Miami Herald: ‘Outright Lie’: Trump DHS Responds to ICE Criticism

DHS Secretary Kristi Noem has pledged to prosecute those involved in doxing or violence against officers. Noem wrote, “We will prosecute those who dox ICE agents to the fullest extent of the law. These criminals are taking the side of vicious cartels and human traffickers.” She added, “We won’t allow it in America.”

Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin noted that department leaders have supported measures to protect ICE personnel. McLaughlin said, “ICE law enforcement are succeeding to remove terrorists, murderers, pedophiles and the most depraved among us from America’s communities, even as crazed rhetoric from gutter politicians are inspiring a massive increase in assaults against them. It is reprehensible that our officers are facing this threat while simply doing their jobs and enforcing the law.”

It’s really simple, bimbos: The reproduction of publicly available information is protected by the First Amendment. PERIOD. STOP. END OF SENTENCE.

If someone does his research on the internet and connects the dots on information available on public web sites, that information is public and can be freely shared.

Likewise, photography in a public place is also protected by the First Amendment. If someone happens to take a picture of one of your Gestapo ICE thugs in public, the taking and reproduction of that image is also protected by the First Amendment.

Suck it up, bitches! You’re on the losing side of this issue. The First Amendment rules!

The only “outright lies” here are coming from you and your cronies.



https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/outright-lie-trump-dhs-responds-to-ice-criticism/ss-AA1JNcCH

AOL: Chokeholds, bikers and ‘roving patrols’: Are Trump’s ICE tactics legal?

An appellate court appears poised to side with the federal judge who blocked immigration agents from conducting “roving patrols” and snatching people off the streets of Southern California, likely setting up another Supreme Court showdown.

Arguments in the case were held Monday before a three-judge panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, with the judges at times fiercely questioning the lawyer for the Trump administration about the constitutionality of seemingly indiscriminate sweeps by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.

“I’m just trying to understand what would motivate the officers … to grab such a large number of people so quickly and without marshaling reasonable suspicion to detain,” said Judge Ronald M. Gould of Seattle.

Earlier this month, a lower court judge issued a temporary restraining order that has all but halted the aggressive operations by masked federal agents, saying they violate the 4th Amendment, which protects against unreasonable searches and seizures.

The Justice Department called the block that was ordered by U.S. District Judge Maame Ewusi-Mensah Frimpong “the first step” in a “wholesale judicial usurpation” of federal authority.

“It’s a very serious thing to say that multiple federal government agencies have a policy of violating the Constitution,” Deputy Assistant Atty. Gen. Yaakov M. Roth argued Monday. “We don’t think that happened, and we don’t think it’s fair we were hit with this sweeping injunction on an unfair and incomplete record.”

That argument appeared to falter in front of the 9th Circuit panel. Judges Jennifer Sung of Portland, Ore., and Marsha S. Berzon of San Francisco heard the case alongside Gould — all drawn from the liberal wing of an increasingly split appellate division.

“If you’re not actually doing what the District Court found you to be doing and enjoined you from doing, then there should be no harm,” Sung said.

Frimpong’s order stops agents from using race, ethnicity, language, accent, location or employment as a pretext for immigration enforcement across Los Angeles, Riverside, San Bernardino, Orange, Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties. The judge found that without other evidence, those criteria alone or in combination do not meet the 4th Amendment bar for reasonable suspicion.

“It appears that they are randomly selecting Home Depots where people are standing looking for jobs and car washes because they’re car washes,” Berzon said. “Is your argument that it’s OK that it’s happening, or is your argument that it’s not happening?”

Roth largely sidestepped that question, reiterating throughout the 90-minute hearing that the government had not had enough time to gather evidence it was following the Constitution and that the court did not have authority to constrain it in the meantime.

Read more:Trump administration asks appeals court to lift restrictions on SoCal immigration raids

Arguments in the case hinge on a pair of dueling Golden State cases that together define the scope of relief courts can offer under the 4th Amendment.

“It’s the bulwark of privacy protection against policing,” said professor Orin S. Kerr of Stanford Law School, whose work on 4th Amendment injunctions was cited in the Justice Department’s briefing. “What the government can do depends on really specific details. That makes it hard for a court to say here’s the thing you can’t do.”

In policing cases, every exception to the rule has its own exceptions, the expert said.

The Department of Justice has staked its claim largely on City of Los Angeles vs. Lyons, a landmark 1983 Supreme Court decision about illegal chokeholds by the Los Angeles Police Department. In that case, the court ruled against a blanket ban on the practice, finding the Black motorist who had sued was unlikely to ever be choked by the police again.

“That dooms plaintiffs’ standing here,” the Justice Department wrote.

But the American Civil Liberties Union and its partners point to other precedents, including the San Diego biker case Easyriders Freedom F.I.G.H.T. vs. Hannigan. Decided in the 9th Circuit in 1996, the ruling offers residents of the American West more 4th Amendment protection than they might have in Texas, New York or Illinois.

In the Easyriders case, 14 members of a Southland motorcycle club successfully blocked the California Highway Patrol from citing almost any bikers they suspected of wearing the wrong kind of helmet, after the court ruled a more narrow decision would leave the same bikers vulnerable to future illegal citations.

“The court said these motorcyclists are traveling around the state, so we can’t afford the plaintiff’s complete relief unless we allow this injunction to be statewide,” said professor Geoffrey Kehlmann, who directs the 9th Circuit Appellate Clinic at Loyola Law School.

“In situations like this, where you have roving law enforcement throughout a large area and you have the plaintiffs themselves moving throughout this large area, you necessarily need to have that broader injunction,” Kehlmann said.

Frimpong cited Easyriders among other precedent cases in her ruling, saying it offered a clear logic for the districtwide injunction. The alternative — agents sweeping through car washes and Home Depot parking lots stopping to ask each person they grab if they are a plaintiff in the suit — “would be a fantasy,” she wrote.

Another expert, Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the UC Berkeley School of Law, said the Los Angeles Police Department chokehold case set a standard that litigants “need to show it’s likely it could happen to you again in the future.”

But, he added: “The 9th Circuit has said, here’s ways you can show that.”

The tests can include asking whether the contested enforcement is limited to a small geographic area or applied to a small group of people, and whether it is part of a policy.

