On the campaign trail, Trump made up an insane story about then-President Biden bringing "millions of... illegal aliens who are invading our country" and vowed to conduct "the largest deportation operation in American history." At one debate, Trump even claimed that the entire population of Venezuela had come to the United States. ("When you look at these millions and millions of people that are pouring into our country monthly where it's I believe 21 million people, not the 15 that people say, and I think it's a lot higher than the 21." There are only 29 million people in all of Venezuela. If Trump's numbers had been accurate, every Venezuelan in the world would have moved here in under six weeks.)
While it's true that some migrants do cross the border without documentation looking for work and take minimum-wage jobs -- such as picking fruit or cleaning -- the overwhelming majority of migrants have nothing to do with drugs or crime. Moreover, the tens of millions Trump claims enter our country every month don't exist. Accoding to Politifact, there are probably around ten million undocumented immigrants in total in the entire United States. According to The Atlantic, most immigrants have never committed any crimes, and their only offense is forgetting to file some paperwork. According to immigration law, this is a civil offense, not a criminal offense. As detailed below, this hasn't stopped the DODO Trump Administration. They're detaining and deporting legal residents who have filed all their paperwork correctly. "The overwhelming majority of criminal aliens become criminals by violating immigration laws," The Atlantic explained. "And almost three-quarters of the people now being held in ICE detention centers aren't even criminal aliens."
Since Trump and his lackeys weren't able to find millions and millions of undocumented immigrants who don't exist, the xenophobe-in-chief decided to target legal immigrants as well. Trump, Vice President J.D. Vance, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, DHS officials Greg Bovino and Tricia McLaughlin, "border czar" Tom Homan, and thousands of ICE snatchers are engaged in an ongoing conspiracy to violate the legal and Constitutional rights of American citizens, legal residents, and undocumented immigrants alike.
It started with the DODO Trump Administration incarcerating and deporting law-abiding permanent residents. The procedure was: (1) revoke a legal permanent resident's green card without cause, (2) don't inform them of their change in status, and (3) detain them for being in the country illegally when they had no idea they were supposed to leave. This mockery of justice has been used to turn hundreds -- if not thousands -- of innocent people into "criminals" when they committed no crimes. This violates Article I of the Constitution, which forbids Bills of Attainder (the government declaring a person, or a group of people, guilty without a trial) and the Ex Post Facto clause (arresting someone for an action that wasn't illegal when they did it.) The DODO Trump Administration has also detained and/or deported refugees who have been granted asylum or protected status, immigrants with citizenship applications pending... and tourists. They have illegally detained American citizens by falsely accusing them to be illegal immigrants. In a few other cases, they illegally deported American children.
As this continued, Trump sent thousands of ICE snatchers into American cities with orders to detain anyone who they think might be an immigrant, without first obtaining a warrant. This has resulted in thousands of cases of abuses of power with thousands of undocumented immigrants, legal residents, and American citizens detained in private prisons with no due process. Though ICE has arrested and deported a few criminals, the majority of people ICE detained have been legal residents who love our country and have never committed any crimes at all. Keeping track of all of ICE's victims is beyond the scope of this article, but a few of the most publicized cases are detailed below. Keep in mind: this is just the tip of the iceberg.
"He had been arrested by ICE [Immigrations and Customs Enforcement] in a targeted operation in his home state of Maryland because he was accused, without evidence, of being a member of the gang MS-13 in 2019.
"Abrego Garcia later challenged his detention, and the immigration judge found his testimony, including his refutation of gang affiliation, 'credible' and 'free of embellishment.' He was granted withholding removal status, which prevented him from being removed to El Salvador.
"Abrego Garcia was removed along with over 250 Venezuelan and Salvadoran immigrants on three planes to CECOT on March 15.
"Lawyers for the Department of Justice repeatedly admitted in court that Abrego Garcia had been wrongfully removed. But the administration has denied it has any power to effectuate his return."
Abrego Garcia's lawyer told The Atlantic that "the gang label stems from a 2019 incident when Abrego Garcia and three other men were detained in a Home Depot parking lot by a police detective in Prince George’s County, Maryland. During questioning, one of the men told officers that Abrego Garcia was a gang member, but the man offered no proof and police said they didn’t believe him, filings show. Police did not identify him as a gang member."
Like the other detainees listed below, Abrego Garcia abided by the law and never missed his annual check-in with ICE. He was detained because the Trump Administration claimed to have changed his protected status. It was the first time Abrego Garcia had heard of it.
After his rendition, the DODO Trump Administration refused to obey a court order to bring Abrego Garcia back to Maryland, claiming that he is a terrorist -- a charge that has already been discredited. His lawyer told The Atlantic that “They claim that the court is powerless to order any relief. If that’s true, the immigration laws are meaningless—all of them—because the government can deport whoever they want, wherever they want, whenever they want, and no court can do anything about it once it’s done.” Trump later held up a photograph of Abrego Garcia that had been altered to make it look like he had gang-related tattoos. In other words, the President of the United States used an obvious forgery to fabricate evidence against an innocent person.
The Trump Administration appealed to the Supreme Court -- who upheld the lower court's ruling. The DODO Trump Administration refused to obey the Supreme Court order for four months, claiming that Abrego Garcia was now in the custody of the Salvadoran government and there's nothing they could do. This is ludicrous, of course. A month earlier, the DODO Trump Administration successfully lobbied the Romanian government to allow Andrew Tate -- a Trump supporter and vocal misogynist -- to return to the United States. Tate and his brother were awaiting trial in Romania on sex trafficking charges.
Trump later called for the judge who issued the original court order to be impeached. "Judge Boasberg is a Democrat activist," claimed Karoline Leavitt, Trump's DODO press secretary. "He was appointed by Barack Obama." While it's true that Obama promoted him, Leavitt was lying about Boasberg's political party. The judge is a Republican who was nominated by George W. Bush.
According to Rolling Stone, Bukele -- who styles himself the "world's coolest dictator" -- refuses to return Abrego Garcia home, claiming "I don’t have the power to return him to the United States." The idea that a dictator is powerless to free an innocent man locked up in his own government's prison would be funny if we weren't talking about someone's real life. Trump later claimed "I could, I could" call Bukele and get Abrego Garcia back. If any other President in the last fifty years had incarcerated an innocent man without due process and then defied a court order to release him, that President would have been impeached immediately.
The Atlantic pointed out:
"This rhetorical game the [Trump] administration is playing, where it pretends it lacks the power to ask for Abrego Garcia to be returned while [Salvadoran dictator] Bukele pretends he doesn't have the power to return him, is an expression of obvious contempt for the Supreme Court -- and for the rule of law. The administration is maintaining that it has the power to send armed agents of the state to grab someone off the street and then, without a shred of due process, deport them to a Gulag in a foreign country and leave them there forever. The crucial point here is that the administration's logic means that it could do the same to American citizens -- after all, if deporting someone under a protective order to a Gulag without so much as a hearing is a "foreign policy" matter with which no court may interfere, then the citizenship of the condemned person doesn't matter.
"The Trump administration's defiance of a Supreme Court order is a new step into presidential lawlessness, in that it suggests that the administration will not abide by any court orders it does not feel like complying with.
"...If the evidence against these men were ironclad, the Trump administration would not need to violate the Constitution to put them in prison. The reason it is deporting people to an overseas Gulag is because it wants to look like it is being tough on criminals without having to investigate whether the people it is being tough on have committed any crimes.
"What it could do to him, it could do to anyone. More significantly, if the Trump administration can defy court orders with impunity, and Congress is unwilling to act, there is no reason for it to respect the constitutional rights of American citizens either."
Trump's DODO Attorney General, Pam Bondi, later cut funds for a program aiding victims of violent crime. Trump and Bondi also cancelled programs to help victims of trafficking, hate crimes, elder abuse, and hundreds of others. Programs to train prison guards and prevent overdoses were also cut. Trump and his DODO lackeys are more interested in locking up people who haven't committed any crimes than they are in helping people actually hurt by real criminals.
Another Atlantic article examined Trump's tortured logic.
"Trump, who has threatened the territorial integrity of multiple hemispheric neighbors, now claims that requesting the return of a prisoner he paid El Salvador to take would violate that country's sovereignty. Neither Trump nor Bukele bothered to make this absurd conceit appear plausible. Even as Trump and his officials claim that only El Salvador has the power to free wrongfully imprisoned American residents, the United States is paying El Salvador to hold the prisoners. (Naturally, Congress never appropriated such funds; Trump has already seized large swaths of Congress's constitutionally mandated spending power for himself.)
"Trump can snatch prisoners and hand them to Bukele before the courts can act, and Bukele can ignore American court orders.
"Trump has opened up a trapdoor beneath the American legal system. This trapdoor is wide enough to swallow the entire Constitution. So long as he can find at least one foreign strongman to cooperate, Trump can, if he wishes, imprison any dissident, judge, journalist, member of Congress, or candidate for office.
"Asked if his deportation plan includes American citizens, [Trump] replied, 'Yeah, that includes them -- you think they're a special type of people or something?" He reaffirmed the position on Fox News the following day.
"...It's important to understand that Trump habitually equates opposition, or any deviation from his goals, with illegality. He has labeled as criminals all three of his electoral opponents, a wide swath of media organizations, and many other people who made the mistake of publicly criticizing or disagreeing with him. Just days before his meeting with Bukele, he ordered the Justice Department to investigate the former cybersecurity official Chris Krebs for having 'falsely and baselessly denied that the 2020 election was rigged and stolen.'"
Mother Jones added: "Bukele is falsely stating that he cannot return Abrego Garcia to the United States. The Trump administration is falsely claiming that it cannot force Bukele's hand to release Abrego Garcia. The end result is that a man sent to one of the world's worst prisons by mistake, along with hundreds of Venezuelans also stuck there, have no clear path to getting out. The Trump administration has loudly claimed that the men sent to El Salvador are terrorists and criminals. But it has refused to provide evidence."
As usual, Trump is talking nonsense. He's using taxpayer money to pay El Salvador to keep the prisoners there. Despite Bukele's claims, he'd return Abrego Garcia if Trump told him to. If Bukeke refused, all Trump would have to do is cut off funding for the prison.
Trump later threatened legal action against advocates trying to get Abrego Garcia home. "Those lying to the American People on behalf of violent criminals have to be held responsible by the Agencies and the Courts," Trump wrote. Of course, Trump is himself guilty of lying on behalf of violent criminals. Not only have his own DODO lawyers admitted that Abrego Garcia is not a criminal and should not have been renditioned to a maximum security prison in a foreign country, Trump himself has spent years lying about the violent criminals who attacked Congress on January 6, 2021. Trump has also spent years defending war criminal Vladimir Putin.
By Trump's logic, the Agencies and the Courts should take action against Vice President J.D. Vance and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem! Vance and Noem lied to the American people when they falsely identified Abrego Garcia as a gang member.
The Atlantic pointed out that the DODO Trump Administration publicly slanders immigrants -- legal residents as well as undocumented ones. In court, however, where DODO officials are required to tell the truth, they're telling a very different story. One Justice Department lawyer admitted under sworn testimony that Abrego Garica had been deported in error. Trump and his DODO aides, on the other hand, aren't under oath when they talk to the press, so they insist that there have been no errors and all the innocent people they deported -- including Abrego Garcia -- are terrorists. The attorney who told the truth under oath was later fired. (It's illegal to fire government employees for doing their jobs.)
The Bill of Rights applies to everyone in American jurisdiction -- not just American citizens. The DODO Trump Administration illegally violated Abrego Garcia's Fifth Amendment rights by depriving him of liberty without due process of law, his Sixth Amendment right to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation, his Sixth Amendment right to be confronted with the witnesses against him, his Sixth Amendment right to a trial, and his Eighth Amendment right to be free of cruel and unusual punishments. The DODO Trump Administration also violated the Writ of Habeas Corpus by detaining him with no evidence that a crime had been committed and no proof that he was a suspect.
Once back in the United States, Abrego Garcia told interviewers how he was tortured at CECOT. On the day he arrived, the guards beat him when he tried to stand up straight. While a prisoner, he was subject to further beatings, along with sleep and food deprivation. 80 prisoners had to share 2 toilets. At the prison, lights are never turned off, and there are no fans, windows, or air conditioning. On one occasion he and other prisoners were forced to kneel all night with no bathroom access, and the guards beat anyone who collapsed from exhaustion. The actual criminals imprisoned there often got in fights, and the guards didn't intervene. What's more, the prison guards there knew perfectly well Abrego Garcia wasn't a gang member and did nothing about it.
In late July, 2025, a judge ordered Abrego Garcia's release. He was free for about a month -- when the DODO Trump Administration arrested him again, this time with plans to illegally deport him to Uganda. (Uganda is in Africa, a continent Abrego Garcia has never been to.) A judge subsequently blocked Abrego Garcia's deportation to Uganda.
Also in July, 2025, the Venezuelan and Salvadoran governments made a deal to return some of the Venezuelan-born CECOT detainees to the country of their birth. Once released, the Venezuelans told horrific stories about the conditions in the prison. One of them was Arturo Suarez Trejo, a Venezuelan-born musician. Like other Venezuelan immigrants, he was detained because he has tattoos, and has nothing to do with any crimes or gangs. His wife only found out that he'd been renditioned to CECOT prison in El Salvador when she recognized him in a photograph with other detainees. Suarez told reporters: "We spent four months without any contact with the outside world. We were kidnapped. We got a beating for breakfast. We got a beating for lunch. We got a beating for dinner." Another detainee, Keider Flores -- a DJ -- told The Atlantic that he was surprised to learn that ICE had deemed him a gang member. He's never had anything to do with gangs. He and the other detainees thought they were being deported to Venezuela and were put on a plane. They had no idea they were being renditioned to CECOT until they arrived in El Salvador. A third detainee, Juan Ramos, entered the United States legally and applied for asylum. He still has no idea why ICE detained him. A fourth detainee, Neri Alvarado Borges, told Mother Jones that the Salvadoran guards beat and choked him and the other detainees as soon as they arrived at CECOT. They were given five seconds to change into prison uniforms, and beaten if they took longer. A fifth detainee, Wuilliam Lozada Sanchez, had a guard punch him in the face and knock out a tooth as soon as he arrived. A sixth, Julio Zambrano Perez, explained how guards would offer them better meals, then snatch them away. If they were sick, they were made to shower at 5 AM, then given pain pills -- and given used bathwater to wash them down. Protests were met with tear gas or solitary confinement in a dark cell.
