More aggressive activities carried out by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement organization, such as the arrest of toddlers, detention of citizens of this country, and a fatal shooting carried out by a customs agent, all paint a sorry picture of how enforcement of the law is being allowed to take place with impunity and little or no respect for rights or law.
At the core of the crisis is the ICE agency: a government agency mandated with the identification, apprehension, incarceration, and expulsion of foreign nationals deemed to be in non-compliance with government regulations. Critics have complained that the increasing activity of the agency has created a grey area between civil immigration enforcement and a punitive militarized policing style, with legal safeguards being disregarded.
In the case of immigration, immigration laws in the United States are enforced mainly by a federal government law enforcer, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), whose mandate includes identifying, arresting, detaining, and deporting persons considered to be in violation of immigration laws. It seems, however, that the current approach that ICE takes is now aggressive and violative of human rights.
ICE Detains U.S. Citizens Without Verification
Also, there have been many instances where ICE has detained many US citizens without properly authenticating them. This has largely happened while apprehending many undocumented immigrants. In 2025, there have been over 170 cases of wrongfully detained US citizens by immigration authorities, including almost 20 children, according to ProPublica. These US citizens were detained without access to attorneys and were subjected to forceful measures such as pepper spray and tackled to ground while trying to aid other people.
Among the specific cases in 2025 were:
- Jose Castillo, arrested by Border Patrol in Sacramento for allegedly slashing a tire.
- Jose Castro, a naturalized citizen detained in Rochester despite presenting valid identification.
- Darren Eichler, Daniel Greer, Cordell Walls, and another individual who were zip-tied at an Illinois cemetery after assisting migrants in a river.
In fact, a Senate report indicated that there have been close to two dozen citizen detainments between June and November 2025, with racial profiling and excessive force remaining major concerns. This is alarming and reveals how immigration action is increasingly leading to violations of civil rights, with citizen involvement treated almost like a criminal.
ICE Detains a Two-Year-Old Girl and Her Father
In another shocking example of ICE’s escalating tactics, a two-year-old girl and her father were detained in Minneapolis. According to Minneapolis City Council member Jason Chavez, the father, Elvis Joel Tipan-Echeverria, and his daughter Chloe Renata Tipan Villacis were taken into custody while returning from a grocery store. DHS confirmed that Tipan-Echeverria was detained and that he was driving with a child at the time, but the agency did not identify the child’s name, age, or gender.
During the arrest, about 120 individuals surrounded the agents, preventing them from leaving. DHS stated that bystanders began throwing rocks and garbage cans toward the agents and the
child, leading to the deployment of crowd control measures.
This incident raises major concerns about the treatment of children in immigration enforcement and highlights the deeply distressing impact of ICE operations on family unity and child welfare.
5-Year-Old Boy Detained in School District Raid
Just days earlier, a five-year-old boy wearing a Spider-Man backpack was detained with his father by immigration authorities in a suburban Minneapolis school district. The child, Liam Conejo Ramos, was photographed standing beside a vehicle with an adult’s hand on his backpack—an image that ignited outrage across the Twin Cities.
School officials said the boy and his father were taken to Dilley, Texas, where they are being held at an immigration detention center. The boy and his father, Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias, arrived in the United States from Ecuador in 2024 and both have active asylum claims. Lawyers emphasized that they came legally and were pursuing lawful pathways, describing them as “not illegal aliens.”
Columbia Heights school superintendent Zena Stenvik publicly asked,
“Why detain a 5-year-old?”,
reflecting the growing public concern over the Trump administration’s deportation operations.
While the government attempted to shift blame to the father, alleging he was in the country illegally, school officials reported that the father and child had just arrived home when the agents detained them. This incident also occurred amid reports that four students in the district were recently apprehended, including a 10-year-old girl who was detained with her mother on her way to school.
These actions suggest a disturbing pattern of targeting children and families, not criminals—raising urgent questions about ICE’s priorities and accountability.
2025: ICE’s Deadliest Year in Two Decades
The human rights crisis deepens when examining ICE’s record of deaths in custody. 2025 marked ICE’s deadliest year in two decades, with 32 deaths in custody amid record detentions of 68,440 people, most of whom were non-criminals. December 2025 alone saw six deaths, and the first 10 days of 2026 added four more migrant deaths.
Notably, the agency’s violence has also affected U.S. citizens. Two confirmed killings include:
- Renée Good, 37, shot by ICE in Minneapolis on January 7, 2026, sparking national protests. Good, a mother of three and a legal observer of ICE activities, was described by family members as a compassionate person, and her death has led to a widespread call for justice.
- Keith Porter, 43, killed by an off-duty ICE agent on December 31, 2025.
The Trump administration has controversially labeled Renée Good a “domestic terrorist,” a claim that has intensified public outrage and raised concerns about the politicization of law enforcement.
A fundraising campaign for Good’s family set a target of $50,000, but it raised more than $1.4 million within a day, reflecting the strong public backlash and solidarity.
Taken together, these incidents reveal a disturbing pattern of dehumanization, legal disregard, and systemic cruelty in U.S. immigration enforcement. The UN’s top human rights official’s warning is not merely symbolic—it reflects an escalating crisis in which migrants, children, and even U.S. citizens are being treated as disposable.
The evidence suggests that ICE’s enforcement practices are no longer aligned with due process, family unity, or basic human dignity. The UN alarm is a stark reminder that, without urgent reform, the U.S. is risking its moral authority and violating the fundamental rights it claims to protect.