“After the injunction here, the secretary of Homeland Security said, ‘We’re going to continue doing what we’re doing,’” Berzon said. “Is that not a policy?”

Roth denied that there was any official policy driving the sweeps.

“Plaintiffs [argue] the existence of an official policy of violating the 4th Amendment with these stops,” Roth said. “The only evidence of our policy was a declaration that said, ‘Yes, reasonable suspicion is what we require when we go beyond a consensual encounter.'”

But Mohammad Tajsar of the ACLU of Southern California, part of a coalition of civil rights groups and individual attorneys challenging cases of three immigrants and two U.S. citizens swept up in chaotic arrests, argued that the federal policy is clear.

“They have said, ‘If it ends in handcuffs, go out and do it,'” he told the panel. “There’s been a wink and a nod to agents on the ground that says, ‘Dispatch with the rigors of the law and go out and snatch anybody out there.'”

He said that put his organization’s clients in a similar situation to the bikers.

“The government did not present any alternatives as to what an injunction could look like that would provide adequate relief to our plaintiffs,” Tajsar said. “That’s fatal to any attempt by them to try to get out from underneath this injunction.”

The Trump administration’s immigration enforcement tactics, he said, are “likely to ensnare just as many people with status as without status.”

The Justice Department said ICE already complies with the 4th Amendment, and that the injunction risks a “chilling effect” on lawful arrests.

“If it’s chilling ICE from violating the Constitution, that’s where they’re supposed to be chilled,” Chemerinsky said.

A ruling is expected as soon as this week. Roth signaled the administration is likely to appeal if the appellate panel does not grant its stay.

https://www.aol.com/chokeholds-bikers-roving-patrols-trumps-232936992.html

Daily Caller: Blue State Judges Refuse To Jail Leftists Charged In Violent Attacks

Democrat-appointed federal judges in Oregon have repeatedly refused to jail suspects charged with violence at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility and an Elon Musk-owned Tesla store.

A court on Monday ordered Robert Jacob Hoopes to be released pending trial after he allegedly tried to ram his way into an ICE facility in Portland and injured an ICE officer’s eye with a rock, according to the Department of Justice (DOJ). Between July 8 and July 11, two other Oregon defendants accused of armed assaults on federal agents and a Tesla store were also given supervised release despite the Trump administration’s objections, according to court records and local media reports.

Hoopes, 24, allegedly threw rocks at the ICE building among a crowd of protesters on June 14 and struck an officer “in the head, causing a significant laceration over the officer’s eye,” according to the DOJ. “Later that same day, he and two other individuals were seen using an upended stop sign as a makeshift battering ram, which resulted in significant damage to the main entry door to the ICE building,” according to the department.

Judge Youlee Yim You, appointed by former President Barack Obama, said she decided to release Hoopes with a GPS ankle monitor in part because some in the community showed up to support the defendant in the courtroom, Oregon Public Broadcasting reported.

Before Hoopes’s release, two federal judges rejected the DOJ’s pleas to detain transgender suspect Adam Lansky, who is accused of throwing Molotov cocktails at a Tesla dealership in January, aiming a rifle at a witness who drove away and returning the next month to fire shots into the building, court documents show.

The DOJ warned in court that Lansky was “a competitive shooter” and former member of the Socialist Rifle Association, a left-wing firearm education and training group with chapters across the U.S. “The [improvised explosive devices] used by Lansky were all manufactured by him using everyday items, empty glass bottles, gasoline, fabric, etc., all these items remain easily accessible to Lansky in the community if released,” prosecutors wrote in a July 9 filing.

Obama-appointed Judge Stacie Beckerman nonetheless ordered Lansky’s release to a halfway house, where individuals receive more freedom to pursue employment and other activities than in jail. Beckerman argued in court that Lansky’s alleged behavior was an “outlier event,” according to The Oregonian.

The DOJ appealed the decision to Judge Adrienne Nelson, who also rejected its request. Former President Joe Biden appointed Nelson as the first black woman to serve on Oregon’s U.S. District Court.

Judge Beckerman also moved anti-ICE defendant Julie Winters on July 8 to a halfway house, The Oregonian reported. Winters tried to light an incendiary device next to a Portland ICE building, threw a large knife at a federal officer without hitting the officer and pulled a second knife on officers who were restraining him at an anti-ICE protest on June 24, the DOJ has alleged.

An attorney for Lansky did not respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment. Court records do not yet list attorneys for Hoopes or Winters.

Beckerman said Winters, who identifies as transgender, should be released from jail because officers put him in solitary confinement rather than house him with male or female inmates, according to The Oregonian. The DOJ, however, said his behavior is “extraordinarily concerning” because he is also charged in a state case with assaulting a police officer in December.

The DOJ did not respond to a request for comment.

https://dailycaller.com/2025/07/29/blue-state-judges-refuse-jail-leftists-charged-violent-attacks

Bradenton Herald: City Council Considers Revoking Permit in Blow to ICE

The Portland City Council is reportedly considering revoking Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)’s permit for the South Waterfront facility due to concerns regarding unlawful detentions exceeding 12 hours. Community unrest has risen amid reports of intimidation and policy violations linked to ICE operations. The council has responded by reviewing legal options in light of resident pressure for more humane immigration enforcement.

At the latest hearing, residents reported intimidation and attacks linked to ICE agents, claiming they have violated Portland’s sanctuary policy. Critics argued that ICE has disrupted housing and schools.

Protests outside the facility escalated, with federal agents using tear gas and rubber bullets. Rising vandalism has further strained tensions between residents and authorities.

