ICE Agents Target Out-of-State License Plates in Apparent Escalation of Car Stops in NYC

Andrés, a Colombian immigrant living in College Point, Queens, had just picked up some Peruvian food on an evening in late June, and was driving his 6-year-old daughter and wife home when they were suddenly boxed in by unmarked cars. 

Masked ICE agents jumped out and started ordering him to get out of the car. While his daughter sobbed in the back seat, Andrés asked the agents multiple times to produce a warrant. The agents waved a blank piece of paper at him, only writing his name in pencil after he surrendered his license, he recalled in an interview with The City Reporter. He asked that his full name be withheld fearing further retaliation. 

He had no criminal history, a work permit and an upcoming immigration court date, but none of that prevented his arrest. 

“You feel helpless,” he said in Spanish in a phone call. 

Andrés, who had recently moved to New York from New Jersey, spent three weeks at the Metropolitan Detention Center, where other detainees encouraged him to file a habeas corpus lawsuit seeking his release. Like him, a lot of others in detention had been driving cars with out-of-state plates when they were ambushed by agents. He drew his own conclusion about his arrest.

“They stopped me because I had out-of-state plates,” Andrés said. 

ICE enforcement across New York City appears to have ticked up in recent weeks, with masked agents seen pepper-spraying a 72-year-old woman trying to film them in Inwood, questioning a young girl in Bushwick and confronting protesters outside New York-Presbyterian Hospital in Lower Manhattan. 

But many of the most recent ICE enforcement videos show agents stopping cars in neighborhoods like Jackson Heights in Queens, Washington Heights in Manhattan and Fordham in The Bronx, introducing an arrest tactic common in surrounding suburbs but less frequently seen in New York City, until now. Drivers or passengers in cars with out-of-state plates may be particularly vulnerable, advocates said.

“Out-of-state license plates are a huge, if not the biggest risk factor, of who gets stopped by DHS,” said Paige Austin, an attorney with Make the Road New York. “We see it time and time again.”

Asked about recent enforcement activity in New York City, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security said, “ICE agents uphold our nation’s immigration laws in all 50 states, seven days a week, 24 hours a day.”

“For operational security reasons, we would not confirm future removal operations,” the spokesperson said. The agency didn’t return a request for additional comment about out-of-state plates. 

ICE Workaround 

New York’s 2019 Greenlight Law, which allowed undocumented New Yorkers to get driver’s licenses, also barred ICE from accessing Department of Motor Vehicle records without a court order. New York is one of the few states, alongside Minnesota, Illinois and Massachusetts, that have restricted the agency’s access to DMV records in this way. 

The Trump administration sued New York last year over the law. The case was dismissed in December, though the federal government is appealing. 

But ICE agents in the field in New York can look up vehicle registration records of cars with plates from most other states. Agents can then check the person’s name and birthdate with their own immigration records and initiate an arrest if the driver is undocumented.

That’s what happened to Andrés, according to ICE’s own account as submitted in federal court by Trump administration attorneys. 

That day, agents in College Point were looking for another Colombian man for whom they had an arrest warrant. They saw Andrés’ car, which had New Jersey plates, drive by and “used law enforcement databases” to confirm he was the owner and his immigration status.

Austin of Make the Road said that a number of detained immigrants who were stopped in cars with out-of-state plates have come into her office seeking legal help, including one driver in Queens with plates from Virginia. 

“Is there some reason they were looking for him? Or did he drive by, have Virginia plates, and they ran his status?” Austin said. “We don’t know why, but we do know he had out-of-state plates.”

In some cases, Make the Road has sued in federal court for a driver’s release, acquiring additional documents filed by ICE that shed light on the arrest. In one such case, an ICE agent saw a vehicle in Brooklyn with New Jersey plates, ran the vehicle registration records, checked the driver’s immigration records and then arrested the driver, according to court records reviewed by The City Reporter.

“The anecdotes have amounted to absolute certainty that your risk is very much heightened when driving with out-of-state plates,” Austin said.  

A recent Newsday investigation documented the use of this tactic on Long Island, where federal agents stake out parking lots and run out-of-state license plates. Democratic members of Congress have been urging Democratic governors to take additional steps to restrict ICE’s access to vehicle records.

