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WASHINGTON — Beyond the car windows being smashed, people tackled on city streets — or even a little child with a floppy bunny ears snowcap detained — the images of masked federal officers have become a flashpoint in the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement operations.

Not in recent U.S. memory has an American policing operation so consistently masked its thousands of officers from the public, a development that the Department of Homeland Security believes is important to safeguard employees from online harassment. But experts warn masking serves another purpose, inciting fear in communities, and risks shattering norms, accountability, and trust between the police and its citizenry.

Whether to ban the masks — or allow the masking to continue — has emerged as a central question in the debate in Congress over funding Homeland Security ahead of Friday’s midnight deadline, when it faces a partial agency shutdown.

“Humans read each others’ faces — that’s how we communicate,” said Justin Smith, a former Colorado sheriff who is executive director and CEO of the National Sheriffs’ Association.

“When you have a number of federal agents involved in these operations, and they can’t be identified, you can’t see their face, it just tends to make people uncomfortable,” he said. “That’s bringing up some questions.”

Democrats demand ‘masks off’

Masks on federal agents have been one constant throughout the first year of President Donald Trump’s mass deportation operation.

What began as a jarring image last spring, when plain-clothes officers drawing up their masks surrounded and detained a Tufts University doctoral student near her Massachusetts home, has morphed into familiar scenes in Los Angeles, Chicago, and other cities. The shooting deaths of two American citizens at the hands of federal immigration officers during demonstrations against ICE raids in Minneapolis sparked widespread public protest and spurred lawmakers to respond.

“Cameras on, masks off” has become a rallying cry among Democrats, who are also insisting the officers wear body cameras as a way to provide greater accountability and oversight of the operations.

House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries told reporters at the Capitol that unmasking the federal agents is a “hard red line” in the negotiations ahead.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement says on its website that its officers “wear masks to prevent doxing, which can (and has) placed them and their families at risk. All ICE law enforcement officers carry badges and credentials and will identify themselves when required for public safety or legal necessity.”

Fueled with funds from Trump’s big tax cuts bill, which poured some $170 billion into Homeland Security, ICE has grown to be among the largest law enforcement operations in the nation. Last year, it announced it had more than doubled its ranks, to 22,000, with rapid hiring — and $50,000 signing bonuses. Homeland Security did not respond to an emailed request for further comment.

Most Republicans say the current political climate leaves the immigration officers, many of them new to the job, exposed if their faces and identities are made public.

Sen. Thom Tillis (R., N.C.) said he just can’t agree with Democrats’ demand that officers unmask themselves.

“You know, there’s a lot of vicious people out there, and they’ll take a picture of your face, and the next thing you know, your children or your wife or your husband are being threatened at home,” he said. “That’s just the reality of the world that we’re in.”

ICE stands apart with masks

It appears no other policing agency in the country regularly uses masking on a widespread basis. Instead, masks are used during special operations, particularly undercover work or at times during large crowd control or protest situations, and when there is inclement weather or individual health concerns.

Experts said only perhaps during the Ku Klux Klan raids or in the Old West has masking been a more widely used tool.

“It is without precedent in modern American history,” said the American Civil Liberties Union’s Naureen Shah in Washington.

She said the idea of masked patrols on city streets seeking immigrants can leave people scared and confused about who they are encountering — which she suggested is part of the point.

“I think it’s calculated to terrify people,” she said. “I don’t think anybody viscerally feels like, OK, this is something we want to become a permanent fixture in our streets.”

Toward the end of the first Trump administration, Congress sought to clamp down after masked federal agents showed up in 2020 to quell protests in Portland, Ore., and other cities. A provision requiring agents to clearly identify themselves was tucked into a massive defense authorization bill that Trump assigned into law.

Last year, California became the first state in the nation to ban most law enforcement officers, including federal immigration agents, from covering their faces. The Trump administration’s Justice Department sued, saying the state’s policies “create risk” for the agents.

A federal judge on Monday blocked the part of the California law that would ban federal immigration agents from covering their faces, but they will still be required to wear clear identification showing their agency and badge number.

Judge Christina Snyder said she issued the initial ruling because the mask ban as it was enacted did not also apply to state law enforcement authorities, discriminating against the federal government. The ruling could have national implications as states grapple with how to deal with federal agents enforcing the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.

It left open the possibility of future legislation banning federal agents from wearing masks if it applied to all law enforcement agencies, with Snyder writing “the Court finds that federal officers can perform their federal functions without wearing masks.” The ruling will go into effect Feb. 19.

Police seek middle ground, advocates say unmasking not enough

Smith, of the sheriffs’ association, said there’s no easy answer to the current masking debate.

He suggested perhaps a middle ground could be reached — one that would allow officers to wear masks, but also require their badge or other identifying numbers to be prominently displayed.

Advocates said while unmasking the federal agents would be an important step, other restraints on immigration enforcement operations may be even more so.