City Council Member Angelita Morillo claimed that tolerating ICE’s actions could set a dangerous precedent. Morillo said, “If we allow ICE to continue to operate when they have violated their permits, that means that anything becomes permissible moving forward.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/city-council-considers-revoking-permit-in-blow-to-ice/ss-AA1JirF2

The Nation: Punished for Playing by the Rules: the Deliberate Cruelty of Trump’s Deportation Regime

Joselyn Chipantiza-Sisalema, 20, dressed in a red shirt and blue jeans on a Tuesday morning in June and took the subway from Bushwick to Lower Manhattan. She walked into the Jacob Javits Federal building at 26 Federal Plaza, a few blocks north of City Hall, took her keys and phone out of her pockets to pass through security, and got in an elevator up to the 12th-floor courtroom of Judge Donald Thompson. Like the vast majority of people appearing in immigration court, she had no lawyer with her. Chipantiza-Sisalema’s parents and younger brother had made the brutal journey from Ecuador to the United States in 2022, part of an increasing number of Ecuadorans propelled north as their country destabilized. They settled in New York—where a large Ecuadoran population has been part of the city since the 1970s—and filed a claim for asylum. Chipantiza-Sisalema joined her parents last year, crossing into the US at El Paso in May 2024. In the volatile political climate in Ecuador, she had faced threats and stalking, her father later told reporters. Immigration officials in El Paso determined Chipantiza-Sisalema was not a flight risk or a danger to the community, so she was permitted to go on to New York to her family and told to appear in court more than a year later. She followed the rules.

The June 24 hearing at 26 Federal Plaza was her first immigration hearing. It was brief. Judge Thompson scheduled her next date for March 2026. But when Chipantiza-Sisalema stepped out of the courtroom to return home, masked men grabbed her. She was hustled down to the 10th floor of the courthouse. She would remain there for nine days—without being charged or ever given the opportunity to contest her detention, without access to an attorney, sleeping on the floor, with minimal food and nowhere to bathe. In hasty one-minute phone calls, Chipantiza-Sisalema told her parents there were at least 70 other people there. The small number of holding cells in the federal building are meant to be used just for a few hours before someone is transferred to a different facility, attorneys familiar with the building explained. There is no provision for meals and no beds. When she was put on a plane and transferred to the for-profit Richwood Detention facility in Louisiana on the Fourth of July—before a New York judge had a chance to review the habeas corpus petition an attorney filed the day before—she was still wearing that same red shirt and blue jeans.

The overwhelming majority of immigrants whose cases are winding through the immigration court system show up for their hearings, believing that by adhering to the system’s labyrinthine requirements they’ll be rewarded with clearance to stay in the country. Or at least the chance to fight another day. But under President Donald Trump’s aggressive deportation regime, abiding by the immigration system’s rules has become increasingly dangerous. Those who show up in court now routinely face arrest. But failure to appear for a hearing generally triggers a deportation order, attorneys explained. Immigrants, advocates, and elected officials at all levels are scrambling to confront what they say is lawlessness inside the courthouse and throughout the ICE detention system. “ICE is just detaining everyone and giving only some a right to a hearing, and it’s only the possibility of having a lawyer who will shout and scream for you that your case is heard,” said Melissa Chua, an attorney at the pro bono New York Legal Assistance Group, who is representing several people who, despite following US immigration procedure, are now in detention.

Chipantiza-Sisalema is just one of hundreds of people taken in the past month by masked ICE agents at Manhattan’s immigration courts, Harold Solis, co–legal director for the Brooklyn-based immigrant rights group Make the Road New York, told The Nation. “The truth is, I don’t think anyone has a full scope of how many people have been held there.” Make the Road is now representing Chipantiza-Sisalema. Similar scenes have played out in courthouses across the country, with immigrants often shuttled between several facilities before their family or attorney can locate them. Beginning in April, it appeared to court observers in Manhattan that ICE was lying in wait for people whose cases were dismissed or who were ordered to be deported. Veteran attorneys say courthouse arrests had previously been extremely unusual. “In all my years of practice, it has never been a fact of life that going to immigration court leads to you being detained,” Solis said. By late June, ICE was routinely taking people even when, like Chipantiza-Sisalema, US immigration judges had ordered them to reappear several months in the future.

“People are being disappeared into this hole of 26 Federal Plaza for a prolonged period of time and in deplorable conditions,” said Kendal Nystedt, an attorney at the rights group Unlocal whose client was held there for six days. The New York Immigration Coalition is representing someone held for three weeks, executive director Murad Awawdeh said. The vast majority, maybe as many as 99 percent, according to a close court watcher who asked not to be identified because of the nature of her work, do not have an attorney.

“If you’re someone without a family member or no one has alerted us to you, there is no way for us to know what has happened,” said Chua. “They are really creating this shadow place that can deny people protections they are afforded by our Constitution.”

In the chaotic seconds as immigrants exit courtrooms, volunteer observers hastily attempt to catch people’s names, alien registration numbers, and contacts for family members before ICE strongarms them into elevators and out of sight. The hope is that by collecting people’s names, their families will be able to find out where they are sent. A diffuse mutual aid network raises commissary funds, tries to connect people to counsel, and offers support to families left behind—often without a breadwinner. Ordinarily when someone is detained, they show up in the ICE detainee locator in a mattered of hours, attorneys said. But those held at 26 Federal Plaza and in irregular detention in courthouses elsewhere are listed only as “in transit” for the days-long duration of their stay. In this limbo state, their lawyers and families can’t reach them.

Chua and other attorneys emphasized that the spectacle of ICE sweeping people up in courthouses was a dramatic departure from norms—even in an immigration system hardly characterized by transparency or compassion. Several members of New York’s congressional delegation, including Representatives Adriano Espaillat, Daniel Goldman, Jerrold Nadler, and Nydia Velasquez, have tried to find out how many people are held at 26 Federal Plaza—and to assess conditions. They’ve all been rebuffed.

In a surreal, Kakfaesque incident, Bill Joyce, deputy director of the New York ICE field office, told Representatives Goldman and Nadler in June that the 10th floor of 26 Federal Plaza—where a shifting number of immigrants are held against their will for days on end—is not a detention facility. Rather, it is a place ICE is “housing [immigrants] until they can be detained.” Members of Congress have a right to inspect places where people are detained, but not, Joyce argued, a place they are merely “held.” On July 14, Espaillat and Velasquez were again prevented from inspecting the facility. The lawmakers are considering legal action against the Department of Homeland Security for preventing them from exercising their oversight rights, Espaillat said.

That people are held within a courthouse in a sanctuary city that considers itself the capital of immigrant America is an affront that has New York lawmakers searching for solutions. “We’re fighting this from the legal front and the budgeting front and the legislative front. And we’re fighting this in public opinion,” Espaillat said. Likewise, New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams said his office is seeking litigation in support and praised the efforts of court observers. A coalition of immigrants rights groups in Washington, DC, filed a class action suit in federal district court in DC on July 17, alleging that the courthouse arrests are a violation of due process. New York groups could soon follow.

