Deportation idea would turn training ship into a 'floating prison,' California congressmen say

SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. — A ship that was used to train Cal Poly Maritime Academy students for 30 years may be used to deport immigrants to Central and South America.

The Trump administration is considering refitting the 500-foot Training Ship Golden Bear — currently docked in Vallejo — and other boats to make expensive, days-long trips to Venezuela, El Salvador and Honduras, according to the New York Times.

The discussions are still hypothetical, but the journeys could cost the U.S. government millions of dollars per trip and would require security personnel onboard, the Times reported. Currently, the Trump administration mainly removes migrants through military or commercial flights.

Now, the talks to use the Golden Bear for deportations have prompted fierce pushback from two California congressmen.

On Tuesday, John Garamendi, D-Walnut Grove, and Salud Carbajal, D-Santa Barbara, sent a letter to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin demanding that the plans to conduct the mass deportations by sea be scrapped immediately due to the “enormous operational, safety and legal challenges.”

The congressmen went on to say in the letter that it would be “a dangerous misuse" of government property to convert the 40-year-old Golden Bear from a seagoing classroom into a “floating prison” used to detain and deport migrants.

“Mark my words, Donald Trump, Markwayne Mullin and ICE will never use the Golden Bear for their mass deportation agenda,” Garamendi said in a news release. “Not only is deporting migrants by ship impractical, but it’s also deeply inhumane.”

The Tribune reached out to ICE and the Department of Homeland Security for this story but did not immediately receive a response. Training Ship Golden Bear was a floating classroom for 30 years

The Golden Bear served students at Cal Poly Maritime Academy, formerly known as Cal Maritime, for three decades. It was the third Golden Bear in a series of ships used by maritime cadets dating back to 1946, extending the legacy of the academy’s first vessel, Training Ship California State, which launched in 1931.

The current ship, which was first deployed in 1996, acted as a living classroom — bringing students aboard for 2-month-long summer semester journeys during which they would apply their classroom knowledge in real time on open waters. During those summers at sea, cadets traveled across the Pacific Ocean as far as Kauai, Guam and Japan, according to the school’s website.

But this summer marked the ship’s final journey in service at the academy, taking students across to San Diego, Tahiti, Fiji and Honolulu for its last training voyage, according to a July news release.

“Along the way, students stood watch on the bridge and in the engine room, operated complex ship systems, participated in emergency drills and developed the skills required of future maritime officers,” the release said.

Following its final journey, the Golden Bear is expected to be replaced by the Golden State, a National Security Multi-Mission Vessel, in 2027, according to the release.

And now it appears that the federal government is considering a new use for the retired vessel: shipping immigrants back to their countries of origin.

The Golden Bear, alongside other training ships used by Cal Poly Maritime Academy and other state maritime colleges, is owned by the federal government through the U.S. Maritime Administration, according to Cal Poly spokesperson Matt Lazier. The university does not control how the ship will be deployed in the future.

“Decisions regarding Golden Bear’s future use rest with the federal government,” Lazier said.

As of Tuesday, the Maritime Administration did not have immediate plans for the Golden Bear beyond supporting instruction at the Bay Area campus, its press office told The Tribune over email.

“We are maintaining the vessel to support the academy’s training needs until the new training ship, Golden State, arrives in summer 2027,” the office stated. Deadly history of deportations by sea

The U.S. government previously used ships to carry out deportations in the 1950s.

Starting in 1954, President Dwight D. Eisenhower launched a mass deportation effort that rounded up hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants from Mexico.

“Operation Wetback,” titled after a racial slur that was widely used at the time, sent migrants back to Mexico by buses, planes and some ships, Politico reported. The conditions on the boats were so poor they were compared to slave ships, according to Mae Ngai’s book “Impossible Subjects.”

The ship deportations resulted in several people dying when a mutiny broke out aboard a boat nearing Tampico, Mexico, in August 1956, the New York Times reported. Forty passengers jumped off the ship and five drowned while swimming the 50 yards to shore.

In the aftermath of the deadly incident, many demanded the government stop repatriation ships due to “alleged unsatisfactory facilities" and the “maltreatment of involuntary passengers.”

In their letter to DHS, Garamendi and Carbajal said the Trump administration’s plan to use the Training Ship Golden Bear “recalls catastrophic historical examples of deportations by sea that violated human rights and resulted in deadly consequences.”