Washington– Federal immigration officers assert sweeping authority to forcibly enter people’s homes without it The judge orderedaccording to the Interior Immigration and Customs Enforcement memorandum It was obtained by The Associated Press, marking a sharp reversal of long-standing guidance aimed at respecting constitutional limits on government inspections.
The memo allows ICE officers to use force to enter a residence based only on a narrower administrative order to arrest someone with a final order of removal, a move advocates say flies in the face of Fourth Amendment protections and upends years of advice given to immigrant communities.
The shift comes as the Trump administration dramatically expands immigration detention across the country, deploying thousands of officers under it. Mass deportation campaign This is true Reshape implementation tactics In cities like Minneapolis.
For years, immigrant advocates, legal aid groups and local governments have urged people not to open their doors to immigration agents unless they are shown a warrant signed by a judge. This directive has its roots in Supreme Court rulings that generally prohibit law enforcement from entering a home without judicial approval. ICE’s guidance directly undermines that advice at a time when arrests are accelerating under the administration’s anti-immigration crackdown.
The memo itself was not widely shared within the agency, according to the whistleblower complaint, but its contents were disclosed. Used for training New ICE officers have been deployed to cities and towns to enforce the president’s anti-immigration crackdown. New ICE employees and those still in training are required to follow the memo’s guidelines rather than written training materials that actually contradict the memo, the whistleblower revealed.
It is unclear how widely the Directive applies to immigration enforcement operations. ICE officers witnessed the Associated Press He crashed through the front door from the home of a Liberian man in Minneapolis on January 11 on an administrative order only, wearing heavy tactical gear and with his rifle drawn.
The change would almost certainly face legal challenges and intense criticism from advocacy groups and immigrant-friendly state and local governments that have spent years successfully urging people not to open unless ICE shows them a warrant signed by a judge.
The Associated Press obtained the memo and whistleblower complaint from a congressional official, who shared it on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive documents. The AP verified the accuracy of the accounts in the complaint.
“Although the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has not historically relied on administrative warrants alone to detain aliens subject to final orders of removal at their place of residence, the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of the General Counsel recently determined that the U.S. Constitution, the Immigration and Nationality Act, and immigration regulations do not prohibit reliance on administrative warrants,” says the memo, signed by ICE Acting Director Todd Lyons and dated May 12, 2025. Orders for this purpose.
The memorandum did not explain in detail how this decision was made nor what its legal ramifications were.
When asked about the warrant, DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said in an emailed statement to the AP that every person the department serves under an administrative warrant has already been subject to “full due process and a final order of removal.”
She said the officers who issued those warrants also found probable cause to arrest the person. She said the Supreme Court and Congress “have recognized the validity of administrative orders in immigration enforcement cases,” without elaborating. McLaughlin did not respond to questions about whether ICE officers have entered a person’s home since the warrant was issued relying solely on an administrative order, and if so, how many times.
Whistleblower Aid, a nonprofit legal organization that helps workers expose wrongdoing, said in a whistleblower complaint obtained by The Associated Press that it represents two unidentified U.S. government officials who “reveal secret — and apparently unconstitutional — policy directives.”
A wave of recent arrests of prominent figures, many It unfolds in private homes The companies, which were captured on video, highlighted methods of arresting immigrants, including officers’ use of proper warrants.
Most immigration arrests are made under administrative orders, which are internal documents issued by immigration authorities that authorize the arrest of a specific individual but do not allow officers to forcibly enter private homes or other non-public places without their consent. Only orders signed by judges carry this authority.
All law enforcement operations—including those conducted by Immigration, Customs, and Border Protection—are governed by the Fourth Amendment, which protects all persons in the country from unreasonable searches and seizures.
People can legally deny federal immigration agents entry to private property if the agents have an administrative warrant only, with some limited exceptions.
This month, federal agents broke into the door of the home of a Liberian man in Minneapolis who had been issued a deportation order starting in 2023, and he was subsequently arrested. Documents reviewed by the AP revealed that the agents only had an administrative warrant, meaning there was no judge who authorized the raid on private property.
The memo says ICE officers can forcefully enter homes and arrest immigrants using a signed administrative warrant known as an I-205 if they have a final order of removal issued by an immigration judge, Board of Immigration Appeals, district judge or justice of the peace.
The memo says officers should knock on the door first and share their identity and why they are at the residence. They are limited in the hours they can enter the house – after 6 a.m. and before 10 p.m. Those inside must be given a “reasonable opportunity to act lawfully.” But if that doesn’t work, the memo says, they can use force to get in.
“If an alien is denied entry, ICE officials and agents must use only the amount of force necessary and reasonable to enter the alien’s residence, after appropriate notification of the officer or agent’s authority and intent to enter,” the memo said.
The memo is directed to all ICE employees. But it was shown only to “select DHS officials” who then shared it with certain employees who were asked to read it and return it, Whistleblower Aid wrote in the disclosure.
One of the whistleblowers was only allowed to see the memo in the presence of the supervisor and then had to return it. This person was not allowed to take notes. Whistleblower Aid said a whistleblower gained access to the document and legally disclosed it to Congress.
Although the memo was issued in May, David Kligerman, senior vice president and special counsel at Whistleblower Aid, said it took its agents some time to find a “safe and legal path to disclosure to lawmakers and the American people.”
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) quickly hired thousands of new deportation officers to implement the president’s mass deportation agenda. They were trained at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Brunswick, Georgia.
during Visit there By The Associated Press In August, ICE officials have repeatedly said new officers are being trained to follow the Fourth Amendment.
But according to the whistleblower’s account, newly hired ICE officers were told they could rely only on administrative warrants to enter homes to make arrests even though that conflicted with Homeland Security’s written training materials.
Ice officers Often waiting for hours For the person they hope to arrest has to go outside so they can arrest him on the sidewalk or at the person’s workplace — public places where they are allowed to work without the risk of violating a person’s Fourth Amendment rights.
Whistleblower Aid called the new policy a “complete break with the law” and said it undermined “the Fourth Amendment and the rights it protects.”