Bill Essayli, the acting U.S. Attorney for the Central District of California, announced that a federal judge’s controversial ruling aimed at halting immigration enforcement operations in the Los Angeles area will not impact U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) strategies.
Late Friday, a federal judge in Los Angeles issued a broad temporary restraining order (TRO) against ICE, asserting that the agency “likely violated” constitutional protections through its enforcement actions in California.
In a 53-page order issued Friday, U.S. District Judge Maame Ewusi-Mensah Frimpong, a Biden appointee, prohibited ICE agents from conducting investigative stops in the Central District of California unless they have “reasonable suspicion” that an individual is in the country unlawfully. The order specifically forbids agents from using factors such as race or ethnicity, speaking Spanish or accented English, geographic location, or type of employment as the sole basis for suspicion, citing protections under the Fourth Amendment.
The order also mandates that ICE maintain and submit detailed records of each stop, including the agents’ justification for them. Additionally, it requires the agency to develop formal guidelines for establishing “reasonable suspicion” and to implement mandatory training for all agents.
In response to the ruling, Essayli asserted that Judge Frimpong’s decision will not affect how ICE carries out its operations in the Central District. “We strongly disagree with the allegations in the lawsuit and maintain that our agents have never detained individuals without proper legal justification,” he said. “Our federal agents will continue to enforce the law and abide by the U.S. Constitution.”
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, who has been threatened with prosecution by the Trump Administration if she escalates her efforts to interfere with federal immigration law, praised Frimpong’s decision in a statement of her own. “Today, the Court ruled in favor of the United States Constitution, of American values and decency — this is an important step toward restoring safety, security, and defending the rights of all Angelenos,” Bass said in a statement.
While speaking with Fox News, Essayli suggested that Bass and other Democratic leaders are contributing to a climate that has led to an unprecedented rise in attacks on federal agents. Just this week, a man fired a handgun at federal agents in Ventura County, California, while 11 people were indicted in North Texas in connection with an ambush-style attack on an ICE facility.
“You have the politicians in California who are being openly hostile to the federal government. We are doing our job. We are enforcing federal immigration laws as written by Congress. If Karen Bass didn’t like the law, she should have changed it when she was in Congress,” Essayli said.
“But instead what she’s doing is she’s signaling to the public that it’s okay to stand up to federal agents to obstruct them, to impede them, and yes, in some cases, to attack them. So we are not going to be dissuaded. This is why the military is here. It’s so critical that we have the military protecting our agents,” he continued. “And to Ms. Bass, we will not be intimidated and we will not be deterred from accomplishing our mission.”