ICE agents arrest 13 in Maryland as Trump’s immigration crackdown begins

SILVER SPRING, Md. – President Donald Trump’s plan to crackdown on illegal immigration is hitting the DMV. Immigration and Customs Enforcement made nearly 1,000 arrests across the U.S. Monday and 13 of those were in Maryland. 

The Associated Press joined a dozen ICE officers gathered who gathered before dawn Monday in a Maryland parking lot, then fanned out to the Washington suburbs to find their targets: someone wanted in El Salvador for homicide, a person convicted of armed robbery, a migrant found guilty of possessing child sexual abuse material and another with drug and gun convictions. All were in the country illegally.

“The worst go first,” Matt Elliston, director of ICE’s Baltimore field office, said of the agency’s enforcement priorities.

It’s a glimpse of how the work of immigration officers has already changed under a White House intent on deporting large numbers of immigrants living in the U.S. without permission.

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“A little hope, but not as much”

Local perspective:

FOX 5 spoke with the older brother of a man taken into custody Monday at the family’s Silver Spring home. He was one of the 13 arrested across Maryland that day.

“From my perspective, I’m kind of nervous but at the same time, they’re doing their job,” he told FOX 5, speaking on the condition of anonymity. “They’re doing what they’re supposed to do. They’re not looking for trouble or nothing else. They’re just doing their job, to be honest.” 

His family did not want to comment on the specifics of his case but did say that his brother made mistakes in his past, adding that he warned him this could happen.

“It’s kind of a tough situation to handle. It is what it is. They’re doing their job. There’s pretty much nothing we can do. We [saw] that coming. When? We don’t know,” he said. “It’s a really tough situation to be under this. We tried our best to do everything in the legal way, but we have…kind of hope…on how we can resolve this. A little hope, but not as much.”

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What is a ‘collateral arrest’? 

The other side:

According to Elliston, people considered a threat to public safety and national security are still the top priority — that’s no different from the Biden administration. What is different now is that ICE agents are allowed to make “collateral arrests,” meaning they can take illegal immigrants into who were not the targets of the search into custody. Those kinds of arrests were previously banned.

“ICE only does targeted enforcement operations. We do not do raids, we do not do drag nets, we do not do sweeps. That is not something ICE has ever done. We do targeted enforcement, but part of that targeted enforcement…if I’m going for an MS-13 gang member, and I see someone next to him…has a big 13 on their face, I’m going to start asking that person questions. So in that, aspect…we’ll ask that person in custody, and if we arrest him and they’re illegally in the United States, that is what we consider a collateral arrest. They will come with us, also,” Elliston told the Associated Press. 

“That’s one of the big differences here. Handcuffs are off. Collateral is on the table so if someone is here illegally, there’s no protection on the table just because they didn’t happen to be the target that day,” he continued. 

 Elliston added that if they do not find those targeted for removal, they will keep looking.

“When we are looking for these people, it’s never 100 percent. As successful as my team is, we’re number one in the United States when it comes to get sex offenders…as successful as we are, we don’t always bat 100 percent. These people, just because we didn’t get them today, doesn’t mean we won’t get them tomorrow,” he said.

 Of the 13 arrests made in Maryland, the Associated Press reports four of them were collateral.