federal immigration agent

As the Liberty Van rolled into the Home Depot, its driver slowed, lowered the window and waved at day laborers standing around the parking lot.

It had rained all morning and the overcast clouds trapped a chill in the air. Still, on a recent Friday, day laborers milled around even as it began to drizzle again. A pastor, a Navy veteran, an immigration lawyer and cameraman got out of the Liberty Van — camioneta de la libertad in Spanish — and greeted the day laborers while offering them water and snacks.

Since June in Los Angeles, federal immigration agents have destabilized daily life by raiding neighborhoods, worksites and Home Depots — popular gathering spots for day laborers who often lack U.S. citizenship. In turn, several “rapid-response” organizations have surged into action to aid those targeted in the raids, and document their treatment.

One of these organizations is the Save America Movement, which runs the Liberty Vans and includes a bipartisan leadership that is far more politically connected than that of many grassroots organizations. The group was founded by Steve Schmidt, a former top aide to Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona, and Mary Corcoran, a longtime public relations specialist, with a steering committee that includes law professors, pastors and strategists.

On this particular Friday, Fabian Núñez — a member of that steering committee who previously served as speaker of the California Assembly — was one of those who hopped out of the Liberty Van. He chatted with a day laborer who stopped by to grab a snack, and explained they were there to film any interactions with federal agents, as part of their national rapid-response effort.

The day laborer said Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have previously detained other workers at the Panorama City Home Depot and have returned frequently. “Many times,” he said. “Five or six.”

Despite the repeated raids, the laborer said workers like himself have little choice but to keep showing up.

“They have to keep coming,” he said. “One has to pay the bills.”

The Save America Movement launched the vans first in L.A. and then in Chicago and Charlotte, N.C., where federal immigration agents were raiding heavily Latino areas. The motivation behind the project was to provide support and help people understand the impact of the daily immigration raids, Corcoran said in an interview. Outside California, she said, many people don’t get it.

“If they did, I believe there would be much more urgency around what’s happening,” she said.

The vans were inspired by the Liberty ships and Victory ships during World War ll that provided supplies and other relief to the U.S. and its allies.

The teams that run the vans document and record video, with the footage published online so the public can watch the enforcement actions and hear testimonies from affected local residents, she said.

For months, the Trump administration has argued that it is merely enforcing the law — and fulfilling a campaign promise — by detaining and deporting immigrants who lack documentation. But some enforcement actions by ICE and Border Patrol agents have resulted in U.S. citizens being detained. Others have been criticized for being unnecessarily violent and traumatizing.

Fabian Núñez, a Save America Movement steering committee member who previously served as speaker of the California Assembly, talks with a laborer who stopped by the Liberty Van for some snacks in the parking lot of a Panorama City Home Depot on Nov. 21, 2025.

(Myung J. Chun/Los Angeles Times)

In Los Angeles, the Save America Movement first launched its vans in MacArthur Park in September, just two months after immigration agents on horses and armored vehicles descended on the area carrying rifles and tactical gear.

City Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez — whose district spans from Highland Park, Chinatown and south to Pico-Union — welcomed the group’s effort, which she described as a tool in a movement of resistance.

Alejandro Maciel, the L.A. bureau chief for the organization and a former Los Angeles Times journalist, takes the van out roughly five times a week, starting around 6 a.m. and wrapping up late into the afternoon. Maciel and volunteers drive to Home Depots across Southern California, going north to Ventura County, east to the Inland Empire and south to Orange County.

On Friday, the van ride included the Rev. Madison Jones McAleese, Navy veteran Brian Kelly and immigration lawyer Juan Jose Gutierrez, who can offer legal support to families or offer “know your right” basics to laborers. And to capture it all was cameraman René Miranda, who started covering raids when a large protest broke out in Paramount, where he lives.

For McAleese, she said she felt it was her duty to be part of the effort to stand against the raids because of what she views as unlawful actions being taken by ICE enforcement. McAleese carries holy water and offers to pray with any one who seeks prayer.

“I don’t feel like I have a choice,” she said. “God is reflected in the face of every immigrant, documented and undocumented.”

As they headed to the next location, Maciel pulled up on his phone StopIce.Net, a website on which people submit reports of ICE activity. Just the day before, there was a raid in Long Beach, later confirmed by local media reports, and nine people were detained by masked agents, an L.A. County official said.

The San Fernando Valley was quiet that Friday, but Maciel said it has been important to establish and maintain relationships with both workers and organizers who have created rapid response networks. When he drives the van to a site, he said, he greets such organizers and makes sure the laborers understand they are there to help.

