The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has confirmed that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detained 16 Hmong and Laotian immigrants in Michigan, transferring them to facilities in Louisiana and Texas. Advocates have criticized the agency’s aggressive tactics, citing some detainees’ longstanding residence in the U.S. Deportations to Laos are reportedly underway following the acquisition of travel documents.
DHS said, “This operation resulted in the arrest of multiple criminal illegal aliens, including child sex abusers, drug traffickers, a known gang member who obstructed a murder investigation, and other Laotian nationals with extensive criminal histories.”
ICE reported that 15 individuals were arrested following summonses to its Detroit field office, including one later arrest at a Lansing workplace. The group reportedly included a known gang member, child sex offenders, and drug traffickers.Authorities noted that Laos and Thailand have accepted more deportees following U.S. pressure under President Donald Trump. More than two dozen Michigan lawmakers and a Detroit council member urged Field Office Director Kevin Raycraft to release the detainees.
Families have said several detainees arrived as children or were born in refugee camps. Supporters have highlighted that many serve caregiving roles, while ICE has emphasized that the individuals have felony convictions and active judicial removal orders.
Advocates have argued that arrests at scheduled meetings may erode trust with immigrant communities. ICE asserted that it will execute final removal orders once travel documents are finalized.
Rep. Donovan McKinney (D-MI) wrote, “It’s cruel, it’s wrong, it’s unjust, and it must end. We are calling for their release. Families belong together, not torn apart in secrecy. We also call for transparency and accountability so these horrific events stop happening. Deportation doesn’t just impact one person; it tears at the fabric of entire communities.”
Authorities noted that Laos and Thailand have accepted more deportees following U.S. pressure under President Donald Trump. More than two dozen Michigan lawmakers and a Detroit council member urged Field Office Director Kevin Raycraft to release the detainees.
Families have said several detainees arrived as children or were born in refugee camps. Supporters have highlighted that many serve caregiving roles, while ICE has emphasized that the individuals have felony convictions and active judicial removal orders.
Advocates have argued that arrests at scheduled meetings may erode trust with immigrant communities. ICE asserted that it will execute final removal orders once travel documents are finalized.
Rep. Donovan McKinney (D-MI) wrote, “It’s cruel, it’s wrong, it’s unjust, and it must end. We are calling for their release. Families belong together, not torn apart in secrecy. We also call for transparency and accountability so these horrific events stop happening. Deportation doesn’t just impact one person; it tears at the fabric of entire communities.”
McKinney added, “We’re talking about small businesses losing a valued employee, elders losing caregivers, children losing a parent or grandparent. … These individuals are our neighbors, our coworkers, our friends, our fellow Michiganders.”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/ice-detains-16-hmong-laotian-immigrants/ss-AA1KHlJ6
HBO’s other late-night political comedian also had something to say about Immigration and Customs Enforcement this week.
“Real Time” host Bill Maher tore into the Department of Homeland Security‘s ICE recruitment campaign on Friday, sharing a series of fake posters that mocked new, lax standards at the agency carrying out President Donald Trump‘s mass deportation agenda.
“If you can read this, you’re already qualified,” one poster in the form of an eye test read. “Also, if you can’t read this.”
Playing on Trump’s evangelical base, one poster said that “Jesus and Angels belong in the Bible, not your neighborhood.” Other posters encouraged potential ICE agents to “take America back from the people we stole it from” and described working for the agency as “like ‘Starship Troopers‘ but with Mexicans.”
The best joke of the segment came at the expense of DHS Secretary Kristi Noem. The former South Dakota governor revealed in her memoir that she once shot and killed her 14-month-old puppy, believing it to be a danger to her family. Maher riffed on an old cover of “National Lampoon,” which threatened to shoot a dog if the reader didn’t buy the magazine. The poster shows Noem holding the gun to the dog’s head under the text, “If you don’t join ICE, we’ll kill this dog.”
An American citizen has told how she was held by ICE for 48 hours, claiming she was denied water despite proving her legal status.
Andrea Velez, 32, had just arrived at work in Downtown Los Angeles on June 24 when agents grabbed her and forced her into a car.
