Kilmar Abrego Garcia speaks before dozens of supporters Friday outside the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Baltimore. (Photo by William J. Ford/Maryland Matters)

Kilmar Abrego Garcia is a free man, at least temporarily.

Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran immigrant and Maryland resident, appeared early Friday for a check-in at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office in Baltimore, less than day after a federal district judge ordered him released from ICE detention in Pennsylvania.

At his last ICE check-in, in August, Abrego Garcia walked in but didn’t walk out: Authorities detained him and held him until Thursday. But Friday, Abrego Garcia walked out of the building to cheers and chants, led by members of the immigrant rights group CASA to a black car that took him to rejoin his family in Prince George’s County.

Before Abrego-Garcia walked inside the building Friday, he thanked his supporters who rallied there, talked about spending the holidays with his family and offered advice for others suffering similar legal battles against the Trump administration.

“I stand before you as a free man, and I want you to remember me this way with my head held up high,” Abrego Garica said in Spanish, through a CASA translator.

“I stand here today with my head held up high, and I will continue to fight and stand firm against all of the injustices this government has done upon me,” Abrego Garcia said. “Regardless of this administration, I believe this is a country of laws, and I believe that this injustice will come to its end. Keep fighting. Do not give up. I wish all of you love and justice. Keep going.”

One of his attorneys, Simon Y. Sandoval-Moshenberg, told reporters and a few dozen protesters outside the field office that the federal judge who ordered Abrego Garcia freed Thursday said Friday that he could not be detained by ICE at his latest check-in.

Based on a temporary restraining order filed by his attorneys, Sandoval-Moshenberg said the judge will schedule a hearing at U.S. District Court in Greenbelt that Abrego Garcia will be able to attend.

“The legal fight is far from over,” Sandoval-Moshenberg said. “I wish I could say that with this, the government is going to leave well enough alone. This man has suffered enough.”

Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin called the judge’s decision to let Abrego Garcia free “naked judicial activism.”

“This order lacks any valid legal basis and we will continue to fight this tooth and nail in the courts,” McLaughlin said in an email Friday morning that repeated her statement from the day before.

Abrego Garcia’s return to the Baltimore ICE office came one day after U.S. District Court of Maryland Judge Paul Xinis ordered the Trump administration to release him from the Moshannon Valley Processing Center in Pennsylvania, where he had been held since September. He was released Thursday evening and spent the night at his home in Beltsville.

Since he was first detained by immigration officials in March and wrongly deported to his home county of El Salvador, Abrego Garcia’s case has shone a spotlight on the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration crackdown.

Abrego Garcia was originally deported to a brutal prison in El Salvador, despite a previous court ruling that prohibited his transfer there because of fear of violence by Salvadoran gangs.

Months later — and months after the U.S. Supreme Court’s April order that the Trump administration “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s return –he was brought back to the U.S. on June 6, only to face charges of human smuggling in Tennessee. The judge in that case eventually ordered Abrego Garcia released to home detention while his claim of vindictive prosecution in the Tennessee case proceeded.

Xinis, who got involved in the case when Abrego Garcia was first deported, issued a ruling Thurday that was highly critical of the administration’s actions in the case. She found that Abrego Garcia’s latest detention, since his August ICE check-in, was “again without lawful authority,” because the Trump administration has been holding him for deportation but has not made an effort to remove him to a third country.

The government’s “conduct over the past months belie that his detention has been for the basic purpose of effectuating removal, lending further support that Abrego Garcia should be held no longer,” Xinis wrote in her opinion.

Costa Rica has agreed to accept Abrego Garcia as a refugee, but Justice Department lawyers could not give Xinis a clear explanation of why the Trump administration would not send him there. Instead, the administration has proposed deporting Abrego Garcia to several countries in Africa.

Back in Baltimore on Friday morning, dozens of supporters braved the cold to hold up signs, chant and then clap and cheer when Abrego Garcia walked back outside the ICE building a free man, chanting “todos somos Kilmar,” or “we are all Kilmar.”

“It’s definitely a good day, but it is a good day to know that he’ll be able to spend the holidays with his family, “said Baltimore City Councilmember Odette Ramos, who attended the rally.

“He and his family have been so brave to go through all of this and to have their story really symbolize, frankly, what so many others are going through,” she said. “The fight’s not over.”

Maryland Matters is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Maryland Matters maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Steve Crane for questions: editor@marylandmatters.org.

Jury selection took place Thursday in the case against Milwaukee County Judge Hannah Dugan, who's accused of helping a man evade U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The post Jurors chosen to hear case against Milwaukee County Judge Hannah Dugan appeared first on WPR.

Kilmar Abrego Garcia speaks to a crowd holding a prayer vigil and rally on his behalf outside the ICE building in Baltimore, Maryland, on Aug. 25, 2025. Lydia Walther Rodriguez with CASA interprets for him. (Photo by William J. Ford/Maryland Matters)

WASHINGTON — The wrongly deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia is no longer in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody after a federal judge ordered his release earlier Thursday, according to his attorneys and an immigrant rights group that has advocated his case.

CASA, the immigrant rights group that has supported Abrego Garcia and his family since he was erroneously deported to a brutal Salvadoran prison, told States Newsroom he was released from the Moshannon Valley Processing Center in Pennsylvania before a 5 p.m. Eastern deadline set by the judge. He has remained there since September. 

 However, it remained unclear Thursday night if the Department of Homeland Security will follow the judicial order, and the White House press secretary said the Department of Justice would swiftly appeal the decision.

DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement to States Newsroom the “order lacks any valid legal basis and we will continue to fight this tooth and nail in the courts.”

She did not respond to a follow-up question if ICE would follow the order from U.S. District Court of Maryland Judge Paula Xinis to release Abrego Garcia, the Salvadoran immigrant and longtime Maryland resident who cast a spotlight on the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration crackdown after he was wrongly deported.

Abrego Garcia was imprisoned in a brutal prison in El Salvador and returned to the United States to face criminal charges in Tennessee. After he was ordered released from U.S. marshals custody by a federal judge, ICE detained him again at an appointment at the Baltimore, Maryland, ICE field office.

‘Without lawful authority’

Xinis, in a ruling highly critical of the administration’s actions in the case, found that since Abrego Garcia was brought back to the United States, he was detained “again without lawful authority,” because the Trump administration has not made an effort to remove him to a third country, due to his deportation protections from his home country of El Salvador. 

The order comes after Abrego Garcia challenged his ICE detention in a habeas corpus petition. Xinis was mulling a Supreme Court precedent that deemed immigrants cannot be held longer than six months in detention if the federal government is not actively making efforts to remove them.

“Separately, Respondents’ conduct over the past months belie that his detention has been for the basic purpose of effectuating removal, lending further support that Abrego Garcia should be held no longer,” Xinis wrote in her opinion.

Costa Rica has agreed to accept Abrego Garcia as a refugee, but in court, Department of Justice lawyers did not give Xinis a clear explanation of why the Trump administration would not remove him to Costa Rica. Instead, the Trump administration has tried to deport Abrego Garcia to several countries in Africa. 

Prolonged detention found

In her opinion, Xinis said that Abrego Garcia’s release is required under the Supreme Court’s precedent, referred to as the Zadvydas v. Davis case, because his nearly four-month detention at an ICE facility in Pennsylvania had been prolonged. 

