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Frontline S44E04 Caught in the Crackdown
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00:21Trump has promised to conduct what he calls the largest deportation program in American history.
00:27We will begin the process of returning millions and millions of criminal aliens back to the places from which they
00:35came.
00:35In collaboration with ProPublica...
00:37Lovino was deployed to several cities.
00:39He was the one who was the tip of the spear for this new type of immigration enforcement across the
00:44country.
00:44When we talk about who they're arresting and who they're holding accountable, it's not the worst of the worst.
00:49From Los Angeles...
00:50Hundreds of National Guard troops...
00:53To Chicago...
00:54Operation Midway Blitz...
00:56To Minneapolis...
00:57The White House today doubling down...
00:59The pushback on protest...
01:01Trying to terrify people and try to scare people away...
01:04Border Patrol agents didn't wake up in the morning and say, let me see who I can hurt today...
01:08And the fallout...
01:09President Trump and I, along with others in the administration, have recognized that certain improvements could and should be made.
01:14Now on Frontline, caught in the crackdown...
01:40This program contains graphic content.
01:43Viewer discretion is advised.
01:48The Trump administration is deploying an estimated 2,000 federal agents to Minneapolis.
01:53That includes ICE agents.
01:54Homeland Security posted on social media this afternoon, quote, we're not leaving until the problem is solved.
02:01Go home to Texas, ass...
02:04A month into the Trump administration's crackdown on illegal immigration in Minneapolis.
02:18Federal officers approached an activist named Renee Good as she sat in her car.
02:23That's fine, dude.
02:24I'm not mad at you.
02:26You want to come at us?
02:28I say go get yourself some lunch, big boy.
02:30Out of the car.
02:31Out of the car.
02:32Get out of the car.
02:47The killing of Renee Good by ICE officer Jonathan Ross stunned the country.
02:52What did you do?
02:55What did you do?
02:56You!
02:57Shame!
02:59Shame!
03:01Shame!
03:03Shame!
03:04Shame!
03:05Shame!
03:05We are following a breaking news situation in South Minneapolis, a shooting involving ICE agents.
03:12We have just learned the victim's name.
03:14She is a 37-year-old woman and her name is Renee Nicole Good.
03:19She was shot and killed today.
03:21And ICE claims that the agent opened fire after Good, quote, weaponized her vehicle in an attempt to kill a
03:29federal officer.
03:30In the days afterwards, I spoke to eyewitnesses and visited the site where Good was killed.
03:37Mother of three, a partner, and a poet, 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good as described by those who knew
03:44her.
03:45Her neighbors now mourning their loss.
03:48Like many here, Good had been out on the streets opposing the immigration sweeps.
03:53Yeah, I just started filming because I saw her body on the ground.
03:57A few blocks away, I met Liliana Zaragoza, who showed me videos she'd take in the morning of the shooting.
04:05She was on her way home after dropping off her kids.
04:10I opened my door and I exited with my hands up and I looked at one of the MPD officers,
04:17right?
04:17And I said, I'm an attorney. What, you know, what's going on?
04:20Is this an ICE operation? Is it an MPD operation? Is it something else?
04:25And he said, this is a crime scene now.
04:27It's here right now.
04:29And so when I get into my car, you know, I just grabbed my phone and started recording.
04:34And I saw on the sidewalk a bloodied person, bloodied head.
04:40I'm looking at her eyes. I'm looking at her body.
04:45And it was just a really horrific, violent thing to see.
04:48And for activists like you, what does her death mean?
04:54You know, I think it hits close to home for a lot of us who've been responding to these ICE
04:58raids.
05:00Frankly, you know, I was there responding like Renee Goode was responding.
05:05That was what you were doing. She was doing the same thing.
05:08Yes.
05:08And she wound up dead.
05:09Yes, exactly.
05:12The Trump administration depicted Goode as part of an extremist left-wing movement.
05:17That woman is part of a broader left-wing network to attack, to dox, to assault,
05:23and to make it impossible for our ICE officers to do their job.
