Watching ICE Can Now Get You Charged With a Federal Crime

In neighborhoods across the country, a new form of immigration enforcement is quietly unfolding, not just against undocumented people, but against the citizens who try to document what feds are doing

In a Minneapolis suburb, Becky Ringstrom, 42, said she was just escorting federal immigration officers in her car when her vehicle was suddenly surrounded by unmarked SUVs. Masked men were deployed, and one immigration officer began knocking on her windshield with a metal object to smash it. In just minutes, Becky, a mother of seven children, found herself under federal custody.

Becky Ringstrom VIA MSN

Her alleged crime: following immigration agents at a distance.

After the arrest, Ringstrom was taken to a federal building and issued a citation under a broad federal statute that criminalizes “assaulting, resisting, opposing, impeding, intimidating or interfering” with federal officers. The law is Title 18, Section 111, and it can carry years in prison, depending on how prosecutors apply it.

The real problem, though, is that she is not an anomaly.

According to an analysis of federal court records, the number of people charged under that statute has more than doubled since last summer, when the Trump administration launched a series of aggressive, city-focused immigration crackdowns. At least 655 people have been prosecuted nationwide under the charge during that period.

Via Reuters

Officials say the prosecutions are necessary to protect agents from threats and interference. Civil liberties advocates and former immigration officials say something very different is happening: that the government is using sweeping federal charges to intimidate and silence people who try to observe enforcement operations.

In recent months, immigration authorities have also begun maintaining internal databases that track individuals who follow or track ICE vehicles. The database contains names, photos, license plates, locations, and descriptions of the behaviors deemed suspicious, according to federal officials familiar with the system. The idea is to identify patterns that could lead to possible criminal charges.

The Department of Homeland Security denies having a “list of domestic terrorists,” but said it monitors threats and refers cases to prosecution when appropriate.

Follow ICE… and getting arrested

Ringstrom said she had watched immigration officers sit in a parked car near her home for about 45 minutes. When they pulled away, she followed, several lengths behind their car.

Once, at a roundabout, an agent approached her and warned her to stop. She says later she turned in another direction, but minutes later, several cars surrounded her, and she was arrested.

According to a legal expert, the charge being used to prosecute people like Ringstrom has been used in the past to charge people for physical assault on law enforcement. Merely tailing agents in a car, without physical contact, may not fit the legal definition of “forcible” interference.

In mid-January, a federal judge ruled that it was not just cause to stop or arrest someone for following ICE vehicles at a reasonable distance. An appeals court shortly suspended this decision.

What’s unfolding isn’t just an immigration crackdown. It’s a crackdown on visibility itself. When the government starts treating witnesses as suspects, the message is clear: they don’t just want control over people’s lives, they want control over the narrative. And in moments like this, the right to watch, record, and speak out becomes just as important as any immigration policy being debated in Washington.