While ICE is barred by state law from entering New York criminal and civil courts, 26 Federal Plaza is under federal jurisdiction. But standing beside Chipantiza-Sisalema’s bereft and terrified parents at a July 3 press conference, several elected officials called on New York Governor Kathy Hochul to find a way to intervene. Assemblywoman Emily Gallagher, who represents parts of Brooklyn, thinks lawmakers, whose session ended mid-June, should return to Albany. “I also call on my governor, Kathy Hochul, to pass New York for All and to call us to a special session and get ICE out of our courts,” she said, referring to a bill that would extend some sanctuary protections to immigrants across New York State. Espaillat introduced HR 4176—The No Secret Police Act—in June. In the unlikely event it passes the Republican-controlled Congress, it would bar federal law enforcement officers from wearing masks or hiding their badges except in specific undercover instances. Last week, New York Attorney General Leticia James and a coalition of 20 attorneys general urged Congress to pass the bill and a bundle of similar legislation.

Closer to home, the New York City budget adopted at the end of June increased city funding for pro bono immigration lawyers by $76 million to $120 million in total, and the city’s law department filed amicus briefs in support of two detained New Yorkers this spring. But the New York Immigration Coalition wants to see a full right to counsel extended to immigration court. The rollout of city-funded right-to-counsel in housing court several years ago was not without complications, but it dramatically rebalanced the scale between tenants and landlords and has been copied elsewhere. New York wouldn’t be the first place to guarantee a right to an immigration lawyer. Oregon adopted universal access to representation in most immigration matters in 2022, said Isa Peña, director of strategy for Innovation Law Lab, based in Portland.

As courthouse arrests pile up, lawyers who are able to identify people being held are filing habeas corpus petitions in federal district courts, in hopes of keeping their clients from being transferred to distant detention facilities or deported—but also simply to compel the government to reveal where they are, dispelling the twilight status of being in perpetual “transit.” These petitions have the advantage of being heard by judges who are part of the federal judiciary—and perhaps more attuned to the rule of law than immigration court judges, who serve at the pleasure of the Department of Homeland Security.

In Buffalo, in a case since joined by the New York Civil Liberties Union, the Prisoners Legal Service is arguing that ICE’s aggressive presence in the halls of federal courthouses constitutes not just an escalation of Trump’s war on immigrants but a systematic attempt to deprive people of their due-process rights. “It’s a huge deviation in ICE tactics and unlawful in various ways,” said NYCLU attorney Amy Louise Belscher, who is representing Oliver Mata Velasquez in a habeas case. Mata Velasquez, 19, came to the United States from Venezuela in September 2024, using the CBPOne app the Biden administration required of asylum seekers.As with Chipantiza-Sisalema, immigration officials at the border determined Mata Velasquez was not a flight risk or a danger and permitted him to enter the country. He obtained work authorization and showed up May 21 for his first immigration hearing, as instructed. A judge told him to return in February 2026, but before he could leave the courthouse, ICE arrested him. Last week a judge ordered Mata Velasquez immediately released and forbade ICE from detaining him again without permission from the judge.

“Federal judges are finding these courthouse arrests unlawful,” Belscher said. “They are detaining people not because they are at risk of flight or a danger to the community, but because they are easy to find.” The NYCLU’s arguments for Mata Velasquez cite a bundle of cases successfully argued in Oregon, by the Innovation Law Lab. Those cases, named for ICE Seattle field office director Drew Bostock, argue that the courthouse arrests violate the immigrant’s right to due process. That such a violation is occurring precisely in the place one goes to seek justice has scandalized attorneys. “When we saw that people were targeted at the courthouse—where your fundamental freedoms are supposed to be upheld, we moved quickly to intervene,” Innovation Law Lab’s Peña said.

Some of the habeas petitions filed in New York last month resulted in judges’ issuing emergency orders to keep the person nearby, preventing ICE from venue shopping by sending the person to Texas or Louisiana.

People aren’t only being taken at court. Milton Maisel Perez y Perez, a teacher who fled his native Guatemala because of threats from gangs, has been in immigration proceedings for six years. Like hundreds of thousands of immigrants across the country, he gained the right to work legally and was required to check in periodically under the Department of Homeland Security’s Intensive Supervision Appearance Program (ISAP). Last month, he went to the ISAP facility in Jamaica, Queens. It was perhaps the 50th time he’d done so, his attorney S. Michael Musa-Obregon said. This time, Perez y Perez was arrested. He was transferred to the 10th floor of 26 Federal Plaza and held for three days. After Musa-Obregon filed a habeas petition with the Southern District of New York, but before it could be heard by a judge, ICE prepared to move Perez y Perez to detention—clear across the country in Seattle. A judge’s order at the last minute had him removed from the plane and transferred to detention in Goshen, New York.

The courthouse arrests are a cynical campaign, Musa-Obregon said. “They are detaining people with the idea that it is much easier to get people to give up their rights when they are incarcerated,” he said. On the Fourth of July, Trump signed into law his massive spending bill, which included $170 billion for immigration enforcement and border security. It makes ICE the largest law enforcement entity in the country and promises to vastly expand the for-profit immigrant detention system. The masked men in the halls of justice are just the beginning. But the ancient writ of habeas corpus appears to be working.

District Judge Analisa Torres ruled on Chipantiza-Sisalema’s habeas petition on July 13, ordering her immediate release. The manner of her arrest, the judge wrote, “offends the ordered system of liberty that is the pillar of the Fifth Amendment.” She was back in her parents’ arms on July 16. Snatched by masked men and held for three weeks, she’s one of the lucky ones.

https://www.thenation.com/article/society/ice-trump-detention-regime-cruelty

Also here:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/punished-for-playing-by-the-rules-the-deliberate-cruelty-of-trump-s-deportation-regime/ar-AA1JcQGd

L.A. Times: Immigration arrest outside Oregon preschool rattles parents

Parents at a preschool in a Portland suburb are reeling after immigration officers arrested a father in front of the school during morning drop-off hours, breaking his car window to detain him in front of children, families and staffers.