“Respondents’ persistent refusal to acknowledge Costa Rica as a viable removal option, their threats to send Abrego Garcia to African countries that never agreed to take him, and their misrepresentation to the Court that Liberia is now the only country available to Abrego Garcia, all reflect that whatever purpose was behind his detention, it was not for the ‘basic purpose’ of timely third-country removal,” Xinis said.

She also noted witness testimony from several ICE officials who were unable to provide any information on efforts to remove Abrego Garcia to a third country where he would not face torture, persecution or deportation to El Salvador.  

“They simply refused to prepare and produce a witness with knowledge to testify in any meaningful way,” she said of the Department of Justice.

While the Trump administration has floated removing Abrego Garcia to Eswatini, Ghana, Liberia and Uganda, the Department of Justice is moving forward with criminal charges lodged against Abrego Garcia that stem from a 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee. 

The judge in that Nashville case is trying to determine if the human smuggling of immigrants charges against Abrego Garcia – to which he has pleaded not guilty – are vindictive. 

Missing order of removal

Another issue Xinis pointed out was the Department of Justice’s inability to produce a final order of removal for Abrego Garica.  

“No such order of removal exists for Abrego Garcia,” she said. “When Abrego Garcia was first wrongly expelled to El Salvador, the Court struggled to understand the legal authority for even seizing him in the first place.”

She also cited the ICE officials’ testimony, which did answer whether a removal order existed. 

“Respondents twice sponsored the testimony of ICE officials whose job it is to effectuate removal orders, and who candidly admitted to having never seen one for Abrego Garcia,” she said. “Respondents have never produced an order of removal despite Abrego Garcia hinging much of his jurisdictional and legal arguments on its non-existence.”

Attorneys for Abrego Garcia have argued if there is no order of removal, there is no basis for his ICE detention.

Abrego Garcia is not challenging his deportation, and has agreed to be removed to Costa Rica, but has remained in ICE detention since August.

William J. Ford contributed to this report. 

Reading Time: 4 minutes

Update, Dec. 10, 2025:

The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky directed Immigration and Customs Enforcement to release Dailin Pacheco-Acosta from custody on Wednesday, less than a day after an immigration court judge in Chicago granted asylum to Pacheco-Acosta and her husband, Diego Ugarte-Arenas. 

Pacheco-Acosta did not immediately leave Campbell County Detention Center in Kentucky, which contracts with ICE to hold detainees facing immigration charges. The couple’s attorney, Ben Crouse, told Wisconsin Watch he filed a new bond motion for Pacheco-Acosta on Wednesday afternoon, and she will return to Madison once the immigration court approves her bond. 

But her husband will remain in custody in the Dodge County Jail while awaiting the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s potential appeal of the couple’s asylum claim. 

If DHS appeals and Ugarte-Arenas remains in custody, their next legal phase could take another 6 months. But Crouse noted another lawsuit winding through federal courts could reopen the more straightforward path for immigrants in ICE custody to be released on bond. That case sits in the 7th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, whose jurisdiction includes Wisconsin.

If ICE releases Ugarte-Arenas from the Dodge County Jail, the couple’s case would shift to the immigration court system’s “non-detained docket,” Crouse said, where cases move far slower than those of immigrants in custody.

Original story, Dec. 9, 2025:

A Chicago immigration court judge has granted the asylum request of a Madison couple who U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers arrested during a routine check-in at the agency’s Milwaukee office in October.

Judge Eva Saltzman sided with Dailin Pacheco-Acosta and Diego Ugarte-Arenas on Tuesday afternoon, but the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) – ICE’s parent agency – reserved the right to appeal.

The ruling does not automatically free the couple from ICE custody. 

“It’s not over,” said Ben Crouse, the couple’s Milwaukee-based attorney. 

Ugarte-Arenas remains in the Dodge County jail, which contracts with ICE to hold immigrants facing deportation, and Pacheco-Acosta sits in a county jail in northern Kentucky. A recent Trump administration policy has prevented them from posting bond and continuing their asylum case from Madison, where they settled in 2021 after fleeing Venezuela. 

The couple crossed the U.S.-Mexico border without a visa, but because of a clerical error by Customs and Border Patrol officers they encountered near Eagle Pass, Texas, they did not initially land before an immigration court and were instead able to file for asylum with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services upon reaching Wisconsin. The couple refiled for asylum with the immigration court in Chicago after their arrests in October. Neither has a past criminal conviction nor a pending criminal charge.

As they await the next step in their legal battle, the Trump administration is defending the policy that has kept the couple in custody for more than a month, even after a federal judge in California challenged its legality. How higher courts rule will determine whether thousands of immigrants in ICE custody can post bond for the first time in months.

Trump officials seek ‘mandatory detention’

Reversing decades of precedent, DHS announced in July that most immigrants in ICE custody would be ineligible for bond and are instead subject to “mandatory detention.” The Board of Immigration Appeals, a body within the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) that sets rules for immigration courts, sided with DHS in September. 

But a Nov. 20 ruling by U.S. Judge Sunshine Sykes of the Central District of California gave the Madison couple and ICE detainees nationwide a moment of optimism. 

Sykes partially ruled on the side of four undocumented immigrants ICE picked up during a June immigration raid in Los Angeles. The four immigrants, represented by attorneys from multiple immigrant rights organizations, had filed a class action lawsuit challenging the rule after they were denied bond. 

But both DHS and DOJ, which oversees immigration court judges, argue Sykes’ decision doesn’t apply to all immigrants in similar positions nationwide. Many immigration court judges, including in Chicago, the court with jurisdiction over most immigrants detained in Wisconsin, have continued to deny bond hearings for immigrants in custody, citing the administration’s reasoning. 

DOJ spokesperson Kathryn Mattingly said department leaders are not instructing immigration judges to specifically reject bond motions.

“Immigration judges are independent adjudicators and decide all matters before them on a case-by-case basis,” Mattingly wrote in a statement to Wisconsin Watch.

Next steps for Madison couple

Crouse, the couple’s attorney, filed motions seeking the Madison couple’s bond before the California ruling. Their motions, even if futile, could help clarify the scope of Sykes’ ruling, he said. 

Crouse and other attorneys are separately testing the last remaining pathway to release: filing “habeas petitions” asking judges to rule on the lawfulness of their clients’ detention. A district court judge in Milwaukee denied a petition for Ugarte-Arenas on Monday, and Pacheco-Acosta is still awaiting a decision from a judge in Kentucky. If Pacheco-Acosta’s petition is successful, she will receive a bond hearing. 

Back in Chicago, Judge Saltzman is preparing a written order outlining her reasoning for granting the couple asylum. DHS signaled plans to challenge her decision before the Board of Immigration appeals. It has 30 days to do so after Saltzman releases her written order. 

Though Crouse called the couple’s case strong — not least because of mounting U.S. military actions in Venezuela —  he noted that recent board decisions siding with DHS mean nothing is assured. 

After asylum win, judge rules ICE must release Madison woman who fled Venezuela. Her husband will remain detained. is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

The front entrance of the E. Barrett Prettyman U.S. Courthouse in Washington, D.C., which houses the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. (Jennifer Shutt/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration Tuesday defended the merits of its fast-track deportation policy before a panel of judges in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, saying immigrants who have been in the country for less than two years without legal authorization are not guaranteed due process.

The suit, brought by immigration rights advocacy groups, challenges the Department of Homeland Security’s expanded expedited removal rule’s application to immigrants in the interior of the United States who cannot prove they have remained in the country for more than two years. 

