Immigration agents arrested more than 130 people over the weekend in Charlotte as federal officers surged into the Democratic-led city for the Trump administration’s latest anti-immigration operation.
Federal officers descended on North Carolina’s largest city despite fierce objections from local leaders. Agents made arrests at apartment complexes and shops across the city, as well as on the grounds of a church in front of children.
“We’ve seen masked, heavily armed agents in paramilitary garb driving unmarked cars, targeting American citizens based on their skin color, racially profiling and picking up random people in parking lots and off of our sidewalks,” Gov. Josh Stein said in a Sunday video statement. “This is not making us safer. It’s stoking fear and dividing our community.”
Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said that agents arrested “over 130 illegal aliens,” all of whom she claimed broke immigration laws.
Those arrested include alleged gang members and other criminals, the agency said, providing few additional details.
The Department of Homeland Security says it has chosen North Carolina as its latest target for Trump’s anti-immigration operation because of its so-called sanctuary policies, which can hinder cooperation between local authorities and immigration agents.
In one Saturday sting, agents turned up at a church in the east of the city as 15 to 20 churchgoers were doing yard work on the property and children were playing games, according to the Charlotte Observer.
The masked agents’ presence caused some of the churchgoers to run into the nearby woods, but officers detained one member of the group, according to the church’s pastor, who did not wish to be identified.
“They took one of the members of the church, they don’t ask nothing, they just took him,” the pastor told the newspaper. “One of these guys with immigration, he [said] he was going to arrest one of the other guys in the church. He pushed him.”
The pastor claimed the agents did not show any identification before they detained the suspect, whose wife and child were reportedly inside the church at the time.
Members of the church were aware the anti-immigration operation was starting this weekend but believed they would be safe on church grounds, said 15-year-old Miguel Vazquez.
“We thought church was safe and nothing gonna happen,” Vazquez told the Observer. “But it did happen.”
The arrest appears to be one of the first instances where the Trump administration has deliberately entered church grounds to carry out anti-immigration enforcement.
Manolo Betancur, who owns a Latino bakery, shut down temporarily over the weekend because he said immigration agents were targeting his customers. He said he saw agents grabbing people mere blocks from his business.
“I saw them with my own eyes. And they just shoved people to the floor,” he said, later adding, “I’m scared. Nobody wants to see another human being treated that way.”
The Independent has requested comment from the Department of Homeland Security.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has been accused of violating First Amendment protections and infringing on religious freedoms after the Trump administration rescinded previous Immigration and Customs Enforcement policy that prohibited enforcement actions in sensitive locations such as places of worship, as well as schools and hospitals.
Faith leaders have hit back with lawsuits in recent months to stop immigration enforcement arrests in their places of worship.
Hundreds of demonstrators protested against Homeland Security’s so-called “Operation Charlotte’s Web” in marches across the city over the weekend.
Charlotte’s New Covenant AME Church, which was not believed to be targeted by border agents, is condemning the administration’s tactics.
“This is not a partisan issue —this is a humanitarian issue,” the church posted in a statement on social media.
“To witness individuals, including U.S. citizens, being snatched off the street and violently forced into vans is more than a travesty of justice; it is a violation of human dignity and a crime against humanity,” the statement added.
Elsewhere in the city, footage began circulating of Border Patrol agents questioning two workers hanging Christmas lights in a homeowner’s front yard.
The homeowner, Rheba Hamilton, filmed the agents speaking to the workers in Spanish, asking them which country they were from.
One agent told the workers, “If you are a citizen, there should be no problems,” and asked, “Do you know which country you are from, sir? Are you an American citizen?”
They did not respond, and the agents did not make any arrests.
The Trump administration’s mass deportation operations have seen a boost in ICE and border patrol agents in major Democratic-led cities with large immigrant populations in recent months, including Chicago, Los Angeles and Portland.
Bovino and officers under his command in Chicago — where agents were filmed tackling protesters and filling neighborhoods with tear gas — faced a federal lawsuit from protesters, press groups and faith leaders accusing agents of indiscriminately firing riot weapons into crowds and at close range as volatile scenes emerged from protests against immigration raids.
Officials in California , Illinois and Oregon have accused the federal government of deliberately trying to incite violence to justify law enforcement crackdowns and military deployments.
With reporting by the Associated Press.