“I feel like a day care, which is where young children are taken care of, should be a safe place,” Natalie Berning said after dropping off her daughter at the Montessori in Beaverton on Friday morning. “Not only is it traumatizing for the family, it’s traumatizing for all the other children as well.”

Mahdi Khanbabazadeh, a 38-year-old chiropractor and citizen of Iran, was initially pulled over by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers while driving his child to the school Tuesday. After asking whether he could drop off the child first, he continued driving and called his wife to tell her what happened, according to his wife, who spoke on condition of anonymity out of privacy concerns for her and her child.

His wife rushed to the school, took their child from his car and brought him inside. Khanbabazadeh stayed in the vehicle in the parking lot and asked whether he could move somewhere not on school grounds out of consideration for the children and families, his wife said. He pulled out of the lot and onto the street and began to open the car door to step out when agents broke the window and took him into custody, according to his wife.

Kellie Burns, who has two children attending the preschool, said her husband was there and heard the glass shatter.

“More than anything we want to express how unnecessarily violent and inhumane this was,” she said. “Everyone felt helpless. Everyone was scared.”

ICE said it detained Khanbabazadeh because he overstayed his visa, which his wife disputes.

“Officers attempted to arrest Khanbabazadeh during a traffic stop when he requested permission to drop his child off at daycare,” ICE said in a statement. “Officers allowed him to proceed to the daycare parking lot where he stopped cooperating, resisted arrest and refused to exit his vehicle, resulting in ICE officers making entry by breaking one of the windows to complete the arrest.”

Immigration officials have dramatically ramped up arrests across the country since May. Shortly after President Trump took office in January, his administration lifted restrictions on making immigration arrests at schools, healthcare facilities and places of worship, stirring fears about going to places once considered safe spaces.

After U.S. military strikes on Iran in June, officials trumpeted immigration arrests of Iranians, some of whom settled in the United States long ago.

Khanbabazadeh’s wife said he has always maintained lawful status. After he arrived on a valid student visa and they subsequently married, she said, they submitted all required paperwork to adjust his status and were waiting for a final decision following their green card interview months ago.

Khanbabazadeh is being held at the ICE detention facility in Tacoma, Wash., she said.

Guidepost Global Education, which oversees the Montessori school, called the incident “deeply upsetting.”

“We understand that this incident raises broader questions about how law enforcement actions intersect with school environments,” Chief Executive Maris Mendes said in a statement. “It is not lost on us how frightening and confusing this experience may have been for those involved — especially for the young children who may have witnessed it while arriving at school with their parents.”

Parents said they want to support the family and teachers.

“We know it’s happening across the country, of course, but no one is prepared for their preschool … to deal with it,” Burns said. “It’s really been a nightmare.”

https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2025-07-19/immigration-arrest-outside-oregon-preschool-rattles-parents

Independent: Mom and her four American-born children detained after visiting Canadian border: ‘What authoritarianism looks like’

Jackie Merlos, her 9-year-old triplets and 7-year-old son held by border patrol for more than two weeks, family says

Merlos’ sister, a legal resident of Canada, had stepped across the boundary while saying goodbye, “which triggered this unfounded accusation,” they said.

So hugging your sister goodbye at an international border gets you 2+ weeks in detention with no charges, no attorney, and no visitors?

Four American-born siblings and their mother have been held inside a border patrol facility for more than two weeks after her arrest by federal law enforcement agents near the U.S.-Canada border.

Kenia Jackeline Merlos, her nine-year-old triplets and seven-year-old son, were visiting her sister at Peace Arch State Park in Washington state on June 28 when U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents took them into custody.

Merlos’ mother, who joined the family on the trip, was also detained, but it remains unclear where she is being held.

The Department of Homeland Security accused Merlos of “attempting to smuggle illegal aliens” into the country, according to a statement. Merlos had requested that her children stay with her during her detention, the agency said.

Merlos’ husband Carlos was detained several days later outside the family’s home in Portland, Oregon. He is currently being held inside an Immigration and Customs Enforcement processing center in Tacoma, Washington. The couple’s immigration status is unclear.

“What began as a simple family trip to Peace Arch Park — a place Jackie had safely visited in the past to visit family in Canada — has turned into a devastating immigration nightmare,” according to a statement from family friends helping raise money for the family’s legal defense.

Merlos’ sister, a legal resident of Canada, had stepped across the boundary while saying goodbye, “which triggered this unfounded accusation,” they said.

The family’s arrest and detention has alarmed legal advocates and members of Congress who are pressing Donald Trump’s administration for their swift release from custody. Customs and Border Protection policy largely prohibits holding people in custody for more than 72 hours.

“Every effort must be made to hold detainees for the least amount of time required for their processing, transfer, release, or repatriation as appropriate and as operationally feasible,” according to CPB guidelines.

“Trump said he would go after ‘the worst of the worst.’ Instead, his immigration machine is abducting Oregonians without cause — including four U.S. citizen children in my district,” said Democratic Rep. Maxine Dexter, who accused CBP of misleading her office about the family’s location.

The congresswoman confirmed that Merlos, who is originally from Honduras, and her children were being held inside a detention center near Ferndale, Washington, during a visit to the facility last week. She was not able to speak with the family but did enter the facility and see them.

“It is wholly unprecedented for CBP to detain any individual for weeks without cause — let alone four U.S. citizens,” Dexter said in a statement. “This is what authoritarianism looks like. Citizen children abducted. Community members disappeared. If we allow this to become normal, we surrender who we are. We cannot look away. We cannot back down.”

Merlos has not been charged with a crime. Federal immigration authorities have not provided any documents to support allegations against her, according to attorney Jill Nedved.

Family friend Mimi Lettunich, who is also a godparent to her youngest child, said Merlos sent her a text message after she was brought into custody. “Mimi, I’ve been detained,” the message said, Lettunich told Oregon Public Broadcasting.

“I’ve known them about 20 years,” Lettunich said. “They’re wonderful people.”

The Merlos family is “the kind of people we want in our community,” Dexter said in a statement on social media. “Kind, hardworking, small business owners, and devoted to their neighbors. The kind of people we are proud to call ours.”