As noted above, Judge Boasberg ruled that sending immigrants to prison in another country was illegal. At the time of the ruling, two planes were already in the air, and the judge ordered the planes to be turned around and the immigrants returned to the United States. Trump refused -- violating the court order. The DODO Trump Administration appealed the ruling, arguing that the immigrants were members of a Venezuelan gang so deadly that most Americans had never heard of it before.
When arriving in El Salvador, the detainees' heads were shaved, and they were thrown in crowded cells in the CECOT mega-prison. According to the Associated Press, CECOT's cells hold 65-70 prisoners each. The prisoners are never allowed to leave the building or receive visitors. 261 people have died there since the prison was opened in 2022. Human rights advocates have reported torture and medical neglect.
Sending legal residents -- or anyone -- to a foreign prison famous for torture violates the Eighth Amendment, banning the use of "cruel and unusual punishments." It's also illegal for anyone -- including members of the Executive Branch -- to violate a court order.
According to The Atlantic, of the "men sent to CECOT, 90 percent of whom lack a criminal record, and 100 percent of whom were deported without due process."
Trump's drive to send people to CECOT won't end with legal residents. Trump says himself that he would like to send American citizens there -- such as those who have vandalized Teslas. "I look forward to watching the sick terrorist thugs get 20 year jail sentences for what they are doing to Elon Musk and Tesla. Perhaps they could serve them in the prisons of El Salvador, which have become so recently famous for such lovely conditions," Trump wrote. The President of the United States cannot tell the difference between criminal mischief-makers who vandalize cars and "sick terrorist thugs."
Trump later told the Salvadoran dictator that he wants to send American citizens to prison there as well. "The homegrowns are next. You've gotta build about five more places." A few months later he reiterated that goal. "Many of them were born in our country. I think we ought to get them the hell out of here, too, if you want to know the truth. So maybe that will be the next job... if we had the legal right to do it, I would do it in a heartbeat." It's illegal to deport American citizens.
As with Abrego Garcia, the DODO Trump Administration violated the detainees' Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendment rights and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. Sign the petition to stop the renditions to El Salvador, and tell the Senate to investigate at Demand Progress and Win Without War.
Professor Abedini is teaching in the United States on a valid visa. By detaining him, ICE violated his Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable seizures, his Sixth Amendment right to know the accusations against him, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
Photojournalist John Abernathy, a US citizen, was covering ICE raids in Minnesota when he was tackled by ICE snatchers. He was handcuffed and detained with tear gas burning his eyes and his skin wounded by pepper bullets. He was released later that day, though he was informed he was being charged.
By attacking a reporter, ICE violated the First Amendment's guarantee of a free press. His detention also violated the Fourth Amendment (freedom from unreasonable seizures) and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
Peaceful protest is protected under the First Amendment. ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States, and it's illegal for them -- or any other government agency -- to arrest peaceful protesters. If ICE thought the protesters were breaking the law -- and the TV news has no evidence of this -- ICE should have de-escalated the situation and called the police. Instead of doing that, ICE fired rubber bullets at the peaceful protesters and threw tear gas at them -- the American citizens ICE is supposed to be protecting! ICE then assaulted protesters who were sitting on the ground -- including the congressional candidate.
Video shows armed officers wearing masks and tactical gear dragging unarmed civilians and throwing them to the ground -- again, including the candidate.
It's illegal and unconstitutional for government agencies to attack and detain peaceful protesters. Every ICE agent involved in this incident must be fired and charged with assault, false arrest, and false imprisonment.
In October, 2025, the Trump Adminstration indicted Abughazaleh for "impeding" ICE. Video demonstrates that an ICE snatcher, not Abughazaleh, was the aggressor. Five other local elected officials were indicted at the same time.
Abughazaleh responded on YouTube.
"This is a political prosecution, and a gross attempt to silence dissent. This case is a major push by the Trump administration to criminalize protest and punish anyone who speaks out against them... ICE has hit, dragged, thrown, shot with pepper balls, and teargassed hundreds of protesters simply because we had the gall to say that masked men coming into our communities, abducting our neighbors, and terrorizing us cannot be our new normal. And because Chicago doesn't back down from bullies and masks who tear gas our neighborhoods, this administration has resorted to weaponizing the federal justice system to scare us into silence. But we're not going to be silent."
Abughazaleh and the others will have to hire and pay legal counsel and go to court in order to fight the charges.
The border patrol violated Aceituno's Fourth Amendment right to be secure against unreasonable searches and seizures and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. The agents who attacked him must be fired and charged with assault, false imprisonment, and destruction of property.
In May, 2025, ICE arrested him at his home in Houston. He has eight children, two of whom are American citizens. He entered this country legally and has never committed a crime. ICE violated his Fourth Amendment rights (against unreasonable seizures), his Fifth Amendment rights (against being deprived of liberty without due process), his Sixth Amendment rights (to be informed of the charges agaisnt him), his Sixth Amendment right to a trial, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
Andrea was released after being held for two and a half months. When she finally got home, "her baby had started crawling and sitting up on her own. She was devastated she had missed such big milestones."
"She’s happy to be home, but things simply aren’t the same. “I wake up from nightmares crying. The smallest things make me cry now,” she said. “I’m anxious all the time. I can’t eat. I feel really lost after everything.”
"Her kids are struggling, too. All three seem to be glued to her side every waking moment, fearful she’s going to disappear again. Her 2-year-old has a meltdown every time she uses the bathroom. Her oldest son gets nervous when she leaves the house.
“I did my whole life here. I grew up here. I have more American in me than I do Argentina,” Andrea said. “America is a country I devoted my whole life to and it turned its back on me.”
By detaining an innocent permanent legal resident with no probable cause, no warrant, no charges, no witnesses, and no due process, ICE violated Andrea's Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendment rights and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. All officers responsible for the detention of an innocent mother must be fired and prosecuted.
Detaining someone without a warrant is kidnapping and false imprisonment. No one -- not ICE, not the President, not people who vandalize Tesla dealerships -- can uphold the law by committing crimes. By kidnapping and disappearing Barios, ICE illegally violated her Fourth Amendment right to be secure from unreasonable seizures; her Fifth Amendment right to due process; her Sixth Amendment right to be notified of the charges against her; her Sixth Amendment right to see the witnesses against her; his Sixth Amendment right to a trial; and the Writ of Habeas Corpus, requiring proof that a crime was committed and that the person in custody is in fact the suspect. The ICE snatchers who disappeared Barios must be fired and charged with her kidnapping and destruction of property.
ICE violated Barranco's Fourth Amendment right to be secure in his person against unreasonable seizures, his Sixth Amendment right to be informed of the charges against him, his Sixth Amendment right to a trial, his Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel punishment, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. The ICE snatchers who detained him must be fired and charged with assault, false arrest, and false imprisonment.
The snatchers stole Arnoldo's phone, which they then sold at an electronics kiosk. (Arnoldo's family was able to track it down and retrieve it.)
DHS Assistant Secretary (and Minister of Propaganda) Tricia McLaughlin falsely claimed that Bazan-Carrillo had rammed the snatchers' vehicles and Arnoldo had attacked them. Arnoldo, however, had been recording the encounter. Video shows that the snatchers rammed them, not the other way around.
Bazan-Carrillo was then deported to Mexico. Arnoldo says that Bazan-Carrillo accepted a deal: either agree to leave the country, or DHS would charge Arnoldo with assault. With their father deported, one of Arnoldo's sisters has had to call off her wedding because they could no longer afford it. Another sister had to quit college for the same reason.
The snatchers violated the Fourth Amendment (which protects against unreasonable seizures), the Fifth (taking and selling Arnoldo's property -- his phone -- without due process), the Sixth (the right to know the charges against you), and the Eighth (outlawing cruel and unusual punishment.) The snatchers who attacked Bazan-Carrillo and Arnoldo must be fired and charged with assault, attempted murder, and attempted evidence tampering.
A ProPublica investigation revealed that ICE snatchers had used illegal chokeholds on more than 40 occasions, violating the law and the Eighth Amendment.
By opening fire on peaceful protesters with no warning, ICE violated Rev. Black's First Amendment right to free speech, his right to free exercise of religion, and his right to peaceably assemble and petition the government. Moreover, ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States, and Rev. Black was not threatening them in any way. If ICE snatchers can open fire on American citizens at will, they can do it to you. All the snatchers involved in this incident must be fired and prosecuted for assault with a firearm.
Bojerski's now in a different prison in Miami. During his incarceration he injured his back and can no longer walk. He has been unable to get his medications, and once was left on his cell floor for hours when he fell out of his wheelchair.
By keeping an injured septuagenarian incarcerated with no medical care and no criminal charges, ICE violated Bojerski's Eighth Amendment right against cruel and unusual punishment.
"When I was detained, my family had no idea where I was for days," said Edwin Jesus Garcia Castillo, who was formerly detained at ICE’s Torrance County Detention Facility in New Mexico. "That feeling of being erased from the world — it’s terrifying. These 48 people and their families are going through that right now. No one should face this kind of treatment in America."
“I was on the ground in Chicago today to make clear we are not backing down," said DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, who was present during the raid. "Just this morning, DHS took violent offenders off the streets with arrests for assault, DUI, and felony stalking. Our work is only beginning.” Botello was neither violent, nor an offender, nor on the street. He has not assaulted anyone, stalked anyone, or driven while drunk. One of the agents asked Botello how he could speak English so well. Botello explained he was a citizen and had been born in Texas.
Though Botello was released, three of his roommates were not, and he has no idea what happened to them. "I’m just blessed that I’m still alive," he said. "It never crossed my mind that it was going to happen here at the house … where I live.”
Noem and her CBP snatchers violated Botello's Fourth Amendment rights to be secure in his house against uinreasonable searches and seizures. (He lives outside of Chicago, nowhere near a border.) They also violated the Writ of Habeas Corpus. ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States. Noem and the snatchers involved in this travesty must be fired and charged with assault, false arrest, false imprisonment, and destruction of property.
Brouch's wife, Mar Nevaro, came to her assistance, and was detained as well. In the vehicle, one of the snatchers grabbed Brauch's handcuffs and threw her around the back of the car, breaking the bones in her hands and covering her arms in bruises. After two hours in detention, Brauch was allowed to go the hospital. Nevaro was released that night. "I'm frustrated," Brauch told an interviewer, "that every act of peaceful resistance from the community is met with more violence from the feds."
ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States. By detaining and assaulting two US citizens without cause, the ICE snatchers broke the Fourth Amendment (the right of people to be secure against unreasonable searches and seizures), the Sixth Amendment (the right of the detained to know the nature and cause of the accusation), and the Eighth Amendment (the ban on cruel and unusual punishment.) All the ICE snatchers involved in this incident -- the snatchers who attacked Brauch and Navaro and those who did nothing to prevent it -- must be fired and charged with assault, false arrest, and false imprisonment.
ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States. Brockman's detenton not only violated a court order, but violated the First Amendment's guarantee of a free press and Brockman's Fourth Amendment right to be secure against unreasonable seizures. The snatchers who detained her must be fired and charged with assault, false arrest, and false imprisonment.
Bulavina followed immigration laws to the letter and has never committed a crime. By arresting an innocent person, ICE violated her Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable seizures, her Sixth Amendment right to confront the witnesses against her, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
Suddenly phones started ringing: it was news of Renee Good's murder. The Latina woman told the snatchers she was not afraid of them, and Rev. Callaghan said: "take me, take me instead of her, I am not afraid of you either." A snatcher pointed a gun at Rev. Callaghan's face, and another handcuffed him. They put him in the back of a SUV. Every few minutes, snatchers asked him if he was afraid yet, and he said no. Eventually a snatcher told him, "Well, you're White. You wouldn't be fun anyway" and let him go after half an hour.
ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States. By detaining Rev. Callaghan -- an man they knew perfectly well had committed no crimes -- ICE violated the First Amendment (freedom of speech and of assembly); the Fourth (everyone in American jurisdiction has the right to be secure in their persons and cannot be detained without probable cause); and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
The snatcher admitted to Rev. Callaghan that ICE's mission is racist. Though there have been white people detained, this is the exception rather than the rule, and ICE's primary goal is to harass and intimidate people of color.
DHS Assistant Secretary (and Minister of Propaganda) Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement that Campollo has an extensive criminal history -- a history that his family calls nonsense. According to them, his only brush with the law was in 1994, where he was arrested in a case of mistaken identity and released without being charged.
DHS violated Campollo's Fourth Amendment right to be secure in his person against unreasonable seizures, his Fifth Amendment right to due process, his Sixth Amendment right to be informed of the charges against him, his Sixth Amendment right to confront the witnesses against him, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. (Though DHS issued a press statement denouncing Campollo as a hardened criminal, there is no indication that they've told Campollo about these charges or given him the chance to refute them.) The agent who arrested Campollo must be fired and charged with assault.
In January 2026, ICE detained Karen Gutierrez Castellanos and her 5-year-old daughter and deported them to Honduras. They never saw an attorney or a judge.