Velez told NBC4 News Los Angeles that an immigration raid was going on when she was slammed to the ground. Velez, a graduate of Cal Poly Pomona, who works in fashion was taken into custody while her mother, Margarita Flores, screamed at agents to stop.
“She’s a U.S. citizen,” Velez’s mother, an immigrant from Mexico, said through tears. “They’re taking her. Help her, someone.”
Velez said she was sitting in a detention center and was given nothing to drink for 24 hours. In total she spent two days in detention. She said that the ordeal has left her unable to physically return to work.
“I’m taking things day by day,” she told the station.
The incident had been notorious from the beginning. LAPD officers were called to the scene because it was reported as a “kidnapping” but did not intervene when it became clear it was an ICE action—even though it was against a U.S. citizen, ABC& Los Angeles previously reported.
Velez was charged with assaulting a federal officer while he was attempting to arrest a suspect. A federal criminal complaint alleged that the agent was chasing after a man but Velez stepped into the agent’s path and extended her arm “in an apparent effort to prevent him from apprehending the male subject he was chasing.” The complaint added that her arm hit the agent in the face.
The incident had been notorious from the beginning. LAPD officers were called to the scene because it was reported as a “kidnapping” but did not intervene when it became clear it was an ICE action—even though it was against a U.S. citizen, ABC& Los Angeles previously reported.
Velez was charged with assaulting a federal officer while he was attempting to arrest a suspect. A federal criminal complaint alleged that the agent was chasing after a man but Velez stepped into the agent’s path and extended her arm “in an apparent effort to prevent him from apprehending the male subject he was chasing.” The complaint added that her arm hit the agent in the face.
Velez denied wrongdoing. She said that during the incident, someone grabbed her and slammed her to the ground. She tried to tell the agent, who was in plainclothes, that she was an American citizen. But he told her she was “interfering” and he was going to arrest her.
“That’s when I asked him to show me his ID, his badge number,” she said. “I asked him if he had a warrant, and he said I didn’t need to know any of that.”
Velez said she repeatedly told ICE officers she was a U.S. citizen. When she was taken into a Los Angeles detention center, she gave officers her driver’s license and health insurance card to prove her citizenship status. She was still locked behind bars.
Velez’s family was unaware of her whereabouts for more than a day until lawyers for the family tracked her down.
Later, the Department of Justice (DOJ) dismissed her case without prejudice, meaning it could be reopened if prosecutors decide to.
Velez’s attorneys told NBC Los Angeles that they are exploring legal moves against the federal government.
Between 2015 and 2020, ICE erroneously deported at least 70 U.S. citizens, arrested 674 and detained 121. It is unclear how many have been mistakenly taken amid the Trump administration’s mass campaign to deport 1 million immigrants per year.
In January, U.S. citizen Julio Noriega was looking for work in Chicago when he was swept up in the mass raids. In May, Georgia college student Ximena Arias-Cristobal was detained after police pulled over the wrong car during a traffic stop. In June, a deputy U.S. marshal was detained in Arizona because he “fit the general description of a subject being sought by ICE.” That same month, a Ph.D. student named Job Garcia was tackled and thrown to the ground by ICE for recording a raid in Los Angeles.
A recent lawsuit claims that at least three American-born children have been removed from the country. The sudden banishment includes a 4-year-old boy with stage-four kidney cancer who was receiving critical, life-saving medical treatment in the United States. He was shipped from Louisiana to Honduras in April.
The Daily Beast has reached out to ICE for comment.
DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin told the Daily Beast: “FALSE. ICE provided Andrea Velez with water, food, sanitary products, and she was given restroom breaks as needed. The media needs to stop peddling lies and smears that have led to a 1000% increase in assaults against our brave ICE officers.”
ICE has joined the Trump cabinet in the group chat disaster club.
Law enforcement officials from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and other agencies accidentally added a stranger to their group chat, exposing highly sensitive information about a manhunt, according to a 404 Media report published Thursday.
The blunder echoes the infamous Signal chat fiasco, in which a journalist was inadvertently included in a text chain where top members of the Trump administration discussed impending air strikes in Yemen.