Over the last two weeks, the family has been held “in a windowless cell, without access to legal counsel,” according to Dexter. “Treated not as citizens, not as children, but as threats.”

The Trump administration’s aggressive anti-immigration agenda has deployed virtually every federal law enforcement agency to support immigration enforcement operations across the country. Nearly 60,000 people are currently in immigration detention centers, and the president has approved legislation that earmarks tens of billions of dollars over the next decade to expand detention center capacity and hire more immigration officers.

The Independent has requested additional comment from Homeland Security.

The Independent is the world’s most free-thinking news brand, providing global news, commentary and analysis for the independently-minded. We have grown a huge, global readership of independently minded individuals, who value our trusted voice and commitment to positive change. Our mission, making change happen, has never been as important as it is today.

https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-politics/jackie-merlos-canada-border-family-arrested-b2788868.html

Newsweek: Trump backs ICE crackdown as farmworkers say they feel ‘hunted’

Undocumented farm workers say they are being “hunted like animals” as President Donald Trump expands ICE raids targeting agricultural sites. Amid rising arrest quotas and shifting enforcement policies, workers report living in fear, losing wages, and facing mounting pressure to surrender autonomy in exchange for continued employment.

What to know:

  • ICE raids under Trump have led to injuries, mass arrests, and at least one death
  • Trump has proposed deferring immigration enforcement to farm owners
  • Advocacy groups warn that the policy undermines civil rights and worker protections
  • Many undocumented farm workers have gone into hiding to avoid arrest
  • Critics liken the enforcement approach to indentured servitude or forced compliance
  • Nearly 40 percent of farm workers in the US are undocumented
  • ICE quotas have tripled under the Trump administration
  • Labor unions say raids are unconstitutional and are executed without judicial oversight

In June, ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) Houston arrested five undocumented migrants with extensive criminal histories. Among them was 56-year-old Cuban national Adermis Wilson-Gonzalez, convicted in 2003 for hijacking a plane from Cuba to Florida. He was taken into custody on June 29.

On June 13, ICE arrested Arnulfo Olivares Cervantes, a 47-year-old Mexican national and former Mexicles gang member. Cervantes had entered the U.S. illegally six times and faced convictions for attempted murder, drug trafficking, and evading arrest.

Luis Pablo Vasquez-Estolano, 29, also from Mexico, was arrested on June 10. He had been deported six times and held convictions for homicide, aggravated robbery, and drug possession.

Jose Meza, 40, was arrested on June 24. ICE reported Meza had entered the U.S. illegally four times and was convicted of sexual assault of a minor and theft.

On June 23, ICE detained 51-year-old Javier Escobar Gonzalez, who had prior convictions for sexual indecency with a minor, criminal trespass with a deadly weapon, and unauthorized firearm use.

ICE officials say the arrests reflect ongoing efforts to remove individuals deemed threats to public safety.

ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) in Houston is pushing back against criticism of its recent immigration enforcement actions, with acting Field Office Director Gabriel Martinez praising agents for their work in removing individuals deemed threats to public safety. In a statement, Martinez said ICE officers are “targeting dangerous criminal aliens” and highlighted recent deportations across Southeast Texas as evidence of their commitment.

The agency reported the removal of individuals with criminal convictions, including child predators and gang members, as part of its broader strategy to restore what it calls integrity to the immigration system. Martinez emphasized that ICE’s mission is being undermined by “false and malicious rumors,” but insisted that agents remain focused on protecting communities.

The statement follows a series of high-profile deportations and increased scrutiny of ICE’s tactics, particularly in Houston, where arrests have surged in recent months.

Dozens of demonstrators gathered outside the Portland International Jetport on Saturday to protest Avelo Airlines’ partnership with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The airline has been conducting deportation flights out of Arizona since May, prompting backlash from immigration advocates and local residents.

Protesters expressed concern that Avelo, which recently began offering commercial flights between Portland and New Haven, Connecticut, is receiving public incentives despite its federal contract. Organizers called for a boycott and urged city officials to reconsider support for the airline.

Avelo maintains that its ICE-related operations are limited to Arizona and are not connected to its Portland service. However, critics argue that any business involved in deportation efforts should not benefit from public resources.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass announced a new initiative to provide direct cash assistance to immigrants impacted by the Trump administration’s ongoing immigration raids.

The funds will be distributed as cash cards valued at “a couple hundred” dollars each and is expected to become available within the next week, Bass said

Newsweek has contacted Bass’ office for comment via email outside of office hours.

President Donald Trump has vowed to carry out the largest mass deportation operation in U.S. history to address illegal immigration and border security. However, the policy has sparked concerns about its potential effects on the economy. The GOP’s flagship immigration policy under Trump is causing people to avoid going to work amid fears over workplace raids.

California has become one of the key battleground states for immigration enforcement after President Trump directed ICE to increase operations in sanctuary states.

California State Senator María Elena Durazo (D-Los Angeles) issued a forceful statement Friday condemning the treatment of immigrant children detained in Los Angeles, following the release of a video showing two dozen minors handcuffed and led through a federal building. Durazo called the footage “a moral failure of the highest order,” denouncing the practice as cruel and fundamentally un-American.

The senator urged the Trump administration to end what she described as barbaric tactics and emphasized that no child should be shackled or separated from their parents. She praised U.S. District Judge Frimpong’s recent ruling that blocked federal immigration raids based on racial profiling and ordered access to legal counsel for detainees.

Durazo criticized the White House’s decision to appeal the ruling, warning that it signals a disregard for constitutional protections. She reaffirmed her commitment to defending immigrant families and called for policies rooted in compassion and justice.

Florida State Rep. Fentrice Driskell criticized the Alligator Alcatraz migrant detention facility during an interview on CNN, calling the site “inhumane” and a misuse of taxpayer funds. Driskell described overcrowded conditions, sweltering heat, and limited access to sanitation and legal counsel. She said detainees are housed in cages with three toilets per pod and shackled during medical screenings.

Driskell also claimed that some Republican lawmakers privately expressed discomfort with the facility, saying it did not reflect what they had envisioned when supporting immigration enforcement. She questioned the $450 million price tag and suggested contractors with ties to the DeSantis administration may be benefiting.