The expanded policy, which allows the removal of immigrants without an appearance before an immigration judge, is a pillar of the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign. 

Arguing on behalf of the Trump administration, Drew Ensign from the U.S. Department of Justice said that immigrants cannot rely on due process rights granted in the Constitution because those rights are reserved for U.S. citizens. Congress and Supreme Court precedents restrict immigrants’ rights to due process, he said.

Additionally, Ensign argued that because Congress authorized the DHS secretary to use expedited removal, the courts have no jurisdiction on the matter. 

Anand Balakrishnan, legal counsel for Make the Road New York, the immigrant rights advocacy group that brought the challenge, said the policy skirts a fair legal process for immigrants.

Democratic state attorneys general also submitted a brief in support of the immigrant rights groups, arguing that the expanded use of expedited removal is unconstitutional. Those states include California, Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawai’i, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Vermont and Washington state. 

Policy expanded to interior

For decades, expedited removal has been used to apply to migrants apprehended at the U.S. border and quickly deported without appearing before an immigration judge. In January, the Trump administration expanded its scope to the interior of the country and applied it to any immigrant apprehended who cannot prove they have remained in the country for more than two years. 

An appeals court in late November declined the Trump administration’s request to pause a district court’s block of the policy while the appeal was pending. 

Tuesday’s hearing was part of the Trump administration’s appeal on the merits of its policy before a different appeals panel, Judges Justin R. Walker, Neomi Rao and Robert L. Wilkins. President Donald Trump nominated Walker and Rao and former President Barack Obama nominated Wilkins.

The panel appeared skeptical of the administration’s argument that due process rights do not apply to immigrants who entered the U.S. without legal authorization.

Duty to notify

The judges seemed split, though, about if the government should be expected to explain the expedited removal statute to a person it is attempting to remove and what that person’s rights are to challenge their removal, or if the person should have to ask for their own due process rights. 

“Even if we accept your portrayal of how the due process works, … under that framing, there still has to be adequate notice (of removal),” Wilkins said to Ensign. 

Ensign argued that immigrants subject to expedited removal have sufficient notice they are being removed and can’t rely on the due process clause of the Constitution’s Fifth Amendment to challenge it. The executive branch has the authority to decide how to apply the clause to immigrants, he said.

Wilkins pushed back on that argument, saying notices must meet minimum standards. 

“The notice (of removal) has to be sufficient,” he said to Ensign. “(It) has to inform you of at least what the procedures are or what you’re facing.”

Balakrishnan said a mere notice of removal is “inadequate.” An immigrant subject to expedited removal can be deported within hours and without having time to challenge their removal or even speak to an attorney, he said.

Walker seemed skeptical that the burden of notifying an immigrant that they were subject to the policy fell to the government. 

“For someone who has chosen to be here illegally, in violation of our laws….from a due process perspective it’s not too much to ask that if someone here illegally wants the special non-expedited removal procedures that Congress has graciously afforded them, it’s not too much to ask that they ask for them,” he said. 

Balakrishnan argued that wouldn’t be sufficient due process.

“I think it’s common sense that having even that bare amount of information, ‘if you’ve been here for over two years you’re not subject to expedited removal’ would certainly decrease the risk of error,” Balakrishnan said. “I’m not sure how it would be overly burdensome for the government to do that.” 

Reading Time: 3 minutes

Wisconsin refugee support organizations and food banks are preparing for the worst as regulators in other states implement new rules barring many refugees and people granted asylum from federal food assistance programs. 

But they haven’t yet seen the new restrictions take effect in Wisconsin.

The Wisconsin Department of Health Services, which administers FoodShare — the state’s name for the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) — has continued to provide benefits to immigrants rendered ineligible under the new federal restrictions, support groups say. The agency has not said how long it will continue to do so. 

Refugees, asylees and other immigrants who entered the country through humanitarian programs had long been eligible for SNAP before securing legal permanent residency. But President Donald Trump’s “big” bill-turned law, signed in July, rewrote SNAP eligibility rules to exclude such immigrants who have yet to obtain green cards.  

The U.S. Department of Agriculture gave states until Nov. 1 to comply. 

Refugee assistance groups and food banks across Wisconsin have sounded the alarm about the ban. Nearly 8,000 refugees and asylees have settled in the state over the past decade, federal data show, and resettlement organizations note many rely on FoodShare as they find their footing.

 “SNAP is a lifeline for refugees and asylees as they rebuild their lives in the United States after traumatic and often dangerous circumstances,” said Matt King, CEO of Milwaukee food bank Hunger Task Force. “Food support is one of the first stabilizing resources they receive as they navigate an unfamiliar country and begin the process of resettlement.” 

Hunger Task Force helped more than 1,600 refugees access food assistance in 2024 alone, he added.

Anticipating a benefits cutoff, Wisconsin aid groups have geared up for a surge in demand for services.

 “We’ve already been proactive,” said Donna Ambrose, executive director of The Neighbor’s Place, the largest food bank in Marathon County – a longtime hub for refugee resettlement. Her organization is extending its hours and offering an “evening market” on Thursday nights to accommodate rising needs. 

In the Fox Valley, the nonprofit Casa Hispana recently received an anonymous donation to support food and fuel assistance. It plans to hold a giveaway in the coming weeks. CEO Carlos Salazar expects part will go to asylees from Latin America who stand to lose FoodShare benefits.

COMSA, a resource center for immigrants and refugees in Green Bay, faces a more difficult position. While the nonprofit will continue its core programs – job application support and English language classes, for instance – the center lacks resources to begin providing food assistance, Executive Director Said Hassan said.

Officials with refugee resettlement groups say their clients who lack green cards are still receiving FoodShare — for now. They haven’t heard details about what’s next. 

“We’re supposed to find out any day” about benefits, said Sean Gilligan, the refugee services manager with Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Green Bay. 

Last-minute guidance from the federal Agriculture Department adds to the uncertainty. The agency on Oct. 31 directed states to permanently block all immigrants who entered the U.S. through humanitarian pathways – including refugees and asylees – from receiving SNAP, even after obtaining green cards.

Wisconsin Democratic Attorney General Josh Kaul and 21 other state attorneys general challenged the directive in a late-November lawsuit, arguing that the department’s instructions conflict with provisions of Trump’s new law. The lawsuit asserts refugees and asylees with green cards remain eligible for SNAP aid.

The attorneys general also argue that federal rules allow a 120-day grace period to implement latest guidance, meaning states shouldn’t immediately be held to its provisions. The Trump administration claims that period ended Nov. 1.

“Wisconsin and other states have already begun implementing the statutory changes enacted earlier this year, but USDA’s guidance now forces them to overhaul eligibility systems without sufficient time,” Kaul’s office said in a press release.

The state could face financial penalties if the Trump administration determines it is distributing aid to  immigrants who are ineligible for SNAP. A provision of Trump’s landmark law will strip some funding from states with high SNAP “error rates” – a measure of over- and under-payments to recipients – beginning in fiscal year 2028. Wisconsin is among few states with an error rate below the bar for penalties, but Kaul’s office said confusion over the new eligibility rules could push the state’s error rate over the penalty threshold. 

The new rules will “create widespread confusion for families, increase the risk of wrongful benefit terminations, erode public trust, and place states in an untenable situation where they must either violate federal law or accept severe financial liability,” Kaul’s office said in a press release.

