[Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 122 (Wednesday, July 16, 2025)]
[House]
[Pages H3326-H3327]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          WEAPONIZATION OF ICE

  (Mr. Ivey of Maryland was recognized to address the House for 5 
minutes.)

[[Page H3327]]

  

  Mr. IVEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today with deep concern over the 
weaponization of ICE by the Trump administration.
  Just this weekend, I had a chance to see Trump Border Czar Tom Homan 
talking about how the administration is conducting the sweeps on the 
streets and that they are doing it to prioritize public safety and 
national security. Yet, the facts tell a different story.
  According to CBS, only 8 percent of those detained have been 
convicted of violent crimes. The conservative Cato Institute found that 
only 7 percent of detainees were violent criminals.
  In fact, most detainees aren't even criminals at all. Of the people 
in detention, about half of them have criminal records. That is 300,000 
people who are detained and who do not have criminal records at all.

                              {time}  1110

  This administration is not actually prioritizing the most dangerous 
people, even though President Trump promised on the campaign trail that 
that is exactly what he would do.
  Mr. Homan also said that this administration always follows the law. 
However, last week, a Federal judge ordered ICE to stop conducting 
roving patrols, stop the sweeping arrests without reasonable suspicion, 
and stop denying access to lawyers.
  Mr. Speaker, the findings in this case are shocking. This is some of 
the worst examples of racial profiling I have seen even during my 12 
years as a prosecutor.
  For example, some people were waiting at bus stops and having coffee 
when they were then surrounded by ICE agents in unmarked vehicles that 
sped up in their direction. They leapt out with masks on and their guns 
drawn and ran immediately toward these individuals. They then 
handcuffed these individuals and forced them into vehicles and drove 
them away. All of this was done before they had even asked them for 
identification.
  The men thought they were being kidnapped. Some of them had their 
feet, hands, and wrists shackled, and another man even had a gun 
pointed at him.
  The court who was reviewing these cases questioned what it was about 
the bus stop that caused these ICE agents to believe they had 
reasonable suspicion to detain these men. Reasonable suspicion means 
that there is evidence at the time that each of these men had committed 
a crime or were in the process of committing a crime.
  What was the basis of the ICE agents' reasonable suspicion? The court 
reviewed it and found that the government said: It was based on their 
past experiences that have demonstrated that illegal aliens utilize and 
seek to work at certain places, like getting their car washed or 
waiting for the bus.
  Nothing about these men suggested that they were in the country 
illegally or about to commit a crime at the time that they were 
stopped.
  They didn't even ask for ID before they were gun-faced and then 
handcuffed and taken away. The bottom line is that these men were taken 
into custody simply because they were Latino.
  Clearly, these tactics are unconstitutional. The use of race as the 
basis for grabbing people on the street the courts have long ago ruled 
are across the line and illegal.
  These tactics threaten some of the most basic and important 
principles that serve as the backbone for our Nation: the rule of law. 
Like the unlawful deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia and the willful 
defiance of a unanimous Supreme Court decision to bring him back, the 
Trump administration is unapologetic in its efforts to target 
immigrants, the Constitution, and the law be damned.
  Now, in addition to being unconstitutional, this wastes a great deal 
of tax dollars because they are detaining masses of people in these 
large sweeps, only to have to release them when proof of their legal 
status is shown. It also horrifies the citizens who have to go through 
this experience.
  We now have Latino citizens who are afraid to leave their house to go 
to work or even to go to court. Remember the so-called Venezuelan 
violent gang members deported to the gulag in El Salvador. As it turns 
out, according to the Cato Institute, 50 of those men were not 
criminals. Their paperwork was in order. They were in the United States 
legally, and they hadn't committed any kind of crimes in El Salvador or 
Venezuela.
  Instead of focusing on criminals, they are grabbing people like the 
64-year-old mother who was gardening in New Orleans, the father of 
three marines who had been working in the United States for decades, or 
yesterday when ICE raided a baseball summer camp. This is not the best 
use of our Federal law enforcement agents.
  I am a former Federal and State prosecutor. I deeply respect the rule 
of law and understand the responsibility elected officials have to 
protect it. We have got to do better than this. Let's focus on getting 
violent criminals off the street. There are more than 100,000 open 
warrants in the United States on any given day. Let's focus on those, 
and let's move forward in a way that respects the Constitution.

                          ____________________