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Judge Rules ICE Cannot Retaliate Against Minnesota Protesters
"This is an important preliminary win for all Minnesotans exercising their constitutional right to peaceful protest and witness," state Attorney General Keith Ellison said.
Jan 17, 2026
Federal officers cannot retaliate against, detain, or attack people who are peacefully protesting and observing immigration enforcement operations in the Minneapolis area, a federal judge ruled on Friday.
The ruling comes a little more than a week after Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent Jonathan Ross shot and killed legal observer Renee Nicole Good, supercharging protests against an immigration enforcement operation in the Twin Cities that the Department of Homeland Security claims is its largest ever.
"This is an important preliminary win for all Minnesotans exercising their constitutional right to peaceful protest and witness," Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison wrote on social media in response to the ruling. "Thanks and congratulations to the ACLU and the plaintiffs for standing strong for this bedrock principle."
The ruling was issued by Biden appointee and US District Judge Kate Menendez, who is based in Minneapolis. It restricts federal officers involved in "Operation Metro Surge"—an immigration-enforcement blitz in the Minneapolis area—from retaliating against, arresting or detaining, or targeting with nonlethal munitions such as pepper spray anyone "engaging in peaceful and unobstructive protest activity," including observing ICE operations.
"We are relieved that in Tincher v. Noem et al. the court has issued a preliminary injunction. The ACLU-MN is hopeful that it will prevent further First Amendment violations like the ones that have been harming Minnesotans since the start of 'Operation Metro Surge.'"
Menendez further stipulated that people could not be detained for following ICE and other immigration enforcers with their vehicles if they were not interfering with the agents.
"The act of safely following Covered Federal Agents at an appropriate distance does not, by itself, create reasonable suspicion to justify a vehicle stop," Menendez said.
The ruling is a preliminary injunction in response to Tincher v. Noem et al., a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota (ACLU-MN) in December 2025 on behalf of six community members who said their constitutional rights were violated by ICE in response to their protests.
Plaintiff Susan Tincher, for example, wrote that she was arrested merely for driving to the place where an ICE operation was taking place.
“I was on a public street,” Tincher in a statement. “I did not cross any lines. I did not interfere with anything. I did not disobey an order. I asked a single question–‘are you ICE?’–and almost immediately, officers rushed me, grabbed me, and slammed me face-first into the snow.”
Since the lawsuit was filed, ICE activity in the Twin Cities continued to escalate, culminating with an influx of 2,000 agents on January 6 and the shooting of Good the next day.
On January 8, the day after Good's murder, the plaintiffs' lawyers sent an emergency letter to the judge urging action.
"Thousands of peaceful observers and protesters turned out in the streets of the Twin Cities in the wake of Ms. Good’s murder," the letter reads in part. "Peaceful observers and protesters turned out again today, they will turn out again tomorrow, and they will continue turning out every day until Operation Metro Surge is over. These Minnesotans who are peacefully exercising their core constitutional rights to speak and gather continue to be met with unconstitutional and terrifying violence at the hands of federal agents on a daily basis, including unwarranted pepper spraying and unfounded arrests... And things appear to be getting worse, not better: Even more federal agents are being deployed to Minnesota at this very moment."
The ACLU-MN applauded the fact that Menendez had moved to restrain ICE.
"We are relieved that in Tincher v. Noem et al. the court has issued a preliminary injunction. The ACLU-MN is hopeful that it will prevent further First Amendment violations like the ones that have been harming Minnesotans since the start of 'Operation Metro Surge,'" the group wrote on social media.
Beyond Good's killing, the ruling follows several other high-profile incidents of ICE violence in Minnesota, including a nonlethal shooting of a man at a traffic stop and the hospitalization of three children after ICE tear-gassed the van they were driving in.
Menendez's decision came the same day that news broke that President Donald Trump's Department of Justice was investigating local leaders who had criticized ICE activity, including Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey.
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'We Are All DC': Tens of Thousands March to White House
D.C.rallies against Trump’s troops as more cities targeted
Sep 06, 2025
The heart of Washington, D.C., pulsed with defiance on Saturday as tens of thousands of demonstrators surged down 16th Street toward the White House. It was the city’s first major organized protest since President Donald Trump declared a state of emergency and unleashed federal troops onto its streets. Banners waved and voices rose in unison at the “We Are All D.C.” march, a massive show of resistance led by a coalition that included Free DC, defenders of local self-rule, Democracy Forward, and the American Civil Liberties Union. Their message was clear: the federal occupation of the capital must end.
People participate in the "We Are All DC" national march in solidarity with DC communities and calling for an end to the deployment of National Guard troops in Washington, DC, on September 6, 2025.(Photo by AMID FARAHI/AFP via Getty Images)
“Today, in defense of the people and communities living under a military takeover of DC, we join in sending a clear and peaceful message: the American people will not bow to dictators. We are in solidarity with our neighbors and Black, Brown, immigrant, and other communities targeted. We will march, we will resist, and we will peacefully protest,” Democracy Forward wrote in a statement on X.
Thousands march to the White House united in our demand. We want federal forces out of DC Now!! Free DC! Free DC! #WeAreAllDC #FreeDC
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— Free DC (@freedcproject.bsky.social) September 6, 2025 at 1:07 PM
With Trump vowing crackdowns in other Democratic-led cities as well, he appeared to threaten Chicago with migrant deportations in a social media post with an image that parodied the 1979 Vietnam war movie "Apocalypse Now."