The facility, located in the Florida Everglades, has drawn criticism from tribal leaders, environmental groups, and immigrant advocates. Driskell warned that the center’s conditions and lack of oversight could have lasting consequences for Florida communities.

Undocumented farm workers say they feel “hunted like animals” as President Donald Trump’s administration intensifies immigration enforcement across U.S. farms, The Guardian reported. ICE raids have disrupted livelihoods, forced workers into hiding, and sparked protests, including one in Ventura County where a worker died after falling from a greenhouse during a raid.

Trump has proposed letting farmers oversee immigration enforcement on their properties, a move critics say strips workers of legal protections and dignity. Labor advocates warn the policy amounts to coercion, with workers forced to rely on employers to avoid deportation.

Despite mixed signals from the White House, the administration has raised ICE arrest quotas and reversed earlier directives to avoid targeting agricultural sites. Officials say the crackdown is necessary to secure the food supply and remove undocumented labor, while critics argue it threatens both human rights and economic stability.

Farmworkers and organizers say the raids have traumatized communities, disrupted families, and risked food shortages. With undocumented workers making up an estimated 40 percent of the U.S. farm labor force, advocates warn that continued enforcement could reverberate far beyond the fields.

Federal immigration agents detained a California woman outside a Home Depot during a workplace raid and used excessive force during her arrest, a family friend told Newsweek.

Alejandra Anleu, a 22-year-old immigrant from Guatemala, was arrested by U.S. Border Patrol agents outside the store located at San Fernando and 26th Street in Los Angeles on Monday, June 30, 2025.

She had been working there when immigration enforcers detained her.

Joyce Sanchez, a 28-year-old U.S. citizen and family friend, told Newsweek: “They used excessive force on a young woman, which was unnecessary.”

A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) told Newsweek: “FALSE. On June 30, U.S. Border Patrol encountered Alejandra Anleu, an illegal alien from Guatemala. During the encounter, Anleu freely admitted to being an illegal alien and she was placed under arrest without any injuries reported.”

Footage obtained by Newsweek shows federal agents leading her away without incident.

Federal officials on Sunday defended President Donald Trump’s intensifying deportation campaign, including a controversial raid at two California cannabis farms that left one worker dead and sparked widespread protests. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Trump’s border czar Tom Homan said the administration would appeal a federal judge’s ruling that temporarily blocked immigration detentions based on racial profiling and restricted access to legal counsel for detainees.

“We will appeal, and we will win,” Noem said on Fox News Sunday, denying that the administration used discriminatory tactics. Homan added on CNN that physical characteristics could be one factor in establishing reasonable suspicion during enforcement actions.

The July 10 raids in Camarillo and Carpinteria resulted in 361 arrests, including 14 migrant minors, according to DHS. Protesters clashed with federal agents, and Democratic Rep. Salud Carbajal said he witnessed officers firing smoke canisters and projectiles into a crowd of civilians. ICE later accused Carbajal of sharing an agent’s business card with demonstrators.

United Farm Workers confirmed that one farmworker died from injuries sustained during the raid. Senator Alex Padilla, who was forcibly removed from a Noem press conference in June, condemned the administration’s tactics. “It’s causing ICE to get more aggressive, more cruel, more extreme, and these are the results,” Padilla said. “It’s people dying”.

Chris Landry, a longtime New Hampshire resident and green card holder, was denied re-entry into the United States after a family vacation in Canada, sparking personal and political upheaval. Landry, 46, has lived in the U.S. since he was three years old and was traveling with three of his five American-born children when he was stopped at the border in Holton, Maine.

“They pulled me aside and started questioning me about my past convictions in New Hampshire,” Landry told NBC News from New Brunswick, Canada. His record includes a 2006 marijuana possession charge and a 2007 suspended license violation—both resolved with fines and no further offenses since.

Despite his legal permanent resident status, border agents denied him entry and warned he could be detained if he returned. “I never expected that I wouldn’t be able to go back home,” Landry said. “It was scary. I felt like I was being treated like a criminal.”

Landry now faces an uncertain future, requiring an immigration judge’s approval to return. The experience has shaken his political beliefs. Once a vocal supporter of Donald Trump’s immigration policies, Landry said, “I feel differently now. I’ve been torn from my family. My life has been disregarded completely”.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection defended the decision, stating that “possessing a green card is a privilege, not a right,” and that prior convictions can trigger mandatory detention or additional scrutiny at ports of entry.

Landry has reached out to New Hampshire’s congressional delegation for help, while his children prepare to return to the U.S. without him.

A GoFundMe campaign for Jaime Alanis, a 57-year-old California farmworker who died Saturday from injuries sustained in a 30-foot fall during an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raid, has raised over $150,000 as of Sunday evening.

Newsweek has reached out to Alanis’ niece, Yesenia Duran, for comment via GoFundMe on Sunday.

Alanis’ death is among the first reported during an ICE raid under President Donald Trump‘s second term. The administration has spearheaded a major immigration crackdown, vowing to carry out the largest mass deportation in U.S. history. The initiative has seen an intensification of ICE raids across the country.

Congress has allocated funding for tens of thousands of additional detention beds in the current tax bill, as the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) moves to expand detention capacity and ramp up arrests.

A federal judge on Friday concluded that immigration agents had been “unlawfully” arresting suspected illegal immigrants in Los Angeles and six surrounding counties, marking the latest legal clashes between California and the Trump administration over immigration enforcement. District Judge Maame Ewusi-Mensah Frimpong imposed two temporary restraining orders (TRO) banning law enforcement from detaining suspected illegal migrants in the area without reasonable suspicion and insisting that those arrested must have access to legal counsel.

Jaime Alanis, a 57-year-old farmworker, died Saturday from injuries sustained during a chaotic federal immigration raid at Glass House Farms in Camarillo, California. Alanis fell roughly 30 feet from a greenhouse roof while reportedly fleeing agents, according to family members. He had worked at the farm for a decade and was the sole provider for his wife and daughter in Mexico.

The Department of Homeland Security confirmed it executed criminal search warrants at the cannabis facility and a second site in Carpinteria, arresting approximately 200 undocumented individuals and identifying at least 10 migrant children on-site. DHS stated Alanis was not in custody and was not being pursued when he climbed the roof and fell.