The state health department declined to comment about its plans, and about what steps it has taken to implement the new eligibility requirements.

Refugee advocates brace for impact from federal limits on food aid is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

Over the past year, President Trump's administration has radically changed the immigration landscape in the United States. Meanwhile, Wisconsin's immigration attorneys are feeling strained as they try to keep up.

The post Wisconsin immigration attorneys struggle to keep up with Trump policy changes appeared first on WPR.

U.S. Rep. Adelita Grijalva, D-Arizona, speaks to the media during a primary election-night party at El Casino Ballroom in South Tucson on July 15, 2025. Grijalva claims she was pepper-sprayed during an ICE raid in Tucson on Dec. 5, 2025, but the Department of Homeland Security denies it. (Photo by Rebecca Noble/Getty Images)

Arizona’s U.S. Rep. Adelita Grijalva was involved in a clash with federal agents during a protest of immigration raids in west Tucson Friday, during which she claims she was hit with pepper spray. 

According to a spokesman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the agency partnered with the Internal Revenue Service to carry out as many as 16 warrants in southern Arizona in a “years-long investigation into immigration and tax violations.” In videos posted to social media by community advocates, several masked federal agents in tactical gear can be seen near the westside location of popular Mexican seafood and grill restaurant Taco Giro. 

The raids prompted a protest and federal agents deployed tear gas and pepper spray against the crowd. The Arizona Daily Star reported that multiple employees who live near the west Tucson restaurant were detained. At least one protester was among those taken into custody by federal agents. AZ Family reported that Taco Giro locations in north Tucson, Casa Grande and Vail were also targeted. ICE spokesman Fernando Burgos-Ortiz confirmed to the Arizona Mirror that multiple people were arrested, but didn’t clarify how many or confirm claims that agents had pepper-sprayed a sitting U.S. Congresswoman.

Tricia McLaughlin, the spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, dismissed Grijalva’s account. McLaughlin accused Grijalva of hindering the work of federal agents and appeared to question Grijalva’s claim that she was pepper-sprayed by highlighting her lack of visible physical reaction in the video. 

“If her claims were true, this would be a medical marvel,” McLaughlin wrote. “But they’re not true. She wasn’t pepper sprayed. She was in the vicinity of someone who *was* pepper sprayed as they were obstructing and assaulting law enforcement. In fact, 2 law enforcement officers were seriously injured by this mob that (Grijalva) joined. Presenting one’s self as a ‘Member of Congress’ doesn’t give you the right to obstruct law enforcement.”

Tucson Sentinel reporter Paul Ingram, who was on-the-ground covering the ICE raid and protest, reported that federal agents shot pepper spray into his face and eye, even though he was clearly identified as a member of the press.

A video from Univision reporter Óscar Gómez shows federal agents shooting pepper spray directly into the faces of protesters, with Grijalva in close proximity. An agent is then seen coming after Gómez directly, covering his camera with pepper spray, even as Gómez appeared to be backing away.

The large-scale raid of several Taco Giros in Southern Arizona is the second time this year a restaurant chain was the subject of an investigation by Homeland Security Investigations, a division within ICE, that ensnared multiple employees who lack legal immigration status. 

In July, federal agents raided Colt Grill BBQ and Spirits locations in Northern Arizona. The operation was the culmination of a multi-year investigation into a money laundering and labor exploitation scheme. Along with the husband-and-wife owners of the Northern Arizona restaurants, and two undocumented immigrants who were involved in recruiting and exploiting other immigrant workers, several more undocumented employees were also arrested. 

In a video posted to her X account, Grijalva described as many as 40 agents gathered at the westside location she visited with her staff for lunch, and said that she was treated with hostility even after identifying herself as a member of Congress. 

“I was here, this is like the restaurant I come to literally once a week, and was sprayed in the face by a very aggressive agent, pushed around by others when I literally was not being aggressive,” she said. “I was asking for clarification which is my right as a member of Congress.” 

A video of the incident posted to Grijalva’s social media accounts shows a federal agent spraying several bursts of pepper spray directly at demonstrators in the street, close to where Grijalva is standing. Grijalva’s staffer jumps in front of her. Coughing can be heard offscreen. Later in the video, a pepper ball appears to explode inches from Grijalva’s feet as she walks away.

Grijalva, Arizona’s first Latina congresswoman, has been a fierce critic of immigration enforcement activity in her district. Earlier this week, she publicly condemned a Border Patrol raid of a humanitarian group’s migrant aid station in the desert on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives, criticizing it as an example of President Donald Trump’s “cruel (and) unconstitutional” mass deportation agenda. 

 In a statement issued shortly after she said she was pepper-sprayed, Grijalva said her office was working to get more information on Friday’s immigration arrests.

“Our residents deserve to know whether these raids are targeting genuine public safety threats – or law-abiding neighbors who have called our communities home for decades,” she wrote. “ICE has become a lawless agency under this Administration – operating with no transparency, no accountability, and open disregard for basic due process.”

While Trump administration officials have time and again emphasized their intent to detain the “worst of the worst”, many of the immigrants that ICE has arrested during Trump’s second term have no criminal record. A June survey of people in immigration detainment facilities at the time found that nearly half, 47%, lacked any criminal history and fewer than 30% of them had been convicted of crimes.

Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, the state’s top legal officer, denounced the incident on social media. In a post on X, the Democrat, who has long criticized Trump’s immigration enforcement tactics, called the incident “unacceptable and outrageous.”

“Enforcing the rule of law does not mean pepper spraying a member of Congress for simply asking questions,” Mayes wrote. “Effective law enforcement requires restraint and accountability, not unchecked aggression.”

Grijalva voiced concern for how federal officials interact with people who don’t have her authority, in light of how she was mistreated on Friday.

“While I am fine, if that is the way they treat me, how are they treating other community members who do not have the same privileges and protections that I do?” she questioned, in her written statement. 

***UPDATE: This story has been updated with eyewitness reporting from the Tucson Sentinel and Univision. 

Gov. Tony Evers vetoed a host of Republican bills Friday, including legislation barring undocumented immigrants from getting federal health care funding.

The post Evers vetoes bill to block Medicaid funds from undocumented residents appeared first on WPR.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Oct. 9, 2024. (Photo by Jane Norman/States Newsroom)

The U.S. Supreme Court said Friday justices will hear a case to decide if President Donald Trump’s order to end birthright citizenship is constitutional.

The court agreed to hear a case, before it is decided in a lower court, that deals with the Constitution’s 14th Amendment, which grants citizenship to almost everyone born in the United States. The amendment’s birthright citizenship clause has been used to give citizenship to the children of immigrants in the country without legal authorization or on a temporary basis.

While a schedule for arguments has not yet been released by the court, it’s likely the case would be heard sometime in early 2026.

The Trump administration argued in its petition to the court that the amendment, which was adopted in 1868, was meant to apply to newly freed slaves. It was not meant to provide citizenship to the children of immigrants without legal status, Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote.

“Long after the Clause’s adoption, the mistaken view that birth on U.S. territory confers citizenship on anyone subject to the regulatory reach of U.S. law became pervasive, with destructive consequences,” Sauer wrote in the September petition.

The petition also sought Supreme Court review of a related challenge to the order by the states of Washington, Arizona, Illinois and Oregon. Friday’s court order did not grant a hearing on that case.

