The Song Remains the Same: “Immigration Raids Single Out Hispanics, Lawsuit Says”

Latinos have claimed for generations that the U.S. immigration laws are enforced in a discriminatory manner.  racial profiling has been alleged in many lawsuits.  But the allegations continue.  The N.Y. Times reports that a federal lawsuit filed yesterday charges that agents of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement unlawfully force their way into the homes of Hispanic families in the New York area without court warrants, sometimes pushing down doors in the middle of the night, in search of people who do not live there. The class action lawsuit, filed in the Southern District ofNew York, accuses ICE of conducting the raids in violation of the Fourth Amendment’s protection from unreasonable searches, harming citizens and legal residents of the United States as well as foreigners here illegally. The 15 plaintiffs — all but one are residents of Suffolk County and seven of them are United States citizens — describe abusive predawn raids on their homes this year by armed immigration agents. They seek an order prohibiting I.C.E. from conducting home raids until the agency develops clear guidelines to end unlawful entries, and unspecified damages.

KJ