In the States: Widening Deportation Dragnet Targets U.S. Citizens, Legal Residents, and Asylum Seekers

Washington, D.C. – The administration’s mass disappearance agenda continues to target legal residents, essential workers, and community leaders, revealing a horrifying truth: Trump’s immigration policy is cruel, chaotic, and indiscriminate. Now, with the expanded use of a 1798 wartime law and a pending $350 billion check from Congress, Trump is set to supercharge these efforts through militarized enforcement, invasive surveillance, and government overreach–all at the expense of civil rights and working families.

In Michigan, ICE wrongfully detained a U.S. citizen outside a courthouse. In New York, raids swept up Caribbean nationals and a mother with her three children. In Florida, a university student with a pending visa was arrested over a traffic stop. In Wisconsin and Illinois, ICE made courthouse arrests that alarmed local judges. In California and Washington, asylum seekers were detained during check-ins or while updating their address. And in Louisiana, a Cuban-American grandfather who lived in the U.S. for 45 years was taken on his way to work. These arrests aren’t isolated—they reflect a nationwide pattern of chaos, cruelty, and overreach.

Read more about the everyday Americans affected by Trump’s anti-immigrant assault:

Guardian: They fled Putin’s Russia for the US. After Ice detention, they’re choosing to leave again (April 9, 2025; San Francisco, CA)

On 27 March, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) called Sergei into the agency’s San Francisco office for a seemingly routine administrative appointment – and arrested him. They transferred him to a detention center 250 miles (400km) away from his family, and cut off his asylum claim. He could reapply, but he’d have to remain in detention indefinitely, and risk being deported to a country that has brutally cracked down on anti-war protesters.

So Sergei and Marina are asking the US government to let them leave, along with their two-year-old daughter, on their own terms.

“It’s kind of crazy, because we have to start life from point zero once again,” she said. “But it’s much better than being separated, or worse.”

NJ.com: Beloved N.J. father of 2 detained by ICE running out of options, faces deportation (April 8, 2025; Flemington, NJ)

A New Jersey man who had been seeking citizenship for years remains detained by Immigrations Customs Enforcement and faces deportation.

But family and friends of Karim Daoud, of Flemington in Hunterton County, say he’s making the best of his situation at the ICE facility in Elizabeth by serving as a translator for fellow detainees.

MLive: U.S. citizen mistakenly detained by ICE outside Michigan courthouse speaks out (April 8, 2025; Dexter Township, Michigan)

Martinez, a 48-year-old handyman, landscaper and farmer, said he’s originally from Mexico but has been a U.S. citizen through his marriage to Sanders for several years. At one point on Tuesday, he went outside the courthouse to check on his dog in the car and was surrounded by several ICE agents, he said.

Agents used their body weight to keep him pinned to the pavement, he said, recalling one may have had a knee on his legs. He continued telling them they were detaining the wrong person, but they just laughed as they started going through the personal items in his wallet, taking out things like his Costco membership card, he said.

Caribbean National Weekly: Caribbean nationals among dozens arrested in ICE in New York (April 6, 2025; New York)

ICE reported that nationals from Trinidad and Tobago and the Dominican Republic were among those arrested during the five-day operation, conducted between March 24 and 28. 

620WTMJ: Milwaukee County Chief Judge releases statement on courthouse ICE arrests (April 6, 2025; Milwaukee, WI)

“The presence of ICE agents can deter individuals, particularly immigrants and marginalized communities, from attending court hearings, seeking legal assistance, or reporting crimes. This undermines the fundamental right to access the courts and seek legal remedies.”

The Independent Florida Alligator: UF student detained by ICE, facing deportation (April 6, 2025; Gainesville, FL)

The Gainesville Police Department arrested Zapata Velásquez for driving with an expired license and registration tag, according to police records. After paying a fine, ICE took custody of Zapata Velásquez and took him to Jacksonville, where deportation proceedings began.

Zapata Velásquez was in the process of renewing his visa when he was arrested. After graduating from Santa Fe College in 2023, the UF International Center was assisting him with the transition to UF.

The Guardian: A Nicaraguan asylum seeker checked in with Ice every week. He was arrested anyway (April 6, 2025; Spokane, WA)

In the weeks since Donald Trump’s inauguration, Ice had asked him to do extra check-ins each weekend. “I even messaged the ICE office through my app, to ask if something was wrong,” Rojas said.

