The lawsuit cames just days after the Trump administration sued the City of Los Angeles over its sanctuary city policies.
TORRANCE, Calif.—At the site of the Bubble Bath Hand Car Wash in Torrance, immigration activists gathered on Wednesday morning to announce a lawsuit against the federal government, launched in the early hours of July 2, 2025.
The suit, which alleges that immigration raids violate the Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights of thousands of people, is being brought by multiple civil and immigration rights groups, according to officials with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Foundation of Southern California, one of the plaintiffs.
Mohammad Tajsar, senior attorney with the ACLU Foundation, told reporters that the groups are suing the federal government “for their
, immoral, and unconstitutional siege of the city of Los Angeles and its neighboring communities” in what he called a “landmark lawsuit.”
“If you are brown, (federal agents) will hunt you down,” he said.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which oversees Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), has vehemently denied claims of racial profiling, calling it a “disgusting” smear tactic against law enforcement officers.
Attorneys and immigration activists were joined by the relatives of several men detained by ICE agents while working on the premises of the car wash. Their last names were not given due to security concerns.
Since June 6, documented cases of arrests made by federal agents have sparked protests throughout the city, leading to arrests and property damage, according to Los Angeles Police Department officials.
Assaults on federal agents have also seen a heavy increase, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Acting Director Todd M. Lyons, who reported that both officers and agents are already facing a 500 percent increase in assaults.
The lawsuit comes just two days after the Trump administration sued the City of Los Angeles on June 30 over its ‘sanctuary city’ policies, alleging in federal court that the ordinance violates the Constitution by thwarting immigration enforcement.
“The United States Constitution’s Supremacy Clause prohibits the city from picking and choosing which federal laws will be enforced and which will not,” United States Attorney for the Central District of California Bill Essayli said in a statement on the lawsuit.
“The lawsuit holds the city of Los Angeles accountable for deliberately obstructing the enforcement of federal immigration law.’’
Hilda Solis, a member of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, said Tuesday that according to data cited by the Department of Homeland Security, between June 6 and 22, more than 1,600 individuals were detained or deported in Southern California.
“There have been no arrests of killers, rapists or drug dealers,” Mark Rosenbaum, senior special counsel for strategic litigation at legal services group Public Counsel, told reporters in the parking area of the Bubble Bath Hand Car Wash.
“One of the clearest patterns that have emerged in the raids in Southern California has been stops and interrogations … on the basis of apparent race and ethnicity.”
Findings by Department of Homeland Security officials, detailed in a June 26 press release, challenged Rosenbaum’s allegation, stating that recent DHS operations in Los Angeles have “resulted in the arrest of criminal illegal aliens—with convictions ranging from murder, pedophilia, fentanyl trafficking, spousal abuse, sexual assault, and armed robbery.
Wednesday’s proposed class-action suit, brought in Los Angeles federal court, is seeking preliminary and permanent injunctions to stop further alleged violations of Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights, according to attorneys for the plaintiffs.
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