Ernesto Ayala, the site coordinator at the Van Nuys Day Labor Center in the Home Depot parking lot, said ICE agents have been to the site several times, as recently as a few weeks ago. At the Van Nuys Home Depot, volunteers monitor each entry point of the parking lot and alert the center of any suspicious vehicles that could contain federal agents.

“It’s very traumatic,” Ayala said of the continuing raids. Ayala himself was detained and sprayed with an irritant by agents after they held him down and accused him of interfering. He was arrested but never charged with any crime, he said.

Organizations such as the Save America Movement help with videos and other documentation that could be used in potential litigation against ICE in the future, Ayala said. He said his arrest was recorded from a distance by a witness.

In October, the organization said video by a Save America Movement photojournalist in Chicago recorded federal agents deploying tear gas against protesters and pointing weapons at journalists, which at the time violated a federal court order. The organization made that footage available online with time stamps and annotations.

Along with documenting interactions, Núñez said, the group hopes to remind ICE agents of the human impact and make them question their actions, and to move viewers. Such footage, he said, could help Americans see “that these Gestapo-like tactics are happening and they’re being utilized with our tax dollars.”

“We think we can convince them to move, to think more compassionately about people and think: Is this the America I signed up for?”

SACRAMENTO — The U.S. Department of Justice sued California on Monday to block newly passed laws that prohibit law enforcement officials, including federal immigration agents, from wearing masks and that require them to identify themselves.

The laws, passed by the California Legislature and signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom, came in the wake of the Trump administration’s immigration raids in California, when masked, unidentified federal officers jumped out of vehicles this summer as part of the president’s mass deportation program.

Atty. Gen. Pamela Bondi said the laws were unconsitutional and endanger federal officers.

“California’s anti-law enforcement policies discriminate against the federal government and are designed to create risk for our agents,” Bondi said in a statement. “These laws cannot stand.”

The governor recently signed Senate Bill 627, which bans federal officers from wearing masks during enforcement duties, and Senate Bill 805, which requires federal officers without a uniform to visibly display their name or badge number during operations. Both measures were introduced as a response to the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration raids that are often conducted by masked agents in plainclothes and unmarked cars.

The lawsuit, which names the state of California, Gov. Gavin Newsom and state Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta as defendants, asserts the laws are unconstitutional as only the federal government has the authority to control its agents and any requirements about their uniforms. It further argued that federal agents need to conceal their identities at times due to the nature of their work.

“Given the personal threats and violence that agents face, federal law enforcement agencies allow their officers to choose whether to wear masks to protect their identities and provide an extra layer of security,” the lawsuit states. “Denying federal agencies and officers that choice would chill federal law enforcement and deter applicants for law enforcement positions.”

Federal agents will not comply with either law, the lawsuit states.

“The Federal Government would be harmed if forced to comply with either Act, and also faces harm from the real threat of criminal liability for noncompliance,” the lawsuit states. “Accordingly, the challenged laws are invalid under the Supremacy Clause and their application to the Federal Government should be preliminarily and permanently enjoined.”

Newsom previously said it was unacceptable for “secret police” to grab people off the streets, and that the new laws were needed to help the public differentiate between imposters and legitimate federal law officers.

The governor, however, acknowledged the legislation could use more clarifications about safety gear and other exemptions. He directed lawmakers to work on a follow-up bill next year.

In a Monday statement, Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), who introduced SB 627, said the FBI recently warned that “secret police tactics” are undermining public safety.

“Despite what these would-be authoritarians claim, no one is above the law,” said Wiener. “We’ll see you in court.”

After a surge in Border Patrol activity in North Carolina’s largest city over the weekend, including dozens of arrests, Gov. Josh Stein said the effort is “stoking fear,” not making Charlotte safer.

The Trump administration has made the Democratic city of about 950,000 people its latest target for an immigration enforcement surge it says will combat crime, despite fierce objections from local leaders and downtrending crime rates. Charlotte residents reported encounters with federal immigration agents near churches, apartment complexes and stores.

“We’ve seen masked, heavily armed agents in paramilitary garb driving unmarked cars, targeting American citizens based on their skin color, racially profiling, and picking up random people in parking lots and off of our sidewalks,” Stein said in a video statement late Sunday. “This is not making us safer. It’s stoking fear and dividing our community.”

Stein acknowledged that it was a stressful time, but he called on residents to stay peaceful. If people see something wrong, he said they should record it and report it to local law enforcement.