05:26And the man the administration put in charge of the operation,
05:30Border Patrol Commander Gregory Bovino defended the officer who killed her.
05:35A 4,000-pound missile is not something anyone wants to face,
05:40especially in a split-second decision-making process in a very already inhospitable environment.
05:47Hats off to that ICE agent. I'm glad he made it out alive. I'm glad he's with his family.
05:54By the time Renee Goode was killed...
05:57Bovino is in the Gold Suburban.
06:00I'd been following Bovino and the Trump administration's immigration sweeps around the country for seven months.
06:07You speak English?
06:08Thousands had been arrested on immigration charges.
06:11Give me a favor. Just stay back, okay?
06:13What is your mission today? Like, if you were going to describe it for PBS.
06:17Title 8 immigration enforcement. So that's what we're here for.
06:20And all these bad people and bad things you see on the street that prey on American citizens, we're here
06:25to get them.
06:29But there was also a backlash.
06:32Better be careful. There's a lot of violence. Be careful.
06:34Are you encountering a lot of resistance?
06:37Most I've ever seen.
06:38Really? You bet.
06:38Amid the protests, the masked and heavily armed federal agents, sometimes backed by the military, had also arrested hundreds of
06:48U.S. citizens, routinely portraying them as domestic terrorists or extremists.
06:53Like, who do you think you're dealing with? Like, I'm not, like, Rambo or anything.
06:58With my colleagues at ProPublica and Frontline, we've interviewed officials, experts, and insiders.
07:05When you talk to agents who've been dispatched for these big operations, what do they tell you?
07:10They say it's a horrific situation and they've been put in very dangerous positions.
07:21So I've definitely seen a lot of violent acts instilled onto the agents by the protesters.
07:27And we analyzed the arrests of more than 300 protesters and bystanders caught in the crackdown.
07:34How could you do this?
07:36Why did you stop and question all these 305s?
07:38Please get out of here. Get back. Get back.
07:41Get back.
07:41While there have been some successful prosecutions, over and over, cases have been falling apart, contradicted by video evidence and
07:50witness testimony.
07:52Do you have video of it?
07:53Right here.
07:56And that's you getting it?
07:58Yep.
07:58Federal prosecutors have been dismissing charges or not filing them at all.
08:03So the case has collapsed. These things are not resulting in any real prosecution.
08:10And in cities across the country, countless people have been injured, and some even killed,
08:17by officers using tactics that experts say violate their own rules.
08:23People live here!
08:24You're not allowed to use less lethal weapons in that way.
08:27You're not allowed to fire people's heads.
08:30The agents attempted to disarm the individual, but he violently resisted.
08:35Fearing for his life, a Border Patrol agent fired defensive shots.
08:40Holy .
08:41Oh, my God!
08:43What do we want?
08:45What do we want?
08:46What do we want?
08:48By February, amid rising opposition around the country...
08:52Rise out! Rise out!
08:54...the Trump administration began backing off its campaign.
08:58And the man at the center of it, Greg Bovino...
09:01Stay back.
09:02...was out.
09:08Reports of a surge in raids of undocumented residents have been circulating on social media.
09:13The roots of the story trace back to January 2025.
09:18Pura Mira.
09:19...and a little-known operation that Bovino led in Bakersfield, California.
09:24Yeah, regular undercovers, everything.
09:26It was called Return to Sender.
09:29They were just rolling around the city like it was theirs, as if they were right, you know, in the
09:33El Centro border.
09:34Journalist Sergio Olmos reported on it for the nonprofit news outlets CalMatters and Evident Media.
09:41Greg Bovino, who was then the sector chief for El Centro, sent out about 65 agents 300 miles north of
09:47his sector into the interior of California to do this operation that they said, at the time, they had a
09:54targeted list of criminals they were going after.
09:56Fools came in deep on the Home Depot, got a helicopter and all.
10:00But Greg Bovino's crew would go up to Home Depots, gas stations, farmland.