His last check-in with Ice was on 5 February – all normal. On 8 February, they came for him.

Rojas, 42, is one of potentially hundreds of people who have been detained in recent weeks despite complying with Ice requirements to regularly check-in. Ice does not appear to keep count of how many people it has arrested at check-ins. But the Guardian has estimated, based on arrest data from the first four weeks of the Trump administration, that about 1,400 arrests – 8% of the nearly 16,500 arrests in the administration’s first month – have occurred during or right after people checked in with the agency.

Newsweek: Cuban-American Granddad in US for 45 Years Arrested by ICE, Family Says (April 6, 2025; Lafayette, LA)

Rodriguez was allegedly picked up by ICE while on his way to work on Monday near his home in Lafayette, Louisiana. She continued that he had come to the U.S. with only the clothes on his back and said that he “struggled.” She then said, “In that struggle, he made some poor decisions. He was punished for those decisions, he served his time, did very well and decided that he would never make mistakes again.”

“I want to clarify that we did try to resolve Jose’s immigration status for 10 years, understanding that he was not eligible for citizenship because of his past, but rather we tried for years to have him removed from the ‘deportation’ list as he had followed all requests from the government and had successfully lived and worked hard for decades following his troubles early on.

KCRA3: Venezuelan man detained by ICE in Sacramento while trying to update address; family seeks answers (April 5, 2025; Sacramento, CA)

The family of 24-year-old Wilfredo Rivero said he was residing in the U.S. legally with a pending asylum case. His fiancée, Victoria Colmenero, said his next court date was scheduled in Chicago for 2027.

With the hope of moving his case closer to home, they drove more than five hours from Siskiyou County to the immigration office in Sacramento. When they arrived, Colmenero said she wasn’t allowed inside the office with him. “When I asked why he was being detained, the immigration officer couldn’t give us any clear reasoning as to why he was being detained,” she said.

Colmenero said Rivero came to the United States from Venezuela seeking asylum and has no criminal record.

Wisconsin Examiner: ICE arrests at Milwaukee courthouse prompt community response (April 4, 2025; Milwaukee, WI)

Although the Milwaukee County Sheriffs Office (MCSO) was aware of the first arrest, the office states that it was not given advance notice of the second arrest. MCSO stressed in a statement that it did not participate in either arrest.

NBC News: Roofer says ICE arrested three of his relatives in a workplace raid (April 4, 2025; Bellingham, WA)

A worker at a roofing company in Bellingham, Washington, that was raided by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said Friday that masked agents in tactical gear swarmed the property with guns drawn, detaining three of his family members and dozens of co-workers.

He arrived at work at his usual time, around 7 a.m., he said, and “many trucks started arriving.”

More than three dozen employees of Mount Baker Roofing were arrested and taken to Northwest ICE Processing Facility in Tacoma, the agency said in a statement.

Federal agents executed a search warrant at the roofing company as part of a criminal investigation into the “unlawful employment of aliens without legal work authorization in violation of federal law,” an ICE spokesperson said.

Gothamist: Harlem activist will stay in ICE detention, but judge says releasing him would be ‘right thing to do’ (April 4, 2025; New York City, NY)

After a hand injury derailed his boxing career, Panton said, he got involved in the drug trade to make money — a decision he called “a mistake I will forever regret and try to make amends for.” He was arrested in 1991 and convicted at trial on a drug conspiracy charge. 

Panton spent nearly three decades in prison before a judge reduced his sentence, citing his rehabilitation during his incarceration. But instead of going home in 2020, he went to ICE detention . . . . He was released months later and has been navigating his immigration case ever since. On March 25, ICE agents detained Panton again, this time during what was supposed to be a routine check-in. They’ve said in court papers that he’s trying to get a U-visa — which allows a crime victim to remain in the country — because he was shot in 1991.

TruthOut: With Detention of Beloved Farmworker Organizer, ICE Comes for the Labor Movement (April 1, 2025)

On the morning of March 25, farmworker organizer Alfredo “Lelo” Juarez was forcibly detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents who stopped his car while he was driving his wife to work in Skagit County, Washington. People to whom Juarez has spoken say he requested to see a warrant, and when he attempted to get his ID after being asked, the ICE agents smashed his car window and detained him.

