for most importers while the appeal proceeds.¹²

California’s Other Suits Against the Federal Government

Tariffs are one front in a much wider campaign. California’s leadership began preparing months before Trump took office, drafting briefs and allocating tens of millions of dollars for litigation, and most of the state’s suits are filed with coalitions of Democratic-led states.¹³ Key wins and pending matters include:

A preliminary injunction, secured in February 2025 by a 19-state coalition in the Southern District of New York, blocking the Department of Government Efficiency from accessing Treasury Department payment systems containing bank account numbers, Social Security numbers, and data tied to Medicare, veterans’ benefits, and tax refunds.¹⁴
An appellate victory on a sweeping federal funding freeze, plus court orders blocking termination of more than $600 million in federal public health grants.¹⁵
A multistate suit to block an overhaul of the childhood vaccine schedule, and a ruling blocking limits on access to gender-affirming care.¹⁵
A suit with Santa Clara County to block development of an ICE facility near Gilroy, and a final judgment in a case challenging a $100,000 tax for H-1B visas.¹⁵
Challenges to the administration’s decision to scrap a key climate finding and to the Sable Pipeline permit.¹⁵
A ruling temporarily blocking what the state described as a federal “fishing expedition” into colleges and universities.¹⁵

The Federal Suit Against California Over In-State Tuition

California is also a defendant. On November 20, 2025, the Department of Justice filed a civil complaint in the Eastern District of California challenging state laws that extend in-state tuition, scholarships, and subsidized loans to undocumented students. The suit targets the 2011 California Dream Act and broader policies allowing in-state tuition for students who attended California high schools for at least three years regardless of immigration status.¹⁶¹⁷

DOJ alleges the laws unconstitutionally discriminate against U.S. citizens, create incentives for illegal immigration, and conflict with federal law. The complaint cites two 2025 executive orders directing agencies to block undocumented people from receiving public benefits and to stop practices that favor undocumented people over U.S. citizens. Defendants include Governor Newsom, the Attorney General, the Regents of the University of California, the CSU Board of Trustees, and the Board of Governors of the California Community Colleges.¹⁶

ICE Detention Conditions at California City

In November 2025, seven people detained at the California City Detention Facility in Kern County, the state’s largest immigration detention center with 2,560 beds, sued in the Northern District of California in Gomez Ruiz, et al. v. ICE. Represented by the ACLU, the Prison Law Office, and other groups, the plaintiffs alleged denial of medical care, excessive solitary confinement, confiscation of religious items, frigid temperatures, and restricted attorney access.¹⁸

On February 11, 2026, the court granted a preliminary injunction requiring the facility to provide emergency medical services, specialist and prescription access, attorney access, and adequate clothing and blankets. The court also granted provisional class certification covering more than 1,000 detained individuals and appointed a monitor to ensure compliance.¹⁹

Eaton Fire Litigation Against Southern California Edison

The January 2025 Eaton Fire burned over 14,000 acres in the Los Angeles area, destroyed roughly 9,400 structures, and killed at least 17 people. Evidence of electrical arcing on an idle transmission tower pointed to Southern California Edison equipment as the ignition source, triggering a wave of litigation.²⁰

Los Angeles County, along with the County Flood Control District and the Consolidated Fire Protection District, sued SCE in Los Angeles Superior Court on March 5, 2025, seeking damages estimated in the hundreds of millions of dollars for destroyed infrastructure, parks, roads, and recovery costs.²⁰ On September 4, 2025, the U.S. Department of Justice filed its own action against SCE in the Central District of California (Case No. 2:25-cv-08357), alleging negligence, trespass by fire, and strict liability, and seeking more than $40 million in fire suppression costs plus compensation for damage to 8,000 acres of Angeles National Forest.²¹

Private plaintiffs have filed claims for total home loss, smoke and ash damage, business losses, wrongful death, and personal injury. The cases are assigned to the Los Angeles Superior Court Complex Division, with the first bellwether trial scheduled for January 25, 2027. Joint inspections and CT scans of SCE transmission towers have reportedly confirmed arcing damage, while the utility has pursued a defense arguing shared responsibility for the fire’s spread. SCE has signaled plans for a voluntary compensation program, which plaintiffs’ counsel have cautioned may undervalue claims given that the utility has not accepted full liability in court.²²

On the insurance side, the California Department of Insurance filed enforcement actions against State Farm General over its handling of wildfire claims, citing 398 violations in a sample of 220 claims and documenting delays, low settlement offers, excessive reassignment of adjusters, and failures in processing smoke damage claims. State Farm policyholders filed roughly 11,300 residential claims from the fires, out of 38,835 total claims across all insurers. As of March 2026, insurers had paid out more than $23.7 billion in fire-related claims.²³