Trump signed an executive order on Jan. 20 seeking to redefine the birthright citizenship clause to exclude the children of immigrants in the country without legal authority or only temporarily. Democratic-led states and advocacy groups swiftly sued.

Courts have largely blocked enforcement of the order, although the Supreme Court in June allowed it to go into effect in the states that had not sued to preserve the right.

In a Friday afternoon statement, the American Civil Liberties Union, a leading civil rights group, noted that several federal judges had blocked enforcement and predicted the Supreme Court would preserve birthright citizenship.

“No president can change the 14th Amendment’s fundamental promise of citizenship,” Cecillia Wang, ACLU’s national legal director, said. “For over 150 years, it has been the law and our national tradition that everyone born on U.S. soil is a citizen from birth. The federal courts have unanimously held that President Trump’s executive order is contrary to the Constitution, a Supreme Court decision from 1898, and a law enacted by Congress. We look forward to putting this issue to rest once and for all in the Supreme Court this term.”

Christine Neumann Ortiz, executive director of Voces de la Frontera, speaks at a press conference on the Wisconsin Supreme Court case challenging the legality of Wisconsin law enforcement agencies' cooperation agreements with ICE | Photo via Voces de la Frontera Facebook video

In Wisconsin we have been watching in horror as President Donald Trump’s lawless immigration crackdown terrorizes communities in our neighboring states of Minnesota and Illinois. 

Here at home, so far, things are mostly quiet. Farmers in western Wisconsin report no ICE raids on the dairies where 60% to 90% of workers are immigrants without legal status. There have been a few high-profile arrests and deportations in Milwaukee, Madison and Manitowoc, but nothing like the scenes of chaos in the streets of Chicago and Minneapolis, where masked federal agents are aiming guns at civilians, smashing out car windows and dragging parents from their children, hustling them off to detention centers to be fast-tracked out of the country without due process.

One of the most disturbing things about this campaign of terror is that it seems to be directed by the president’s whim. In a Thanksgiving post full of invective and schoolyard insults directed at Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, Trump denounced the Somali community he claimed was “completely taking over the great State of Minnesota.” One week later, CBS News confirmed that ICE operations were underway targeting Somali immigrants in the Twin Cities.

Since we can’t count on the federal government to stay inside the bounds of reason or the law, it is critical that local and state leaders stand up to the racist, unconstitutional and unAmerican assault on immigrants. 

It was good news when, on Wednesday, the Wisconsin Supreme Court accepted a case filed by the state chapter of the ACLU on behalf of the immigrant rights group Voces de la Frontera, contending that Wisconsin law enforcement agencies do not have the authority to make arrests or keep people in jail on detainers based solely on ICE’s administrative warrants.

Tim Muth, the ACLU of Wisconsin’s senior staff attorney, said hundreds of people throughout the state are being illegally held for days.

“It is extremely important for the Wisconsin Supreme Court to determine whether any law enforcement in Wisconsin has the legal authority to put or keep people in jail when they have not committed a crime and when no judge has issued an arrest warrant,” Wisconsin immigration attorney Grant Sovern wrote in an email to the Examiner. “Anyone in Wisconsin would want dangerous people to be kept from the public. But ICE is currently making no determinations about dangerousness or the likelihood to show up for a hearing if a summons is issued. A summons is a perfectly rational and legal way to address a civil legal question like someone’s immigration status. Jailing people before any independent adjudicator determines someone to be dangerous is against the Constitution and not the Wisconsin way.”

At a press conference Wednesday, Christine Neumann-Ortiz, executive director of Voces, told the story of a landscaper in Green Bay who was picked up for driving without a license (immigrants without legal status are barred by a 2007 state law from obtaining driver’s licenses). He was sent to county jail and then handed over to ICE. “He was a grandfather, very active in his church,” Neumann-Ortiz said, describing him as “someone who does not represent any kind of threat to society at all” and who, on the contrary, is a pillar of his community and beloved by his family. 

Voces helped fight the deportation in a case that is still working its way through the courts. “At least he’s out and together with his family,” Neumann-Ortiz said. “But that’s an example of how people can be impacted by this.” 

As it scrambles to meet arbitrary deportation quotas, ICE sends detainers even for people who have never been convicted of a crime and have only minor charges pending in Wisconsin courts. 

Voces has been fighting at the local level since the first Trump administration for local law enforcement to refuse to collaborate with ICE unless there is a judicial warrant for someone, meaning that person is being sought in connection with a serious crime. As a result of Voces’ efforts, that is now the standard in Milwaukee County. The state Supreme Court case is an effort to establish the same standard statewide.

Neumann-Ortiz said she’s grateful the Supreme Court justices recognized the urgency of the issue in agreeing to take the case on an expedited basis, “given the current level of abuse that we’re seeing happen, and which will only escalate.”

And, she added, “We certainly very much anticipate Milwaukee being one of the cities that will be targeted for militarized occupation with these aggressive sweeps.”

Whether or not Wisconsin communities can protect people from the kind of violence we’ve been seeing in other states depends on the courageous actions of state and local officials, advocates and informed community members. It begins with recognizing that the Trump administration’s actions are wrong and then standing up.

At the press conference, a reporter asked about ICE’s assertion that the agency doesn’t have room for everyone in its detention facilities and therefore needs space in county jails. Muth responded: “Detain fewer people.”

Neumann-Ortiz added some clarifying context. “They are profiling people, they are just grabbing people without any probable cause. So it’s a very racist program that is using violence against people and is trying to hijack, through bribery and through threats, local law enforcement to be part of this mass deportation machinery,” she said. 

“We’re seeing, at the local level, community come together,” she added, “to reject these efforts to undermine local law enforcement — which is supposed to play a public safety role — into just this arm of deportation driven by xenophobia and racism. And which is making a lot of money for the for-profit prison industry.”

This year, communities across the state have pushed back on 287g partnership agreements between local law enforcement and ICE that turn sheriff’s departments into an arm of the federal immigration agency. Palmyra, Ozaukee and Kenosha counties rejected ICE’s offers of money to transform their sheriffs into agents of federal immigration enforcement.

The Kenosha sheriff’s office made its decision not to participate after the ACLU and Voces had already named it in the Supreme Court lawsuit, along with Walworth, Brown, Sauk and Marathon counties. Palmyra also reversed a decision to accept a large payment from ICE to participate, responding to public outrage.

“Resistance is happening, it’s successful, it’s building community,” Neumann-Ortiz said. “But we do need state protections to uphold our rights.”

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U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement will move its Milwaukee processing operations from a downtown building owned by the Milwaukee School of Engineering to a site on the Northwest Side, an ICE spokesperson said in an email to NNS.

ICE has been using the university-owned building at 310 E. Knapp St. as a processing center, a presence that has drawn weekly protests from students and community members since June. 

A spokesperson for the General Services Administration, the real estate arm of the federal government, said the GSA “remains focused on supporting this administration’s goal of optimizing the federal footprint, and providing the best workplaces for our federal agencies to meet their mission,” the spokesperson wrote in a statement to NNS.

Demonstrators have been calling on the university to cut ties with the agency.

MSOE officials say the university inherited the federal lease when it purchased the building in 2023 and does not have the legal authority to remove ICE.

Alan Madry, professor emeritus at Marquette University Law School, said there is no question the federal government has eminent domain authority in such situations. 

The federal government has the legal power to take or use property for public purposes even if a private landowner or local government objects.