Karen fled poverty in Honduras in 2018. Though she was given a deportation order in 2020, she appealed the order. The system is so backlogged that her appeal hasn't been processed yet.
Karen's daughter is an American citizen. It's illegal to deport US citizens, and the 5-year-old has never been to Honduras before. By detaining a 5-year-old who has obviously committed no crimes, ICE violated the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth and Eighth Amendments and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
Obviously, ICE and the other government agencies that raided the building couldn't have had warrants to search every single apartment. They thus violated the residents' Fourth Amendment right to be protected in their persons, homes, and effects from unreasonable searches and seizures. They violated the residents' Fifth Amendment right to due process, their Sixth Amendment right to know the nature of the accusations against them, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. Moreover, by separating children from their parents and dragging them naked outside in the middle of the night in October in Chicago, they violated the residents' Eighth Amendment rights against cruel and unusual punishment. Everyone involved in this travesty must be fired and charged with assault, false arrest, false imprisonment, child endangerment, child abuse, and destruction of property.
A few days later, ICE attacked protesters outside an ICE detention facility. The Chicago police arrived, and ICE threw tear gas at the crowd -- including the police. On other occasions, ICE called 911, telling the Chicago police that people were trying to break into their facility. The police rushed to the scene -- to find the only people there were a CBS News cameraman talking to a security guard. False reporting is illegal. If police are busy responding to pranks, they are unable to respond to actual emergencies.
The judge -- who'd been appointed by Trump -- investigated, and was so appalled at conditions inside the ICE detention center that he threatened to hold the government in contempt.
"ICE held them, day after day, without access to bunks, bedding, soap, showers, toothbrushes or clean clothes," the judge ruled. "The space is unheated or poorly heated at night, while the outside temperature dropped to as low as 21 degrees... To the extent they could sleep, they did so, crammed on the filthy floor, while the lights blared 24 hours a day.
"After nearly 35 years of experience with federal law enforcement in this judicial district, encompassing service as a prosecutor and a judge, I have never encountered anything like this."
By holding Clarke and others in conditions like this, ICE violated his Eighth Amendment protection from cruel and unusual punishment.
In a stomach-churning crime, in January 2026, ICE snatchers in Minnesota detained a 5-year-old boy, Liam Conejo Ramos, on the way home from school. They also detained his father, Adrian Conejo Arias, and sent him both to a detention center in Texas. School officials told the press that snatchers told Liam to knock on his front door to see if there was anyone else home they could detain. A family member who opened the door begged the snatchers to let them care for Liam, but the snatchers refused. ICE later claimed that Liam had been "ABANDONED by their criminal illegal alien parent," which is completely false. DHS Assistant Secretary (and Minister of Propaganda) Tricia McLaughlin denied that ICE had detained a five-year-old, but then said Liam had run away from the snatchers who then "apprehended" him.
Adrian Conejo Arias is neither a criminal nor illegal. The Conejo family arrived in the United States as refugees from Ecuador in 2024 and applied for asylum. They are legal residents in the country until their asylum application is processed.
The school district reported that at least three other children from their district alone (aged from 10 to 17) have been kidnapped by ICE in the last month.
While in the Texas prison, the food was so bad that it made Liam sick with stomach pains and vomiting. His health deteriorated, and he started refusing to eat. He was soon feverish.
Two members of Congress visited the Texas prison, and found the situation disgusting. The water is moldy and there are bugs and dirt in the food. (McLaughlin, of course, denies all of that.)
Two weeks later, a furious Texas judge ordered Adrian and Liam released. A Texas congressman, Joachim Castro, picked them up at the prison and flew home with them to Minneapolis.
Liam and Adrian made it home safely, but there are many other parents and children who are still in detention -- including Elvis Tipan Echeverria and his 2-year-old daughter; Maria Velasco Hurtado, her husband, and their children in 1st and 7th grade; and Rosa Zuna and her 10-year old daughter, Elizabeth.
ICE has violated the Fourth Amendment (protecting anyone in American jurisdiction from unreasonable seizures); the Sixth Amendment (requiring the government to provide witnesses against the accused); and the Eighth Amendment (forbidding the government from employing cruelty.) They also violated the Writ of Habeas Corpus (it's unconstitutional to arrest someone first and try to figure out if they're a criminal later.) The ICE snatchers who detained a legal resident and his 5-year-old son must be fired and charged with kidnapping, false arrest, false imprisonment, and child abuse. Everyone at the ICE detention facility who locked up children and served them tainted water and food (not to mention the adults) must be fired and charged with false imprisonment, child abuse, and child endangerment.
The same thing is happening to Alejandra Juarez. Juarez is married to a Marine veteran and was initially deported to Mexico in 2017, leaving her husband behind with their two children. She was legally allowed to return in 2021, but she's was told to leave the United States again by July 4.
Rueben Cruz, 60, is a legal resident who was approached by ICE snatchers in October, 2025. They detained him, put him in their truck, and drove around in circles while interrogating him. After an hour, they finally verified that he was telling the truth, and let him go -- after writing him an $130 ticket for not having his papers on him.
Illinois has no law requiring residents to show proof of residency. Though a federal law says legal residents should carry their documentation with them, this law was rarely enforced before the second Trump Administration.
Nevertheless, the ICE snatchers did not have any reason to suspect Cruz of any crimes. They had neither a warrant to arrest Cruz nor any probable cause. Thus, they had no right to detain him, whether he had his papers on him or not. Therefore, the snatchers violated his Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable searches and seizures, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
Joey and Dari de Crespo are legal residents -- refugees who fled South America in 2024 and are seeking asylum in the United States. They currenly live in Oregon. In January 2026, their 7-year-old daughter Diana had a medical emergency, and they took her to a nearby hospital. When they arrived, ICE snatchers detained the family in the parking lot and sent them to prison in Texas. Diana never saw a doctor.
By detaining a family of legal residents who have committed no crimes and denying them medical care, ICE violated the Fourth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendments and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
The same thing happened to Ximena Arias-Cristobal, another 19-year-old in Georgia. Arias-Cristobal has since been released; Dias Goncalves is still incarcerated without charges.
Dulce Diaz Morales was born in Maryland. In December 2025, ICE detained her and her sister at a fast food restaurant. They let her sister go, but imprisoned Dulce at a facility in Louisiana, then transferred her to one in Texas. According to her sister, it's because Dulce has darker skin than she does. Diaz's lawyers provided ICE with her birth certificate and other records of her life in the United States, only for ICE to claim the documents were fakes. Diaz -- an innocent US citizen -- was finally released after a month in detention.
ICE violated Dulce's Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable seizures; her Sixth Amendment right to confront the witnesses against her; and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
Dixon was finally released in June after three months in a crowded prison. She was never informed why she was detained in the first place.
In January 2026, ICE snatchers caused an international diplomatic incident when they tried to force their way into the Ecuadorian consulate. One snatcher threatened to detain one of the consular staff. This was a violation of longstanding international law.
Though Eriksen is not one of the legal permanent residents renditioned to prison in El Salvador, many others have. Even though a court order forbade the DODO Trump Administration from renditioning anyone to other countries with no due process, Trump has been doing it anyway, and to nations other than El Salvador. "A woman... reported that her husband from Vietnam and up to 10 other people were flown to Africa." These Asian immigrants -- from Myanmar (a country east of India) and Vietnam (a country south of China) were apparently sent to South Sudan, a war-torn country in Africa. A judge quickly ruled that the deportees must remain in American custody. (South Sudan later denied any deportees had arrived in their country. This raised concerns that the deportees were sent to Libya instead -- a different war-torn country in another part of Africa.) In September, 2025, ICE deported other immigrants to Ghana, an African country none of them had ever been to.
Though Escobar was born in El Salvador, he has never committed any crimes, is married to an American citizen, and has applied to be a permanent resident.
ICE violated Escobar's Fourth Amendment right to be secure in his person against unreasonable seizures; his Sixth Amendment right to confront the witnesses against him; and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. The snatchers who detained him must be fired and charged with assault and destruction of property.
By kidnapping Ferreira without a warrant, ICE illegally violated her Fourth Amendment right to be secure against unreasonable seizures, her Fifth Amendment right to due process, her Sixth Amendment right to be informed of the charges against her, her Sixth Amendment right to a trial, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. Worchester must immediately drop all charges against the people who came to Ferreira's defense. Moreover, the ICE snatchers who disappeared Ferreira must be fired and charged with kidnapping and child endangerment, and the Worcester police officers who stood by and did nothing as ICE snatchers illegally abducted someone must be fired.
ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States. They violated Figueroa's Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable seizures, her Fifth Amendment right to due process, and her Sixth Amendment right to counsel. The snatchers involved in this horrifying abuse of power must be fired and charged with reckless driving, leaving the scene of a crash, failure to report the crash, failure to give aid or information, assault, witness tampering, witness intimidation, obstruction of justice, false arrest, and false imprisonment. If they can do it to her, they can do it to anybody. They can do it to you.
The snatchers then ordered the workers to jump down. Five did, and miraculously, only one of them was injured in the jump. The others were chased down and detained at gunpoint. (One worker hid on the roof and escaped later.) All five of the detained workers were in this country legally.
The snatchers trespassed on Fischer's property and violated the workers' Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable searches, their Sixth Amendment rights to confront the witnesses against them, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. Since the snatchers committed a crime in order to detain five innocent people, they committed false arrest and false imprisonment, and must be fired and charged just like any other citizen would be.
DHS later confirmed that the masked men who refused to identify themselves or present a warrant were working for the Customs and Border Patrol (CPB.) DHS -- a department with a sterling reputation for honesty and never embellishing the facts -- claimed that the CPB agents shot the vehicle in self-defense after two of the masked men were struck.
The CPB agents violated the family's Fourth Amendment rights to be secure against unreasonable seizures; their right to see a warrant; and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. The CBP agents involved in this fiasco must be fired and charged with attempted kidnapping and destruction of property.
If ICE snatchers can detain an American citizen -- who they know perfectly well is an American citizen -- for "interfering" when all she did was ask for proof that they were following the law, they can do it to anyone. They can do it to you.
The Atlantic later identified the patient as Ronal Orozco-Meza. The patient was a legal resident until last April, when Trump arbitrarily and illegally revoked his Temporary Protected Status along with that of 600,000 other Venezuelan refugees. (Declaring a whole group of people guilty without a trial violates the Constitution's Bill of Attainder clause and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.)
Funez-Andrade was eventually released a day or two later and charged with resisting arrest. Video of her arrest shows the officers attacking her with no warning, and she doesn't appear to have resisted at all.
The two male snatchers who attacked a woman who was not resisting and then abandoned a minor on the side of the road must be fired and charged with assault and child endangerment.
ICE violated Gamez Lira's Fourth Amendment right to be secure from unreasonable seizures; his Eighth Amendment right against cruel and unusual punishment (placing a baby US citizen in medical jeopardy); and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. The ICE snatchers must be fired and charged with assault and child endangerment.
ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States. ICE violated Garcia's Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable seizures. The ICE snatchers who illegally detained Garcia must be fired and prosecuted for false arrest.
Garcia was approached again by ICE snatchers a month later. Fortunately, he wasn't handcuffed the second time. The New York Times detailed his story along with that of several other American citizens ICE snatchers detained and handcuffed with no warrant and no probable cause. Like Garcia, Julio Noriega, Jason Gavidia, B.G. (a disabled 15-year-old), and Miguel Ponce tried to explain that they were citizens, and the ICE snatchers ignored them. If ICE can do this to them, they can do it to you.
ProPublica later interviewed Garcia Venegas. He described how DHS snatchers hopped a fence, ignored a "no trespassing" sign, and targeted Latino workers, ignoring their Black and white colleagues.
"Garcia Venegas began filming after his undocumented brother asked agents for a warrant. In response, the footage shows, agents yanked his brother to the ground, shoving his face into wet concrete. Garcia Venegas kept filming until officers grabbed him too and knocked his phone to the ground.
"Other co-workers filmed what happened next, as immigration agents twisted the 25-year-old’s arms. They repeatedly tried to take him to the ground while he yelled, "I'm a citizen!" Officers pulled out his REAL ID, which Alabama only issues to those legally in the U.S. But the agents dismissed it as fake. Officers held Garcia Venegas handcuffed for more than an hour. His brother was later deported.
Video footage supports Garcia Venegas' version of events and does not support DHS statements.
By threatening Gentry with a gun, ICE violated his First Amendment right to peacefully assemble and petition the Government for a redress of grievances. The snatcher who threatened Gentry must be fired and prosecuted.
In January 2026, ICE snatchers arrived at the home of Garrison Gibson -- a Liberian man living legally in Minneapolis -- and smashed the door down with a battering ram. They then arrested Gibson in front of his wife and their 9-year-old child. After his arrest, Gibson was imprisoned on an army base in Texas. Four days later, a judge found out that the snatchers didn't have a warrant, agreed that they had violated the Fourth Amendment, and ordered Gibson released.
The town rallied around him. He was still in detention on graduation day -- he was supposed to play in the band -- and, after the ceremony, the high school students walked to the town hall and protested. Trump "pardons cop-beaters from Jan 6 but detains high-school volleyball players," said Congressman Jake Auchincloss, who attended the rally. ICE violated Gomes' Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures, his Sixth Amendment right to confront the witnesses against him, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. The snatcher that detained him must be fired and charged with false arrest and child endangerment, and everyone involved in his detention must be fired and charged with false imprisonment and child endangerment.
By arresting and detaining an innocent legal resident without cause, charges, witnesses or due process, ICE violated Go's Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendment rights and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. Everyone involved in her detention must be fired and charged with false arrest and false imprisonment. It's illegal and unconstitutional for the government to lock up innocent people. If they can do it to her, they can do it to you.