“I love the smell of deportations in the morning,” Trump said, converting a line about napalm in the Vietnam War to refer to deportations. “Chicago about to find out why it’s called the Department of WAR.”
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Trump-Appointed Judges Quash Contempt of Court Case Against White House
Judge Cornelia Pillard, who was appointed by former President Barack Obama, dissented and described the other two judges' ruling as a "grave disservice."
Aug 08, 2025
Two judges appointed by U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday at least temporarily shut down a bid by U.S. District Judge James Boasberg to potentially hold members of the Trump administration in contempt of court.
Politico reported that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit voted in a 2-1 ruling to quash contempt proceedings that Boasberg initiated against the Trump administration after he found there was probable cause to believe officials had defied his orders by sending 130 Venezuelan immigrants to be detained at El Salvador's Terrorism Confinement Center.
Judges Gregory Katsas and Neomi Rao, both of whom were appointed by Trump, ruled in favor of shutting down the hearings. Judge Cornelia Pillard, who was appointed by former President Barack Obama, dissented and described the other two judges' ruling as a "grave disservice" to Boasberg.
Politico noted that the ruling does not totally shut the door on Boasberg holding administration officials in contempt.
Among other things, the full 11-member bench of the D.C. Circuit could decide to take up the case and overrule the three-judge panel. Additionally, Judge Rao stopped short of saying that her ruling completely foreclosed upon the possibility that Boasberg could initiate criminal contempt proceedings against members of the administration.
In an interview with Politico, ACLU attorney Lee Gelernt signaled that an appeal of some kind was forthcoming.
"We strongly disagree with the ruling and are considering all options going forward," Gelernt said. "The opinion brushes aside the considerable evidence that has emerged that DOJ's lawyers understood the order at the time and simply ignored it."
The possible contempt of court charges stemmed from a ruling that Boasberg delivered back in March demanding that the administration halt and return the group of Venezuelan immigrants who were sent to El Salvador. The men were sent to the prison regardless and administration officials argued that they had no jurisdiction to order their return because the plane they were on had already left American airspace at the time of Boasberg's ruling.
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'Deadly Shadow Prison': Inmates, ACLU Sue Trump Admin for Denying Due Process at 'Alligator Alcatraz'
"What's happening here is not just a policy failure, it's a moral one," said the executive director for the ACLU of Florida. "This is how rights are erased."
Jul 17, 2025
Detainees at "Alligator Alcatraz" are suing the Trump administration for subjecting them to inhumane conditions at the prison without due process.
The class action suit, brought Wednesday with the help of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and other immigrant rights groups, challenges the government's refusal to let detainees speak with lawyers and file legal documents needed to petition for their release.
Inmates in the Everglades detention facility have detailed horrific conditions, including crushing heat, incessant mosquito presence, tainted food, cramped conditions, and a lack of access to water and basic sanitation.
After visiting the detention center over the weekend, some Democratic lawmakers described it as an "internment camp," where as many as 32 inmates apiece were crammed into small cages beneath a single tent.
The majority of the roughly 1,000 people detained there, according to the Miami Herald and Tampa Bay Times, have not been convicted of criminal offenses, while over a third have not even been charged.
"This facility opens another dark chapter in our nation's history. Its very existence is predicated on our country's basest impulses and shows the danger of unchecked governmental authority when combined with unbridled hate. It represents an attack on common decency, and in this case, its treatment of detained people is also unlawful," said Eunice Cho, senior counsel with the ACLU's National Prison Project and the lead attorney in the case.
According to the complaint, multiple attorneys have arrived at the detention center to meet with their clients, only to be turned away by armed police and members of the Florida National Guard. The attorneys were later told no in-person meetings would be allowed. They have additionally been given no information about how to communicate with their clients over the phone or virtually.
"The U.S. Constitution does not allow the government to simply lock people away without any ability to communicate with counsel or to petition the court for release from custody. The government may not trample on these most fundamental protections for people held in its custody," Cho said.
The plaintiffs argue this violates the First and Fifth Amendment rights of those being detained, as well as the First Amendment rights of the attorneys.
"What's happening here is not just a policy failure, it's a moral one," said Bacardi Jackson, executive director of the ACLU of Florida. "The state has hastily erected a costly and deadly shadow prison in the middle of the Everglades during hurricane season to warehouse human beings—stripping them of due process and dignity, cutting them off from their families and legal counsel, intentionally putting their lives in danger, and leaving them to suffer in silence. This is how rights are erased."
The Trump administration is seeking to replicate "Alligator Alcatraz" all around the country. As The New Republic reports, the budget megabill signed by the president earlier this month contains $3.5 billion for "eligible states" to use for the "temporary detention of aliens."
In a Fox News interview earlier this month, Stephen Miller, the architect of Trump's "mass deportation" crusade, called on Republican governors to use this fund to build their own immigrant detention camps.
"We want every governor of a red state, and if you are watching tonight: Pick up the phone, call [the Department of Homeland Security], work with us to build facilities in your state," Miller said.
