ACLU Defends Court Order Barring Border Patrol's Unlawful Stop-and-Arrest Practices

SAN FRANCISCO—After the U.S. Border Patrol indiscriminately stopped and arrested Latinos, farmworkers, and day laborers in Kern County in January 2025, agents publicly boasted about the unlawful practices and vowed to continue dragnet sweeps across the Central Valley.

In response, the United Farm Workers and five Kern County residents sued the federal government in February 2025 and got a court order prohibiting Border Patrol from stopping people without reasonable suspicion and arresting them without a warrant if agents haven’t established that the individual is likely to flee.

Today, the plaintiffs in UFW v. Noem asked the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to uphold that April 2025 preliminary injunction, which applies to operations in the Eastern District of California. They argued that people who live in and travel through Latino neighborhoods and agricultural areas in the district face an ongoing, credible threat that Border Patrol will violate their rights during future immigration raids.

“We don’t have to speculate about what would happen if the court order were overturned because we’ve seen the lawlessness and chaos Border Patrol has inflicted upon Kern County, Los Angeles, and cities across the country,” said Bree Bernwanger, senior staff attorney at the ACLU of Northern California. “Roads through farming communities in the Central Valley would become traps. People going about their daily lives taking their children to school or commuting to work would run the risk of being stopped and arrested, regardless of their immigration status.”

During the Kern raids, Border Patrol pulled over cars along rural highways near farms and in predominantly Latino neighborhoods in Bakersfield and demanded the occupants’ papers. Of the 78 people Border Patrol arrested, records show that agents had no knowledge of who they were when they stopped them and only one individual had an immigration history. The government has never presented any contrary evidence or disputed that Border Patrol agents violated the plaintiffs’ rights. Unable to refute the facts in the case, the government instead appealed the court order on procedural grounds.

Border Patrol continues to disregard the constitutional rights of Eastern District residents. This month, the district court ruled that Border Patrol violated the preliminary injunction in July 2025 when agents stopped people outside a Sacramento Home Depot, even though they had no reason to believe any individual they detained was in the country unlawfully.

“When Border Patrol promised to expand its campaign of indiscriminate arrests across California, the court acted quickly to stop the agency’s unlawful practices,” said Franco Muzzio, a partner at Keker, Van Nest & Peters. “Today, we asked the Ninth Circuit to keep those protections in place. California residents should not have to fear they will be detained by immigration officers simply because of how they look or where they work.”

“No one in America should be targeted because of the color of their skin, the language they speak, or the type of job they do,” said Teresa Romero, president of the United Farm Workers. “From farmworkers in Delano to day laborers in Sacramento, Border Patrol has profiled and terrorized hardworking people just for being Brown while trying to make a living. That is unconstitutional and un-American. The entire working class must stand up to Trump’s deportation agenda.”

UFW and the five Kern residents sued the Department of Homeland Security, Customs and Border Protection, and Border Patrol in February 2025. The ACLU Foundations of Northern California, Southern California, and San Diego & Imperial Counties, and Keker, Van Nest & Peters LLP represent the plaintiffs.

Key milestones in UFW v. Noem.