By detaining Solis without a warrant, ICE violated his Fourth Amendment rights to be secure against unreasonable seizures and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. Moreover, ICE appears to have libeled the clinic staff by falsely accusing them of having assaulted law enforcement. Since the ICE snatchers detained Solis with neither probable cause nor a warrant, the arrest wasn't legal, and clinic staff acted correctly in reporting a kidnapping.
The ICE snatchers who detained Solis without a warrant must be fired and charged with false arrest and false imprisonment.
Fortunately, Greeley was released after being held for an hour. Nevertheless, ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States, and her detention was illegal. It violated her Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable seizures; her Sixth Amendment right to see the witnesses against her; and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. The snatchers who detained Greeley must be fired and charged with false arrest and false imprisonment.
DHS Assistant Secretary (and Minister of Propaganda) Tricia McLaughlin said that Congresswoman Grijalva made the whole thing up -- that the Congresswoman had "joined" a "mob" and was never pepper-sprayed. The Mayor and Vice-Mayor of Tuscon confirmed Congresswoman Grijalva's version of events.
ICE has no jurisdiction over US citizens inside the United States. The snatchers involved in this disgusting abuse of power must be fired and charged with assault.
It turned out that the masked men were ICE snatchers who were looking for someone else. ICE has no jurisdiction over US citizens, and the snatchers who chased and threatened an innocent woman must be fired.
According to Mother Jones, Hermosillo said he was detained with about 15 other men in a cell at the Florence Correctional Center. He was served only cold food. He said he contracted the flu because “they have it cold in there and everybody’s getting sick.” Hermosillo said he requested medicine but was not provided with any. ICE illegally violated Hermosillo's Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendment rights and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. The ICE snatchers who detained and imprisoned an American citizen inside the United States with no charges must be fired and prosecuted for false arrest and false imprisonment.
Hermosillo is not the only innocent person held in disgusting, inhumane conditions. One woman who contacted NPR says her brother is in custody at a detainment center in Florida. He has a fever and an eye infection and has been denied medical care. An attorney with a client at the same prison says the detainees are starving: they are given one cup of rice and one cup of water per day, and that's their only food. They are forced to sleep on the floor. Another person whose spouse has been detained says the food they're served is rotten.
Henriquez Serrano was born in Honduras and it isn't clear what his immigration status is. Regardless, he has no criminal record. ICE violated his Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable seizures, his Fifth Amendment right to due process, his Sixth Amendment right to confront the witnesses against him, his Eighth Amendment protection from cruelty, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
The raid violated the Writ of Habeas Corpus -- the government cannot detain people without evidence that a crime was committed. It also violated the Writ of Attainder clause and the Fourth Amendment's prohibition on unreasonable seizures.
DHS blamed the victims. "It is horrific to see radical agitators bring children to their violent riots... PLEASE STOP ENDANGERING YOUR CHILDREN."
American citizens peacefully demonstrating in support of their Constitutional rights are neither radical nor agitators. There haven't been any riots, and the only violent agitators are the ICE snatchers. The Jackson family weren't even protesters. They were a family driving home who got stuck in traffic and had no idea ICE was in the area.
Mother Jones pointed out that ICE has fired tear gas at children on several other documented occasions.
The ICE snatchers who fired tear gas into a traffic jam -- poisoning innocent passers-by, including children and a baby -- must be fired and charged with assault and attempted murder.
After that, she waited to be sent the link to submit her paperwork online. To her shock, even though she never received the email and never submitted anything, ICE offered her a job. They'd never run a background check on her. "I skipped the steps of the application process that would have clued the agency in on my lack of fitness for the position," she wrote. "I made no effort to hide my public loathing of the agency, what it stands for, and the administration that runs it. And they offered me the job anyway.
"But if they missed the fact that I was an anti-ICE journalist who didn't fill out her paperwork, what else might they be missing? How many convicted domestic abusers are being given guns and sent into other people's homes? How many people with ties to white supremacist organizations are indiscriminately targeting minorities on principle, regardless of immigration status? How many rapists and pedophiles are working in ICE detention centers with direct and unsupervised access to a population that will be neither believed nor missed? How are we to trust ICE's allegedly thorough investigations of the people they detain and deport when they can't even keep their HR paperwork straight?"
ICE has no jurisdiction over US citizens inside the United States. ICE violated Jimenez' Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable seizures, his Sixth Amendment right to confront any witnesses against him, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. The snatchers who detained him must be fired and charged with kidnapping, false imprisonment, child endangerment, and destruction of property.
That same week, ICE detained two more US citizens who were filming them. Though they were released later that day, ICE violated the two citizens' First Amendment right to freedom of peaceful assembly.
By detaining a legal resident who has broken no laws, the Trump Administration violated the Writ of Habeas Corpus and the Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Amendments.
Mrs. Kaur is a vegetarian and was given meals with meat for her first week in detention. (Someone who's been a vegetarian for years cannot eat meat without getting sick.) She has been denied medical care and access to most of her medications. Mrs. Kaur has been using every legal means to remain in the country, and though she lost her most recent court case, she is no threat to anyone. It's a waste of taxpayer dollars to imprison a grandmother in failing health who has never committed a crime. Her detention is in no way reasonable, and ICE violated her Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable seizures.
When ICE showed up at Khalil's apartment to detain him, they also threatened to arrest his wife -- an American citizen who was eight months pregnant. (It's illegal to threaten someone under New York law. She later gave birth while her husband was incarcerated.) The snatchers told Khalil that his student visa had been revoked. Khalil managed to get his lawyer on the phone, and she told the ICE snatchers that Khalil was a permanent resident with a green card. The ICE snatcher then said they were revoking that instead. Khalil had no idea his green card was being revoked until ICE showed up at his front door -- and the ICE snatchers didn't know this either.
Khalil has never committed a crime and has not been charged with one. The DODO Trump Administration apparently targeted Khalil for criticizing a foreign country during a student protest. Khalil later told the Associated Press that "I have around 13 allegations against me, most of them are social media posts that I had nothing to do with."
The First Amendment guarantees freedom of speech to everyone in America. The DODO Trump Administration illegally violated Khalil's First Amendment right to free speech, his Fourth Amendment right to be secure in his person and his home from unreasonable seizures, his Fifth Amendment right to due process, his Sixth Amendment right to confront the witnesses against him, and the Bill of Attainder clause. Whether you agree with Khalil's politics or not, if the government can arrest an innocent person without charges and imprison them forever, they can do this to American citizens as well as legal residents.
A judge finally ordered Khalil released after four months in prison. The snatchers who detained Khalil must be fired, and the agent (or agents) who threatened his wife must be prosecuted.
Kim was detained at San Francisco International Airport when returning home from his brother's wedding. He has been denied access to his family or a lawyer. Neither he nor his family have been told why he has been detained.
By arresting Kim without a warrant or probable cause and detaining him without counsel, charges or explanation, ICE violated his Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendment rights and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. Everyone involved in the detention of an innocent person must be fired and charged with false imprisonment.
According to Amnesty International, in March, 2025, ICE detained Leqaa Kordia, a Palestinian woman living in New Jersey, for criticizing another country. ICE violated Kordia's First Amendment right to free speech. Even though the charges against her have been dismissed, Kordia has not been released.
"A highway patrol officer asked everyone in the van to identify themselves, then called for backup. Officers with US border patrol arrived on the scene.
"Video footage of the incident captured by Laynez-Ambrosio, an 18-year-old US citizen, appears to show a group of officers in tactical gear working together to violently detain the three men, two of whom are undocumented. They appear to use a stun gun on one man, put another in a chokehold and can be heard telling Laynez-Ambrosio: “You’ve got no rights here. You’re a migo, brother.” Afterward, agents can be heard bragging and making light of the arrests, calling the stun gun use “funny.”
"Laynez-Ambrosio said he is unsure why the van was pulled over, as his mother was driving below the speed limit.
"Laynez-Ambrosio... already had his phone out... but immediately clicked record when it became clear what was happening.
"Laynez-Ambrosio said things turned aggressive before the group even had a chance to exit the van. One of the officers “put his hand inside the window”, he said, “popped the door open, grabbed my friend by the neck and had him in a chokehold”.
"Footage appears to show officers then reaching for Laynez-Ambrosio and his other friend as Laynez-Ambrosio can be heard protesting: “You can’t grab me like that.” Multiple officers can be seen pulling the other man from the van and telling him to “put your fucking head down”. The footage captures the sound of a stun gun as Laynez-Ambrosio’s friend cries out in pain and drops to the ground.
"Laynez-Ambrosio said that his friend was not resisting, and that he didn’t speak English and didn’t understand the officer’s commands. “My friend didn’t do anything before they grabbed him,” he said.
"In the video, Laynez-Ambrosio can be heard repeatedly telling his friend, in Spanish, to not resist. “I wasn’t really worried about myself because I knew I was going to get out of the situation,” he said. “But I was worried about him. I could speak up for him but not fight back, because I would’ve made the situation worse.”
"Laynez-Ambrosio can also be heard telling officers: “I was born and raised right here.” Still, he was pushed to the ground and says that an officer aimed a stun gun at him. He was subsequently arrested and held in a cell at a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) station for six hours.
"Audio in the video catches the unidentified officers debriefing and appearing to make light of the stun gun use. “You’re funny, bro,” one officer can be overheard saying to another, followed by laughter.
"Another officer says, “They’re starting to resist more now,” to which an officer replies: “We’re going to end up shooting some of them.”
"Later in the footage, the officers move on to general celebration – “Goddamn! Woo! Nice!” – and talk of the potential bonus they’ll be getting: “Just remember, you can smell that [inaudible] $30,000 bonus.”
"Laynez-Ambrosio was charged with obstruction without violence and sentenced to 10 hours of community service and a four-hour anger management course. While in detention, he said, police threatened him with charges if he did not delete the video footage from his phone, but he refused."
ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States. By detaining an American citizen -- and a minor -- without a warrant or probable cause, the ICE snatchers committed kidnapping, false arrest, and false imprisonment. They violated Laynez-Ambrosio's Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable searches and seizures, his Fourth Amendment right to see a warrant, his Sixth Amendment right to see the witnesses against him, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. The government sentencing him to anger management for being the victim of a crime is a mockery of justice. If ICE can do that to him, they can do that to you. All ICE snatchers involved in this travesty must be fired and prosecuted.
DHS Assistant Secretary (and Minister of Propaganda) Tricia McLaughlin later claimed that Longoria was trying to run the snatchers over, allegations that are not supported by video.
A week later, a dozen armed DHS agents arrived at Longoria's house at 4:18 AM in an armored personnel carrier. They broke the locks on his gate and surrounded the home, pointing rifles at the doors and windows and using a bullhorn to demand Longoria's surrender. Longoria gave himself up, and at this writing is in ICE custody.
According to Longoria's attorneys, "These are the type of tactics reserved for dangerous criminals such as violent gang members, drug lords and terrorists. It was clearly intended to intimidate and punish Mr. Longoria and his family for daring to speak out about their attempted murder by ICE and CBP agents on August 16th. No reasonable prosecutor could believe that a conviction would be secured against Mr. Longoria for the August 16th stop, when every video supports Mr. Longoria's version of events and directly contradicts DHS' story. Yet DOJ will not drop the charges; it has been their practice during this administration to pursue charges based on unsubstantiated and false affidavits in order to arrest individuals and then turn them over to ICE."
By pulling Longoria over without a warrant, refusing to identify themselves, and smashing his truck window, ICE violated Longoria's Fourth Amendment right to be secure against unreasonable searches and seizures. By illegally shooting at a moving car when they had no reason to suspect the driver or the passengers of any crimes, they violated his Fifth Amendment right (and his passengers' rights) not to be deprived of his life without due process. All the ICE snatchers involved in this travesty must be fired and charged with false arrest, child endangerment, and destruction of property, and the snatcher who shot at the vehicle must be charged with child endangerment and attempted murder.
A few hours later, a federal judge heard about this and ordered ICE not to take her out of Massachusetts. Despite the judge's order, ICE deported her to Honduras the next day. (It was her first time back in Honduras since she and her family fled the country a decade earlier.) Lopez was later told that a different immigration judge had ordered her deported in 2015, when she was 9 years old. It was the first she'd heard of it.
ICE didn't just violate a court order -- they violated Lopez' Fifth Amendment right to due process. They also violated her Sixth Amendment right to counsel, her right to trial, her right to know the nature and cause of the accusations against her, and her right to confront the witnesses against her.
ICE is supposed to protect American citizens from criminals -- not from teenage girls who grew up in America, love our country, and have never committed any crimes. Sign the petition to bring her home.
The same thing happened to a U.S. Marshal in May, 2025. ICE detained him while he was walking into a Federal building in Arizona.
Bodycam footage proved that Martinez hadn't caused the accident, and the Justice Department was forced to drop the charges.
Every snatcher involved in this appalling abuse of power must be fired, and the relevant agents must be charged with assault with a deadly weapon, attempted murder, and concealing evidence.
The ICE snatchers should have ended the raid and apologized as soon as they realized the people they wanted no longer lived there. Instead, they violated the family's Fourth Amendment rights to be secure in their persons and houses from unreasonable searches and seizures, and their Fifth Amendment rights not to be deprived of their property without due process. The family's possessions must be returned immediately, and all the officers involved in this fiasco must be fired, arrested, and charged with child endangerment, breaking and entering, false imprisonment, and armed robbery.
For detaining an innocent person, ICE violated Marrero's Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable seizures. They violated his Fifth Amendment right to due process, his Sixth Amendment right to confront the witnesses against him, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
In January 2026, Kevin's mother Arlit was detained by ICE while on her way to work. (Though Arlit was born in Mexico, she is a legal US resident.)
