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due process
'Fucking Insane': Journalist Finds at Least 2,300 Illegal ICE Detentions Since July
"This is what 'mass deportations' looks like. Neither due process nor basic humanity," said one lawyer. "Don't look away."
Jan 26, 2026
In yet another display of the Trump administration's disregard for the US Constitution, there have been at least 2,300 cases in which federal judges have ruled that immigration officials illegally detained people without bond or due process since just July, according to one journalist.
Politico reporter Kyle Cheney shared some of the cases he's tracked in a thread on the social media platform X late Saturday. "This is one that stands out," he said of Sonik Manaserian, an Iranian woman of Armenian ethnicity who is a member of the Baha'i faith.
According to an order out of the Central District of California in Manaserian's case, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) "arrested a chronically ill, 70-year-old woman, who came to this country to avoid religious persecution and applied for asylum, who has lived here peacefully for 26 years and complied with all check-in requirements and other conditions of release, who has no known criminal record and poses no threat to anyone, without notice or the process required by their own regulations and without any plan for removing her from this country, then kept her in detention for months without sufficient medical care—and they do not have any argument to offer to even try to justify these actions."
Cheney's thread came just hours after Customs and Border Protection (CBP) fatally shot legal observer and nurse Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, less than three weeks after ICE officer Jonathan Ross similarly killed Renee Good in Minnesota's largest city.
"Minnesota courts have been inundated with these cases since the beginning of Operation Metro Surge last month," said the journalist, noting a Friday order in which a judge freed Audberto J., a Mexican man residing in the state, "where he and his wife have lived and raised three children together over the last 20 years."
While the Trump administration has repeatedly claimed that its immigration enforcement operations are targeting "the worst of the worst," like the vast majority of immigrants actually seized by agents with the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in recent months, Audberto J. has no criminal history, according to the order.
"Yet another ruling from Friday, freeing a man detained by ICE in Minnesota who suffered severe head injuries during his arrest and has been hospitalized since. The man claims ICE has required him to be shackled in the hospital, against the wishes of doctors," Cheney noted. "Here's another Minnesota ruling that just came in tonight: A federal judge is threatening DHS with contempt for transferring a petitioner out of the state despite a court order enjoining the administration from doing so."
The journalist added to the thread on Sunday, as judges in Minnesota continued issue to rulings. In one of those cases, "Judge [Katherine] Menendez—who issued last week's injunction against ICE's retaliatory use of pepper spray—just ordered the release of a Kenyan woman arrested while picking up seizure medication at CVS."
Sharing the thread, American Immigration Council senior fellow Aaron Reichlin-Melnick stressed "this is what 'mass deportations' looks like. Neither due process nor basic humanity. Don't look away."
Immigrant Defenders Law Center co-founder and CEO Lindsay Toczylowski said that "as you read this excellent thread, let it sink in that one of the most pervasive issues for people in ICE detention is lack of access to counsel which means in most cases people have no shot at filing these challenges to their illegal detentions in federal court."
The Fifth Amendment to the US Constitution states in part that no person shall "be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law," and protects various rights in legal proceedings. The Trump administration has also faced intense criticism recently for its disregard of rights protected by the First, Second, and Fourth amendments.
Cheney was praised by other journalists for "such good shoe-leather reporting," as "PBS NewsHour" correspondent Lisa Desjardins put it. Lawfare senior editor Roger Parloff suggested that he "should get a Pulitzer for this thread."
John Yarmuth, a former newspaper editor and Democratic congressman from Kentucky, said that "this is a great example of a journalist doing his very critical job. Now it's up to government officials to act to correct these injustices. AND be shamed and replaced if they don't."
Last Thursday, seven Democrats in the US House of Representatives voted with nearly all Republicans to pass a multibillion-dollar DHS funding bill. Pretti's killing has increased pressure on all senators to reject it. While immigration agents' deadly and illegal actions have fueled calls to "abolish ICE," some lawmakers are demanding reforms at the agency and across the department.
Pointing to Cheney's findings, anti-monopoly lawyer Basel Musharbash said: "This is fucking insane. What reforms are supposed to fix an agency that commits 2,300 adjudicated constitutional violations in just six months? And those are just the ones that made it to court!"
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We Shouldn't Have to Watch a Woman's Murder to Counter Government Lies
Right-wing leaders are trying to convince all of us that what we saw on video with our own eyes was not actually what we saw, and for far too many, it seems to be working.
Jan 13, 2026
None of us should have to watch videos of our fellow citizens and neighbors being killed to get factual information about what happened. Yet the way President Donald Trump and Kristi Noem, the secretary of Homeland Security, described the moment an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent shot and killed a 37-year-old mom and American citizen in broad daylight was so blatantly far off from what happened that I fear we will need to keep seeing for ourselves.
