Jan. 21 (UPI) — Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers are trained to enter suspects’ homes when possessing an administrative warrant, whistleblowers say.
Two anonymous whistleblowers have provided evidence to U.S. senators that shows the Department of Homeland Security has altered its policy on administrative warrants to encourage officers to use them to gain access to suspects while they are inside their homes, Whistleblower Aid announced on Wednesday.
A May 12 memo provided to Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., indicates that federal ICE officers can forcibly enter people’s homes when they have an administrative warrant, which is not the same as a judicial warrant that has been signed by a judge.
“Every American should be terrified by this secret ICE policy authorizing its agents to kick down your door and storm into your home,” Blumenthal said.
“It is a legally and morally abhorrent policy that exemplifies the kinds of dangerous, disgraceful abuses America is seeing in real time.”
Homeland Security and its various agencies use I-205 forms, which are administrative warrants that ICE officials say enable its officers to force their way into homes if a judge has issued a removal order, NBC News reported.
Whenever a federal immigration judge, the Board of Immigration Appeals, a U.S. district judge or a federal magistrate judge signs a final order of removal, Homeland Security officials say that enables ICE officers to arrest and detain the named individuals while they are in their respective homes.
They must knock on a door, announce who they are and state the purpose of their visit before entering a residence.
Officials with Whistleblower Aid said the policy change is an abrupt alteration from a prior Homeland Security policy and could lead to Fourth Amendment challenges.
“This is precisely what the Fourth Amendment was created to prevent,” said David Klingman, Whistleblower Aid senior vice president and special counsel.
Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin dismissed concerns of a Fourth Amendment violation.
The 1-205 forms are warrants for deportation or removal from the United States after “full due process and a final order of removal from an immigration judge,” McLaughlin told NBC News.
She said officers also have found probable cause when issuing the administrative warrants.
“For decades, the Supreme Court and Congress have recognized the propriety of administrative warrants in cases of immigration enforcement,” she added.