Two days after Arlit's detention, Kevin died of the disease. Arlit was not allowed to attend her son's funeral, and at this writing is still in detention. The only time Arlit has ever been in legal trouble was a 2015 traffic citation.
Since neither Arlit nor her family has been informed why she has been detained, ICE violated her Sixth Amendment right to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusations against her and to confront the witnesses against her. Likewise, ICE violated the Writ of Habeas Corpus. There is no evidence Arlit ever committed a crime.
ICE demanded to see "David." Medina explained her husband's name is Jorge, but the snatchers still forced Medina and her four children out of their house so they could search it.
After the June incident, ICE snatchers approached Medina four more times, demanding to know where her husband is. The most recent incident was in August, when Medina was arrested after visiting a clinic for her pregnancy check-up. During her arrest, snatchers shoved her stomach against the car, endangering the life of her unborn child.
Medina's husband -- Jorge Saldana -- was convicted of assault ten years ago, served time, and has since turned his life around. He is currently in hiding and Medina has no contact with him.
By breaking into Medina's house when she was in the shower with a warrant for someone named "David," Noem and ICE violated her Fourth Amendment right to be secure in her home against unreasonable searches and seizures. Moreover, by repeatedly following, threatening, and harassing Medina -- an innocent woman -- and making her fear for her safety, ICE violated California's anti-stalking laws. Secretary Noem and all the snatchers involved in this harassment must be fired and charged with breaking and entering, false arrest, child endangerment, and stalking.
ICE released Mahari five days later... outside the Texas prison. Mehari was forced to figure out how to make the 1,000 mile journey back to her Minnesota home on her own, without any money or identification. Her documents and jewelry have not been returned to her.
According to the New York Times, the same thing happened to 19-year-old Walid Ali and over 100 other refugees. Ali said he protested when ICE confiscated his wallet, phone, and papers, and the snatchers responded by forcing him to the ground and beating him. Among the other refugees were Christians from Myanmar (Burma) who have been persecuted for their religious beliefs.
By detaining legal residents, ICE violated their Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable seizures; their Fifth Amendment rights by depriving them of their property without due process; their Sixth Amendment rights to find out why they'd been detained; and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
Miles feared the snatchers were themselves fake -- not real ICE agents. She asked them to give her their names and badge numbers, and they refused. When she called her tribal enrollment office, the four snatchers tryed to grab her phone. A fifth snatcher then called the others off.
DHS Assistant Secretary (and Minister of Propaganda) Tricia McLaughlin denied that the snatchers dismissed Miles' ID as fake and claimed that "Allegations that DHS law enforcement officers engage in 'racial profiling' are disgusting, reckless, and categorically FALSE." (Border patrol offical Greg Bovino told a reporter that detaining based on their appearance is standard procedure. DHS asked the Supreme Court for permission to racially profile anyone they encounter on American streets, and the Alito Court granted it in September, 2025. "What this means in practice is that if you are not white, you cannot go certain places without the risk of being kidnapped by federal agents," the Atlantic pointed out. Statements like the above from DHS and ICE continue to regularly deny that they're doing what they've said they're doing and everyone knows they're doing. They're counting on American citizens, legal residents, and tourists to be ignorant of their Constitutional rights.)
ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the country. By demanding Miles "show her papers," ICE violated the Writ of Habeas Corpus and Miles' Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable searches.
ICE has no jusrisdiction over American citizens inside the United States. ICE violated Miranda's Fourth Amendment right to be secure against unreasonable seizures; his Fifth Amendment right to due process; his Sixth Amendment right to confront the witnesses against him; and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. All the snatchers involved in this travesty must be fired and charged with assault, false arrest, and false imprisonment.
Ironically, abortion is illegal in all three of those States, and had Monterroso-Lemus tried to terminate her pregnancy voluntarily she would have been barred from doing so. Moreover, Alabama has a fetal personhood law that declares an unborn fetus a person and has prosecuted pregnant women who gave birth to stillborn babies -- so the ICE snatchers who denied Monterroso-Lemus medical care when her unborn child was dying could be guilty of child endangerment and criminally negligent homicide. ICE violated Monterroso-Lemus' Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment, as well as her Fifth Amendment right to due process and her Sixth Amendment right to a trial.
"I was in an immigration office talking to an officer about my work visa, which had been approved months before and allowed me, a Canadian, to work in the US. The next, I was told to put my hands against the wall, and patted down like a criminal before being sent to an ICE detention center without the chance to talk to a lawyer.
"I was taken to a tiny, freezing cement cell with bright fluorescent lights and a toilet. There were five other women lying on their mats with the aluminum sheets wrapped over them, looking like dead bodies. The guard locked the door behind me.
"For two days, we remained in that cell, only leaving briefly for food. The lights never turned off, we never knew what time it was and no one answered our questions. No one in the cell spoke English, so I either tried to sleep or meditate to keep from having a breakdown. I didn't trust the food, so I fasted, assuming I wouldn't be there long."
On the third day, "They gave me a stack of paperwork to sign and told me I was being given a five-year ban unless I applied for re-entry through the consulate. The officer also said it didn't matter whether I signed the papers or not; it was happening regardless.
"I was so delirious that I just signed. I told them I would pay for my flight home and asked when I could leave.
"No answer.
"Then they moved me to another cell -- this time with no mat or blanket. I sat on the freezing cement floor for hours. That's when I realized they were processing me into real jail: the Otay Mesa Detention Center.
"I was told to shower, given a jail uniform, fingerprinted and interviewed. I begged for information. 'How long will I be here?'
"'I don't know your case,' the man said. Could be days. Could be weeks. But I'm telling you right now -- you need to mentally prepare yourself for months.' "I felt like I was going to throw up."
After a few days in the prison, she started talking to the guards and detainees. One of the guards told her not to get in a fight. She asked if there'd ever been a fight there, and he said no. "No one in this unit has a criminal record," he told her.
"I met a woman who had been on a road trip with her husband. She said they had 10-year work visas. While driving near the San Diego border, they mistakenly got into a lane leading to Mexico. They stopped and told the agent they didn't have their passports on them, expecting to be redirected. Instead, they were detained. They are both pastors.
"I met a family of three who had been living in the US for 11 years with work authorizations. They paid taxes and were waiting for their green cards. Every year, the mother had to undergo a background check, but this time, she was told to bring her whole family. When they arrived, they were taken into custody and told their status would now be processed from within the detention center.
"Another woman from Canada had been living in the US with her husband who was detained after a traffic stop. She admitted she had overstayed her visa and accepted that she would be deported. But she had been stuck in the system for almost six weeks because she hadn't had her passport. Who runs casual errands with their passport?
"There was a girl from India who had overstayed her student visa for three days before heading back home. She then came back to the US on a new, valid visa to finish her master's degree and was handed over to ICE due to the three days she had overstayed on her previous visa.
"There were women who had been picked up off the street, from outside their workplaces, from their homes. All of these women told me that they had been detained for time spans ranging from a few weeks to 10 months. One woman's daughter was outside the detention center protesting for her release."
After a few days, Mooney was sent to another prison in Arizona.
"The transfer process lasted 24 hours, a sleepless, grueling ordeal. This time, men were transported with us. Roughly 50 of us were crammed into a prison bus for the next five hours, packed together - women in the front, men in the back. We were bound in chains that wrapped tightly around our waists, with our cuffed hands secured to our bodies and shackles restraining our feet, forcing every movement into a slow, clinking struggle."
The Arizona prison was worse. "There were no pillows. The room was ice cold, and one blanket wasn't enough. Around me, women lay curled into themselves, heads covered, looking like a room full of corpses. This place made the last jail feel like the Four Seasons.
"Thirty of us shared one room. We were given one Styrofoam cup for water and one plastic spoon that we had to reuse for every meal... I got sick. None of the uniforms fit, and everyone had men's shoes on. The towels they gave us to shower were hand towels. They wouldn't give us more blankets. The fluorescent lights shined on us 24/7."
Mooney was eventually able to contact some friends outside the prison, who went to the media. When the story went viral -- an innocent Canadian actress with all her paperwork in order had been deprived of her liberty without charges or due process -- she was released.
"I had a Canadian passport, lawyers, resources, media attention, friends, family and even politicians advocating for me. Yet, I was still detained for nearly two weeks. Imagine what this system is like for every other person in there.
"ICE detention isn't just a bureaucratic nightmare. It's a business. These facilities are privately owned and run for profit... The more detainees, the more money they make."
The DODO Trump Administration illegally violated Mooney's Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendment rights, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. It likely violated the same Constitutional rights of everyone Mooney met in the detention facilities. Everyone involved in this -- from the ICE snatchers who detained someone they knew was innocent to the prison officials and guards who knew they had an innocent woman in their custody -- must be fired and prosecuted for false arrest and false imprisonment.
DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin called the snatcher's behavior unacceptable, and the snatcher was temporarily relieved of duty. However, as the incidents detailed on this web page reveal, ICE doesn't really consider this unacceptable at all. ICE snatchers do this all the time. The only things that differentiate this incident from all the others is that the surveillance video of an ICE snatcher assaulting a petite woman went viral. If DHS really thought the ICE snatcher's attacking an unarmed woman was unacceptable, he would have been fired and charged with assault. Instead, he was back on the job a week later.
The snatcher never identified himself as an ICE agent. Mubashir has never committed a crime and has not been accused of one. DHS claims that the snatcher detained Mubashir because he ran away, a claim Mubashir denies. "I didn't even see him," he explained. (Even if DHS's claims were true, under Minnesota law, people have a duty to retreat from a violent situation and are only allowed to defend themselves as a last resort. ICE is accusing Mubashir of complying with the law!)
When Mubashir realized that the man who abducted him worked for ICE, he tried to show the snatcher proof of citizenship, including photos of his passport, but the snatcher refused to look at them.
When arriving at the ICE detention center, Mubashir was shackled and denied water and medical care. Fortunately, he was released later that day. (Thousands of other detainees are not so lucky.) ICE refused to give the innocent citizen they'd disappeared off the street a ride home from the prison, though. Mubashir quotes a snatcher as telling him "no, you have to walk in the snow." These are the people supposed to be keeping us safe.
(DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin dismissed as "categorically FALSE" allegations that DHS has been racially profiling people. This is DHS's typical gaslighting, as her superiors have admitted to racial profiling, both in court filings and in interviews.)
By abducting and detaining an innocent US citizen nowhere near a border, ICE violated Mubashir's Fourth Amendment right to be secure from unreasonable seizures, his Sixth Amendment right to be informed of the accusations against him, his right to confront the witnesses against him, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the country.
The snatchers responsible for this appalling abuse of power must be fired and charged with assault, false arrest, and false imprisonment. If the Federal Government can do this to a 20-year-old American citizen, they can do it to any of us.
DHS later released a statement claiming "Officers identified themselves and explained their intent to conduct a security check, however, one individual became verbally confrontational and physically blocked access to the office." Nadler's chief of staff later told the press: "DHS's statement that they were coming in for a safety check doesn't mesh with the video." Nadler himself wrote: "The decision to enter a Congressional office and detain a staff member demonstrates a deeply troubling disregard for proper legal boundaries. If this can happen in a Member of Congress's office, it can happen to anyone -- and is happening."
The DHS officers violated the staffer's Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable seizures. The DODO officers fabricated the "riot" excuse to justify handcuffing one of the innocent American citizens they're supposed to be protecting. All the officials who went to Nadler's office and handcuffed an innocent woman -- or watched it happen and did nothing -- must be fired and prosecuted for false imprisonment.
By violating a court order to release Naser, ICE committed contempt of court and false imprisonment -- and they continue to violate his rights as long as he remains in detention.
It should go without saying that it's impossible for Native Americans to be immigrants. All Native Americans inside the country are completely outside ICE's jurisdiction. That didn't stop ICE snatchers from detaining four Sioux Tribe members in Minnesota in January 2026. One has been released, but the other three have been sent to a prison in Texas. The Sioux detainees must be immediately released, and the ICE snatchers who detained them must be fired and prosecuted for false arrest and false imprisonment.
She's spent the last 25 years living and working in Los Angeles and has applied for legal permanent residence. She was expecting to have her residence approved at her final interview in June, 2025, but instead, ICE showed up and detained her. She has been in prison ever since. Her husband has been trying to get her out of prison and buy her a plane ticket to Canada -- all to no avail. "The only crime I committed is to love this country and to work hard and to provide for my kids," she said.
Cynthia entered the United States without the proper documentation over two decades ago when she was a teenager, but she has complied with the law ever since. ICE violated her Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable seizures and her Sixth Amendment right to a trial.
ICE later denied they'd ever pulled the Congresswoman's son over in the first place and claimed the Congresswoman had made the whole incident up.
"The congresswoman's son and others were pulled over by ICE, racially profiled, and forced to prove their citizenship with a passport," Omar's spokesperson replied. "It's no surprise that an agency known for disappearing people also can't keep its records straight. ICE now claims it has records of all the stops, and our office would welcome the opportunity to review them."
According to Slate, her detention was caught on camera.
"A man in a dark hoodie and baseball cap crossed the street toward her. Chilling surveillance footage shows the moment he approaches: “Excuse me, ma’am,” he says politely, his tone disarming. Ozturk hesitates and tries to sidestep him. Another man in plainclothes appears across the street. One reaches for a radio. The other moves in.
"One of the men goes for her phone. The other grabs at her hands. Ozturk screams. Shock and fear ripple through her voice. Two masked women join them, tugging at her backpack, peeling the straps from her shoulders. “I’m going somewhere, I need to call someone,” she pleads. “We’re the police. Relax,” one of the men says in response.
They surround her. Then, one by one, they pull their neck gaiters up to cover their faces. “You don’t look like police,” a voice off screen says. “Why are you hiding your faces?” The questions continue, but the figures don’t respond. Instead, they cuff Ozturk, cross the street, and put her in an unmarked SUV. She is gone.
