How have courts in different federal districts ruled on warrantless ICE arrests and ‘sensitive location’ protections since 2022?
Executive summary
Since 2022 federal judges in at least one major district have pushed back on warrantless ICE arrests by enforcing or extending court-ordered limits on interior arrests, most notably the Castañón Nava consent decree enforced in the Northern District of Illinois (Chicago) [1] [2]. At the same time, lower-court precedent and shifting federal policy around “sensitive locations” and sovereign immunities have created a patchwork: some courts have required probable cause for warrantless immigration arrests, while agency guidance and internal memos have signaled broader enforcement latitude [3] [4] [5].
1. Chicago’s hard line: extension and enforcement of the Castañón Nava consent decree
A federal judge in Chicago found that ICE violated the 2022 Castañón Nava settlement by making at least 22 warrantless arrests and extended active court oversight of the consent decree, ordering monthly reporting, retraining, and reissuance of probable-cause guidance nationwide while keeping procedural protections in place through a limited extension [1] [6] [2]. The court characterized agency tactics—such as carrying blank administrative-warrant forms and back-dating paperwork—as deliberate attempts to circumvent the requirement of probable cause for warrantless arrests, and ordered remedial measures including identification of affected individuals and potential relief [2] [7].
2. Lower courts’ Fourth Amendment lens: “reason to believe” and probable cause limits
Longstanding lower-court rulings have read the statutory standard for warrantless immigration arrests as effectively requiring probable cause—courts have overturned entries or seizures where exigent circumstances or consent were absent and have required sufficient facts that a reasonable officer could conclude an alien had violated immigration law and might escape before a warrant could be obtained [3] [8]. Those judicial interpretations create doctrinal pressure on district courts reviewing ICE conduct, which helps explain why judges in some districts scrutinize warrantless interior arrests and home entries closely [3] [8].
3. Sensitive locations: policy protections rolled back and contested in court
Federal policy dating back to 2011 limited enforcement actions in “sensitive locations” such as schools, hospitals, and places of worship, but recent administrative moves have rescinded some or all of those protections—Acting DHS leadership in 2025 rescinded Biden-era guidance that limited operations near sensitive sites, and legal advocates argue that rescission increases the likelihood of interior encounters and litigation [4] [5]. Courts have split historically over the reach of constitutional and statutory protections in places of worship and other public spaces, so the policy rollback is likely to generate more district-court disputes about whether particular arrests were lawful under Fourth or First Amendment frameworks [3] [4].
4. National context: immunity doctrines and the limits of judicial remedies
Separately, scholarship and reporting note that Supreme Court decisions in the early 2020s narrowed the avenues for damages against immigration officers and altered litigants’ remedies for ICE misconduct—shifts that both complicate enforcement of constitutional limits and motivate reliance on injunctive orders like consent decrees instead of damages suits [9]. That makes district-court injunctions—such as the Chicago judge’s extension of Castañón Nava—more consequential, because damages remedies may be constrained while equitable remedies remain available to shape agency practice [9] [2].
5. Competing narratives and agendas shaping the litigation landscape
Advocacy groups emphasize civil-rights harms and argue for nationwide limits on warrantless interior arrests, pointing to pattern-and-practice problems and the reliance on collateral-arrest tactics; ICE and parts of the administration emphasize enforcement prerogatives and contend policy changes are needed to address criminality and border enforcement goals, as reflected in internal emails and guidance rescinding sensitive-location limits [5] [7]. Courts are therefore weighing constitutional standards, statutory text, administrative guidance, and the political stakes—producing a fragmented set of district rulings and active appeals that will determine whether local injunctions become broader precedents or are narrowed on appeal [1] [2] [5].
6. What to watch next
Ongoing reporting and litigation tracks include appeals of the Chicago orders, monthly compliance reporting from ICE ordered by the court, new district-level challenges to arrests in places like hospitals and courts, and how federal policy changes (and internal agency communications) are treated by judges balancing enforcement interests and constitutional protections [1] [4] [5]. Because scholarship shows that courts have long required probable cause for warrantless immigration arrests in many contexts, the immediate future will hinge on whether appellate courts reconfigure those requirements or uphold district judges’ injunctions and oversight remedies [3] [8].