What federal court cases have found ICE detainers unconstitutional and what remedies did courts order?

1. Gonzalez v. ICE — a landmark district ruling and class remedy

In Gonzalez v. ICE, a federal district court concluded that ICE’s primary detainer program relied on unreliable databases and resulted in unconstitutional arrests, certified the matter as a class action, and the litigation produced a final judgment upholding a permanent injunction barring ICE from issuing detainers based solely on the flawed database information while giving ICE a short compliance deadline; later the case produced a multi‑year, nationwide class settlement approved in December 2024 that imposes reforms on ICE’s detainer practices for five years ^{[1] [4] [3]}.

2. Ninth Circuit: probable cause and a neutral decisionmaker requirement

An appellate decision in the Ninth Circuit distilled the constitutional problem to a process defect—ruling that the Fourth Amendment requires more than a computer‑generated hit and mandates a neutral probable‑cause evaluation before someone may be held on an immigration detainer—and it sent the case back to the lower court to reassess factual findings about the underlying government databases’ reliability ^[2].

3. District courts across the country and the doctrine that detainers lack warrant power

Numerous federal trial courts have reached parallel conclusions: courts have emphasized that an ICE detainer request carries no legal force and does not authorize state or local officials to hold someone in custody as if on an arrest warrant, and other district rulings have found unlawful prolonged detention caused by detainers—holding that even an additional 48 hours of custody can constitute a new, warrantless arrest raising Fourth Amendment concerns ^{[5] [6]}.

4. Other named litigations and individual judgments

Individual cases have reinforced the constitutional narrative: federal judges have ruled in favor of U.S. citizens and noncitizens who were wrongfully held because of detainers—finding Fourth Amendment violations in at least one Florida sheriff’s detention and entering judgments for plaintiffs—illustrating that liability can flow to local authorities who rely on ICE requests without independent probable‑cause review ^{[7] [8]}.

5. What remedies courts have actually ordered

Courts have ordered a spectrum of remedies: permanent injunctions limiting ICE’s ability to issue detainers based on database hits, deadlines to reform detainer procedures, nationwide class settlements imposing multi‑year compliance obligations, remands to district courts to reassess factual predicates (such as database reliability), and individual judgments finding constitutional violations ^{[1] [4] [3] [2] [7]}.

6. Limits, ongoing disputes and institutional pushback

Despite these wins, appellate rulings have not uniformly insulated all detainer litigation from reversal or narrowed remedies—the Ninth Circuit’s remand for factual review shows courts must grapple with credibility of government databases—while some courts have been reluctant to convert policy complaints into enforceable regulatory regimes, meaning that remedies often focus on injunctive relief and case‑by‑case judgments rather than a single statutory fix ^{[2] [9]}.

7. Two competing narratives and implicit agendas in the reporting

Advocacy groups and court dockets emphasize systemic constitutional failure—highlighting millions purportedly affected and pushing for nationwide injunctions and settlements—while government and some courts have framed the issue as one of evidence and process (database reliability, proper statutory authority) rather than a categorical illegality; these divergent frames reflect implicit agendas: civil‑rights litigants seek broad structural change, whereas government defenders emphasize operational necessity and technical fixes ^{[1] [2] [3]}.