President Donald Trump's mass deportation campaign received a legal setback on Tuesday when a federal judge issued yet another preliminary injunction against the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). For the second time in as many months, the agency has been ordered to stop conducting warrantless immigration arrests without probable cause, this time in Washington, D.C., and to report on the facts surrounding these arrests moving forward. The DHS must also clarify to all federal agents that probable cause, not mere "reasonable suspicion," is the appropriate standard on which to base arrests.
Shortly after the federal takeover in D.C., in August, five plaintiffs filed a lawsuit against the DHS, accusing the agency of making unlawful immigration-related arrests. Under federal law, immigration agents have probable cause to make a warrantless arrest only if the officer has "reason to believe" that the individual is in the United States in violation of any immigration law or regulation and is likely to escape before a warrant can be obtained. But rather than follow this procedure, plaintiffs in the case—four of which were arrested without a warrant and later released—allege that federal officers conducting their arrests failed to ask about their legal status or assess whether they were a flight risk, or both.