They are pushing Congress to curb the ability of ICE officers to rely on administrative warrants in immigration operations, particularly to enter people’s homes, insisting such actions should be required to use judicial warrants, with sign-off from the courts.

There is also an effort to end roving patrols — the ability of immigration officers to use a person’s race, language, or job location to question their legal status, sometimes called “Kavanaugh stops” after Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s concurring opinion to a Supreme Court decision last summer.

Greg Chen, senior director of government affairs at the American Immigration Lawyers Association, said because Congress gave Homeland Security such robust funding in the tax cuts bill, “That’s why the policy reforms are so important right now to bring the agency in check.”

Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D., Mass.), who recently returned from Minnesota, said the weight of the masked enforcement operation can be felt in ways that impact everyone — regardless of a person’s own immigration status.

“It’s a very a heavy presence of surveillance and intimidation,” she said. “No one is exempt.”

MINNEAPOLIS — Federal authorities have denied attempting to expedite an end to asylum claims by the family of a 5-year-old boy who was detained with his father during the immigration crackdown that has shaken the Minneapolis area.

Images of Liam Conejo Ramos wearing a bunny hat and Spider-Man backpack surrounded by immigration officers stirred outrage over the crackdown.

Danielle Molliver, a lawyer for the boy and his father, told the New York Times that the government was attempting to speed up the deportation proceedings, calling the actions “extraordinary” and possibly “retaliatory.”

The government denied that.

“These are regular removal proceedings. They are not in expedited removal,” Department of Homeland Security official Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement, adding ”there is nothing retaliatory about enforcing the nation’s immigration laws.”

Molliver told the Times that an immigration judge, during a closed Friday hearing, gave her additional time to argue the family’s case.

The boy and his father, Adrian Conejo Arias, who originally is from Ecuador, were detained in a Minneapolis suburb on Jan. 20. They were taken to a detention facility in Dilley, Texas.

They were released following a judge’s order and returned to Minnesota on Feb. 1.

Neighbors and school officials have accused federal immigration officers of using the preschooler as “bait” by telling him to knock on the door to his house so that his mother would come outside. DHS has called that description of events an “abject lie.” It said the father fled on foot and left the boy in a running vehicle in their driveway.

The government said the boy’s father entered the U.S. illegally from Ecuador in December 2024. The family’s lawyer said he has an asylum claim pending that allows him to stay in the U.S.

WASHINGTON — U.S. military forces boarded a sanctioned tanker in the Indian Ocean after tracking the ship from the Caribbean Sea as part of an oil quarantine meant to squeeze Venezuela, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Monday.

Venezuela had faced U.S. sanctions on its oil and relied on a shadow fleet of falsely flagged tankers to smuggle crude into global supply chains. Following the U.S. raid to apprehend then-President Nicolás Maduro in early January, several tankers fled the Venezuelan coast, including the ship that was boarded in the Indian Ocean overnight.

Hegseth vowed to eventually capture all those ships, telling a group of shipyard workers in Maine on Monday that “the only guidance I gave to my military commanders is none of those are getting away.”

“I don’t care if we got to go around the globe to get them; we’re going to get them,” he added.

The Trump administration has seized seven tankers as part of its broader efforts to take control of the South American country’s oil. Unlike those previous actions, the Aquila II has not been formally seized and placed under U.S. control, a defense official said.

Instead, the ship is being held while its ultimate fate is decided by the U.S., according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss ongoing decision-making.

The Aquila II is a Panamanian-flagged tanker under U.S. sanctions related to the shipment of illicit Russian oil. Owned by a company with a listed address in Hong Kong, the ship’s tracking data shows it has spent much of the last year with its radio transponder turned off, a practice known as “running dark” commonly employed by smugglers to hide their location.

It was one of at least 16 tankers that fled the Venezuelan coast last month, according to Samir Madani, co-founder of TankerTrackers.com, who said his organization used satellite imagery and surface-level photos to document the ship’s movements. According to data transmitted from the ship Monday, it is not currently laden with a cargo of crude oil.

The Pentagon’s post on X said the military “conducted a right-of-visit, maritime interdiction” on the ship.

“The Aquila II was operating in defiance of President Trump’s established quarantine of sanctioned vessels in the Caribbean,” the Pentagon said. “It ran, and we followed.”

A Navy official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss military operations, would not say what forces were used in the operation but confirmed the destroyers USS Pinckney and USS John Finn as well as the mobile base ship USS Miguel Keith were operating in the Indian Ocean.

In videos the Pentagon posted to social media, uniformed forces can be seen boarding a Navy helicopter that takes off from a ship that matches the profile of the Miguel Keith. Video and photos of the tanker shot from inside a helicopter also show a Navy destroyer sailing alongside the ship.