"The video is haunting. You can see Ozturk’s panic set in, and the clear impunity the agents feel in taking her and vanishing with no explanation. Just days after the Trump administration successfully pressured Columbia University to ban masks at campus demonstrations, these agents concealed their identities and arrived in an unmarked vehicle, asserting only that they were the authorities, period."
After her abduction, Ozturk was then moved to the LaSalle Detention Facility in Louisiana. Ozturk has a valid student visa and was detained without charges. Though DHS Assistant Secretary (and Minister of Propaganda) Tricia McLaughlin later accused Ozturk of supporting Hamas -- a Mideastern terrorist group -- neither Homeland Security nor ICE has any records of Ozturk commiting any crimes, supporting any terrorists, sympathizing with Hamas, or even being rude. According to her attorneys, she was targeted for the same reason as Khalil -- for criticizing a foreign country. This violates the First Amendment, which guarantees freedom of speech to anyone in American jurisdiction.
Ozturk has asthma, and had twelve asthma attacks while imprisoned. “The air is full of fumes from cleaning supplies and is damp which triggers my asthma. We don’t get much fresh air which also impacts my ability to breathe well. The conditions in the facility are very unsanitary, unsafe, and inhumane. There is a mouse in our cell. The boxes they provide for our clothing are very dirty and they don’t give us adequate hygiene supplies.” Mother Jones reported that Ozturk was denied access to her inhaler.
Ozturk will not be the last. Secretary of State Marco Rubio says he's revoked "more than 300" student visas, calling these non-violent legal residents "lunatics," even though none of them has committed a crime. "We do it every day. Every time I find one of these lunatics, I take away their visa." This violates the Constitution's Bill of Attainder clause. (A judge later ordered ICE to reinstate the visas of 133 students whose visas had been revoked, but at this writing over 1,500 students have had their visas cancelled.)
A judge ordered Ozturk's release after she spent six weeks in prison with no charges.
The DODO Trump Administration illegally violated Ozturk's First, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendment rights. Sign the petition demanding an investigation into her kidnapping and the petition demanding the release of the other students. The ICE snatchers who disappeared her off the street must be fired and prosecuted for kidnapping.
"Once you walk out those doors, then you're completely on your own. So if you don't have any family to receive you, anyone that you know, you're completely lost here," she told an interviewer.
Unlike many people who are deported to countries they last saw as small children and don't know anyone, Palacios was able to contact a grandmother, and is now staying with her. "Everywhere I look, I feel out of place, because even though this is the country that I was born, it is not the country that I have called home... My goal and dream is still to go back and be able to work as a nurse, because that's still my dream, and has always been."
Palacios was legally living in the United States and never committed a crime. By arresting her anyway, confining her for six months, and then deporting her, ICE violated her Sixth Amendment right to see the witnesses against her; her Sixth Amendment right to a speedy and public trial; and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
Though Park obviously should not have done drugs, it isn't justice to punish a veteran a second time for the same crime after he completed his sentence over a decade ago. ICE violated Park's Fifth Amendment rights by punishing him twice for the same offense.
Perez legally immigrated from Cuba to the United States in 1966 and was a legal resident ever since. He was convicted of drug possession in the early 1980's and served his sentence. He subsequently turned his life around.
Like Park, Perez should not have done drugs. However, it's a violation of the Fifth Amendment to punish a someone a second time for the same crime after he completed his sentence forty years ago. According to CBS, Perez is one of a dozen people (so far) to die in ICE custody.
Perez was not charged, tried, or convicted of a capital crime, and he certainly wasn't condemned to death. ICE violated his Fifth Amendment right not to be deprived of his life without due process. Though Perez was in failing health, he would probably still be alive if he hadn't been illegally detained. The ICE snatchers who knowingly imprisoned a sick man and denied him medical care must be charged with criminally negligent homicide.
By keeping Petrova in prison without trial, ICE illegally violated her Sixth Amendment rights. After four months in prison, a judge finally ordered her release in June.
The same thing happened to Amir Makled, a lawyer representing a student protester.
Pina fled the encounter, and the snatchers attacked him with a baton and forced him to the ground. He attempted to explain that he was an American citizen, but the snatchers held him until a supervisor arrived. ICE violated Pina's Fourth Amendment rights to be secure against unreasonable searches and seizures; his Fifth Amendment right not to be deprived of his liberty without due process; and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. The snatchers who attacked Pina must be fired and charged with assault and false imprisonment.
Heidi Plummer, a U.S. citizen and Orange County attorney, strolled through Centennial Regional Park in Santa Ana on June 14 to clear her mind after a family funeral when she suddenly encountered an immigration raid.
Plummer recounted seeing several vans pull into a big parking lot near where she walked, sometime between noon and 1 p.m. Masked federal agents poured out of the vans wearing tactical gear emblazoned with “ICE” and made their way through the park.
“They were just grabbing people that were close to them and handcuffing them,” Plummer said. She stood only a few feet from the sweep, she said, when ICE snatchers approached and arrested her. Plummer said the federal agents didn’t ask any questions before taking her personal belongings and leading her back to their vans.
Plummer, who is half-Ecuadorian, began advising people of their rights after agents handcuffed her. In Spanish, she told those arrested by ICE not to answer any questions and to ask for a lawyer.
Her advice continued after vans transported Plummer and other detainees to an ICE detention facility in Santa Ana. Agents had separated men from women in different vans. Plummer said that at the center she was held in a room without enough chairs for all the women detained. Agents called detainees up one by one.
Plummer said she provided authorities with her identification. After about an hour-and-a-half, they returned her ID, cellphone and released her.
When finally reached for comment, a spokesperson for ICE refuted Plummers’ account.
“ICE was not at that park that day, nor did they make any arrests there,” the spokesperson said. “There is no record backing her claims.”
Rivera [Plummer's lawyer] invited the U.S. Department of Justice and federal immigration agencies to provide him with information to help determine who the individuals were, if not ICE as claimed.
If the masked agents wearing ICE vests who took Plummer to an ICE detention facility weren't ICE, then who were they? If they were common criminals, why did they take her to an ICE detention facility along with all the other detainees? Why didn't the real ICE arrest them when they got there?
ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States. ICE violated Plummer's Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable seizures, her Fifth Amendment rights to due process; her Sixth Amendment rights to be informed of the accusations against her; and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. The agents who detained her must be fired and prosecuted for false arrest (i.e. detaining someone with neither a warrant nor probable cause.)
ICE illegally violated Pohl's and Lepere's Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendment rights and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. By strip-searching two innocent teenage girls and making them spend the night in a cell with a murderer, ICE violated their Eighth Amendment rights against cruel and unusual punishment. The officials who did this must be fired and prosecuted for false arrest and false imprisonment.
The CBP agents were there looking for Ramirez' boyfriend, a U.S. citizen who was not home at the time. They went after him because he'd been in a fender-bender with a CBP truck. The agents in the truck he hit told him he was free to go.
By blowing a hole in the side of her house instead of knocking on the door, the CPB agents violated Ramirez' Fourth Amendment right to be secure in her house, and her Fifth Amendment right not to be deprived of her property (the wall of her house) without due process of law. The CBP agents involved in this travesty must be fired and charged with child endangerment and destruction of property.
in October, 2025, ICE's false allegations against Quintanilla were thrown out of court. Nevertheless, at this writing, Quintanilla is still in detention. ICE violated the Writ of Habeas Corpus and Quintanilla's Fourth Amendment right to be secure from unreasonable seizures. Since Quintanilla -- an innocent man -- is still in detention, ICE is also violating his Fifth Amendment right not to be deprived of his liberty without due process.
DHS Assistant Secretary (and Minister of Propaganda) Tricia McLaughlin claims ICE boxed Parias in with their vehicles, and then Parias began ramming their vehicles with his own in an attempt to get away. (As usual, video from the scene doesn't support ICE's claims.) One of the snatchers then shot Parias in the elbow. ICE then charged Parias with assault.
in December, a judge learned that ICE had violated the Sixth Amendment by denying Parias access to his attorney, and the judge dismissed the assault indictment against him. At this writing, Parias remains in custody.
Parral was sent from Minnesota to an ICE detention center in Texas (where he still is locked up at this writing.) ICE took Bonfilia to the hospital, but initially wouldn't let her family visit her. Though her children were eventually able to see her once, hospital staff physically prevented Bonfilia from leaving, and her children were not allowed any further visits. Later that day, their pastor arrived, and hospital staff lied to his face, telling him Bonfilia wasn't there. (Bonfilia was able to text him and confirmed which room she was in.) Bonfilia's attorney arrived the next day and was told the same lies; a security guard then threatened to arrest the lawyer.
ICE violated the Parral family's right to be secure against unreasonable searches; detained them without a warrant; deprived them of their liberty without due process; did not inform them of the nature of the accusations against them; denied them their right to see any witnesses against them; denied them access to counsel; and inflicted cruel and unusual punishment (dragging a sick woman out of a car.) The ICE snatchers responsible for this outrage must be fired and charged with assault, false arrest, and false imprisonment.
Comedian Robby "Roadsteamer" Potylo was protesting outside an ICE facility in Portland, Oregon, dressed in a giraffe costume and singing a parody song. ICE snatchers opened fire on him, shooting him six times with pepper balls and insisting he not cross a blue line which he hadn't crossed. Three snatchers the grabbed him, dragged him across the blue line, and charged him with failing to comply (i.e. trespassing on Federal property.) Potylo was only on Federal property because the snatchers dragged him there.
ICE violated Potylo's First Amendment rights to free speech and free protest and his Fourth Amendment right to be secure from unreasonable seizures. The ICE snatchers had no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States and no legal right to arrest him. The snatchers who shot and grabbed Potylo must be fired and charged with assault, false arrest, and false imprisonment.
DHS spun its usual slander about Rahman being an agitator who was obstructing ICE snatchers. In reality, Rahman had no idea there was an ICE operation happening on her route to the doctor's office and tried to avoid it. ICE violated Rahman's Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable seizures, her Sixth Amendment be informed of the nature and cause of the accusations against her, her Eighth Amendment protection from cruelty, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
"As long as you look Mexican, they would come up to you and they just take you up," Ramirez said. "As soon as I see them, the first thing I do is pull up my hands. 'Hey, I'm not a threat to you.' They still went at me."
ICE violated Ramirez' Fourth Amendment right to be secure in his person against unreasonable seuzures and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
"The agents surrounded his car and started yelling conflicting orders to get out of his car, reverse and park his car, according to the father. Retes then reversed, trying to leave the tense scene, he said.
"Agents continued yelling, banged on his window and pulled on his door trying to get it open, he said. The uniformed federal agents eventually threw what appeared to be tear gas into the crowd of protesters, which blurred Retes’ vision and made him choke.
"'I’m trying to leave. I’m trying to get out of here,' Retes said he told the agents in between gasping breaths.
"At that moment, one agent shattered his driver’s side window, and another sprayed pepper spray in his face, Retes said, recalling feeling a piece of glass from the window cut his leg. Then, they dragged him out of the car and threw him on the ground, pinning him down, he said.
"'I had one agent kneeling on my back and another one kneeling on my neck,' said Retes, who noted he had neck and back injuries from his four-year Army service.
"Retes recalled telling officers he couldn’t breathe because of the pepper spray and tear gas. But he said they proceeded to put him in handcuffs and dragged him away without explaining what he was arrested for. The Department of Homeland Security would later accuse Retes of assault – an allegation he vehemently denies.
"'They never told me anything … I sat there for hours asking them why I was here, why I’m being arrested, and no one could give me an answer,' Retes said. 'No one even knew who arrested me or why they arrested me. No one knew what was going to happen to me or who I was even going to go with.'
"He remained alone in a cell with bright lights that never turned off, according to Retes. Guards were always outside his cell and a psychiatrist checked on him once a day to ensure he wouldn’t harm himself, he said. [But] In the cell for [three] days, Retes was never told why he was arrested or if he was charged with any crimes, he said."
He was denied his phone call and was held incommunicado with no medical treatment. He wasn't allowed to shower, call a lawyer, or call his family. He missed his daughter's birthday party, and his family had no idea where he was.
Retes was finally let go after three days. He'd spent the entire time in pain from his injuries and unble to sleep.
"'So I basically was locked up for no reason, and missed my daughter’s birthday for no reason?' Retes said he asked the guards. He says he was met with silence."
DHS Assistant Secretary (and Minister of Propaganda) Tricia McLaughlin told CNN that "George Retes—a U.S. citizen—became violent and refused to comply with law enforcement. He challenged agents and blocked their route by refusing to move his vehicle out of the road.”
"'I would like to see where I assaulted an officer, and if that’s true, why wasn’t I charged?' he said. '...That’s not what happened.'"
ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States. By detaining him without charges, ICE violated Retes' Fourth Amendment rights to be secure in his person against unreasonable seizures; his Fifth Amendment right to due process; his Sixth Amendment right to a lawyer; his Sixth Amendment right to know the accusations against him; and his Eighth Amendment right against cruel punishment.
All the ICE snatchers involved in this must be fired and charged with false arrest (i.e. detaining someone without a warrant or probable cause) and and destruction of property. The prison officials who knowingly held an innocent American citizen without medical treatment for three days must be fired and charged with false imprisonment.
Retes wasn't the only victim of that ICE raid. According to the Los Angeles Times, Jaime Alanis Garcia, a 57-year-old farmer, fell to his death during the raid. A professor, Jonathan Caravello, saw a tear gas grenade land under someone's wheelchair. He moved the person and got tackled by several agents. Two months later, Caravello was charged with assault for... throwing a tear gas canister back at the person who threw it at him. He has pleaded not guilty.
ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States, and it's illegal to deport American citizens. Romeo's mother says she was never given any choice about her children's fate, and that she could have asked American-born family members to care for them. DHS Assistant Secretary (and Minister of Propaganda) Tricia McLaughlin claims this story is nonsense and that the Miami Herald -- along with Romeo's family's lawyers -- made the whole thing up. She claims that ICE never deported any American children, and also claims it was the mother's decision to have her American-born children returned to Honduras with her. (There are several documented cases -- see below -- where ICE did indeed deport American children.)
In order for Romeo to continue treatment, Romeo's mother had to put him on a plane back to the United States without her.
ICE violated Romeo's Fourth Amendment rights -- along with his mother's and his sister's -- to be free from unreasonable seizures. ICE also violated the family's Fifth Amendment right not to be deprived of their liberty without due process and the Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment. The ICE snatchers involved in this travesty must be fired and charged with child endangerment.
Video of the incident shows the protest did not become violent until the snatchers attacked the protesters. By doing so, ICE violated the protesters' First Amendment rights to protest peacefully. The snatcher who shot Rummler must be fired and charged with assault and attempted murder.
Fourteen years later, she fell in love with an American citizen, began the process of applying to be a legal permanent resident, and she and her husband got married. ICE detained her when she was returning from her honeymoon in the Virgin Islands. (The Virgin Islands are part of the United States, and Sakeik never left the country.) According to KERA News, "After arriving at a Miami airport, Sakeik said she was handcuffed for 16 hours without any food or water on the bus to a detention center in Florida. She was frequently denied the opportunity to call her husband or attorney." She spent five months in a detention center, and ICE attempted to illegally deport her to Israel, a country she's never been to. According to the Huffington Post, the prison "included unhygienic restrooms, rusted beds and insects that bit other detained migrants." Sakeik was never told why she'd been detained.
Showing great respect for the Bill of Rights, DHS Assistant Secretary (and Minister of Propaganda) Tricia McLaughlin claimed that "any claim that there is a lack of food or subprime conditions at ICE detention centers are false... Why does the media continue to fall for the sob stories of illegal aliens in detention and villainize ICE law enforcement?" Perhaps it's because ICE violated Sakeik's Fourth Amendment right to be secure in her person from unreasonable seizures; violated her Fifth Amendment rights by depriving her of liberty for five months without due process; violated her Sixth Amendment rights by detaining her without charges; and violated the Writ of Habeas Corpus. Moreover, DHS lied when they said Sakeik was an illegal alien, so why would anyone think they're telling the truth when they claimed -- in the same statement, no less -- that there are no inhumane conditions at the detention facilities?
Shaw subsequently learned that someone made a mistake on her immigration paperwork. The mistake doesn't appear to be her fault, and isn't supposed to result in detention. There aren't any mistakes on her son's paperwork, which means her son is being held illegally. ICE violated Shaw and her son's Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable seizures; their Fifth Amendments right to due process; their Sixth Amendment rights to confront the witnesses against her; and their Eighth Amendment rights against cruel and unusual punishment, i.e. being forced to watch the government put her innocent six-year-old son in prison. Shaw didn't know about the paperwork error that caused ICE to take her and her son into custody, and wasn't told about it until some time after they'd been detained. Her detention thus violated her Sixth Amendment right to know the nature of the charges against her and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. (It's illegal for the government to detain someone and then look for a reason later.) The ICE snatchers that abducted her and her child -- and everyone involved in their ongoing detention -- must be fired and prosecuted for kidnapping, child endangerment, false arrest, and false imprisonment.
Shaw and her son were released after three weeks in detention with no charges.
As usual, DHS Assistant Secretary (and Minister of Propaganda) Tricia McLaughlin blamed the detainee, even though ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States. DHS made the laughable claim that an unarmed woman assaulted 20 armed federal agents by pushing "her phone into agents' faces." Video of the incident does not support DHS's claims.
ICE violated Siemons' First Amendment right of free assembly, her Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable seizures, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
By detaining Sotelo-Casas based on charges for which there is no evidence, ICE violated his Sixth Amendment right to confront the witnesses against him, his Sixth Amendment right to a trial, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States. ICE violated Shouhed's Fourth Amendment rights to be secure against unreasonable searches and seizures; his Fifth Amendment right not to be deprived of his liberty without due process; his Sixth Amendment right to be notified of the charges against him; and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. The snatchers who attacked Shouhed must be fired and charged with assault, false arrest, and false imprisonment.
By assaulting a group of U.S. citizens engaged in a peaceful protest, ICE violated their First Amendment rights to free speech and freedom of peaceful assembly. The snatcher who attacked Ms. Stagi -- and the other snatchers on the scene -- must be fired and prosecuted for robbery and assault.
Stinton explained that he and 100 other men were held in a cell meant for 10, "like sardines all just stuck on [a] cold concrete floor." He continued: "It's not just criminals that are being taken. It's normal everyday people... I had a correct visa. I had all my paperwork together. I had a social security number. I paid my taxes. I've never been in trouble with the police before in my life." He explained how one of his cellmates with a heart condition spent days begging for his medication, and was never given it. The cellmate then had a heart attack.
The officials who arrested and detained Stinton violated his Fourth Amendment right to be secure against unreasonable seizures; his Fifth Amendment right to due process; his Sixth Amendment right to be informed of the accusations against him; and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. They also violated his Fourteenth Amendment right to equal protection of the laws. It's illegal to detain someone for "looking Mexican."
ICE illegally violated Professor Suri's Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendment rights, the Bill of Attainder clause, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
Without his father to take care of him, Wael's condition deteriorated rapidly, and he was hospitalized on Christmas Eve. His family and attorney begged DHS to release Maher so he could resume caring for his son -- or at least visit him in the hospital -- but DHS refused. Wael died a month later. Maher remains in custody and was not allowed to attend his son's funeral.
By detaining Maher for months without a trial and the opportunity to prove his innocence, DHS violated his Fifth Amendment right to due process, his Sixth Amendment right to confront the witnesses against him, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. They also broke the Eighth Amendment's ban on cruel and unusual punishment by keeping Maher behind bars when his son was dying.
Moreover, Wael was innocent. Over years of taking care of his son, Maher became an expert in his son's disease and treatment. By detaining the person who knew how to keep Wael alive and keeping him imprisoned without a trial, DHS violated Wael's Fifth Amendment right not to be deprived of his life without due process. They violated Constitution's spirit, if not the letter of the law.
ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States. It's not illegal for American citizens to taunt ICE snatchers. Rudeness -- as Donald Trump has personally demonstrated thousands of times -- is free speech. Bovino and the ICE snatchers acted illegally when they detained the American boys, however, violating the Fourth Amendment's ban on unreasonable searches and seizures. It appears that Bovino and other snatchers did not read the two boys their rights, thus violating the Sixth Amendment's requirement that the accused must be informed of the nature of the accusation. Since the two citizens were minors, Bovino and the other snatchers must be fired and charged with assault, false arrest, and kidnapping.
CBP violated Taylor's Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable seizures, his Fifth Amendment right not to be deprived of his liberty without due process; his Sixth Amendment right to be notified of the accusations against him; and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. By discriminating against him based on what State he lives in, CBP violated Taylor's Fourteeth Amendment right to equal protection. The CBP officers who knowingly detained an innocent American citizen must be fired and prosecuted for false imprisonment.
According to The Nation,
He is in constant pain, since his prosthetics rely on battery power for their flexibility. When the power runs down, he feels that his limbs are dragging huge, heavy, rigid objects. His stumps have chafed, since he is terrified of removing the braces, which hold in place his prosthetics, at night, fearful they will either be stolen or broken. He can only walk short distances, but the guards often won’t allow other inmates to go to the cafeteria for him and bring his meals back to his cell. And even when they do, the food, he said, “is horrible. It’s not good for you, and they feed you the same stuff every day.” When he has a medical issue and puts in a request for an appointment, it takes two weeks for the facility to even send him a reply.
According to his fiancee, deportation to Liberia would be a death sentence. "They don’t have that type of medical accommodation. There aren’t medical supports.”
ICE violated Taylor's Fifth Amendment right to due process, his Sixth Amendment right to trial, his right to confront the witnesses against him, his Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
The snatchers violated Thao's Fourth Amendment right to be secure in his home against unreasonable searches and seizures; his Fifth Amendment right not to be deprived of his property (the door of his house); his Sixth Amendment right to know the nature of the accusations against him; and his Eighth Amendment right to be free of cruel and unusual punishment. The ICE snatchers involved in this travesty must be fired and charged with assault, false arrest, false imprisonment, and destruction of property.
ICE violated Thomas' Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable seizures (he was in the country due to a medical emergency), his Fifth Amendment right to due process, and his Sixth Amendment right to an attorney. Anyone involved in keeping Thomas in prison instead of sending him to his home country must be fired.
DHS claims that the 55-year-old woman with gray hair assaulted a federal agent. This fits the usual ICE pattern of claiming innocent bystanders were violent. As usual, DHS' lies were contradicted by video. Tincher was finally released without charges -- which ICE wouldn't have done if they actually had a violent criminal in custody who had assaulted Federal agents.
ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States. By arresting Tincher when she was committing no crimes, they violated her First Amendment right to free assembly, her Fourth Amendment right to be secure against unreasonable seizures, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
Arnoldo Tiul Caal and his daughter Karla fled violence in Guatemala in 2020 and applied for asylum in the United States. They are legal residents until their 2027 court date.
In January 2026, Tiul had just dropped Karla (now 10) at school when ICE snatchers detained him. They told him to leave the United States either alone or with his daughter. Terrified of leaving the 10-year-old by herself, Tiul agreed to take her with him, an agreement his lawyer says was coerced. Instead of sending them back to Guatemala, though, Arnoldo and Karla were sent to a detention center in Texas -- over a thousand miles away from their home in Spokane, Washington. Though Karla is not opposed to returning to Guatemala, she speaks better English than Spanish and is more American than Guatemalan. Conditions in the prison are disgusting, where the food is moldy and worm-infested.
By detaining two legal residents -- one of whom is 10 years old -- ICE violated the Fourth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendments and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. Everyone at the ICE prison who's served moldy food to children -- or knew about it and did nothing, which is hard to believe -- must be fired and charged with child abuse, child endangerment, and false imprisonment.
In December, 2025, a snatcher posing as a construction worker knocked on Toledo-Martinez's door, claiming he'd hit his parked car and needed to exchange insurance information. Toledo-Martinez followed the snatcher onto sidewalk, and a second snatcher unleashed an attack dog. Toledo-Martinez was mauled and taken into custody, where he had to beg for medical treatment. At this writing he is still in detention.
DHS claims Toledo-Martinez is a hardened criminal, an assertion denied by his family -- and his U.S. Senator, who has advocated for his release.
The same thing happened to Jessica Brosche, a German tourist who was imprisoned for six weeks before she was allowed to go home. The Huffington Post continued: "On the Canadian border, a backpacker from Wales spent nearly three weeks at a detention center before flying home this week. And a Canadian woman on a work visa detained at the Tijuana border spent 12 days in detention before returning home last weekend."
ICE illegally violated the tourists' Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendment rights and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
V.M.L. is one of (at this writing) four known American children who have been illegally deported. Two of the children are severely ill and were deported to countries where they will likely have no access to medicine. If these children die, those involved could be guilty of criminally negligent homicide.
By detaining Vedam a second time for a crime he did not commit, ICE violated the double jeopardy clause of the Fifth Amendment.
Two weeks later, his children were allowed to leave the US and join their father in Mexico.
By arresting a legal resident and deporting him while his case was still pending, ICE violated Vasquez Meave's Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable seizures; his Fifth Amendment right to due process; his Sixth Amendment right to confront the witnesses against him; his Eighth Amendment right against cruel and unusual punishment (i.e. separation from his six minor children); and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
"Andrea had just been dropped off at work by her mom and her sister, when the pair witnessed masked federal agents grabbing her and taking Andrea in an unmarked car during an immigration raid. One video shows a masked agent lifting Andrea off the ground and carrying her away." According to her sister, "Just because of the color of our skin, they think that we’re criminals. My sister was there, so they were like, 'Oh, she looks Hispanic, so let’s take her, too.'"
Velez' lawyer told an interviewer more details.
"As she exited the vehicle, she walked three, four steps onto the sidewalk, and suddenly there was a swarm of vehicles surrounding her. So, as she’s kind of getting her bearings what’s going on, she sees vendors over to her right, and she assumes, 'OK, this must be - maybe it’s a raid. I don’t know.' She sees men approaching them. But she looks to her left, and she sees an ICE agent about 10 feet away, running full speed at her, and becomes terrified. She's 4'11". This is a man who, in her estimation, is over six feet. He’s masked. And he does not stop. So she becomes - she gets scared, and her reaction is to cover and block herself to protect herself, and she’s thrown to the ground.
"The ICE agent continues on for about another 10, 15 seconds to get their target, and then returns and tells her she's under arrest for what she describes as interfering. She gets put into a vehicle, a van, an unmarked van, and she's in handcuffs. And while she's waiting, she sees the [first] officer, so she walks over to the officer and asks if he would help her. She doesn't know who these men are. And that’s when you see the ICE agent pick her up and take her back to the unmarked van.
"She is being charged with... assault on a peace officer. So, the version of the story that the federal agent is putting forth is that Andrea Velez purposefully walked into his path in order to protect whoever their target was, and knocked that ICE agent off balance and hit him in the head. It's a complete fabrication.
"They were speaking to her in Spanish, even though she was demonstrating that she... could speak fluent English and that she was a U.S. citizen... I think it was a matter of 'Let’s see if she is a U.S. citizen. And if she is, then we’ll slap on these charges.' ... arrest now, ask questions later."