A ‘phased’ transition

In a statement to NNS, ICE said the transition “will follow a phased approach to ensure a smooth and efficient process” and that the agency “remains committed to maintaining continuity of operations as the office becomes fully operational.”

Processing centers are typically used to conduct interviews and sometimes hold people for the short term rather than overnight detention. 

The ICE spokesperson did not provide a timeline for the move, but said the new location at 11925 W. Lake Park Drive will operate as a processing center, not a detention facility.

In a statement, Jeremy McGovern, spokesperson for the Milwaukee Department of Neighborhood Services, said the city has no additional inspections scheduled for the Lake Park Drive site and that the certificate of occupancy is already in place. 

Because the federal government is not subject to local zoning and permit requirements, McGovern said, the city cannot determine when the site becomes active and has limited knowledge about the federal timeline.

Protests continue

The university says it intends to use the Knapp Street building for academic purposes once ICE leaves. But Noah Dinan, a sophomore studying software engineering at the school, said the lack of clarity about the move raises troubling possibilities. 

The transition could take years, or ICE could expand its Milwaukee operations rather than relocate, said Dinan, who is a member of the university’s chapter of the Young Democratic Socialists of America.

The organization has circulated petitions, contacted alumni and joined the weekly Friday protests. 

Dinan also pointed to the financial incentives of leasing to ICE. 

According to the General Services Administration’s September 2025 lease inventory, the federal government is paying the university about $2.1 million per year to occupy the Knapp Street site through April 2028.

Despite the news that ICE has plans to transition from Knapp Street to its new property, Dinan said he and other students plan to continue protesting. 

“Our campaign is one of sanctuary,” Dinan said.

---

Jonathan Aguilar is a visual journalist at Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service who is supported through a partnership between CatchLight Local and Report for America.

ICE plans to leave Milwaukee School of Engineering facility is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

A shift in the Trump administration’s stance toward Afghan refugees has shaken members of Wisconsin’s Afghan community, following months of renewed uncertainty about their status in the United States.

The post Afghans in Wisconsin face uncertainty amid Trump administration crackdown appeared first on WPR.

Farm workers harvesting yellow bell peppers near Gilroy, California. (Nnehring/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration Thursday announced new restrictions for immigrants, reducing the work authorization periods from five years to 18 months, the latest crackdown on legal immigration.

The new policy follows the shooting of two West Virginia National Guard members by an Afghan national granted asylum earlier this year. 

The shift will not only affect hundreds of thousands of immigrants, but the shortened period for work authorization could create massive backlogs at the agency responsible for processing legal immigration requests, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. 

“Reducing the maximum validity period for employment authorization will ensure that those seeking to work in the United States do not threaten public safety or promote harmful anti-American ideologies,” USCIS Director Joseph Edlow said in a statement.

“After the attack on National Guard service members in our nation’s capital by an alien who was admitted into this country by the previous administration, it’s even more clear that USCIS must conduct frequent vetting of aliens,” he continued. 

Immigrants affected by the new changes include refugees; those granted asylum; those with a withholding of removal; those with pending applications for asylum or withholding of removal; those adjusting their status, for example by gaining a green card; and those who fall under the Nicaraguan Adjustment and Central American Relief Act of 1997.

That act applies to certain Nicaraguans, Cubans, Salvadorans, Guatemalans, nationals of former Soviet bloc countries and their dependents who in the 1990s had applied for asylum and were systematically denied.

Additionally, USCIS fees for applying for permits and other paperwork increased as a result of the massive tax and spending passage that Republicans passed over the summer and President Donald Trump signed into law. For initial employment authorization, fees are now $550 and $275 to renew. 

Following the shooting, U.S. Army Spc. Sarah Beckstrom, 20, died. A second guard member, U.S. Air Force Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, 24, remains critically wounded but hospitalized in stable condition. 

In response, the Trump administration has ramped up its crackdown on legal immigration and highlighted the need for its mass deportation campaign. The suspect, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, pleaded not guilty to several charges in court on Tuesday. 

This week, all immigration applications from 19 countries listed on Trump’s “high-risk” countries or travel ban from earlier this year, were paused — a move that freezes processing for green card holders and citizenship applications.

Supporters gather for a rally to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program in 2012 in New York City. (Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images) 

WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, a longtime champion of creating legal status for immigrants brought into the country as children who will retire next year, re-introduced his trademark immigration bill for the last time Thursday. 

Durbin, an Illinois Democrat, first introduced the measure now known as the Dream Act in 2001 with Utah Republican Orrin Hatch and has reintroduced it every Congress since. Congress has not passed the bill. 

Durbin, 81, spoke about his legacy on immigration at a Thursday press conference.

“We are a nation of immigrants. I am proud to be the son of an immigrant,” the No. 2 Senate Democrat said. “This is a proud son of an immigrant who’s doing everything he can to help the next generation of immigrants be part of America’s future. The fight has just begun.”

While Congress is again unlikely to approve the measure this year, younger Senate Democrats Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada and Alex Padilla of California said Thursday they would carry on the effort.

“The dream is still alive,” Padilla said. “We are committed as ever to get it across the finish line.”

Cortez Masto agreed. 

“Some day, with the hard work of everyone, we (will) get it across the finish line,” she said. 

Alaska Republican Lisa Murkowski co-sponsored the latest version of the legislation.

Temporary fix now 13 years old

The Dream Act would create a path to citizenship for immigrant children who came into the country with their parents without legal authorization.

The bill has nicknamed more than 530,000 immigrants in the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program as Dreamers. The Obama administration created the program in 2012 as a temporary measure to allow recipients to obtain work permits and drivers licenses while Congress created a pathway to citizenship.

DACA’s legality is tied up in the courts, throwing its recipients into limbo. 

For now, existing DACA recipients can continue to renew, but the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in January upheld deportation protections for recipients, but found the work authorization portion unlawful. The appeals court limited its ruling to Texas, which spearheaded the suit, meaning that DACA remains in full effect in every state and U.S. territory except Texas.

Many immigration policy experts have called DACA outdated because there are now thousands of undocumented youth who are not eligible for the program because they were not even born by 2007, the year a recipient must have started residence in the United States. 

A federal judge in 2021 blocked new applicants from being accepted.

Trump crackdown adds urgency

Many DACA recipients have been caught up in President Donald Trump’s mass deportation campaign. 

Dozens of recipients have been detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, despite their legal status, according to immigrant advocacy groups tracking the issue. 

“This moment in the history of our nation is a terrible, challenging moment for so many people, not just the Dreamers, but immigrants in general,” Durbin said. 

“I’ve been both angry and heartbroken to watch masked federal agents parading in their combat uniforms with automatic weapons in the city of Chicago,” he continued. “I’ve seen them wreak havoc in these communities and sow fear among people who are afraid to even go outside, to go to church or to go shopping.”

The executive director of the immigrant advocacy group United We Dream, Greisa Martinez Rosas, said that while DACA has allowed some immigrant youth to obtain work authorization and deportation protections, more needs to be done, especially under a second Trump administration.

“We are currently facing unprecedented attacks that pose the greatest threat to… the future of the DACA program, and in doing so, the future of this country and those millions of people who would make our country stronger every single day,” she said.

Immigration reform elusive

Durbin said the Dream Act would be a “key step toward true, positive, bipartisan change” in immigration policy.  

​​The last time Congress came close to bipartisan immigration reform was in 2013. 

That year, the bipartisan “Gang of Eight” senators, including Durbin, crafted a bill to create a pathway to citizenship for millions of undocumented people who had resided in the country for years. 

