What's at stake:
As immigration enforcement continues across the Central Valley, Fresno advocates have reported an uptick in operations involving masked agents, or people impersonating agents, who lack identification.
California doesn’t have a ban on ICE agents wearing masks or raiding homes in plain clothes.
The state legislature pushed a ban through earlier this year but a federal judge tossed it because it singled out the federal immigration agency and did not apply to all law enforcement agencies.
And while the progressive Bay Area state senator who launched the now-suspended mask ban says a similar, more robust ban is already in the works, little progress has been reported publicly.
That’s bad news for Fresno-area immigration advocates who say recent ICE raids in the Central Valley in the runup to Tuesday’s power-tipping midterm elections only serve as more evidence that the law is needed for the public’s safety.
“You’re picking up people off the streets in a way that is so violent that you don’t know if it’s another organized crime group,” said Dr. Lizbeth De La Cruz Santana. “We don’t know if it’s immigration because again, they’re not having their cars marked or anything. So of course, people are going to be scared.”
De La Cruz Santana, regional partnerships specialist at the Central Valley Immigrant Integration Collaborative (CVIIC), said the public needs protection and suggested that if the state law doesn’t work then perhaps a city-level law could establish protocols for federal agents operating locally.
“ICE agents not wearing identification, are masked or others who are impersonating ICE, affect the way that people interact with immigration or the perception that we have of ICE specifically,” De La Cruz Santana said.
Reports of people impersonating immigration agents only fuel those concerns, she said, noting that costumes and equipment sold online, including on Etsy and Amazon, make it easy for bad actors to pose as federal agents.
She also raised concerns about civilians forming patrol groups and using easily obtained gear or AI-generated fake identification to impersonate authorities.
Fake ICE agents and unknown masked men with guns
Earlier this month, daycare worker Victoria Ford witnessed a traffic stop in which a man in plain clothes first identified himself as being an agent with the fictional and nonsensical “Kerman County Parole.”
She said the unidentified man wore a cami-green bulletproof vest with the words “police work,” when Ford witnessed him stop a woman of color outside Ford’s workplace near Shields and West in early October. She said the man posing as law enforcement ordered the driver out of her car under threat of physical removal.
Ford also said the man quickly changed his story when questioned by witnesses at the scene. He was then joined by two other men who also vaguely claimed to be law enforcement. She said one of them wore a police badge that she said looked like a Halloween costume – and the other man wore a face mask.
“Were they ICE agents, traffickers? We still don’t know,” Ford said in a community assembly hosted by United San Joaquin (USJ) on Oct. 19. “What I do know is that these kinds of tactics are terrorizing our communities, and I can only imagine what might have happened to that young woman, but no one had been there to stand up for her.”
Ford and her colleagues called the Valley Watch Network and provided the license plate numbers of the vehicles, as well as the woman’s, in case something happened.
“If you have no identification on you, all you’re doing is just feeding the terror of, ‘I don’t know who you are. I can’t trust you,’” Ford said. “I think it’s a growing problem because of the fact that, like for myself, I was pretty confident that we had a law that said that they can’t have masks.”
But currently there is no valid law requiring ICE agents to identify themselves during routine raids.
Critics say the problem is far from new and people posing as federal officers aren’t the only problem created by maskless and unidentifiable immigration agents.
Protesters have posted their interactions with agents on social media to encourage the community to join them to speak out against ICE and to provide more information about the raids the federal government refuses to discuss.
Many say the masks give even legitimate ICE agents cover to act at least unprofessionally and aggressively.
On Oct. 13, video shows agents shining bright lights at the activists and agents surrounding one individual, and calling another activist, “a bitch.” In another clip, Fresno Resistance co-founder Alfred Aldrete accused agents of pepper-spraying both his brother, Noah, and himself on Oct. 14. On the same day, the agents pushed Noah into a car and knocked Alfred’s phone from his hand and threw him down. A police car is seen parked in clips as the incident occurred.