"No amount of armed guards or government spin can shield this facility from legal scrutiny," Jackson said Wednesday. "We will use every tool at our disposal to end this cruel experiment and defend the rights of every person trapped inside of this unconstitutional abomination."
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Rights Defenders Denounce Trump-DeSantis Alligator Alcatraz as 'Direct Assault on Humanity'
"This facility echoes some of our nation's darkest history," said a civil liberties advocate.
Jul 02, 2025
Civil liberties advocates expressed horror on Tuesday after President Donald Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis held a joint press event at a massive new detention facility in the Florida Everglades known as "Alligator Alcatraz."
The facility was first announced last month when Republican Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier unveiled a plan to renovate the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport and transform it into a mass detention center for immigrants. During a press event touting the new facility, DeSantis boasted that detainees being held at the facility had little hope of ever escaping given that it was surrounded by miles of alligator-infested swamps.
"What'll happen is you'll bring people in there, they ain't going anywhere once they're there unless you want them to go somewhere, because, good luck getting to civilization," he explained. "So the security is amazing—natural and otherwise."
Civil liberties advocates were appalled by the new facility, which is lined with razor-wire fence and is projected at least initially to house 5,000 beds for immigrants awaiting deportation. Bacardi Jackson, the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Florida, accused Trump and DeSantis of engaging in wanton cruelty with their touting of the new facility and said it harkened back to dark chapters in American history.
"Building a prison-like facility on sacred indigenous land in the middle of the Everglades is a direct assault on humanity, dignity, indigenous sovereignty, and the constitutional protections we all share," she said. “Our laws—both U.S. and Florida—prohibit cruel and unusual punishment. Yet, this facility echoes some of our nation's darkest history, all while trampling the very land that indigenous communities have long fought to protect."
She added that "the facility's opening also comes as Congress is poised to authorize $45 billion in funding to expand the harmful mass immigration detention machine, right on the heels of multiple deaths in detention facilities" and further said that the project "dehumanizes people, strips them of their rights, and diverts public dollars from the services our communities need."
Guardian correspondent Robert Tait, meanwhile, described the press event surrounding the facility's opening as a "calculatedly provocative celebration of the dystopian" in a place that was designed to be "a location of dread to those lacking documentary proof of their right to be in the U.S."
Former CNN anchor Jim Acosta delivered an even more scathing denunciation of the facility on his Substack page, labeling it a "gulag in the swamp" that was intended to distract Trump supporters from the Republican Party's efforts to take an axe to Medicaid spending in their budget bill.
"Trump knows he can salvage a bad news cycle in conservative media if he can find new and, in this case, medieval ways to torment immigrants," Acosta explained. "Distract the base from Medicaid coverage they're going to lose or the skyrocketing deficits plaguing future generations by conjuring up the fantasy of terrified migrants being eaten by alligators—a prospect that seemed to delight Trump when speaking with reporters Tuesday morning."
Amid growing condemnation of the facility, Trump adviser Stephen Miller encouraged other states to pitch their own ideas for migrant detention facilities during a Tuesday night Fox News appearance. What's more, Miller said that accepted proposals from states would receive funding from the very same GOP budget bill that is projected to slash Medicaid spending by over $1 trillion over a 10-year period.
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Judge: Trump Admin Can't Hold or Deport Mahmoud Khalil 'On Rubio's Say-So'
"This is the news we've been waiting over three months for. Mahmoud must be released immediately and safely returned home to New York to be with me and our newborn baby, Deen," his wife, Noor Abdalla, said.
Jun 11, 2025
The Trump administration cannot detain or deport former Columbia University student and Palestinian solidarity advocate Mahmoud Khalil over the claim that he poses a threat to U.S. foreign policy, a federal judge ruled on Wednesday.
"The court finds as a matter of fact that [Khalil's] career and reputation are being damaged and his speech is being chilled—and this adds up to irreparable harm," U.S. District Judge Michael Farbiarz of New Jersey wrote in his preliminary injunction.
While judges have ordered the release of other noncitizen student protesters detained by the Trump administration, the ruling marks the first from a federal court to state that the administration cannot deport or detain noncitizens by arguing they pose a threat to foreign policy under the Immigration and Nationality Act, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of New York said in a statement.
"Today's ruling is a huge win for the Constitution and the rights of citizens and noncitizens alike."
"This is the news we've been waiting over three months for. Mahmoud must be released immediately and safely returned home to New York to be with me and our newborn baby, Deen," Noor Abdalla, Khalil's wife, said in response. "True justice would mean Mahmoud was never taken away from us in the first place, that no Palestinian father, from New York to Gaza, would have to endure the painful separation of prison walls like Mahmoud has."
Khalil, a green card holder married to a U.S. citizen, has been held in a detention facility in Louisiana since he was seized by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents from his New York City home in early March, missing the birth of his son. He has not been charged with any crime.
Instead, Secretary of State Marco Rubio argued that Khalil's participation in student Palestine solidarity protests threatened U.S. foreign policy interests, citing Section 1227 of the U.S. Code.
Farbriarz determined late last month that Rubio's argument was "likely" unconstitutional, but stopped short of granting Khalil a preliminary injunction releasing him from detention. Since then, Khalil's legal team filed new evidence detailing the "irreparable harm" he has experienced due to his detention.