The Senate passed the measure, but then-House Speaker John Boehner, an Ohio Republican, never brought the bill to the floor for a vote.

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The Wisconsin Supreme Court has agreed to hear a lawsuit challenging five Wisconsin sheriffs’ practices of holding detainees in their jail for handoffs to ICE.

The ACLU filed the lawsuit in September on behalf of the immigrant rights group Voces de la Frontera. It names sheriff’s offices in Brown, Kenosha, Marathon, Sauk and Walworth counties as respondents. 

All five sheriffs’ offices honor ICE detainers —  nonbinding requests that a law enforcement agency assist ICE in taking custody of a person suspected of being in the country illegally by holding an inmate in a jail up to 48 hours past the person’s scheduled release. The local law enforcement agency can then pass the detainee directly to ICE officers.

The lawsuit argues that the detainers qualify as an arrest and that state statutes prohibit law enforcement agencies from making arrests based on ICE’s administrative warrants.

While most Wisconsin sheriffs’ offices honor ICE detainers, the lawsuit claims that five named offices received roughly a quarter of all detainers issued to Wisconsin sheriffs’ offices between January and July of this year. 

The sheriff’s offices have differing relationships with ICE. Brown and Sauk counties, for instance, also contract with ICE to hold immigrant detainees in their jails, meaning a person could remain in the same jail after entering ICE custody. Kenosha County has no such contract, but it does participate in a federal grant program that partially reimburses local law enforcement agencies for incarceration costs in exchange for data on undocumented inmates. 

ICE records list more than 130 arrests at county jails in Wisconsin between January and July of this year. Nearly 40% of those arrested were awaiting a ruling in their first criminal case.

In its initial petition, Voces de la Frontera urged the Supreme Court to immediately take up the case as a statewide concern. The court’s order, published on Wednesday afternoon, allows the plaintiffs to skip the lower courts entirely.

Liberal justices have a 4-3 majority on the court. At least four unnamed justices voted to immediately accept the case. Justices Annette Ziegler and Rebecca Bradley, both conservatives, dissented. Justice Brian Hagedorn, who often votes with conservatives, discussed the process in an opinion that did not specify his vote.

“When this court grants review in a case, we almost always let our grant order proceed without comment or dissent,” he wrote, later adding: “Even if some of my colleagues publicly record their dissent, as in this case, that does not necessarily reveal which justices voted for or against the petition in closed conference.”

Voces de la Frontera has 30 days to file a brief in the case. The court has not yet scheduled oral arguments in the case.

None of the five sheriffs’ offices named in the lawsuit immediately responded to requests for comment.

“We are reviewing the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s order and evaluating our next steps in this litigation,” Milwaukee attorney Sam Hall, who is representing all five sheriffs, wrote in an email Wednesday evening. “We are confident, however, that Wisconsin sheriffs who honor ICE detainers do so fully within the bounds of Wisconsin law and the federal legal framework governing immigration enforcement.”

Wisconsin Supreme Court to weigh sheriffs’ cooperation with ICE is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

Federal immigration "strike teams" are in Minnesota looking for undocumented Somali immigrants, after President Trump referred to them as "garbage" and said he doesn't want them in the U.S.

The post Somali residents in Wisconsin uneasy following Trump comments, federal raids appeared first on WPR.

Wisconsin's Supreme Court will take up a case that challenges the practice of holding people in local Wisconsin jails at the request of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The post Wisconsin Supreme Court accepts case challenging sheriffs who assist ICE appeared first on WPR.

Construction on a new city hall in Raleigh, N.C., was at a standstill Nov. 18 as word of immigration raids kept away most workers. Industries with large immigrant workforces, such as construction, are asking for federal relief as they combat labor shortages and raids. (Photo by Clayton Henkel/NC Newsline)

As food prices remain high, the Trump administration has made it easier for farmers to hire foreign guest workers and to pay them less. Now, other industries with large immigrant workforces also are asking for relief as they combat labor shortages and raids.

Visas for temporary foreign workers are a quick fix with bipartisan support in Congress. And Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins’ office told Stateline that “streamlining” visas for both agricultural and other jobs is a priority for the Trump administration.

But some experts warn that such visas can be harmful if they postpone immigration overhauls that would give immigrant workers a path to green cards and citizenship.

“Lack of permanent status is costly to migrants, employers, and the broader economy,” wrote Pia Orrenius, a labor economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, in a report published in June. Workers are “vulnerable to policy changes triggered by a change in administration, most recently the threat of mass deportations.”

In a Nov. 25 interview with Stateline, Orrenius said the crackdown on illegal immigration could be a good thing if it leads to permanent solutions.

“If you can stop undocumented immigration, then great. This is a great time to work on comprehensive immigration reform,” Orrenius said. “Where is there a scarcity of workers and how do we address those legally instead of illegally?”

Restaurants, construction and landscaping businesses have lost a combined 315,000 immigrant workers through August this year, more than any other industries, according to a Stateline analysis of Current Population Survey data provided by the University of Minnesota at ipums.org.

The construction industry needs more foreign worker visas like those already being provided for agriculture to prevent more delays in building everything from homes to highways, business owners say.

The industry needs help to “provide lawful workers while working to prepare more Americans for permanent careers in construction,” said Jaime Andress, testifying at a congressional hearing last month on behalf of the Associated General Contractors of America trade group. About 92% of contractors with open positions are having trouble finding enough skilled labor, whether it’s for construction of buildings, highways or utility infrastructure, she testified.

There are about 145,000 fewer immigrants working in restaurants, on average, through August of this year compared with the same period in 2024, the Stateline analysis found. There are about 127,000 fewer in construction and 43,000 fewer in landscaping.

One landscaping firm, which did not agree to an interview, lost $50,000 in contracts this year when workers stopped showing up because of rumored immigration raids, said Rebecca Shi, chief executive officer of the Chicago-based American Business Immigration Coalition, which advocates for employers seeking immigration changes.

“He had 75 workers and 50 of them didn’t show up one day because there were rumors ICE was going to be in the area,” Shi said. “Many of them were citizens and legal workers, but they were worried about family members and neighbors, so they didn’t show up either. It’s bad for the economy when you lose a worker, but it’s also the fear and uncertainty. We know restaurants that have lost 50% of staff and are at risk of closing because people just aren’t showing up.”

The coalition organized a “fly-in” in October to Washington, D.C., to ask members of Congress for more help to legalize immigrant workers through work permits in hospitality, agriculture, construction, elder care, health care and manufacturing.

In a letter dated Dec. 2, thousands of businesses in all 50 states asked the administration for an additional 64,716 H-2B visas, saying they rely on them for seasonal surges in hospitality, tourism, landscaping, forestry, seafood production and other industries.

And a bipartisan group of 33 U.S. senators from 22 states signed a letter Nov. 13 by Maine Independent Sen. Angus King and South Dakota Republican Sen. Mike Rounds asking for more H-2B seasonal employment visas.

“Employers’ workforce needs cannot be met with American workers alone,” the letter said.

Construction contractors say they need visas that are similar to the H-2A visas for agriculture that the Trump administration streamlined in October to make them easier and cheaper for farmers to hire temporary foreign workers.

The Associated General Contractors of America wants visas like the proposed new H-2C visas floated by Pennsylvania Republican U.S. Rep. Lloyd Smucker. Those would allow up to 85,000 less-skilled temporary workers in construction, hospitality and other fields to stay in this country up to nine years. The bill, introduced in September, has not advanced.