The ICE messages, which discuss an active search for a convicted attempted murderer slated for deportation, were sent via MMS, or Multimedia Messaging Service, and were not end-to-end encrypted like messages on Signal or WhatsApp.
Officials reportedly texted an ICE “Field Operations Worksheet” on Wednesday that revealed detailed information about the person being sought—including their Social Security number—and DMV and license plate reader data, 404 Media reported.
The outlet labeled the incident a “significant data breach and operational security failure for ICE.”
404 Media reported that the group chat had six members, verifying one as an ICE official and identifying another as likely from the U.S. Marshals Service.
The Daily Beast has reached out to ICE and the U.S. Marshals Service for comment.
The person mistakenly added to the group chat is not a law enforcement official and had no connection to the manhunt, according to 404 Media. They told the outlet they were added weeks ago and assumed the messages were spam—until they received the ICE worksheet and license plate numbers.
404 Media, which said it obtained and verified screenshots from the group chat, has withheld the person’s identity to protect them from retaliation.
In Wednesday’s messages, the law enforcement officials discussed the search for their target and their next moves.
“Going to need to roll out at 1000,” one member texts the chat, called “Mass Text.”
“Copy. We can break it down at 10,” another replies.
The unintended recipient told 404 Media that the messages stopped coming shortly thereafter.
In what became known as “Signalgate,” Trump cabinet members, including Vice President JD Vance and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, discussed classified attack plans for airstrikes on Houthi rebels in Yemen on a Signal chat.
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem is living for free in a military home typicallyreserved for the U.S. Coast Guard’s top admiral, officials familiar with the matter said. The highly unusual arrangement has raised concern within the agency andfrom some Democrats, who describe it as a waste of military resources.
Protests at the Portland ICE facility have continued into August, marking two months of demonstrations. Dozens of individuals have been federally charged in connection with the protests. Some of the allegations have included trespassing and felony assault of an officer.
In June, several police officers reportedly sustained injuries during a violent outbreak at a Portland ICE facility, where a “No Kings” protest drew tens of thousands. The demonstration reportedly turned chaotic when a crowd attacked federal agents and set off fireworks. Reports have indicated that the incident led to the wounding of four officers.
Department of Homeland Security (DHS) condemned attacks on law enforcement and the doxxing of ICE agents, vowing to continue enforcement efforts. DHS warned that violence against officers will result in prosecution.
DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said, “Portland rioters are violently targeting federal law enforcement and we won’t sit idly by and watch these cowards.”
McLaughlin added, “Our officers are facing a 413% increase in assaults against them as they put their lives on the line to arrest murderers, rapists, and gang members.”
McLaughlin stated, “Secretary [Kristi] Noem’s message to the rioters is clear: you will not stop us or slow us down. ICE and our federal law enforcement partners will continue to enforce the law. And if you lay a hand on a law enforcement officer, you will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”
The Portland Police declared the protest an unlawful assembly, warning of possible use of crowd control. They later announced targeted arrests due to criminal activity.
The Portland Police Bureau wrote, “Please move away from the entrance and do not interfere with Police or medical during the process or force may be used against you.”
DHS wrote, “We will NOT be deterred by rioters’ intimidation and threats.” DHS added, “ICE immigration enforcement will only ramp up. The violent targeting of law enforcement in Portland, OR by lawless rioters is despicable, and its leaders must call for it to end.”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/you-will-not-stop-us-dhs-criticizes-anti-ice-rallies/ar-AA1KDWTw
A 4-year-old boy’s ongoing care for stage 4 kidney cancer was interrupted when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers illegally deported him, his sister and mother “without even a semblance of due process,” attorneys for the family say.
Though they are U.S. citizens and were born Louisiana, the boy and his 7-year-old sister were deported to Honduras along with their 25-year-old mother, who is a Honduran citizen, on April 25, according to a federal lawsuit filed in the Middle District of Louisiana on July 31. The filing uses pseudonyms for the family, referring to the brother and sister as Romeo and Ruby and their mother as Rosario.
Before their deportations, Romeo, now 5, was receiving “life-saving” treatment at a New Orleans children’s hospital for his “rare and aggressive form” of cancer, following his diagnosis at age 2, a complaint says.