"We are relieved that the court documented what was obvious to the world, which is that the government's vindictive and unconstitutional arrest, detention, and attempted deportation of Mahmoud for his Palestinian activism is causing him and his family agonizing personal and professional harm," said Baher Azmy, legal director of the Center for Constitutional Rights—one of the organizations involved in Khalil's defense. "We look forward to his reunion with his wife and newborn son, and for this remarkable, brilliant man to reclaim his life and his reputation."
Brett Max Kaufman, a member of Khalil's legal team and senior counsel in the ACLU's Center for Democracy, said: "Today's ruling is a huge win for the Constitution and the rights of citizens and noncitizens alike. No one should be imprisoned or deported for their political beliefs, and the three months that Mahmoud has spent in detention are an affront to the freedoms that this country is supposed to stand for."
Fellow legal team member Ramzi Kassem, the co-founder and director of CLEAR, said, "This vindicates what Mahmoud has maintained since day one—that the government cannot detain or deport him based on Rubio's say-so."
Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said: "We welcome this ruling as yet another example of our nation's judicial system pushing back against the Trump administration's unconstitutional effort to silence all those who speak out against Israel's genocide in Gaza, and against our government's unconscionable complicity with that genocide. Mahmoud Khalil's unlawful and cruel detention deprived him of his liberty and of being with his wife when she gave birth to their first child. This government's war on First Amendment rights must be challenged by all Americans who value free speech and the Constitution."
Yet while Farbiarz's injunction offers hope to Khalil and his supporters, it does not yet guarantee Khalil's freedom. Farbiarz gave the administration until 9:30 am Friday morning to appeal the ruling, after which time it would take effect.
There is a potential opening for the administration to continue to fight Khalil's release.
As Farbiarz noted, the Trump administration also alleges that Khalil falsified his green card application by omitting his previous work at the Syria Office at the British Embassy in Beirut and with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees. However, the judge argued that it was unlikely that this was the underlying cause for Khalil's detention.
"The evidence is that lawful permanent residents are virtually never detained pending removal for the sort of alleged omissions in a lawful-permanent-resident application that the petitioner is charged with here. And that strongly suggests that it is the secretary of state's determination that drives the petitioner's ongoing detention—not the other charge," Farbiaz wrote in granting the injunction.
Still, The New York Times reported that it was "not clear that [Khalil] would be released on Friday if the government were to argue that those allegations were, in fact, the reason for his detention."
Khalil's legal team and family vowed to keep working for his release.
"Today was the first step to justice, but we will not stop fighting until Mahmoud is home with his wife and child," Dratel & Lewis associate Amy Greer said.
Noor Abdalla concluded, "I will not rest until Mahmoud is free, and hope that he can be with us to experience his first Father's Day at home in New York with Deen in his arms."
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'A Declaration of War': Trump Sends National Guard to LA Over Anti-ICE Protests
"The Trump administration's baseless deployment of the National Guard is plainly retaliation against California, a stronghold for immigrant communities," one advocate said.
Jun 08, 2025
U.S. President Donald Trump deployed 2,000 National Guard members in response to protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity in Los Angeles over the weekend, as Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth threatened to call in the marines.
The protests kicked off on Friday in opposition to ICE raids of retail establishments around Los Angeles. During Friday's protests David Huerta, president of SEIU California and SEIU-United Service Workers West, was injured and then arrested while observing a raid. His arrest sparked further protests, which carried over into Saturday in response to apparent ICE activity in the nearby city of Paramount.
"The Trump administration's baseless deployment of the National Guard is plainly retaliation against California, a stronghold for immigrant communities, and is akin to a declaration of war on all Californians," Victor Leung, chief legal and advocacy officer at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Foundation of Southern California, said in a statement.
"They yell 'invasion' at the border—but this is the real one: Trump is seizing control of California's National Guard and forcing 2,000 troops into our streets."
Saturday's most dramatic protest occurred outside a Home Depot in Paramount following rumors of an ICE raid there. However, Paramount Mayor Peggy Lemons told the Los Angeles Times that the ICE agents may instead have been staging at a nearby Department of Homeland Security (DHS) office. There were also rumors of an ICE raid on a meatpacking plant that never occurred.
"We don't know what was happening, or what their target was. To think that there would be no heightening of fear and no consequences from the community doesn't sound like good preparation to me," Lemons said. "Above all, there is no communication and things are done on a whim. And that creates chaos and fear."
According to the LA Times, the Home Depot protests began peacefully until officers lobbed flash-bang grenades and pepper balls at the crowd, after which some individuals responded by throwing rocks and other objects at the ICE cars, and one person drove their vehicle toward the ICE agents.
"Many of the protesters did not appear to engage in these tactics," the LA Times reported.
In another incident, Lindsay Toczylowski, the chief executive of Immigrant Defenders Law Center, wrote on social media that ICE agents threw a tear-gas canister at two of the center's female attorneys after they asked the agents if they could see a warrant and observe their activities.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California said that over a dozen people were arrested on Saturday for interfering with the work of immigration agents.
The first member of the Trump administration to mention sending in the National Guard was White House border czar Tom Homan, who told Fox News, "We're gonna bring National Guard in tonight and we're gonna continue doing our job. This is about enforcing the law."
