El Cajon Mayor Bill Wells Accuses AG Bonta of Protecting Child Traffickers, Ties Crisis to Becerra’s HHS Failures 

In a viral video posted Wednesday, El Cajon Mayor Bill Wells detailed how California Attorney General Rob Bonta’s office instructed local police not to conduct welfare checks on approximately 50 children in his city flagged as possible sex trafficking victims—because doing so based on federal information could violate the state’s sanctuary law. 

The video features Wells recounting the sequence of events and connecting it to broader Democratic failures under former HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra—now the Democratic frontrunner for California governor—when hundreds of thousands of unaccompanied migrant children went missing or unaccounted for under his watch, numbers Wells’ reveals was in the range of 319,000 to 320,000.

WATCH:

We got word that there were around 50 children in our city who were suspected victims of sex trafficking. We wanted to go get them. That is the whole job. That is why you put on the badge.

Our city attorney stopped us. He told us that under state law, we'd be the ones in… pic.twitter.com/nFJo3kRgbn

— Bill Wells (@MayorBillWells) August 19, 2026

“We got word that there were around 50 children in our city who were suspected victims of sex trafficking. We wanted to go get them. That is the whole job. That is why you put on the badge,” Wells said in the reel.

 The city’s attorney warned that under state law, officers—not the traffickers—would be the ones in violation. Any officer knocking on a door risked criminal charges, loss of pension, and livelihood. 

El Cajon officials then formally asked Sacramento for guidance: Could police check on the children? Bonta’s office replied in writing : No.

“I keep that response because people don’t believe me when I describe it. They think it’s hyperbole, or politics, or some wild-eyed conspiracy theory. It isn’t. It’s a letter. It’s the state of California telling a police department to leave trafficked children where they are,” Wells stated. “It happened in my town. I have no reason to believe my town is unique.” 

Federal authorities had previously flagged 52 unaccompanied migrant children with addresses in El Cajon as potential trafficking victims.  Local officials sought Bonta’s guidance before acting; the AG’s office warned that wellness checks “alongside or based on information provided by federal immigration authorities” could violate Senate Bill 54, the 2017 California Values Act sanctuary law (see below).  That refusal helped spur El Cajon’s April 2026 lawsuit against Bonta challenging the sanctuary policies as conflicting with federal law and endangering children.

Senate Bill 54, the 2017 California Values Act, signed by then-Gov. Jerry Brown, authored by then-Senate President Kevin de León, was enacted as a response to the first Trump administration’s immigration enforcement priorities. It generally prohibits state and local law enforcement from using resources to assist federal immigration authorities. 

As California Globe has previously reported, SB 54 specifically bars California agencies from inquiring into an individual’s immigration status; detaining someone on the basis of an ICE hold request; providing release date or personal information; participating in arrests based on civil immigration warrants; assisting in interrogations or arrests of noncitizens for immigration purposes; transferring individuals to immigration authorities without a judicial warrant in most cases; and contracting with the federal government to house immigration detainees, among other restrictions. Limited exceptions supposedly exist for individuals convicted of certain serious or violent felonies, yet…

According to the Department of Homeland Security, as of February 6, 2026, ICE had active detainers for over 33,000 criminal non-citizens in California custody, including murderers, sex offenders, and drug traffickers.

“California’s failure to honor ICE detainers has resulted in the release of 4,561 criminal illegal aliens since January 20. The crimes of these aliens include 31 homicides, 661 assaults, 574 burglaries, 184 robberies, 1,489 dangerous drugs offenses, 379 weapons offenses, and 234 sexual predatory offenses,” DHS reported.

“There are currently 33,179 aliens in the custody of a California jurisdiction with active detainers. The crimes of these aliens include 399 homicides, 3,313 assaults, 3,171 burglaries, 1,011 robberies, 8,380 dangerous drugs offenses, 1,984 weapons offenses, and 1,293 sexual predatory offenses.”

Wells has repeatedly described the conflict: officers risk violating either federal law by following state sanctuary rules or state law by cooperating with federal tips on vulnerable minors. 

In related Globe coverage, “Failure in Pomona: Thousands of Migrant Children Missing,” former Lake Elsinore mayor Thomas Buckley detailed how HHS’s Office of Refugee Resettlement under Becerra lost track of at least 85,000 unaccompanied minors. Many were processed at the Pomona Fairplex emergency intake site in California. Whistleblowers described children sent to fake addresses (including empty fields), known gang members, and suspected traffickers; some were forced into sex work or labor. 

Secretary Becerra prioritized rapid releases over rigorous vetting and follow-up, reportedly comparing the process to a Ford assembly line. In June, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s delivered a sharp rebuke of Becerra’s record: “His only notable accomplishments here were losing 300,000 children, referred to HHS for custody and care, to human traffickers and drug runners…” Kennedy pledged to locate the children Becerra lost. 

While Bonta’s office has publicized its own anti-trafficking operations, the El Cajon episode underscores a policy conflict: state sanctuary rules that treat federal tips on at-risk migrant minors as off-limits for local police. 

Critics, including Wells, argue this prioritizes protecting illegal immigration status over child welfare. Bonta has dismissed the El Cajon lawsuit as politically motivated. Wells maintains the written refusal from Sacramento is not theory but documented state policy that left suspected child victims unchecked.

 As California’s gubernatorial race intensifies with Becerra as frontrunner, Wells’ video forces the question into the open: When local law enforcement is barred from checking on children flagged for sex trafficking, whose interests does Sacramento truly serve?