The association also supports a pathway to legal status for some workers already in the country, as proposed by Florida Republican U.S. Rep. María Elvira Salazar and Texas Democratic U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar. The bill, introduced in July, also has not advanced.

“Workforce shortages are the leading cause of construction project delays,” said Brian Turmail, a vice president at the association. “Nearly 1 out of 3 contractors have been impacted in one way or another by enhanced ICE enforcement activities. That number is almost certain to increase now that ICE has received significant boosts to its budget as part of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.”

Those industries are asking for more help as the latest federal immigration raids further affect workforces in Illinois, Maryland and North Carolina, with more raids planned in Louisiana. Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a data research organization at Syracuse University, reported a “massive redeployment of government military and civilian personnel to immigration enforcement” in recent months, with total detentions reaching more than 65,000, according to a Nov. 24 report. Nearly three-quarters of those arrested have no criminal convictions.

Construction, landscaping and other industries are already heavy users of H-2B visas for temporary non-agricultural foreign workers, according to government figures reviewed by Stateline.

In fiscal year 2025, which ended in September, there were about 209,000 H-2B visas, with Texas (20,051), Florida (18,515), North Carolina (8,634), Colorado (7,723) and Louisiana (7,234) getting the most. The most common occupations were building and grounds (94,152); food service (31,403); construction (16,729); farming, fishing and forestry (15,665); and personal care (12,170).

Some of the largest users of the visas last year were Core Tech Construction of New York City, a concrete coring and cutting firm (2,619 visas); ABC Professional Tree Services of Texas, which provides land clearance services (1,913); and Progressive Solutions LLC of Arkansas, which provides herbicide application to utilities (1,882).

The H-2B visa program needs to be streamlined and expanded to be useful for employers and workers, said David Bier, director of immigration studies at the libertarian CATO Institute, who has written about the visas.

Employers don’t always get the workers they want because the United States limits H-2B visas to 33,000 twice a year. Requests for the visas have already surpassed the 33,000 cap for the first half of fiscal 2026.

“The paperwork is a nightmare for employers and there are a lot of steps for workers also,” said Bier. “And there are so few visas available that your chance of getting all you need is almost nil.”

Stateline reporter Tim Henderson can be reached at thenderson@stateline.org.

Federal agents, including members of the Department of Homeland Security, the Border Patrol, and police, attempt to keep protesters back outside a downtown U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility on Oct. 4, 2025 in Portland, Oregon. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

Members of the U.S. House Homeland Security Committee decried violence against law enforcement, but seemed to make little headway in identifying how to address the issue during a Wednesday hearing that often saw each party harshly blame the other.

Chairman Andrew Garbarino of New York, at his first hearing since taking over as for the retired Mark Green of Tennessee, sought to strike an even tone in an opening statement, condemning violence against police while noting that officers have a responsibility to maintain the public’s trust.

“Law enforcement personnel are public servants, not public figures. They stepped forward to safeguard our nation and uphold the laws enacted by this body,” Garbarino said. “But that alone does not absolve them from facing any form of accountability. Public trust and public safety go hand in hand.” 

Other members of the panel, though, were less even-handed, with Democrats strongly criticizing some tactics used by federal law enforcement officers under President Donald Trump and Republicans denouncing such criticism as fueling violence against police.

Several members of the panel, of both parties, acknowledged the two West Virginia National Guard members shot in a Nov. 26 alleged ambush in Washington, D.C.

Police witnesses denounce Nazi comparisons

Witnesses from three police organizations, the Fraternal Order of Police, the National Sheriffs’ Association and the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, largely agreed that heightened rhetoric about law enforcement activity was a danger to their members.

“The rhetoric coming from the top, calling officers Nazis and Gestapo, it better stop right now,” Jonathan Thompson, the executive director of the National Sheriffs’ Association, said. 

“You are inflaming dangerous circumstances. You’re attacking people that wake up every single day and do one thing: they put on their uniforms, they put on their star and… enforce the laws of this country.”

Daniel Hodges, a D.C. Metropolitan Police officer who responded to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack and who Democrats invited to testify to the panel as a private citizen Wednesday, said protocol of federal officers under Trump invited the comparison.

“There is a semi-secret police force abducting people based on the color of their skin and sending many of them via state-sponsored human trafficking to extraterritorial concentration camps,” he said. 

“Before we go around the room clutching our pearls, wondering how people could possibly compare law enforcement in this country to the Gestapo, maybe we should take a moment and ask ourselves if there isn’t some recent behavior on the government’s part that could encourage such juxtaposition,” Hodges said.

Patrick Yoes, the national president of the Fraternal Order of Police, said violence against officers was a nonpartisan issue.

“My members are both Democrat and Republican,” he said. “And we’re all having the same problem.”

ICE under microscope

Several Democrats said the tactics used by officers of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and its parent agency, the Department of Homeland Security, undermined their law enforcement mission and endangered them, while Republicans blamed that rhetoric for making police targets.

New York Democrat Daniel Goldman, a former federal prosecutor, objected to Thompson’s testimony that police officers “put on their uniforms.”

“The problem is that’s not the case,” Goldman said. “They don’t put on a uniform, they don’t wear identification, and they go out with masks on to — violently in many cases — arrest unsuspecting immigrants, non-violent, many of whom are actually here legally.”

Goldman said as a federal prosecutor he worked with DHS officers “who represented the very, very best of our country.” But under Trump, the department’s behavior had grown irresponsible, he said.

Illinois Democrat Delia Ramirez went further, calling DHS “the single biggest threat to public safety right now.”

“They use anonymity to terrorize our communities and to violate our rights,” she said. “They reject accountability. They disregard court orders and they violate consent decrees. Bottom line: DHS agents lie. They act with impunity. They reject checks and balances, and they ignore Congress and the courts.”

GOP defends DHS

Republicans on the panel deflected blame from DHS and drew a direct line from the rhetoric of some Democrats opposed to ICE’s tactics to physical attacks on law enforcement.

Tennessee Republican Andy Ogles said Ramirez’s comment “pisses me off” and characterized DHS agents as carrying out the rule of law.

“This is about the rhetoric against law enforcement, violence against law enforcement,” Ogles said. “This isn’t about ICE. This isn’t about deportations, or the (Homeland Security) secretary doing her job, securing the border and deporting those who are here illegally.”

Rep. Eli Crane, an Arizona Republican, played a video showing Rep LaMonica McIver, a New Jersey Democrat who also sits on the panel, confronting ICE agents at a detention facility in her district.

“What do you think it means to people that are out there watching and listening, watching social media, watching the news, and they see a member of Congress who sits on this committee go out there and behave like that?” Crane asked the witnesses.

Thompson answered he was “appalled.”

“Quite honestly, I find it reprehensible, and it’s obviously dangerous,” he said.

McIver said she had been doing her job to provide oversight.

Jan. 6 pardons at issue

Democrats also cited Trump’s pardons of people convicted of crimes as part of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol as condoning violence against law enforcement.

McIver suggested committee Republicans were hypocritical in condemning some anti-police rhetoric while staying silent or praising Trump’s decision to pardon Jan.6 rioters.

“It is not Democrats who are praising, let alone pardoning, people who stormed this very Capitol complex to beat police officers and hunt down elected officials,” she said.