Trump then signed a memo Saturday night calling members of the California National Guard into federal service to protect ICE and other government officials.
"To the extent that protests or acts of violence directly inhibit the execution of the laws, they constitute a form of rebellion against the authority of the Government of the United States," the memo reads in part.
"The only threat to safety today is the masked goon squads that the administration has deployed to terrorize the communities of Los Angeles County."
Instead of using the Insurrection Act, as some had speculated he might, Trump federalized the guard members under the president's Title 10 authority, which allows the president to place the National Guard under federal control given certain conditions, but does not allow those troops to carry out domestic law enforcement activities, which invoking the Insurrection Act would enable.
"On its face, then, the memorandum federalizes 2,000 California National Guard troops for the sole purpose of protecting the relevant DHS personnel against attacks," Georgetown University Law Center professor Steve Vladeck explained in a blog post Saturday. "That's a significant (and, in my view, unnecessary) escalation of events in a context in which no local or state authorities have requested such federal assistance. But by itself, this is not the mass deployment of troops into U.S. cities that had been rumored for some time."
Indeed, several state leaders spoke out against the deployment.
"The federal government is moving to take over the California National Guard and deploy 2,000 soldiers," California Gov. Gavin Newsom wrote on social media Saturday. "That move is purposefully inflammatory and will only escalate tensions. LA authorities are able to access law enforcement assistance at a moment's notice. We are in close coordination with the city and county, and there is currently no unmet need."
"The Guard has been admirably serving LA throughout recovery," he continued, referring to the devastating wildfires that swept the city early this year. "This is the wrong mission and will erode public trust."
Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) posted on social media that he "couldn't agree more."
"Using the National Guard this way is a completely inappropriate and misguided mission," Padilla said. "The Trump administration is just sowing more chaos and division in our communities."
Rep. Norma Torres (D-Calif.) added, "They yell 'invasion' at the border—but this is the real one: Trump is seizing control of California's National Guard and forcing 2,000 troops into our streets."
While the National Guard's mission is currently limited, Vladeck argued that there were three reasons to be "deeply concerned" about the development. First, troops could still respond to real or perceived threats with violence, escalating the situation; second, escalation may be the desired outcome from the Trump administration, and used as a pretext to invoke the Insurrection Act after all; and third, this could depress the morale of both National Guard members and the civilians they engage with while degrading the relationships between federal, local, and state authorities.
"There is something deeply pernicious about invoking any of these authorities except in circumstances in which their necessity is a matter of consensus beyond the president's political supporters," Vladeck wrote. "The law may well allow President Trump to do what he did Saturday night. But just because something is legal does not mean that it is wise—for the present or future of our Republic."
Leung of the ACLU criticized both the ICE raids and the decision to deploy the Guard.
"Workers in our garment districts or day laborers seeking work outside of Home Depot do not undermine public safety," Leung said. "They are our fathers and mothers and neighbors going about their day and making ends meet. Rather, the only threat to safety today is the masked goon squads that the administration has deployed to terrorize the communities of Los Angeles County."
He continued: "There is no rational reason to deploy the National Guard on Angelenos, who are rightfully outraged by the federal government's attack on our communities and justly exercising their First Amendment right to protest the violent separation of our families. We intend to file suit and hold this administration accountable and to protect our communities from further attacks."
National political leaders also spoke out Sunday morning.
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) wrote on social media that it was "important to remember that Trump isn't trying to heal or keep the peace. He is looking to inflame and divide. His movement doesn't believe in democracy or protest—and if they get a chance to end the rule of law they will take it. None of this is on the level."
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) posted that the entire incident was "Trump's authoritarianism in real time."
Meanwhile, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth threatened further escalation Saturday night when he tweeted that "if violence continues, active duty Marines at Camp Pendleton will also be mobilized—they are on high alert."
Newsom responded: "The Secretary of Defense is now threatening to deploy active-duty Marines on American soil against its own citizens. This is deranged behavior."
"This is an abuse of power and what dictators do. It's unnecessary and not needed."
Hegseth then doubled down on the threat Sunday morning, replying on social media that it was "deranged" to allow "your city to burn and law enforcement to be attacked."
"The National Guard, and Marines if need be, stand with ICE," he posted.
Journalist Ryan Grim noted that it was an "ominous development" for the secretary of defense to be commenting on immigration policy or local law enforcement at all.
Rep. Nanette Barragán (D-Calif.) said of Trump and Hegseth's escalations: "This is an abuse of power and what dictators do. It's unnecessary and not needed."
Writing on his Truth Social platform early Sunday, Trump praised the National Guard for their work in Los Angeles. Yet local and state leaders pointed out that the Guard had not yet arrived in the city by the time the post was made.
As of Sunday morning, the National Guard had arrived in downtown Los Angeles and Paramount, ABC 7 reported.
In the midst of the uproar over Trump's actions, labor groups continued to decry the ICE raids and call for the release of Huerta.
National Nurses United wrote on Friday: "With these raids, the government is sowing intense fear for personal safety among our immigrant and migrant community. Nurses and other union workers oppose this, and are standing up in solidarity with fellow immigrant workers. We refuse to be silent, and people like David Huerta are bravely putting their own bodies on the line to bear witness to what ICE is doing. It's appalling that ICE injured and detained him while he was exercising his First Amendment rights. We demand his immediate release."
AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler and AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Fred Redmond said in a statement Saturday:
The nearly 15 million working people of the AFL-CIO and our affiliated unions demand the immediate release of California Federation of Labor Unions Vice President and SEIU California and SEIU-USWW President David Huerta. As the Trump administration's mass deportation agenda has unnecessarily targeted our hard-working immigrant brothers and sisters, David was exercising his constitutional rights and conducting legal observation of ICE activity in his community. He was doing what he has always done, and what we do in unions: putting solidarity into practice and defending our fellow workers. In response, ICE agents violently arrested him, physically injuring David in the process, and are continuing to detain him—a violation of David's civil liberties and the freedoms this country holds dear. The labor movement stands with David, and we will continue to demand justice for our union brother until he is released.
The unrest in Los Angeles may continue as Barragán told CNN on Sunday she had been informed that ICE would be present in LA for a month. She argued that the National Guard deployment would only inflame the conflict.
“We haven't asked for the help. We don't need the help. This is [President Trump] escalating it, causing tensions to rise. It's only going to make things worse in a situation where people are already angry over immigration enforcement."
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'Chilling and Unprecedented': Trump Memo Threatens Law Firms That Cross His Administration
"Good lawyers, regardless of ideology or party, will remain undeterred in the honorable pursuit of our profession," wrote the national legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union.
Mar 23, 2025
Legal advocacy groups have issued a sharp rebuke to a directive from U.S. President Donald Trump that was unveiled on Friday and which aims to hold "accountable" law firms and lawyers that, according to him, "engage in frivolous, unreasonable, and vexatious litigation against the United States."
"Accountability is especially important when misconduct by lawyers and law firms threatens our national security, homeland security, public safety, or election integrity," Trump wrote in a memorandum to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi and U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, which was issued late Friday. Trump directed Bondi to "seek sanctions against attorneys and law firms" who engage in objectionable litigation, and scrutinize litigation against the government stretching back over the past eight years.
The new directive is a widening of Trump's campaign against lawyers and law firms he does not like. Reuters reported Saturday that the Trump administration has been hit with over 100 legal challenges, taking aim at various White House actions.
Multiple legal groups denounced the move, saying they would not be intimidated.
Nancy Northup, president and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights, wrote on Sunday that for over 30 years her organization "has stood strong against attacks on reproductive freedom. We have litigated scores of cases in federal courts, including against the U.S. government, regardless of the political party in power."
"We will not back down in the face of the president's intimidation campaign—not while his administration refuses to defend women who are denied emergency abortion care; not while it condones violence at abortion clinics; and not while doctors are under threat of criminal prosecution for providing essential care. Not now and not ever," she continued.
Cecillia Wang, national legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), echoed this sentiment in a statement released on Saturday.
"This action by the president of the United States is a chilling and unprecedented attack on the foundations of liberty and democracy. Good lawyers, regardless of ideology or party, will remain undeterred in the honorable pursuit of our profession. We will continue to stand up for the people and the rule of law," Wang wrote.
Trump specifically called out lawyers working in the immigration space. "The immigration system... is likewise replete with examples of unscrupulous behavior by attorneys and law firms. For instance, the immigration bar, and powerful Big Law pro bono practices, frequently coach clients to conceal their past or lie about their circumstances when asserting their asylum claims," he wrote.
Kelli Stump, the president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA), and the group's executive director Ben Johnson, pushed back on Trump's claims.
"The broad assertion that immigration attorneys are acting improperly in their efforts to represent individuals against an increasingly complex and restrictive immigration system is both unfounded and dangerous," they wrote in a statement on Saturday.
The memo also name drops Marc Elias, a prominent attorney who has worked for multiple major Democratic political campaigns.
Skye Perrymen, the CEO and president of the legal group Democracy Forward—where Elias serves as board chair—said in a statement on Saturday that "the ongoing threats to the legal profession and the rule of law by the president are intended to intimidate and inspire fear, but instead they should inspire action."
"The president's increasing targeting of lawyers, the legal profession, and judges is in response to a number of instances where communities across the nation have had to go to federal court to protect their rights from this administration's overreach and where judges nominated by both Republican and Democratic presidents and confirmed by the U.S. Senate have found that the Trump-Vance administration's actions warrant scrutiny and, in many cases, are unlawful," added Perrymen.
Democracy Forward, the ACLU, and AILA have all brought cases challenging Trump administration actions.
The order comes at the end of a rocky week for the field of law. On Thursday, one of the country's top law firms, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP, brokered a deal with the White House in order to spare the firm from an executive order that suspended security clearances for lawyers and staff.
As part of the deal, according to a post from Trump on social media, the firm "will dedicate the equivalent of $40 million in pro bono legal services over the course of President Trump's term to support the administration's initiatives, including: assisting our nation's veterans, fairness in the justice system, the president's Task Force to Combat Antisemitism, and other mutually agreed projects."
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Violence Against Guantánamo Detainees, Again
Immigrant prisoners are isolated and mistreated in what a post-9/11 lawyer called a "lawless enclave."
Mar 05, 2025
Just weeks after the Trump administration began sending immigration detainees to Guantánamo, the detainees report windowless solitary confinement for up to 23-hours-a-day; denial of drinking water as a form of punishment or retaliation; verbal and psychological abuse, including guards "threatening to shoot detainees"; and "never [being] permitted to contact family members."
