An Alabama construction worker is challenging the Trump administration's warrantless construction site raids after he says he was arrested and detained by federal immigration agents—twice—despite being a U.S. citizen with a valid ID in his pocket.
In a federal civil rights lawsuit filed today in the Southern District of Alabama, Leo Garcia Venegas is seeking to stop "dragnet raids" that target Latinos like himself, without any probable cause besides their ethnicity.
"It feels like there is nothing I can do to stop immigration agents from arresting me whenever they want," Venegas said in a press release by the Institute for Justice, a public interest law firm that filed the suit on his behalf. "I just want to work in peace. The Constitution protects my ability to do that."
Venegas and the Institute for Justice argue that Department of Homeland Security (DHS) policies allow immigration agents to illegally raid private construction sites, detain workers without reasonable suspicion, and continue detaining them even after they offer evidence of citizenship or legal status. All of this, they say, violates the Fourth Amendment's protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.
ICE arrested a U.S. citizen—twice—in Alabama raids. Now he's suing.
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