Since the U.S. ouster of Maduro in a surprise nighttime raid on Jan. 3, the Trump administration has set out to control the production, refining, and global distribution of Venezuela’s petroleum products. Officials in President Donald Trump’s Republican administration have made it clear they see seizing the tankers as a way to generate cash as they seek to rebuild Venezuela’s battered oil industry and restore its economy.

Trump also has been trying to restrict the flow of oil to Cuba, which faces strict economic sanctions by the U.S. and relies heavily on oil shipments from allies like Mexico, Russia and Venezuela.

Since the Venezuela operation, Trump has said that no more Venezuelan oil will go to Cuba and that the Cuban government is ready to fall. Trump also recently signed an executive order that would impose a tariff on any goods from countries that sell or provide oil to Cuba, primarily pressuring Mexico because it has acted as an oil lifeline for Cuba.

CARACAS, Venezuela — Venezuela’s top prosecutor said on Monday that his office had requested the arrest of one of the closest allies of opposition leader María Corina Machado, less than 12 hours after his release from a detention facility as part of a government move to free those facing politically motivated accusations.

The attorney general’s statement did not say whether Juan Pablo Guanipa was rearrested, or give indication of his whereabouts. The government had released him along with several other prominent opposition members on Sunday following lengthy politically motivated detentions.

Attorney General Tarek William Saab’s office posted on social media that it had “requested the competent court to revoke the precautionary measure granted to Juan Pablo Guanipa, due to his non-compliance with the conditions imposed by the aforementioned court.”

It did not elaborate on what conditions Guanipa, a former governor for the opposition, violated during the hours he was free, but said authorities were seeking house arrest.

Guanipa’s son, Ramón, told reporters Monday that authorities have not yet notified him of his father’s whereabouts and their decision to place him on house arrest. He said his father did not violate the two conditions of his release — monthly check-ins with a court and no travel outside Venezuela — and showed reporters the court document listing them.

Abducted by ‘heavily armed men’

Earlier on Monday, Machado announced Juan Pablo Guanipa had been “kidnapped” by “heavily armed men, dressed in civilian clothes” who “arrived in four vehicles and violently took him away” in a neighborhood in the capital, Caracas.

The development marked the latest twist in the political turmoil in Venezuela in the wake of the U.S. military’s seizure on Jan. 3 of Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, from a military base compound in Caracas in a stunning operation that landed them in New York to face federal drug trafficking charges.

The government of Venezuela’s acting President Delcy Rodríguez has faced mounting pressure to free hundreds of people whose detentions months or years ago have been linked to their political activities. The releases also followed a visit to Venezuela of representatives of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Rodríguez was sworn in as Venezuela’s acting president after Maduro’s Jan. 3 capture and her government began releasing prisoners days later.

Some of those freed Sunday joined families waiting outside detention facilities for their loved ones. They chanted, “We are not afraid! We are not afraid!” and marched a short distance.

“I am convinced that our country has completely changed,” Guanipa told reporters after his release. “I am convinced that it is now up to all of us to focus on building a free and democratic country.”

Guanipa had spent more than eight months in custody at a facility in Caracas.

“My father cannot be a criminal … simply for making statements,” Ramón Guanipa said. How much longer will speaking out be a crime in this country?”

Venezuelan-based prisoners’ rights group Foro Penal confirmed the release of at least 30 people Sunday.

Several members of Machado’s political organization were among the released Sunday, including attorney Perkins Rocha and local organizer María Oropeza, who had in 2024 livestreamed her arrest by military intelligence officers as they broke into her home with a crowbar.

Alfredo Romero, president of Foro Penal, expressed serious concern over Juan Pablo Guanipa’s disappearance.

“So far, we have no clear information about who took him,” he said on X. “We hope he will be released immediately.”

Long detentions for political activities

Guanipa was detained in late May and accused by Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello of participating in an alleged “terrorist group” that was plotting to boycott that month’s legislative election. Guanipa’s brother Tomás rejected the accusation, and said the arrest was meant to crack down on dissent.

Rodríguez’s government announced Jan. 8 that it would free a significant number of those arrested — a central demand of the country’s opposition and human rights organizations with backing from the United States — but families and rights watchdogs have criticized authorities for the slow pace of the releases.

The ruling party-controlled National Assembly last week began debating an amnesty bill that could lead to the release of hundreds. The opposition and nongovernmental organizations have reacted with cautious optimism as well as with suggestions and demands for more information on the contents of the proposal.

National Assembly President Jorge Rodríguez on Friday posted a video on Instagram showing him outside a detention center in Caracas and saying that “everyone” would be released no later than next week, once the amnesty bill is approved.

Rodríguez, the acting president, and Volker Türk, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, spoke by phone in late January. His spokesperson, Ravina Shamdasani, in a statement said he sent a team to the country and “offered our support to help Venezuela work on a roadmap for dialogue and reconciliation” in which human rights should be centered.