These allegations are from a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) on March 1 to prevent new transfers to the offshore prison. The mistreatment is not surprising.
In 1991, U.S. military personnel dressed in riot gear and carrying "rifles with fixed bayonets" attacked Haitian asylum-seekers at Guantánamo—while the Haitians were sleeping.
ICE detention has long aspired to the lawlessness which Guantánamo makes possible.
That's according to an official military history of the detention of thousands of Haitians at the U.S. Naval Station in Cuba. Some of the Haitians had protested delays in their cases, as well as their mistreatment in U.S. custody, after fleeing U.S.-sponsored political violence in their country.
"The stunned migrants offered no resistance," writes the Marine Corps historian in his account of this "humanitarian mission."
In 1993, an American soldier at Guantánamo was angered when a Haitian child urinated in the dirt. The soldier "took the little boy's hand and rubbed it in the urine and mud, and then wiped it in his face and in his mouth," according to a fellow service member who later spoke to documentary filmmakers about his refusal to violently suppress nonviolent protests (see Crowing Rooster Arts, Guantánamo Notes, at 21:29).
In 1995, Haitian children unaccompanied by adults reported being "cracked" by U.S. military guards at Guantánamo: "their hands cuffed behind their back, their feet cuffed and then stepped on... The cuffings often occur[ed] in conjunction with other punishments, such as... being forced to kneel for hours on hot cement or beds of ants," according to the newspaper Haïti Progres.
After a 15-year-old Haitian girl threw food on another girl's bed, American soldiers handcuffed her to a cot in solitary confinement for a day-and-a-half, the girl told a visiting attorney. (You can read more about those imprisoned Haitian children in this pamphlet, published as part of "Ghosts of Guantánamo," a 1995 exhibit in Miami Beach organized to bring attention to those children in a time before social media.)
A brigadier general who acknowledged these incidents said they were not "abuse" but merely the result of "poor judgment and improper disciplinary techniques." A press release from the U.S. Atlantic Command said that the "conduct" of the military was being "closely monitored" by the U.S. immigration service.
Today, as the U.S. military collaborates with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) at Guantánamo, "degrading conditions and extreme isolation have led to several suicide attempts," according to the ACLU.
Remember that these "administrative detainees" are being held for alleged civil violations, and their past crimes are either exaggerated or non-existent.
The conflation of "immigrant" and "criminal" by anti-immigrant movements preceded the Trump administration by decades, of course, but the Trump-Vance campaign took mere lies to a new level, claiming outright that even legal immigrants are "illegal." On January 28, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt picked up the line, saying that all undocumented immigrants are criminals. (That's not true, either.) Then Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth parroted the slogan that the immigration detainees sent to Guantánamo are the "worst of the worst." The phrase was popularized by former Vice President Dick Cheney in his justification for sending post-September-11 prisoners to the U.S. base in Cuba, and it was misinformation then, too.
So what is the real point of Guantánamo detentions?
In the 2004 Supreme Court arguments in Rasul v. Bush, concerning the post-9/11 detainees, attorney John Gibbons called the U.S. naval base at Guantánamo a "lawless enclave." That lawlessness had already been tested on the immigration prisoners. It's now more widely understood that the point of imprisoning Haitians—and others, including Cubans and Chinese—in offshore camps on foreign territory controlled by the U.S. was to keep them isolated from the U.S. justice system. Attorney Gibbons was referring to this lack of access to courts and due process.
ICE detention has long aspired to the lawlessness which Guantánamo makes possible. That's part of what the oft-quoted "taking the shackles off" of ICE really means, and it's why the Trump administration has ordered legal organizations to stop helping detained noncitizens within the U.S. even to understand the laws they're accused of breaking, much less to know their own rights under the law. (That order has been blocked by a federal judge for now.)
It's also worth remembering, with all the propaganda about borders and invasion, that the executive's backwards rationale for its claim to unlimited detention authority in Cuba has been that the U.S. is holding the prisoners outside U.S. borders. But Escalona v. Noem, the ACLU lawsuit, argues that the very transfer of immigration detainees from the U.S. to Cuba is illegal under U.S. immigration law. (The 1990s immigration detainees at Guantánamo had been picked up at sea, not transferred from the mainland U.S.)
At Guantánamo, as in ICE detention centers here, the lawlessness of procedure and the brutality of daily mistreatment are part of the same fabric. Isolating the detained persons—from lawyers, family, and the media—is crucial to that project. Trying to break the prisoners' isolation is therefore paramount.
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Trump Spokesperson Affirms Day 1 Plans for Nation's 'Largest Mass Deportation Operation'
"As always, we will go to court to challenge illegal policies, but it is equally essential that the public push back, as it did with family separation," one rights advocate said.
Nov 07, 2024
President-elect Donald Trump is set to begin his promised mass deportation of undocumented immigrants as soon as he takes office on January 20, 2025, even as rights groups are mobilizing to stop him.
Trump national press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News Wednesday morning that "the American people delivered a resounding victory for President Trump."
"It gives him a mandate to govern as he campaigned, to deliver on the promises that he made, which include, on Day 1, launching the largest mass deportation operation of illegal immigrants that Kamala Harris has allowed into this country," Leavitt said.
