Glass House Brands issued a statement Monday regarding the July 10 immigration raids of its two cannabis facilities in Carpinteria and Camarillo. In the statement, the company claims that only nine of its employees were detained or arrested in the two operations, and the rest of those taken by federal agencies — including the 11 minors government officials say were found at the Camarillo location — were employed by a third-party contractor.
The Glass House Brands statement confirms that a federal search warrant was served for “evidence of possible immigration violations under Title 8 of the United States Code” on July 10, though Glass House representatives say that “very few documents were seized” during the joint operation.
Government officials said that 361 individuals were arrested in both locations. Of these, 10 were taken from the Carpinteria location, according to witnesses on the scene. Glass House Brands, however, said in the August 4 statement that “the company has been unable to verify the actual number or the identities of those detained.”
What the company has been able to verify is that only nine of those arrested in the July 10 operations were employees of Glass House Brands, the statement says. Any other individuals detained or arrested were either “employees of third-party contractors providing services at [Glass House’s] Camarillo farm, including the farm labor contractors,” or otherwise “unassociated with the company, “ the statement said.
Regarding the 11 minors that federal authorities say were found at the Camarillo farm, Glass House Brands’ statement says that, although federal law allows minors as young as 12 to work on California farms, Glass House Brands requires third-party contractors to ensure employees are over the age of 21 to work at cannabis facilities.
“While the identities of the alleged minors have not been disclosed, the company has been able to determine that, if those reports are true, none of them were Glass House employees,” the statement said.
Glass House Brands representatives say that no company employees were involved in the protests outside either location. The statement points out that George Retes, security contractor at the Camarillo location — who is a U.S. citizen and a veteran — was detained for three days without charges; and a third-party employee at the same location, Jaime Alanís Garcia, died from injuries sustained after suffering a fall during the July 10 raid.
In the weeks since the raid, Glass House Brands has ended its contracts with two different companies that provide third-party labor, and the company has updated its farm labor contractor agreements to prevent labor issues in the future.
“Since July 10, 2025, the company has hired leading compliance consultants Guidepost Services — led by former Director of ICE and Assistant Secretary of Homeland Security Julie Myers Wood — to assist the company’s counsel with implementing best practices for determining employment eligibility for its employees and for ensuring eligibility of employees of contractors,” Glass House’s statement said. “All employees of the company and farm labor are now e-verified, and the underlying documents are reviewed by experts for validity and age gating.”
