By Noah Powelson
Federal immigration agents have conducted thousands of unconstitutional stops and arrests on New Yorkers over the last year, targeting people based solely on race and without any probable cause, a new class action lawsuit claims.
The Department of Homeland Securities was sued in the Eastern District of New York on Wednesday for the aggressive enforcement conducted by the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement and the Customs and Border Protection agencies over the past year. The lawsuit alleges ICE and CBP agents have been violating the constitutional rights of New Yorkers through warrantless immigration arrests made without probable cause and based solely on perceived race.
The lawsuit was brought by The Legal Aid Society, the New York Civil Liberties Union, Make the Road New York and Covington & Burling LLP.
Eight plaintiffs were listed in the lawsuit, all of whom are Latino immigrants or asylum seekers and several of whom were stopped in Queens. Most of the plaintiffs have lived in New York for at least a decade, and the lawsuit claims each has been stopped and arrested by ICE agents without a warrant while they were going about their daily lives.
One plaintiff, a 46-year-old Greenpoint resident, was arrested by ICE agents while on his daily commute to work via the ferry. According to the suit, the plaintiff was waiting in his parked car aboard the ferry in the early morning when an ICE agent knocked on his window and began questioning him about his immigration status, job and family. He was eventually arrested and spent 22 days in an ICE detention facility before being released.
Another plaintiff, a 36-year-old Brooklyn resident, was stopped by ICE agents as he was entering his apartment building after work. Agents approached the plaintiff and showed him a picture of a man, and asked if he had seen that man in the apartment building. When the plaintiff said no, agents asked if he was the man in the photograph, which the plaintiff said he wasn’t. The plaintiff was still arrested, and spent seven days in ICE detention.
All eight plaintiffs in the suit said that the arrests have made them fearful of going to work or carrying out daily tasks for worry they will be rearrested without any reason.
One plaintiff said they now drive to a further grocery store after he was arrested at a local market closer to his home. Another stopped going to church after hearing of ICE presence in the area.
The lawsuit said the federal agents’ alleged illegal actions are not limited to just these eight plaintiffs.
Amy Belsher, the director of Immigrants’ Rights Litigation at the NYCLU, said ICE’s immigration enforcement practices are unconstitutional and discriminatory in nature.
“For over a year, immigration agents have treated our state like a constitution-free zone, unlawfully profiling and detaining Black and Brown New Yorkers in service of Trump’s deportation agenda,” Belsher said in a statement. “New Yorkers going about their lives — heading to work, taking their kids to school, or grocery shopping — must now fear being suddenly snatched by masked agents and arrested without probable cause.”
“We are confident the court will hold this administration’s immigration officials accountable,” Belsher added.
ICE and federal agents have conducted arrests and patrols throughout the state, but the lawsuit alleges they have been heavily concentrated in the immigrant dense communities of New York City and Queens.
Between January 20, 2025, and March 10, 2026, immigration officials arrested 9,346 people in the greater New York City area and 4,094 people elsewhere across New York State, according to the Deportation Data Project.
The lawsuit alleges ICE has been targeting low-income and immigrant communities instead of the wealthier and whiter areas of New York City, and has set up checkpoints in the World’s Borough, as well.
According to the lawsuit, ICE has established checkpoints in Corona, Jackson Heights and Flushing. At these checkpoints, agents wait in unmarked cars near commercial thoroughfares and busy intersections, jumping out to stop and arrest pedestrians. Attorneys say ICE agents arrest people without any probable cause at these checkpoints, targeting Latinos while permitting non-Latinos to pass undisturbed.
New York Attorney General Letitia James also said she supports the lawsuit, and called ICE’s recent enforcement “illegal and unconscionable.”
“New Yorkers should be able to go about their daily lives without fear of being targeted by masked federal agents because of the color of their skin,” James said in a statement. “This policy of racial profiling is illegal and unconscionable. I am proud to stand in support of these plaintiffs and advocates as they fight to uphold the Constitution and protect the rights of every New Yorker.”
Hasan Shafiqullah, one of the attorneys at the Legal Aid Society behind this lawsuit, said plaintiffs were targeted by ICE because of skin color or because agents heard them speaking Spanish.
If the class action lawsuit proves successful, Shafiqullah said, ICE would only be able to arrest people they have probable cause or reasonable suspicion of as required by law.
“All ICE saw was a Latino or Hispanic looking person, or someone speaking Spanish, and stopped them,” Shafiqullah told the Eagle. “You can’t do that. That’s not a basis to stop someone.”
“We’re only asking them to follow the law,” Shafiqullah added.