Joswar Torres is finally free after spending seven months unjustly locked up by ICE in Washington state. This is a massive legal defeat for the administration’s detention policy, delivered by a federal judge who said Torres’ constitutional rights had been violated, per The Guardian.
The ruling came from US District Court Judge James Robart, who was appointed by George W. Bush. Robart’s strong condemnation of the current administration’s methods is particularly notable. The judge specifically ruled that DHS officials failed to consider Torres’ individual facts or circumstances before detaining him in June 2025. This, Robart concluded, “constitutes an abuse of DHS discretion” and violates the law.
Torres, 29, had been granted humanitarian parole in the United States and already had an asylum application pending when he was detained after a routine check-in. Judge Robart drove home the crucial point that the due process protections of the Fifth Amendment apply to “all persons” within the United States, including noncitizens, regardless of whether their presence here is lawful, temporary, or permanent.
ICE is pretty good at taking away your constitutional rights
The Trump administration’s legal team argued that the federal courts couldn’t even review Torres’ habeas corpus petition, a constitutional right that forces authorities to justify a person’s imprisonment. This is a tactic they use constantly, but as immigration attorney Brian McGoldrick noted, they almost always lose. McGoldrick, who recently secured the release of an Afghan refugee on similar grounds, said he now files habeas corpus petitions about five times a week, a massive jump from his previous workload.
The administration isn’t taking this defeat well. DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin immediately fired back, stating that it should be “no surprise that more habeas petitions are being filed by illegal aliens.”
McLaughlin specifically slammed “activist judges” who she claims are attempting to thwart President Trump from fulfilling the American people’s mandate for mass deportations. She insisted that the Trump administration is not going to ignore the rule of law and will continue to fight for the arrest, detention, and removal of people who have no right to be in this country.
No, under Obama we had record deportations. The issue is that the administration is denying people their constitutional rights to due process, freedom of speech, and illegal search and seizure.
— BS (@mets_bs) February 9, 2026
This is not a binary of letting ICE run wild or having open borders. A middle ground…
This specific case fits into a much larger national trend. Federal judges have ruled against the administration’s aggressive effort to lock up nearly everyone with pending deportation proceedings more than 300 times. These rulings have ordered the release or bond hearings in over 1,600 cases.
Furthermore, data reveals that during the second Trump administration, more than 17,000 habeas corpus petitions have landed in federal court. This is a staggering number, highlighting the massive legal conflict surrounding these detentions.
Torres’ detention, which started with a routine visit to the Department of Homeland Security office in Spokane, became a massive flashpoint last summer. The case garnered national attention after a huge protest was organized, involving nearly 2,000 people who attempted to block an ICE transport carrying Torres and another migrant to Tacoma.
The demonstration was largely peaceful, with people linking arms against masked federal agents, though it did turn contentious enough that a government car had its windshield smashed and a tire slashed.