The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees CBP, has said it was focusing on North Carolina because of so-called sanctuary policies, which limit cooperation between local authorities and immigration agents.

Several county jails house immigrant arrestees and honor detainers, which allow jails to hold detainees for immigration officers to pick them up. But Mecklenburg County, where Charlotte is located, does not. Also, the city’s police department does not help with immigration enforcement. DHS alleged that about 1,400 detainers across North Carolina had not been honored, putting the public at risk.

Gregory Bovino, who led hundreds of U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents in a similar effort in Chicago, documented some of the more than 80 arrests he said agents had made in social media posts on Sunday. He posted pictures of people the Trump administration commonly dubs “criminal illegal aliens,” meaning people living in the U.S. without legal permission who allegedly have criminal records. That included one of a man with an alleged history of drunk driving convictions.

The activity has prompted fear and questions, including where detainees would be held, how long the operation would last and what agents’ tactics — criticized elsewhere as aggressive and racist — would look like in North Carolina.

However, some welcomed the effort, including Mecklenburg County Republican Party Chairman Kyle Kirby, who said in a post Saturday that the county GOP “stands with the rule of law — and with every Charlottean’s safety first.”

Bovino’s operations in Chicago and Los Angeles triggered lawsuits over the use of force, including widespread deployment of chemical agents. Democratic leaders in both cities accused agents of inflaming community tensions. Federal agents fatally shot one suburban Chicago man during a traffic stop.

Bovino, head of a Border Patrol sector in El Centro, California, and other Trump administration officials have called their tactics appropriate for growing threats on agents.

Tareen, Witte and Dale write for the Associated Press. Tareen and Dale reported from Chicago. Witte reported from Annapolis, Md.

A top Border Patrol commander touted dozens of arrests in North Carolina’s largest city Sunday as Charlotte residents reported encounters with federal immigration agents near churches and apartment complexes.

The Trump administration has made the Democratic city of about 950,000 people its latest target for an immigration enforcement surge it says will combat crime, despite fierce objections from local leaders and data showing declining crime rates.

Gregory Bovino, who led hundreds of U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents on a similar operation in Chicago, went on social media to document some of the arrests he said numbered more than 80 in Charlotte. He posted pictures of people the administration commonly dubs “criminal illegal aliens,” in reference to people living in the U.S. without legal permission who are alleged to have criminal records. That included one of a man with an alleged history of drunk driving convictions.

“We arrested him, taking him off the streets of Charlotte so he can’t continue to ignore our laws and drive intoxicated on the same roads you and your loved ones are on,” Bovino wrote on X.

The effort was dubbed “Operation Charlotte’s Web,” a play on the title of the beloved E.B. White children’s book, which isn’t about North Carolina — and whose story of friendship and solidarity with a seemingly doomed farm animal would appear antithetical to the federal crackdown.

The flurry of activity immediately raised questions, including where detainees would be held, how long the operation would run and what agents’ tactics that have been heavily criticized elsewhere would look like in North Carolina.

Bovino’s operations in Chicago and Los Angeles triggered a series of lawsuits and investigations over questions about use of force, including wide deployment of chemical agents. Democratic leaders in both cities said that agents’ presence inflamed community tensions and led to violence. During the Chicago area operation, federal agents fatally shot one suburban man during an attempted traffic stop.

Bovino and other Trump administration officials have called the use of force an appropriate response to growing threats on agents’ lives.

The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees Customs and Border Patrol, did not respond to inquiries about the Charlotte arrests. Bovino’s spokesman did not return a request for comment Sunday.

Elsewhere, Homeland Security has not offered many details about who it is arresting. For instance, in Chicago, the agency provided names and details on only a handful of its more than 3,000 arrests in the metro region from September to last week. In several instances U.S. citizens were handcuffed and detained during operations, and dozens of demonstrators were also charged, often in community clashes over arrests or protests.

By Sunday, reports of CBP activity were “overwhelming” and difficult to quantify, Greg Asciutto, executive director of the community development group CharlotteEast, said in an email.

“The past two hours we’ve received countless reports of CBP activity at churches, apartment complexes and a hardware store,” he said.

City Councilmember-elect JD Mazuera Arias said federal agents appeared to be focused on churches and apartment complexes.

“Houses of worship. I mean, that’s just awful,” he said. “These are sanctuaries for people who are looking for hope and faith in dark times like these and who no longer can feel safe because of the gross violation of people’s right to worship.”

Tareen, Witte and Dale write for the Associated Press. Tareen and Dale reported from Chicago, Witte from Annapolis, Md.