But up until recently, arrests of pedestrians appeared to be more prevalent within the five boroughs. A months-long investigation into street stops across the region by The City Reporter identified hundreds of car and pedestrian stops in the region, 94% of which targeted Latino immigrants. Of the 81 confirmed street stops within the five boroughs between October and April identified by The City Reporter, just four of them were of people in cars.

But in the months since, in a second review of federal habeas corpus lawsuits, The City Reporter found several examples of ICE targeting drivers in New York City with out-of-state plates.

That’s what happened to Chidozie Wilson Okeke, a Nigerian immigrant in Bushwick, whose arrest made headlines in early May after he was beaten up and appeared to have been tased. A counterprotest and standoff with police and ICE agents formed outside Wyckoff Hospital where he’d been taken after his arrest. 

ICE’s account of the arrest submitted in federal court described agents surveilling a Bushwick location with an administrative warrant to arrest a Mauritanian man when they saw Okeke, who they described as having “the same build and likeness” as their target, on the driver’s side of a Toyota with New Jersey plates. They ran his plates and checked the Law Enforcement Support Center which confirmed he’d overstayed a tourist visa. 

The agents said they trailed Okeke for several blocks before pulling him over and trying to arrest him. In the immediate aftermath, DHS put out a statement saying Okeke had prior arrests for assault and criminal drug possession, but their own record of his arrest says “Okeke has no known criminal history.”

A Neighborhood of Drivers

In recent weeks, College Point has been targeted particularly hard, advocates say, with repeated sightings and arrests along College Point Avenue, the neighborhood’s main commercial strip. 

More than a dozen videos posted to TikTok in the last two weeks show masked ICE agents stopping cars on the main drag and side streets and parked in a Home Depot parking lot at the edge of the neighborhood, making several arrests. 

“Taking people out of cars, that seems to be the pattern,” said Sister Ruth Lautt, a nun who lives in College Point and volunteers at St. Fidelis Roman Catholic Church.

Lautt spoke to The City Reporter after a Sunday Spanish-language mass packed with congregants, despite the recent uptick in ICE sightings.

“It’s unnerving,” she said. During mass a week earlier, word spread that ICE agents were detaining the driver of a car just a block away, spreading fear among churchgoers, Lautt said. 

“We see them all over College Point,” she said. 

Of the around 30,000 residents in College Point, 39% are Hispanic, mostly from Ecuador, Colombia and the Dominican Republic, according to a recent city analysis. With no subway access, an estimated 60% of residents commute by car, far greater than the citywide average of 26%.

Up and down College Point Avenue on a recent afternoon, more than a dozen workers and residents told The City Reporter they’d seen ICE agents in recent days along the block. Lucas saw masked agents taking pictures of license plates and registrations in front of the smoke shop where he works on July 31. He declined to give his full name fearing retaliation. 

“Full tactical gear, masks, tinted windows, big trucks, at least 10 of them in the middle of the street double-parked,” he recalled. 

Andrés Piscel, a butcher on the block said he’d watched several recent arrests in front of the shop where he works, including two men who were taken out of a car with plates from New Jersey.

“People who have license plates from elsewhere, there they are,” he said in Spanish. 

Vickie Paladino, the local City Council member and one of the Council’s few Republicans, said she was supportive of the increased presence in the area.

“The fact is College Point has seen a significant increase in migrant gang activity since the border surge a few years ago,” she said. “My office welcomes ICE and will cooperate with them in any way possible. This district supports law enforcement and that includes immigration law.”

A federal judge reviewing his habeas corpus lawsuit ordered Andrés released after he’d spent about three weeks at Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn. One of the first things he did when he got out was switch his car’s registration to his new Queens address. His arrest still hangs heavily over the family, and his 6-year-old daughter often breaks down in trembling fits of tears.

“She says her heart hurts,” he said. 

In the weeks since he’s gotten out, Andrés said he’s been carrying around copies of his release papers from detention in case he’s stopped again, and he’s heard through social media and whatsapp that agents have been spotted almost every day in the neighborhood. 

“I’m a little more protected with these pages that I have with me, but I’m not at ease, because my wife and children are still going out into the street,” he said.

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