WASHINGTON (CN) — A federal judge Tuesday night ordered the Trump administration to cease its campaign of arresting immigrants in Washington, D.C. without a warrant or probable cause of a flight risk, warning that the White House’s mistreatment of immigrants could put Americans overseas at risk.
U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell ruled that, while federal agents may have the authority to make warrantless immigration arrests, the way that authority has been used on the immigrant community in Washington was likely unlawful.
“Defendants are preliminarily enjoined from enforcing their policy of conducting warrantless civil immigration arrests without probable cause to believe that the arrestee is likely to escape before an administrative warrant can be obtained,” Howell wrote in the 88-page opinion.
She further certified a class, which she referred to as the “Unassisted Escape Risk Class,” that includes all individuals who, since President Donald Trump’s Aug. 11 “crime emergency,” have been or will be arrested without a warrant and without a pre-arrest, individualized assessment of probable cause.
On Aug. 11, Trump invoked Section 740 of the Home Rule Act — a 1973 federal statute granting local control of the District of Columbia to a city government — to effectively federalize the Metropolitan Police Department by declaring a “crime emergency.”
Under the emergency, Trump activated the D.C. National Guard throughout the city, leading several Republican governors to deploy their own National Guard troops. Federal agents began patrolling the streets with MPD officers, as the troops are not generally authorized to make arrests despite being the face of the crackdown.
According to recently reported numbers, more than 3,500 people have been arrested by federal agents following Trump’s declaration, with more than 40%, or 1,400, being immigration related.
Howell, a Barack Obama appointee, slammed Trump’s characterization of all immigrants who entered the U.S. without permission as “illegal alien criminals,” as a clear misunderstanding of immigration law.
“First, ‘as a general rule, it is not a crime for a removable alien to remain present in the United States,’” Howell wrote, citing the Supreme Court’s decision in Arizona v. United States. “As a legal matter, an immigration status violation is a civil violation. Consequently, viewing all immigrants potentially subject to removal as criminals is, as a legal matter, plain wrong.”
She added that the Supreme Court made clear in Arizona — where the high court ruled 5-3 to strike down Arizona’s infamous “Show Me Your Papers” policy authorizing warrantless immigration arrests — that the “perceived mistreatment of aliens in the U.S. may lead to harmful reciprocal treatment of American citizens abroad.”
A coalition of immigrant rights groups, led by the Amica Center for Immigrant Rights, sued the Trump administration over its warrantless arrests policy on Sept. 25, arguing the practice has been overwhelmingly used against the Latino community in the nation’s capital and has swept up multiple U.S. citizens.
https://www.courthousenews.com/judge-orders-trump-administration-to-halt-warrantless-immigration-arrests-in-district-of-columbia/