Motel 6 Agrees to $12M Settlement After Sharing Guest Info With ICE

Top Class Actions’s website and social media posts use affiliate links. If you make a purchase using such links, we may receive a commission, but it will not result in any additional charges to you. Please review our Affiliate Link Disclosure for more information.

Motel 6 has reached a $12 million settlement with Washington state for sharing guest info with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in violation of anti-discrimination laws.

The settlement deal between the budget hotel chain and Washington was reach last week.

Motel 6 Operating LP and its parent company G6 Hospitality LLC will put $12 million into a settlement which will be used to compensate around 80,000 guests whose information was given illegally to ICE when the agency requested it.

Motel 6 will reportedly pay $50 in damages to each person whose information was given to immigration authorities, $1,000 to each person who was questioned by immigration as a result of their information being shared by Motel 6, and $7,500 to each person subjected to removal proceedings because Motel 6 shared their information.

Under the terms of the settlement agreement, the chain will also seek to “take corporate responsibility for past actions that adversely affected some of its customers.”

The chain will also implement new policies and employee training for handling guest information.

Per the terms of the settlement agreement, employees will not comply with requests for guest information before consulting with Motel 6’s legal department.

Exceptions to this new policy will occur when then the requests are “judicially enforceable with a warrant” or when there is “imminent danger.”

To help implement these polices, the motel chain will set up a 24-hour hotline that employees can call when they are faced with a request for guest information from government officials.

Reportedly, Motel 6 will publish the information about their new policy on the company’s website, and will submit a plan for their new policies to the Washington attorney general’s office.

Motel 6 expressed approval of the settlement saying that “the safety and security of our guests, which includes protecting guest information, is our top priority.”

The Motel 6 ICE guest information lawsuit was filed by the Washington attorney general’s office in January 2018 in King County Superior Court.

According to the attorney general’s office, Motel 6 made a corporate policy of giving guests’ personal information to ICE when it was requested.

Allegedly, this practice was in violation of state consumer protection and anti-discrimination laws.

According to the attorney general’s office, ICE uses guest information to target individuals whose names are Latino-sounding in order to make multiple immigration arrests.

Allegedly, some Motel 6 locations provided information to ICE almost daily. The Washington attorney general’s office also asserted that this information was provided without Motel 6 employees requiring ICE agents to present a warrant or probable cause for requesting this information.

This Motel 6 ICE class action lawsuit is not the first claim of this type against the hotel chain. In November, Motel 6 customers received preliminary approval for a $6.6 million settlement over similar claims filed in Arizona.

Washington state is represented by Mitchell Riese and Andrea Brenneke of the Civil Rights Division at the Washington attorney general’s office.

The Washington Motel 6 ICE Information Disclosure Class Action Lawsuit is State of Washington v. Motel 6 Operating LP and G6 Hospitality LLC, Case No. 18-2-00283-4, in the Superior Court of the State of Washington, King County.

UPDATE: August 2019, the Washington Motel 6 ICE class action settlement is now open.Click here to file a claim.

Unum Denied Claims for Disability Despite Evidence, Lawsuit ClaimsDuracell Class Action Says LED Flashlights Drain Batteries QuicklyValsartan Medication Recall Cites Risk of CancerStarKist ‘Heart­-Healthy’ Tuna Class Action Lawsuit Trimmed