A US appeals court has upheld an order blocking immigration agents from carrying out patrols in California. The patrols have led to indiscriminate detentions without reasonable grounds to suspect people of being undocumented immigrants. The ruling, delivered by a three-judge panel late on Friday, August 2, denies the federal government's appeal to overturn a temporary July order to halt "roving patrols" in Los Angeles, which immigration rights groups have described as illegally using racial profiling. California residents and advocacy groups sued the Department of Homeland Security over the detentions.
District Judge Maame Ewusi-Mensah Frimpong had ordered an end to the arrests. She had argued that such actions by agents violate a person's constitutional rights, which safeguard against unreasonable seizures by the government. She had said the detentions were being made "based upon race alone," on whether a person was speaking Spanish or English with an accent or because of their place of work, and ordered them stopped.
Friday's ruling by the US Ninth Circuit Court of appeals described the case of plaintiff Jason Gavidia. A US citizen, born and raised in East Los Angeles, Gavidia was arrested outside a tow yard in Montebello by agents carrying military-style rifles on June 12.
"The agents repeatedly asked Gavidia whether he is American – and they repeatedly ignored his answer: 'I am an American,'" the ruling said. Agents asked what hospital he was born in, and Gavidia responded he did not know, but said he was born in "East LA."
The court said Gavidia told the agents he could show them his government-issued ID. "The agents took Gavidia's ID and his phone and kept his phone for 20 minutes. They never returned his ID."
Los Angeles and the surrounding suburbs have been ground zero for President Donald Trump's aggressive immigration crackdown. He ordered the US military deployed there for weeks, and agents have rounded up migrants at car washes, bus stops, stores and farms.
The ruling said the government's defense team argued that "certain types of businesses, including car washes, were selected for encounters because (...) they are likely to employ persons without legal documentation."
Rights groups hailed the order as a victory for those seeking to bar the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents from conducting the raids.
"This decision is further confirmation that the administration's paramilitary invasion of Los Angeles violated the Constitution and caused irreparable injury across the region," said attorney Mohammad Tajsar of the ACLU Foundation of Southern California. "We look forward to holding the federal government accountable for these authoritarian horrors it unleashed in Southern California."