"We have a simple message for President-elect Trump or his deputies if they decide to make good on their despicable plans: We will see you in court."
Trump has pledged to conduct the largest deportation in U.S. history, with running mate and now Vice President-elect JD Vance promising 1 million deportations each year. The plan would likely rely on mobilizing federal agencies, the military, diplomats, and Republican-led states while using federal funds to pressure uncooperative states and cities into complying.
The stocks of private prison companies like GEOGroup and Core Civic rose significantly after Trump's win, and private contractors had already been discussing ahead of the election how to build enough detention space to accommodate Trump's plans.
A study released by the American Immigration Council in October found that a massive, one-time deportation program of the estimated 13.3 million migrants in the country without legal status would cost the government at least $315 billion while a 1-million-a-year approach would cost $88 billion a year for a total of $967.9 billion. It would also shrink the nation's gross domestic product by between 4.2 and 6.8%, not to mention the massive human cost to immigrant families, as around 5.1 million children who are U.S. citizens live with an undocumented family member.
The council also warned that such a program would likely threaten the well-being of all immigrants and increase vigilantism and hate crimes.
"As bad as the first Trump administration was for immigrants, we anticipate it will be much worse this time and are particularly concerned about the use of the military to round up immigrants," Lee Gelernt, a lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union who fought the first Trump administration on family separation and other policies, told The Washington Post. "As always, we will go to court to challenge illegal policies, but it is equally essential that the public push back, as it did with family separation."
Exit polls show that 56% of U.S. voters favor offering immigrants already in the U.S. a pathway to citizenship, while Data for Progress found that survey respondents did not favor deportation for 7 out of 9 categories of people who might be caught up in a mass deportation scheme.
The ACLU has urged cities and states to take steps to protect their undocumented residents ahead of January 20.
"They should prepare for mass deportations because those will wreak havoc on the communities," Noreen Shah, director of government affairs at the ACLU's equality division, told Newsweek. "It will mean kids who go to school and their parents are gone and not there to pick them up at the end of the day."
In particular, legal groups are gearing up for Trump to potentially evoke the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, which authorizes the country to deport noncitizens of a hostile nation. It has only been used three times, most recently to detain Japanese Americans during World War II.
"Many fear that a second Trump administration would seek to use this law to justify indefinite detention and remove people from the country swiftly and without judicial review," Shah told Reuters.
The Brennan Center for Justice has called on Congress to repeal the act.
"This law was shameful and dangerous back when it was created 200 years ago," the center's Marcelo Agudo wrote in October. "It's even more so today. It must be repealed or overturned."
Several other organizations pledged to continue defending immigrants and refugees after Trump declared victory.
"We have a simple message for President-elect Trump or his deputies if they decide to make good on their despicable plans: We will see you in court," Karen Tumlin, founder and director of Justice Action Center, said in a statement. "And, we have a message of love to immigrant communities, we see you, we are you, and we will stand with you."
Calling Trump's win "one of the most dangerous moments in our country's history, National Immigration Law Center president Kica Matos said the organization had led a "movement-wide effort to plan for this moment."
"Trump and his allies told us what he plans to do: mass deportations, ending birthright citizenship, ending the right to public education for immigrant children, internment camps, and using the military to hunt down immigrants. We should take him at his word," Matos said.
She continued: "One thing is certain: we cannot and will not retreat. For more than 40 years, NILC has been steadfast in our fight to defend the rights of low-income immigrants and their loved ones. We successfully fought Donald Trump before, and we will do it again."
The American Immigrant Lawyers Association (AILA) pledged to continue working for its clients.
"If implemented, the anti-immigrant policies avowed by candidate Trump will inflict lasting damage to the American economy, communities, and character," AILA Executive Director Benjamin Johnson said in a statement. "AILA and its more than 16,000 members will continue to defend the Constitution and stand against laws and policies that violate due process, undermine civil rights, or denigrate the contributions of immigrants. Our future prosperity depends on not giving up. We must stand together and work towards a brighter future."
Refugees International also promised to continue with its "shared commitment to rights and refuge for people forced from their homes."
"Amid historic levels of global displacement, the incoming Trump administration plans to enact an anti-refugee, anti-asylum agenda that will endanger millions of people—both those threatened by crises overseas and those who have been welcomed as neighbors into communities across the United States," the group's president, Jeremy Konyndyk, said in a message to supporters. "Yet we hold on to hope, even as we are clear-eyed about the daunting struggles ahead."
Knowndyk added: "As we do under any presidential administration, we will work tirelessly with all of you to defend and advance the rights, protection, and well-being of all people forced to flee their homes."
United We Dream, the largest U.S. organization led by immigrant youth, committed to building the "largest pro-immigrant movement this country has ever seen."
"Immigrant young people of United We Dream declare ourselves hopeful and clear eyed about the fight ahead," said the group's executive director Greisa Martínez Rosas. "With Trump pledging to carry out the largest deportation effort in our country's history—ctivating the military to raid our communities, schools, hospitals, and more in order to round up our people into concentration camps—young, Black, brown, and queer leaders who have been at the vanguard of our movement and of creating meaningful change are ready move mountains to protect our communities."
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