“These masks give these goons just enough confidence to become physical and abuse not only the kidnapped community members but also become physical with peaceful protesters and assault some,” said Aldrete, who, along with others like Rehop Fresno, have been working to document ICE encounters in and around Fresno.
Activists have begun shining lights in agents’ faces, with the caption, “expect us to shine a light upon your darkness. To light you up.”
A tough spot for local-level law enforcement
The masks and fear over unidentifiable agents creates problems for local-level police and sheriff’s deputies, too.
Sheriff John Zanoni, at the Oct. 19 USJ assembly, urged residents to be responsible when sharing information on social media, saying videos have incorrectly identified sheriff’s deputies on the department’s auto theft task force as ICE agents.
“I ask that people be responsible,” Zanoni said. “When you see this uniform, you see the sheriff’s office. Know that we are not immigration enforcement officers.”
Zanoni said that it’s important for people to know who they’re interacting with for their own safety and to avoid potential legal liability, especially when distinguishing federal agents from people falsely posing as law enforcement.
“We need to be readily identifiable and have our badge and other identifications visible,” Zanoni said.
He also acknowledged concerns about federal agents wearing face masks or not identifying themselves, and shared “that’s not how we do business or major operations.”
Zanoni added that ICE could do a better job communicating with the sheriff’s office about its enforcement activities.
Mayor Jerry Dyer, the city’s longtime former police chief, has not been shy about his criticism over tactics used by federal immigration agencies in recent years.
“If they want to focus on immigration, it should be on the worst of the worst,” Dyer said at the Oct. 19 assembly hosted by United San Joaquin. “And in terms of working together, that we continue to have a unified voice, that we not blame one another.”
Dyer also called for local governments to maintain a unified response and have realistic expectations about what they can do to challenge federal immigration enforcement.
“We’re not going to go out and arrest ICE,” Dyer said. “We can’t do anything that’s going to be positive not to wear masks. But we need to be very vocal and say that we don’t want ICE doing what they’ve been doing within our community.”
‘Avoiding accountability for their harm they cause’
California’s federal mask ban would have eliminated claims of law enforcement immunity in lawsuits if the agents covered their face while on duty.
In February a federal judge ruled that the state could not enforce SB 627 because the law treats federal officers differently from state and local police. The ruling means federal officers can continue wearing masks while the legal fight continues.
“There has been multiple accounts of people impersonating ICE across the nation and we must be able to prevent that,” Aldrete said. “We must be able to hold these terrorists accountable if and when they break the law.”
Aldrete said that upholding the mask ban could help prevent unwarranted ICE arrests, reduce the risk of physical harm to people, and improve safety for immigrant communities, including parents and children.
Ford also stressed the importance of identification in helping families locate loved ones detained by immigration agents.
“If I have no identification to go off of, I can’t find my family member,” Ford said. “I would need to know who you are and what department you’re working for, so that I can go find whoever you are detaining.”
Trump’s administration previously sued to block the mask ban, prompted by concerns over forcing agents to reveal their identities would put the agents at risk.
Throughout California last year, a huge number of the federal agents detaining people wore masks over their faces. California lawmakers in at least 30 other states have introduced, considered, voted on, or even passed similar legislation.
New Jersey, Oregon, and Washington, all passed mask bans earlier this year. Los Angeles County and Saint Paul, Minnesota have passed local bans.
On Oct. 14, a federal appeals court ruled against a California law requiring ICE officers to show visible identification, a final ruling after the law was previously put on hold after the Ninth Circuit separately blocked enforcement in April.
State Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, who authored the legislation, called the ruling “a huge win.” He said the judge’s decision supports the law’s constitutionality and could pave the way for its application to law enforcement officers at all levels of government. Wiener now plans to introduce a new bill that would extend the ban to state officers as well but no new deadlines have been announced.
Aldrete hopes city officials will push for greater accountability for ICE agents, citing concerns about out-of-town agents bringing detained community members to the facility and blending in with local agents.
He said communities do not feel safe “while ICE operates under the cover of masks avoiding accountability for their harm they cause.”