We believe his detention is politically motivated because of his organizing in the farmworker and immigrant community. We believe he was targeted. The way that ICE detained him was meant to intimidate. They hardly gave him any chance to defend himself or explain. He wasn’t resisting, and he just asked to see the warrant. They asked to see his ID, and right when he was reaching for it, they broke his car window. The ICE agents escalated really fast. From what we heard, it was less than a minute from the time he was pulled over to him being in handcuffs.

WGRZ: ICE detains man after Olean council arrest (April 3, 2025; Salamanca, NY)

Salamanca Police Chief Jamie Deck tells WGRZ that his officers detained Andres while he was working a shift at the Ava Marie Cafe on Broad St. Salamanca Mayor Sandy Magiera tells 2 On Your Side that Andres was well known in the community and had been there between 2-3 years. “He does little things that, the police have to talk to him about, right?” Mayor Magiera said. “He likes to he likes to praise to God, he’ll stand on the street corners and sing and things like that, doesn’t really bother anybody with it.”

The mayor also says that Andres would visit the office every now and then to discuss where he could camp, as he was unhoused for a period of time. According to Mayor Magiera and Chief Deck, Andre had no prior police record in their jurisdiction. Mayor Magiera says she believes Andres has been in the United States for six years, but is originally from Colombia.

Democracy Now: ICE Detains Mother & Her Three Children in Farm Raid Near NY Home of Border Czar Tom Homan (April 3, 2025; Sackets Harbor, NY) (Family has since been released)

In total, seven people were detained, including the mother and her three kids, who were enrolled in the local public school — a third grader, a 10th grader and an 11th grader. Witnesses say they were all handcuffed before being removed from a home at the dairy farm and put in a van. ICE has confirmed they were then taken to a recently reopened family detention center in Texas.

This family actually was going through the immigration system as they were told to, following the process and the steps that was dictated to them by the immigration court. And now, instead of waiting for their court date, they are sitting in a family detention center in Texas.

CBS News: District attorney considers charging ICE agent after defendant is detained mid-trial in Boston (April 2, 2026; Boston, MA)

Wilson Martell-Lebron, who is from the Dominican Republic and was living with family in Massachusetts, was on trial for allegedly pretending to be someone else in his driver’s license application. His lawyers say ICE agents who did not identify themselves put him in a pickup truck as he was leaving court, and he’s now being held at a detention facility in Plymouth.

Fox9: UMN student detained by ICE feared he was being kidnapped: court docs (April 2, 2025; Minneapolis, MN)

“Two plainclothes HSI officers approached Mr. Günaydın just outside his St. Paul apartment as he was leaving to go to class,” the lawsuit reads. “The plainclothes federal officers handcuffed him and placed him into an unmarked vehicle. Mr. Günaydın feared he was being kidnapped.”

Attorneys say while DHS did terminate his student status, it happened seven hours after his arrest and Günaydın had not violated the conditions under the law that allow for his student status to be removed. The petition says even “DHS appears to be unclear about the actual basis for terminating Mr. Günaydın’s student status.”

Knox News: ICE has begun making arrests on residents without criminal charges at required check-ins (April 2, 2025; Knoxville, TN)

Three people arrested and detained Feb. 12 by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement at the Knoxville office during a routine scheduled check-in. The three were taken without warning. None faced criminal charges.

He had a Social Security card, a driver’s license and employment authorization to work for his employer, a landscaping company in Maryville, according to documents provided by Jennifer and reviewed by Knox News. Melo had a June court date scheduled at the region’s immigration court in Memphis tied to his pending asylum claim.

The Daily Illini: ICE arrests 2 individuals at Champaign County Courthouse (April 1, 2025; Champaign-Urbana, IL)

Gomez and Lorenzo-Raymundo were both on pretrial release when they were arrested.

“After the appearance when we vacated the premises of the courtroom, I think four or five ICE agents took him and that’s where we are right now,” Martinkus said.

Martinkus said that neither he nor his client were given further information by the agents.

“I don’t think (ICE) did inform him much,” Martinkus said. “They didn’t really speak Spanish. My client only speaks very little English, so I don’t think they’d have the ability, from whom they sent, to explain any of that to him. They didn’t explain anything to me either.”

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