California v. Shasta County Over Measure B

In June 2026, Attorney General Bonta and Secretary of State Shirley N. Weber sued in the California Third District Court of Appeal to strike down Shasta County’s Measure B, which passed with 55.6% of the vote. The measure would require government-issued photo identification for voter registration and in-person voting, eliminate vote-by-mail and most early voting, mandate hand-counting of ballots, and create a county-specific voter registration system separate from the state’s.²⁴²⁵

The state argues that even as a charter county, Shasta lacks authority to regulate elections, and that Measure B is preempted by state law mandating uniform procedures across all 58 counties. State law prohibits photo ID requirements, guarantees access to early and mail-in voting, and generally bars hand-counting except in small elections with fewer than 5,000 voters. The state has urged the court to rule by August 24, 2026, to avoid confusion before the November general election.²⁴

The Civil Litigation Backdrop

Alongside the political cases, California’s broader civil litigation climate continues to draw attention. The American Tort Reform Foundation designated Los Angeles the top “Judicial Hellhole” for 2025–2026, citing 199 personal injury and wrongful death verdicts exceeding $10 million between 2013 and 2022, totaling over $9 billion, with Los Angeles County accounting for more than a third. Notable 2025 verdicts included a $1 billion jury award in a Los Angeles mesothelioma case involving talc and a $50 million verdict against Starbucks for a drive-through burn injury.²⁶

California also leads the nation in federal ADA accessibility lawsuits, in part because the state’s Unruh Civil Rights Act allows $4,000 in statutory damages per violation. The state accounted for 3,252 ADA Title III cases in 2024. Proposition 65 settlements reached $43.7 million by November 2025, roughly a 60% increase over the prior year, with nearly 90% of those funds going to attorneys’ fees.²⁶

The Private Attorneys General Act, which since 2004 has allowed employees to sue on behalf of the state for Labor Code violations, was significantly reformed in July 2024 when Governor Newsom signed AB 2288 and SB 92. The deal, negotiated between labor and business groups, led to the withdrawal of a competing ballot initiative that would have repealed PAGA entirely. The reforms tightened standing so that employees must have personally experienced each alleged violation, capped penalties for employers who proactively comply with the Labor Code, increased penalties for malicious or fraudulent conduct, raised the employee share of penalties from 25% to 35%, and expanded the list of violations eligible for a “cure” process. Filings have remained high: 7,987 PAGA notices were filed between January and early November 2025.²⁷²⁶

1
Civil Rights Litigation Clearinghouse. State of California v. Trump
2
CalMatters. California Trump Tariffs Lawsuit
3
International Trade Insights. California Mounts Constitutional Challenge to IEEPA Tariffs
4
Politico. Judge California Dismisses Tariffs Lawsuit
5
Supreme Court of the United States. Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump, No. 24-1287
6
Penn Wharton Budget Model. Supreme Court Tariff Ruling
7
White & Case. Trump Administration Imposes 10% Section 122 Tariff
8
Wiley Rein. Trump Imposes Section 122 Tariffs After Halting IEEPA Tariffs
9
California Attorney General. California Sues Trump Over His Unlawful Use of Tariffs — Again
10
Politico. States Sue Trump Tariffs
11
Barnes, Richardson & Colburn. Court of International Trade Panel Strikes Down Section 122 Tariffs
12
Gibson Dunn. Section 122 Global Tariffs Invalidated by the Court of International Trade
13
CalMatters. California Trump Lawsuits
14
California Attorney General. Attorney General Bonta Secures Preliminary Injunction Blocking DOGE’s Access
15
California Attorney General. Federal Accountability
16
U.S. Department of Justice. Justice Department Files Complaint Challenging California Laws Providing State Tuition
17
The Guardian. Justice Department Lawsuit California Undocumented University Students
18
ACLU. Immigrants Sue Trump Administration Over Inhumane Conditions at California’s Largest Immigration Detention Center
19
ACLU. District Court Grants Preliminary Order Prohibiting Abhorrent Conditions at California City Detention Facility
20
Los Angeles County. Sue Edison Eaton Fire
21
Courthouse News Service. Edison Eaton Fire Lawsuit
22
Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein. Eaton Los Angeles Fire
23
California Department of Insurance. Enforcement Action Against State Farm
24
Courthouse News Service. California Sues Shasta County Over Newly Passed Voter ID Ballot Measure
25
California Attorney General. Attorney General Bonta, Secretary of State Weber Sue Shasta County Over Measure B
26
Judicial Hellholes. Los Angeles Judicial Hellhole
27
State of California Governor’s Office. Governor Newsom Signs PAGA Reform