"I have privilege. I was medically retired, I'm a combat vet, I'm white, I'm middle class. If I can't advocate for people who need it, then who else is going to do it? Who else is going to stand up and speak truth to power?" Vermie told an interviewer.
While Vermie was in detention, his wife called an attorney, who went to the building where Vermie was being held. The lawyer waited there for three hours before he was able to talk with his client.
ICE has no jurisdiction over American citizens inside the United States. By detaining Vermie, they violated his First Amendment right to peaceful protest; his Fourth Amendment right to be secure from unreasonable seizures; his Sixth Amendment right to see a lawyer; and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
Vermie wasn't the only person who was illegally refused access to counsel. Several attorneys recounted similar stories where they showed up to meet with their clients and were denied access. One attorney recounted an ICE snatcher saying "we don't do attorney visitation" in so many words. Another snatcher said: "if we let you see your clients, we would have to let all the attorneys see their clients, and imagine the chaos."
A DHS spokesman told ABC News that the whole story is nonsense and anyone in detention can call a lawyer at any time. According to ABC, "The attorneys... work independently of one another" and didn't know the other attorneys had been interviewed.
ICE claims that Villegas-Gonzalez ran into one of the snatchers, who was injured, and both were taken to the hospital. The snatcher survived, but Villegas-Gonzalez did not. Video footage of the incident does not support ICE's claims about the snatcher's injury.
The ICE snatcher violated DHS written policy when he fired on the driver of a moving vehicle. ICE later said the victim had "a history of reckless driving." This wasn't true. Villegas-Gonzalez was never charged criminally with anything. The victim did plead guilty to a speeding violation... 12 years ago.
ICE violated Villegas-Gonzalez' Fifth Amendment right not to be deprived of his life without due process. The ICE snatchers involved in this fatal incident must be fired and charged with reckless discharge of a firearm -- a crime in Illinois. Since the ICE snatcher violated DHS policy, this could also qualify as manslaughter under Illinois law.
What will happen next depends on several unknown factors. For instance, if the ICE snatchers presented the victim with a warrant for his arrest, then Villegas-Gonzalez resisted a lawful arrest and the ICE snatchers are only guilty of reckless discharge of a firearm and possibly manslaughter. (The other people in the victim's car -- along with the agents themselves -- could testify about this. Moreover, if the agents possesed a warrant for Villegas-Gonzalez' arrest, there would be records of it.) However, if the ICE snatchers attempted to detain the victim with no probable cause and no warrant -- as other ICE snatchers have done on documented occasions -- then they are guilty of attempted kidnapping. If the ICE snatchers were breaking the law, Villegas-Gonzalez had no legal obligation to go with the kidnappers and had every right to flee. If anyone -- even people working for the Federal government -- attempted to kidnap someone illegally and shot him when he tried to escape, they are guilty of felony murder.
In a healthy democracy, government agents who abuse their power would be arrested, charged, given counsel, given a fair trial, convicted, and sentenced, just like any other citizen. At this writing, the names of the ICE snatchers involved in the wrongful death of Silverio Villegas-Gonzalez have not been released, and it's unlikely they will be charged with anything. (At this writing, only one ICE agent has ever been charged with breaking the law, and the charges were dismissed.)
If ICE snatchers -- who have a history of acting unlawfully -- can order anyone in America to "show me your papers," disappear anyone with no warrant and no probable cause, and shoot anyone who attempts to escape, they can do it to anyone. They can do it to you.
Vicens-Marquez later told an interviewer that ICE snatchers had been looking for someone else and grabbed him anyway. Though ICE claims Vicens-Marquez had been ordered to leave the country, Vicens-Marquez's attorney says that's nonsense.
Vicens-Marquez got lucky. Of the two other people detained at the same time, one was deported to Mexico, and the other was shipped to a prison in another state. Vicens-Marquez was kept close to home -- so his family, his attorney, his community, and even the Mayor got involved to work for his release. Vicens-Marquez was finally released after over a month in a private prison. Other detainees at that prison reported that there were days when they were never fed. He's still required to wear an ankle monitor -- even though he's never been charged with a crime.
By detaining Vicens-Marquez without a warrant, ICE snatchers violated the Writ of Habeas Corpus, his Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable seizures, and his Sixth Amendment right to confront the witnesses against him. The ICE snatchers who detaned him without a warrant must be fired and prosecuted for false arrest.
DHS denies that they separate families, but did not deny that Zheng and his son had been separated. By separating the father and the six-year-old child and then losing track of the boy for several days, ICE violated the Eighth Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishments. By arresting the two when they were complying with the law, ICE violated the Fourth Amendment's ban on unereasonable seizures. ICE also violated the Zhengs' Fifth Amendment right to due process, their Sixth Amendment right to confront the witnesses against them, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
ICE violated Zia's Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable seizures, his Sixth Amendment right to confront the witnesses against him, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
By keeping Zinkevych in prison with no warrant and no charges and denying him medical care, ICE violated his Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendment rights, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus.
His mother told reporters, "Children shouldn't be scared of going to school, and parents shouldn't be worried about dropping them off. We shouldn’t be going through this."
ICE violated the boy's Fourth Amendment rights to be free from unreasonable seizures, his Fourth Amendment right to see a warrant, and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. All the CPB agents involved in this fiasco must be fired and charged with attempted kidnapping and child endangerment.
DHS denies that any of this ever happened. Instead, they claim the boy was throwing eggs at a CPB officer and voluntarily confessed when he was detained. Then, despite CBP having an airtight case and a confession, they released him without charges. (Chicago's East Side is nowhere near a border, and in a functioning democracy, CBP wouldn't be running around downtown Chicago.)
A few days later, ICE released tear gas right outside an elementary school, spreading the gas toward the building when class was in session. All ICE personnel responsible for this must be fired and charged with child endangerment. According to The Intercept,
"The Trump administration claims that Chicago is unsafe and needs order, despite the fact that the city experienced its lowest homicide rate in 60 years this summer. But instead of investing in underfunded schools or attempting to eradicate poverty, which have been shown to increase public safety, the administration is pouring millions into the militarization of American cities and fighting a court battle to federalize the National Guard in Chicago.
"'I'm worried every day,” said [one teacher]. 'I'm worried that we'll have kids here waiting to be picked up and nobody will ever come for them, because we've seen it happen.'
"What makes it worse is that the money the administration is spending to deploy federal agents to patrol outside of elementary schools could genuinely make a difference in Chicago Public Schools."
Chicago has recently had to cut after-school programs -- band, for instance -- because of lack of funds. While our public schools are teetering on the edge of bankruptcy, the Republican-controlled Congress increased ICE's operating budget to three times the budget of the entire Chicago public school system -- spending taxpayer money on fake problems while ignoring real ones.
The landlord says that ICE broke into his home without a warrant, and that the tenants were in the country legally.
By smashing through the door of the landlord's house and doing other damage to the interior, ICE violated the family's Fourth Amendment right to be secure in their persons and houses; their Fifth Amendment right not to be deprived of their property (the doors on their home) without due process; and the Writ of Habeas Corpus. The ICE snatchers who held a family of American citizens at gunpoint must be fired and charged with breaking and entering, assault with a deadly weapon, and destruction of property.
In April, 2025, Trump wrote that "We cannot give everyone a trial, because to do so would take, without exaggeration, 200 years." He said that after firing eight immigration judges in an already overworked system. Trump is wrong. The Constitution isn't optional.
At the end of April, a judge blocked Trump's use of the Alien Enemies Act to deport Venezuelan immigrants on the grounds that we're not at war. Neither the nation of Venezuela nor any Venezuelan group is attempting to conquer the United States.
According to CBS News, in the first five months of Trump's second term, ICE detained 59,000 people -- not counting those who were later released. According to the Cato Institute, 65% of those detained are innocent, and only 7% of detainees are violent criminals. Those who do have criminal records were mostly convicted of... traffic violations. Disappearing people off the street without a warrant is not law enforcement. It's kidnapping. Detaining people without charges isn't law enforcement. It's false imprisonment. Everyone in the United States and El Salvador involved in the kidnapping and false imprisonment of innocent people must be brought to justice -- including Trump, who admitted he was illegally detaining and deporting people without trials. The people targeted by the DODO Trump Administration -- undocumented immigrants, legal residents, tourists, and American citizens -- were deprived of their Constitutional rights, including freedom of speech, the right to be secure from unreasonable seizures, the right to due process, the right to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation against them, the right to confront witnesses against them, the right to have the assistance of counsel, the right to trial, the right to be free from to cruel and unusual punishments, the Bill of Attainder clause (the government can't declare a person guilty without a trial) and the Writ of Habeas Corpus (the requirement that the government prove before a judge that a crime has been committed and that the police didn't arrest the wrong person.) As Ms. Mooney discovered, the ICE snatchers knew perfectly well that they were breaking the law and knew they were doing it routinely. Everyone involved in this DODO travesty must be charged, provided with counsel, tried, brought to justice, and treated humanely. They must be provided with the due process and Constitutional rights they denied their victims.
Non-citizens who are convicted of crimes should be deported to their country of origin -- if that's part of their sentence. Deporting legal residents who have complied with the law is illegal and unconstitutional.
If the DODO government can do this to legal residents who have committed no crime, they can do it to you. Trump has already said he wants to. If Presidents Clinton, Obama, or Biden had disappeared just one legal resident -- let alone over two hundred of them -- they would have been impeached immediately.
As of late July, 2025, 750 detainees are being held at the concentration camp. Only 233 of these have actually been convicted of any crimes. 250 are completely innocent; one is 15 years old. The other 267 either have minor traffic citations or made mistakes on their immigration paperwork.
Lindsey is a Florida prison guard who worked at the concentration camp for about a week. She told an interviewer that she and the other prison guards "had to use the porta-johns. We didn't have hot water half the time. Our bathrooms were backed up.” And that was for the guards.
Lindsey described the actual prison as “an oversized kennel. They have no sunlight. There's no clock in there. They don't even know what time of the day it is. They have no access to showers. They shower every other day or every four days. The bathrooms are backed up because you got so many people using them.” On rainy days, "water pours into the tents."
Lindsey caught COVID after a week there and had to isolate herself until she recovered. She was fired while she was sick, and still hasn't been paid.
If Presidents Clinton, Obama, or Biden had built a concentration camp and filled it with legal residents who have committed no crimes, they would have been impeached immediately. During his first term, Trump was impeached twice. The first time, he was caught trying to extort another country into framing his electoral opponent for a crime he didn't commit in an attempt to steal the 2020 election. The second time, Trump incited his supporters to attack Congress in an attempt to stay in power after having been voted out. Now Trump, Noem, and Rubio have ordered plainclothes ICE snatchers wearing masks to drive around the country in unmarked vehicles and disappear American citizens, legal residents, and tourists off the street with no warrants, no probable cause, no charges, and no due process, and lock them in a concentration camp. The fact that Congress thinks the first two offenses are impeachable and the third one is not boggles the mind.
In August, a judge ordered Alligator Alcatraz torn down over environmental concerns.
Though the concentration camp is being closed down, an investigation by the Miami Herald revealed that around 1,200 of the men sent there and then moved out have vanished. Reporters (and there families) were unable to determine whether the detainees had been moved to other prisons, had been deported, or were still in transit somewhere.
In November, 2025, a Chicago judge issued a 200-page opinion that found that DHS claims about protesters routinely contradicted video recorded by DHS agents' body cameras. For example: in September, 2025, ICE snatchers demanded protesters "move back" when protesters were standing 30 feet away. With no provocation, the snatchers then opened fire on the proters with pepper balls and tear gas. In October, 2025, a snatcher shoved a protester to the ground -- and the other snatchers opened fire on the other protesters with tear gas and pepper balls. The snatchers were never threatened, provoked, or in any danger at all. In another October incident, DHS claimed that ICE had used tear gas when a protester had thrown a bike at them. ICE's own video shows that ICE fired first and the ICE snatchers attacked the bicycle-riding protester, not the other way around.
In November, 2025, Trump announced that he was stripping 705 Somali refugees living in the United States of Temporary Protected Status, which would lead to them being deported back to their war-torn birth country. Declaring an entire group of people guilty without a trial is illegal under the Bill of Attainder clause.
Sign the petition to stop the DODO disappearances and mass deportations. The truth is, though, that signing petitions doesn't really do much. The way to stop this fascist travesty is to write your Representatives, your Senators, your State legislators, and your Governor and demand that they take all legal means to protect innocent Americans, legal residents, and tourists from ICE's abuses of power.
Pema Levy wrote in Mother Jones that Trump is following the "dual state" theory first used to describe Nazi Germany. Early in Hitler's dictatorship, there were two justice systems functioning at the same time. The first justice system existed before the Nazis came to power and continued to function normally for many ordinary white people. The second justice system -- where the dictator's power was absolute and the accused were denied any legal human rights -- was used for minorities and anyone who stood up to Hitler. The Nazis used this "dual state" scheme to argue that everything was normal and that most people would continue their lives as they had before.
"Life in the early months of Trump’s second presidency hews to this framework in important respects. How else to explain that most people enjoy a sense of normalcy while, for example, foreign students like Rümeysa Öztürk and green card holders like Mahmoud Khalil can be detained for their speech. Americans and immigrants alike can be terrorized by ICE, the federal government’s unleashed immigration force, if they speak Spanish, look nonwhite, or happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. The administration is sinking Venezuelan vessels and executing the civilians on board without any legal authorization—killings that look like war crimes or murder. The government demanded that Disney fire comedian Jimmy Kimmel as if the First Amendment didn’t exist."
Eventually, the facade of the pre-Nazi justice system was abandoned, and human rights disappeared for everyone.
Legacy Links: [But Today, I Confess: Political Satire in Verse] | [Obamawatch] | [The Legacy of George W. Bush]