When Enforcers Break the Law

I spent more than three decades wearing a badge and swearing an oath to protect our Constitution. Nobody—local, state, or federal—gets to set that oath aside for political ends. Yet today we watch an agency charged with upholding the law routinely trample the very liberties its officers are sworn to protect.

Citizens Detained, Jailed and Deported

Investigations and federal audits have documented a chilling pattern: U.S. citizens and lawful residents have been detained by ICE, sometimes for days or weeks, while their claims of citizenship were dismissed or ignored. The Government Accountability Office and subsequent reporting show egregious errors; the American Immigration Council noted that dozens of U.S. citizens were deported or nearly deported in recent years because of agency mistakes. This is not a bureaucratic misstep — it’s wrongful imprisonment and deportation.

Court decisions have made clear an important principle: an ICE detainer is not an automatic arrest order for local jails to enforce. Yet counties and local agencies have repeatedly complied with these detainer requests and held people past the point they should have been released—creating real civil-rights liability. Cases like Galarza v. Szalczyk and Miranda-Olivares v. Clackamas County underline that holding someone on an ICE detainer can amount to a new arrest requiring probable cause. When officials ignore those rulings, liberty is the casualty.

No Single “Citizenship Card”

There is no singular “citizen card” that guarantees immunity from ICE’s grasp. Birth certificates, Social Security cards, and state IDs are all imperfect; none are intended to be foolproof proof of citizenship in the heat of an enforcement action. A U.S. passport is the strongest single document a person can carry and should ordinarily prevent wrongful detention—but, as reporting has shown, even passports and Real IDs have sometimes been dismissed at the scene, with agents claiming documents are “fake” while detentions proceed. That reality is intolerable.

Solitary, Overcrowding, and Inhumane Conditions

Beyond wrongful detentions, the conditions inside ICE custody have become a national scandal. The Marshall Project and other watchdogs have documented surging use of solitary confinement and widespread overcrowding, with thousands put into solitary over short spans of time. Physicians for Human Rights and academic partners have documented more than 10,500 people placed in solitary confinement in immigration detention over a recent 14-month period—a dramatic surge with destructive mental-health consequences. This is not detention as administration; this is detention as cruelty.

Masked, Plainclothes Agents Who Hide Their Identity

Perhaps one of the most disturbing developments is an operational tactic that short-circuits accountability: agents wearing masks, plain clothes, and taking part in raids without clear, visible identification. Communities have described scenes of masked federal agents descending on neighborhoods; residents and even bystanders cannot identify who is in authority, and citizens who present valid ID are sometimes ignored or intimidated. Journalists and civil-liberties advocates say this practice spreads fear, invites misidentification, and prevents ordinary people—and local officials—from holding federal agents accountable. Recent reporting has prompted legislative responses in some states seeking to ban identity-concealing coverings for officers during ordinary enforcement actions.

Hiding behind masks or civilian clothing may be defensible in narrowly tailored tactical situations where safety is at immediate risk. But using anonymous appearances as the routine posture for civil immigration enforcement is a recipe for mistakes, abuses, and legal exposure. When an agent’s identity is masked, the checks and balances of a free society—witnesses, lawyers, journalists, and local oversight—are effectively disabled.

This is a Policing Problem — And a Constitutional Problem

If a local police department habitually did what ICE does—detaining people without probable cause, ignoring valid ID, placing people in solitary arbitrarily, or carrying out masked raids without identification—there would be lawsuits, federal investigations, and calls for removal of leadership. The same standards must apply to federal agents.

Local law enforcement leaders and elected officials must not be complicit. ICE detainers are voluntary requests; complying blindly can convert a lawful release into unlawful detention and expose local government to liability. Do not be used as an instrument to short-circuit constitutional safeguards.

What Must Be Done

Demand judicial warrants. Local law enforcement should insist on judicial warrants—signed by judges—before turning custody over to federal immigration agents. Administrative paperwork is not a substitute for probable cause.
Refuse masked, unidentified enforcement. Local officials should not cooperate with or facilitate enforcement actions by agents who conceal identity or lack clear, visible credentials. Where safety truly requires concealment, that should be narrowly documented and justified.
Improve oversight and transparency. Congress and state legislatures must strengthen oversight of detention conditions, solitary confinement use, and the procedures ICE relies on. Independent inspections, real-time reporting, and public data are essential.
Protect due process and counsel. Ensure detainees have access to counsel, medical care, and timely hearings; stop treating civil immigration detention as a black box.
Hold agencies accountable. When ICE errs—detaining a citizen, violating court precedent, or operating in ways that violate civil rights—hold them to account through litigation, oversight hearings, and public pressure.

Final Word

We are a nation of laws. The power to detain and imprison is the government’s most terrible power—one we reserve for the soberest, most carefully justified circumstances. When any agency treats that power as if it were a cudgel to be used at whim—when people are cuffed while clutching passports, when detainees are fed into a system of solitary and squalor, when masked agents terrorize neighborhoods—then we are no longer living under the rule of law. That must end.