ICE(d) Out

The Warning Was Clear. The Brutality Followed. Now Comes Accountability Or... Complicity.

Back in 2019, then-Senator Kamala Harris described the first Trump Administration’s deportation raids and deployment of ICE a “campaign of terror” to make whole populations of Hispanic Americans afraid”.

And she told y’all again in 2024 that Trump would do the same (or worse) and send troops to our cities – and folks didn’t take her seriously.

She also called for significantly restructuring ICE and the Department of Homeland Security back in 2020, which again, some folks (including some running for the Democratic nomination in 2028) have also criticized.

Now, that we see that ICE is operating as the new slave catchers, brutalizing Americans, operating like a paramilitary version of the Proud Boys, and murdering citizens, we’ve got to revisit two really big questions.

• First, what are we going to do to prosecute ICE agents and purge them when Democrats are back in power?

• And, second, what exactly should we do with ICE if/when we’re in a position to do something about them again other than protest?

Because I spend quite a bit of time suing police departments and correctional facilities when they brutalize and murder Americans like ICE is doing now, I spend a lot of time navigating this issue of qualified immunity.

This is basically a legal doctrine that makes it harder to hold law enforcement accountable even when they’re clearly on bullshit.

Unfortunately, ICE is largely protected by qualified immunity but not protected in the way that J.D. Vance, Steven Miller, or Stephen A. Smith suggests they are.

First, the immunity is qualified not absolute. ICE offices do have some immunity from criminal prosecutions, but they can’t do whatever they want on the job. They still have to comply with federal laws, act reasonably, and not clearly violate a person’s constitutional rights. That clearly happened here, so qualified immunity isn’t a get out of jail free card – even if these cases are often difficult and law enforcement usually wins.

So, what can we do?

First, I think Attorney General Ellison in Minnesota should pursue a prosecution of the ICE offices in question anyway – even if we know that qualified immunity could ultimately protect an officer. The public needs to see how awful this doctrine is in the face of tragedies like what we saw with Rachel Good in Minneapolis.

And, this is a case where the State of Minnesota could succeed. Here’s a good read on what they can – and should! – do under state law from LawFare Media.

Second, I like what Governor Pritzker and Mayor Johnson are doing and saying in Chicago. In addition to prosecutions like what I hope we will see in Minnesota; we need to track names and activity for future state and federal prosecutions of ICE agents.

Third, every single Democrat running for election or re-election to Congress this cycle needs to be supporting H.R. 4944, the “Ending Qualified Immunity for ICE Agents Act” and whatever comes out Senator Murphy’s efforts to reform DHS. If this isn’t coming out of the mouths of the people asking for your vote for Congress this year, don’t vote for them, and don’t send them money.

The “Abolish ICE” crowd was right. We’ve created a monster that has to be reigned in – or potentially abolished.

Now, some of you will hate me here, but another reality is that Americans want immigration enforcement; they don’t want slave catcher brutality and moms being murdered. And there’s a political line to walk here because “Abolish ICE” can easily be misconstrued politically as “open borders.” That’s a political liability for Democrats, and a trap that we have to avoid.

But, Vice President Harris was right, too – we have to radically alter what DHS and ICE do. Their current iterations have to abolished, and immigration enforcement has to go to somewhere else and they have to be able to held accountable.

Hell, I want to change all qualified immunity laws applied to law enforcement – this should also be a bedrock principle for Democrats moving forward.

We absolutely have to call for any 2028 Democratic hopeful to do a full purge of DHS and ICE if elected and Nuremberg-style trials led by the Department of Justice commencing the first day of the next Democratic Administration. If Donald Trump can make up fake prosecutions of people that tried to hold him accountable, we have to bring real prosecutions of the actual terrorists deployed by this Administration to terrorize us.