“As a direct consequence of ICE’s unlawful conduct, Romeo was deprived of much-needed continuity in his treatment, and he has faced substantial health risks due to his inability to access emergency specialized care and the routine critical oncological care that was available to him in the United States,” his family’s attorneys wrote in the complaint.
The lawsuit was filed on behalf of Romeo and his family, as well as a second family also wrongly deported by ICE under similar circumstances on April 25, according to the National Immigration Project, Gibson Dunn, Most & Associates, and Ware Immigration, groups representing the case.
The second family includes Julia, 30, a mother from Honduras. She has two daughters, Jade, 2, a U.S. citizen born in Baton Rouge, and Janelle, 11, also a Honduran citizen. Those names are also pseudonyms.
The same week of both families’ deportations, Rosario and Julia separately went to what they thought were supposed to be “regularly scheduled check-ins” with an ICE contractor.
However, officers with ICE apprehended both women and their children “in hotel rooms” in secret, the National Immigration Project said in a July 31 news release.
ICE “denied them the opportunity to speak to family and make decisions about or arrangements for their minor children, denied them access to counsel, and deported them within less than a day in one case and just over 2 days in the other,” the advocacy organization said.
According to the lawsuit, ICE did not let Rosario or Julia decide whether they wanted their children to come with them to Honduras or to make arrangements for them to stay in the U.S. with other loved ones.
“Given Romeo’s cancer and specialized medical needs, Rosario wanted both of her U.S. citizen children to remain in the United States,” the complaint says.
DHS, however, maintains both women wanted their children with them.
In response to McClatchy News’ request for comment for DHS and ICE on Aug. 11, DHS Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement that “the media and Democrat politicians are force-feeding the public false information that U.S. citizen children are being deported. This is false and irresponsible.”
“Rather than separate their families, ICE asked the mothers if they wanted to be removed with their children or if they wanted ICE to place the children with someone safe the parent designates,” McLaughlin added. “The parents in this instance made the determination to take their children with them back to Honduras.”
The lawsuit has been brought against Attorney General Pam Bondi, the Department of Homeland Security, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, ICE and ICE Director Todd Lyons, as well as New Orleans ICE Field Office Director Brian Acuna, the office’s Assistant Field Office Director Scott Ladwig and the office’s former director, Mellissa Harper.
Justice Department spokesperson Natalie Baldassarre declined to comment.
‘Detained and deported U.S. citizens’
After being deported in April, Rosario said in a statement shared in National Immigration Project’s news release that life in Hondorus has been “incredibly hard.”
“I don’t have the resources to care for my children the way they need,” Rosario said.
The morning of April 25, ICE officers are accused of waking Rosario, Romeo and Ruby and forcing them into a van.
They drove them to an airport in the Alexandria area and had them flown to Honduras, the lawsuit says.
With her son still in need of specialized treatment for his cancer, which had spread to his lungs, she has to send Romeo “back and forth” from Honduras to the U.S. for care, without her, according to the complaint.
“Even though she has very limited financial resources, Rosario has already had to pay for flights and travel companions to enable her children to return to the United States for Romeo’s necessary medical appointments,” the complaint says.
Romeo, whose health has worsened, has been temporarily staying in the U.S. for cancer treatment, according to the filing.
The lawsuit asks the court to declare that ICE wrongly arrested, detained and deported Rosario, Romeo and Ruby, as well as Julia, Jade and Janelle, in violation of their constitutional rights.
“This whole situation has been incredibly stressful,” Julia, who is married to a U.S. citizen, the father of her daughters, said in a statement shared by the National Immigration Project.
“Returning to Honduras has meant leaving my husband behind, and that’s been very hard,” she added.
In a statement to McClatchy News, National Immigration Project attorney Stephanie Alvarez-Jones said “ICE put these families through a series of incredibly traumatizing experiences, taking actions that are completely shocking from a human perspective and illegal even by ICE’s own standards.”
“ICE denied these families the fundamental opportunity to make meaningful choices about the care and custody of their children, and detained and deported U.S. citizens in flagrant violation of its own policy and the law,” Alvarez-Jones added.
The families are seeking an unspecified amount in damages and demand a jury trial.