The United Farm Workers union, which does not represent workers at the raided farm, condemned the operation, calling it “violent and cruel” and warning of its impact on food supply chains and immigrant families.

Protests erupted during the raid, with demonstrators clashing with agents in military gear. Tear gas and smoke forced crowds to disperse. Four U.S. citizens were arrested for allegedly assaulting officers, and the FBI is offering a $50,000 reward for information about a suspect who fired a gun at agents.

Glass House Farms said it complied with federal warrants and is assisting detained workers with legal support. The company denied knowingly violating hiring practices or employing minors.

Democratic lawmakers condemned Florida’s newly opened Everglades immigration detention center after touring the facility Saturday, describing it as overcrowded, unsanitary, and infested with insects. “There are really disturbing, vile conditions, and this place needs to be shut the hell down,” said Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who joined other Democrats in criticizing the 3,000-bed site dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz.”

Republicans on the same tour disputed those claims, with State Sen. Blaise Ingoglia calling the facility “well-run” and “clean.” Sen. Jay Collins added that the center was “functioning well” and equipped with backup generators and dietary tracking systems.

The tour followed an earlier attempt by Democrats to access the site, which was denied. Lawmakers have since filed a lawsuit against the DeSantis administration, alleging obstruction of oversight authority.

The detention center, built in days on a remote airstrip, is part of President Donald Trump’s push to expand migrant detention capacity to 100,000 beds. While officials say detainees have access to medical care, air conditioning, and legal services, advocates and relatives report worm-infested food, overflowing toilets, and limited hygiene access.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said any issues “have been addressed” and suggested other states may adopt similar models. The facility remains controversial, with critics calling it a political stunt and supporters touting its efficiency.

Vice President JD Vance encountered heckling and widespread protests during a family visit to Disneyland in Anaheim, California, over the weekend.

Hundreds of demonstrators gathered outside the theme park, the Los Angeles Times reported, voicing their disapproval of Vance’s presence amid ongoing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids across California.

Jane Fleming Kleeb, a vice chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and chair of the Nebraska Democratic Party, later confronted Vance inside the park while the Republican walked with his child. Vance’s visit disrupted park operations as security measures increased, resulting in prolonged wait times and temporary ride closures for other guests, according to The Independent.

Newsweek has contacted Vance’s team via email outside of normal office hours for comment.

https://www.newsweek.com/immigration-trump-ice-raids-green-card-visa-live-updates-2098579

Washington Examiner: Liberal judge frees federally charged anti-ICE rioters in Portland

A liberal Portland judge has ordered the pretrial release of several antifa-affiliated activists facing federal charges for their alleged violent involvement in the uprisings against Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Stacie Fatka Beckerman, a federal magistrate judge who donated to Democrats, freed at least four known antifa affiliates federally charged over serious crimes connected to the anti-ICE riots, according to a Washington Examiner review of court records.

Joshua Ames Cartrette, a convicted felon accused of assaulting a federal officer; Ginovanni Joseph Brumbelow, who allegedly tried to stab a Customs and Border Protection agent with a wooden stake; Deni Jungic Wolf, who is suspected of punching a federal officer in the head; and alleged anti-ICE rioter Eli Victor McKenzie were all released without bail after appearing before Beckerman in separate preliminary proceedings.

Cartrette, 46, of Oregon City, allegedly attacked a federal agent and kicked deployed tear-gas cannisters toward other officers during a declared June 14 riot outside the ICE office in south Portland, according to a copy of the criminal complaint obtained by the Washington Examiner.

Authorities allege that Cartrette was part of a far-left mob that launched mortar fireworks, rocks, bricks, and glass bottles at the facility to burn down the building following nationwide “No Kings” protests. Cartrette, a self-described “anarchist” who uses the comrade moniker “Zero,” has frequently been featured in writings published on the antifa blog “It’s Going Down.” If convicted, Cartrette faces a maximum one-year prison sentence.

That same evening, Brumbelow, 21, of Gresham, allegedly interfered with the arrest of a fellow anti-ICE rioter and used a “pointed” stake to strike the back of a CPB agent’s head, according to probable cause statements.

Video evidence allegedly captures Brumbelow, dressed in black, bashing the officer over the head with the wooden end of a protest sign. Brumbelow faces up to eight years in federal prison for felony assault of an officer.

Wolf, 19, of Portland, is accused of assaulting a federal officer at a June 16 standoff outside the local ICE office. When agents moved in to clear a make-shift barricade erected by anti-ICE activists, Wolf allegedly punched an officer with enough force to knock his mask off and expose him to pepper spray deployed during crowd-control operations. Charging documents say Wolf was armed with a knife. Assaulting a federal officer resulting in bodily injury is punishable by up to 20 years behind bars. Last year, Wolf was reported to Portland police as an autistic, teenage runaway.

McKenzie, 21, of Portland, is charged with failing to obey a lawful order at the June 16 riot near the city’s ICE office. The offense is a Class C misdemeanor and carries a penalty of up to 30 days in custody.

So glad to see these heroes resisting ICE!

Newsweek: Anti-Trump Protests Update: ‘National Day of Action’ Planned for July 17

Another round of national anti-Trump demonstrations is being planned across the U.S. for July 17 under the banner of Good Trouble Lives On, a reference to the late civil rights icon, Congressman John Lewis.

Good Trouble Lives On demonstrations are being planned for dozens of American cities on July 17 including the likes of New York, Washington D.C, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco with attendees invited to “March in Peace, Act in Power.”

The name is a reference to Lewis, a Georgia Democrat and an advocate of peaceful protests, who famously called for “good trouble” during the civil rights era.

According to its downloadable “Host Toolkit” for organizers, the protests have three main goals. These are demanding an end to “the extreme crackdown on civil rights by the Trump administration,” “the attacks on Black and brown Americans, immigrants, trans people, and other communities,” and “the slashing of programs that working people rely on, including Medicaid, SNAP, and Social Security.”

Good Trouble Lives On is being supported by a range of other groups including the 50501 Movement, which also helped organize the “No Kings” demonstrations.

https://www.newsweek.com/anti-trump-protests-update-national-day-action-planned-july-17-2088233