I never watch videos of people being killed on purpose. Yet, I clicked on a video of a woman in Minnesota in her SUV who seemed to be in a heated verbal exchange with an ICE agent. I saw her try to pull away from an agent who was reaching into her car, only to be shot at close range as she was trying to leave. It happened so quickly I hoped that she got away and the bullet did not hit her, but my hopes gave way to a nauseating pit in my stomach as her car veered off and hit a pole, the way one does when a driver falls asleep. Only, I knew she didn’t fall asleep because moments earlier, I saw an angry man in ICE uniform shoot at her. Her name was Renee Nicole Good, and she was an award-winning poet, wife, and mom of three, her youngest child only 6 years old.
Surely everyone would condemn this killing, I thought to myself. I immediately sought out comments sections on the internet and official accounts of various politicians hoping for a solidarity and decency that has eluded us since Donald Trump arrived on the political scene. I just knew that everyone—regardless of political party or support for Donald Trump—and perhaps even those in the current administration, would condemn this brazen murder by an ICE agent who was filmed losing his temper, shooting, and killing a woman as she tried to drive away. At the very least, I thought politicians who support ICE would call it a tragic accident. Admittedly, I especially thought this would be true when I learned that the victim was white, a citizen, and a mother—identities that have often provided cover from the deadliest encounters with those across law enforcement entities.
Instead, I read a statement on Instagram from The Department of Homeland Security that insinuated Renee Good was a rioter. They said that she used her Honda as a weapon and began to weave together a familiar narrative that amounts to: ICE was blameless, and the mom in her car was part of an organized movement that should be considered domestic terrorism. The comments were divided. Some people expressed their deepest sympathies and outrage that she was killed that way. But far too many others repeated the story from Homeland Security’s written statement and from Kristi Noem’s testimony. I’d seen comments like those before. “She should have complied” and “FAFO” (fuck around and find out).
We must fervently resist the attempts made by this current administration to gaslight and pacify us in the face of deadly injustice, and we must challenge those who seek to override the best of our humanity with their institutionalized and wildly funded cruelty.
In the past six years we've watched the American right-wing push narratives that encourage the general public to support police officers when they kill unarmed Black people and squash any suspicions of their wrongdoings. The same messages that were used to criminalize Philando Castile and paint Trayvon Martin as an aggressor, the same messages that were used to try and excuse away Breonna Taylor’s murder, are the talking points we are hearing now about what happened to Renee Good in Minnesota. And they are yielding the same divided responses, only this time in response to the killing of a white mom as we live out the cautions in the famous “First They Came” poem.
Right-wing leaders have spent years telling people that, to put it simply, there are good guys and bad guys and law enforcement officials, including ICE, are always the good guys and anyone opposing them are always the bad guys. They have also convinced too many that “bad guys” deserve to be executed on the spot, no trial necessary.
Now, most alarmingly, they are trying to convince all of us that what we saw on video with our own eyes was not actually what we saw, and for far too many, it seems to be working.
We must fervently resist the attempts made by this current administration to gaslight and pacify us in the face of deadly injustice, and we must challenge those who seek to override the best of our humanity with their institutionalized and wildly funded cruelty. It starts by recognizing the predictable playbook they have been using since George Floyd died crying for his mama and saying, “I can’t breathe.” We must work to restore these bipartisan basics:
- Shooting people is not an acceptable resolution to misbehavior and nonviolent confrontation;
- Trained professionals should know how to deescalate and remain calm, not shoot when they feel threatened (or more accurately, angry);
- Protests are not inherently riots and are a constitutional right;
- Rather than playing “good guys or bad guys,” we must acknowledge good actions vs. bad ones, legal actions vs. illegal ones, and use due process to determine guilt and consequences when things go wrong; and
- No matter what a government official or even the president says, what you see with your own eyes is more trustworthy than a story they concoct to spin events to serve their agendas.
Renee Nicole Good should still be alive to mother her children, love her wife, and write poems. We will not allow them to distract us from that with lies.
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Standing Witness to ICE’s Cruelty Is Peaceful Protesting Done Right
If we want to preserve our democracy, then none of us have the luxury of averting our eyes to the Trump administration’s injustices. No matter how grueling it may be, we must grit our teeth, bear witness, and fight.
Jan 01, 2026
Throughout 2025, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have been abducting people across the United States. This includes people like Rümeysa Öztürk who was arrested by six plainclothes officers as she left her home. It includes Frank Miranda, a US citizen, who was detained by plainclothes officers outside his Portland workplace and detained for hours. It includes Patricia Quishpe who was arrested by Border Patrol agents as part of the Trump administration’s Operation Midway Blitz.
These abductions are being fueled by multiple factors, including the Trump administration’s disregard for due process, their indifference to the safety of people of color, as well as ICE’s hired private sector bounty hunters. To date, ICE has hired 10 contractors with ties to spy agencies and the military-industrial complex to track and surveil suspected migrants. They have also partnered with private prison companies like Geo Group and CoreCivic. Currently, nearly 90% of all people in ICE custody are held in for-profit facilities. These multimillion-dollar contracts have been made possible by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act which allocated $170 billion to ICE for border and interior enforcement.
These partnerships and resources have allowed ICE to effectively create a secret police force that kidnaps people off the street, detains them in private prisons, and prevents lawmakers from exercising any oversight. ICE has become the Gestapo.
