The Trump administration admitted in a court filing that it had erroneously relied on an ICE memo to justify arrests at immigration courthouses as part of an ongoing federal case brought by groups seeking to block the tactic.
Federal prosecutors said Tuesday that they had used the memo, titled “2025 ICE Guidance,” to defend the Trump administration’s deployment of ICE agents at courthouses, which led to numerous arrests of immigrants attending hearings.
The memo indicated that “ICE officers or agents may conduct civil immigration enforcement actions in or near courthouses when they have credible information” that a targeted person would be “present at a specific location.”
But, the Justice Department said in the court filing, the memo “does not and has never applied to civil immigration enforcement actions in or near” immigration courts.
The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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