While this threat is real and growing, people are resisting ICE’s fascist tactics. This includes the work being done by groups like “Witness at the Border,” an advocacy group that has been monitoring and reporting ICE activities since 2018. Their work includes talking to people coming in and out of detention centers, tracking buses and flights carrying detainees, as well as traveling to the US-Mexico border to witness the dire conditions migrants face there. They have held in-person and online seminars to inform the public about what they have seen and learned, as well as lobbied state legislatures and Congress to hold ICE and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) accountable for their abuses.
We cannot trust the Trump administration to be transparent with the American public. If DHS is becoming a secret police force, then it is up to us to bring their abuses to light. We must all bear witness to their cruelty.
These “witnesses” provide civilian oversight over ICE abuses. As Lee Goodman, one of the activists describes it: “Our process basically is to do what we can to see, to listen, to hear, to talk to people who know and to get the word. We don’t want [ICE] to ever think they can do what they want without being observed.” Goodman has been part of witnessing efforts at detention centers in Tornillo, Texas and Homestead, Florida—both of which have since shut down.
Advocates for Witness at the Border are currently witnessing outside several detention centers, including the North Lake Processing Center in Michigan and the Broadview ICE Facility in Illinois. These efforts are incredibly important. From the start of Trump’s mass deportation campaign, Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem has worked to restrict congressional oversight. State representatives in Illinois, for instance, had been denied entry into the Broadview facility for months until a federal judge intervened in mid-December. This, despite numerous allegations of human rights abuses occurring at the Broadview ICE Facility, including denying detainees food and medical care as well as forcing them to sleep on concrete floors amid “urine and dirty water.”
We cannot trust the Trump administration to be transparent with the American public. If DHS is becoming a secret police force, then it is up to us to bring their abuses to light. We must all bear witness to their cruelty.
Fortunately, many are seeing the value of witnessing as a form of peaceful protest. Individuals, like Job Garcia and Carlitos Ricardo Parias, have recorded ICE’s cruelty and shared those videos on social media. In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom and Attorney General Rob Bonta have announced a new online portal to share information about unlawful activity by federal agents and officers across the state. As Gov. Newson puts it: “This new portal gives Californians an easy and safe way to speak up, share what they see, and help us hold people accountable. No one is above the law.”
DHS wants nothing more than to commit their illicit activities unseen. They fear witnesses and will resort to violence to stop them.
Beyond drawing attention to the problem, witnessing has several praiseworthy features.
First, and perhaps most obviously, witnesses document abuse. This is not only important for calling out ICE’s actions today, but for holding the people committing these abuses—including Secretary Noem and members of the Trump administration—criminally accountable in the future. When their day in court comes, we must ensure that the evidence against them is resounding. We must bear witness today to ensure justice tomorrow.
Second, witnesses empower and protect victims. DHS continues to deny any wrongdoing. Secretary Noem has even insisted, despite abundant evidence to the contrary, that, “there’s no American citizens that have been arrested or detained.” Yet, videos of ICE agents doing precisely this prove that she is lying. These videos validate the experiences of US citizens who have been assaulted by ICE agents. It provides them the leverage to speak out against an administration that wants nothing more than to discredit and silence them.
Third, witnessing provides a fuller picture. From the outside, it’s easy to think that everyone working at ICE facilities is simply evil or, at best, morally indifference. However, Majorie Ziefert, an activist working with Witness at the Border, reports that the reality on the ground is quite different. She has spoken with staff at processing centers who express hating what is happening to detainees at those facilities. They only continue to work there because they need the income. While we may still condemn those people for their part in ICE’s cruelty, witnessing draws attention to how capitalism pressures people to contribute to unjust systems. At the same time, it helps bridge inroads that may lead to unlikely alliances.
Fourth, to witness is to take a risk. ICE agents have attacked and detained people like Barbara Stone, a volunteer with the group Detention Resistance that observes and documents immigration court proceedings. Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin has claimed that “videotaping ICE law enforcement and posting photos and videos of them online is doxing our agents. We will prosecute those who illegally harass ICE agents to the fullest extent of the law.” This response by DHS highlights the value of witnessing as a form of protest. DHS wants nothing more than to commit their illicit activities unseen. They fear witnesses and will resort to violence to stop them.
Witnessing is risky, but facing this risk may help us cultivate the kinds of virtues—courage, selflessness, justice, perseverance, and empathy—that make people into good activists. The reality is that the Trump administration is far from over. The situation will likely get far worse, especially as DHS invests in more invasive surveillance technologies. We will all need to become more resilient to combat what comes next.
Fifth, like any form of protest, witnessing will be more impactful when done alongside others. But whether it’s at a detention center or on the street, whether it’s a testimony or recording a video, anyone can be a witness.
In 2025, the Trump administration deported more than 600,000 people while stripping 1.6 million immigrants of their legal status. In 2026, they seek to expand their efforts by denaturalizing 100 to 200 people per month. If we want to preserve our democracy, then none of us has the luxury of averting our eyes to the Trump administration’s injustices. No matter how grueling it may be, we must grit our teeth, bear witness, and fight.
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