10:07You know, looking at people who look Latino and stopping them and asking, show me your papers.
10:10Y aquà la patrulla fronteriza, pues, tiene, pues me imagino, pidiéndole los respectivos documentos a las personas.
10:19Thanks so much for inviting us.
10:21Bovino agreed to talk to Olmos about the operation.
10:25Every single one of the 78 that we arrested were criminals when you cross the border illegally at USC 1325,
10:32illegal entry into the United States.
10:34So they were all criminals. Let's get that one out of the way here, right out of the box.
10:43If they cross the border illegally, then they're coming with us. They were under arrest and they're coming with us.
10:51They said they were looking after, going after criminals. That was what they promoted it as.
10:57And what was the reality?
10:58We got documents from Customs and Border Protection that showed that 77 out of the 78 people they arrested, they
11:06had no knowledge of criminal or immigration history prior to encountering them.
11:10All that means is they didn't know who these people were when they arrested them.
11:14The idea of a target enforcement where traditionally someone like an agency like ICE would find out if somebody has
11:21a criminal record, they'd surveil their house, they'd check to see if they had been deported before.
11:25That whole, like, pre-investigation stuff, that doesn't happen when, you know, guys in Border Patrol just roll up to
11:31Home Depot and Kevlar and mask and see who runs.
11:34That's up what you guys are doing.
11:36And this operation in Bakersfield, we saw as a kind of, like, test case for how he could use Border
11:42Patrol in the interior.
11:45Yesterday's catch from Indio is being brought in by the Border Patrol.
11:49In fact, Return to Sender was a throwback to a campaign from the 1950s.
11:55Greg Bovino told congressional investigators a couple years earlier his model for immigration was President Eisenhower, that he really knew
12:02how to do interior enforcement.
12:03And I had to look this up because I didn't know what he was talking about, but it was Operation
12:07Wetback.
12:08This is the morning prison train.
12:09It's cargo, Mexican wetback, who have sneaked across the border and are being deported.
12:15The operation, which took its name from a racial slur, started on the border, but eventually extended to major cities
12:23like Chicago and Los Angeles.
12:27Bovino really looks at Operation Wetback as, like, the way that Border Patrol should be used.
12:33They should not just be lined up on the border watching a wall.
12:36They should be in cities setting up checkpoints and just stopping people.
12:40They got this guy pulled over over here at INS.
12:42And treating every town as if it's right across the border.
12:47We made contact with and arrested a lot of bad people.
12:52In the interview with Olmos in early 2025, Bovino said the Border Patrol would be taking an aggressive approach going
13:00forward.
13:00Over the next several years, we're going to go hard.
13:04Whether you're an illegal alien, a fentanyl smuggler, or any other type of transnational criminal threats, I'd self-deport right
13:12now.
13:13Just go ahead and self-deport because the Green Team is on the job and it's game on. Game on
13:21with the Green Team.
13:22Federal authorities have been reported at several locations in Los Angeles.
13:27Five months after Operation Returned to Sendra, the Trump administration deployed Greg Bovino to Los Angeles.
13:34This was at a Folk Depot in Westlake. It was earlier this morning.
13:39Homeland Security agents were detaining the multiple people outside that.
13:43He would be a key player in carrying out the President's immigration crackdown.
13:48Widespread immigration raids here in L.A.
13:50Federal officials have detained multiple people at different locations.
13:54I arrived in L.A. as dozens of people a day were being swept up in raids by the Border
13:59Patrol, ICE, and other federal agencies.
14:02Fifteen-year-old Brian Vasquez screaming at Border Patrol agents as they take his father into custody.
14:10Angry residents were also coming out to confront the agents.
14:20And protests were erupting.
14:23Full street! High street!
14:25Full street! High street!
14:28At this point, they're clearly on the road.
14:29They certainly are, and they're slowly making their way out of here.
14:33Oh, you guys, this is at Paramount on Atlantic.
14:36On June 7th, hundreds of protesters gathered near a Border Patrol staging area.
14:41I'm gonna start charging on this right now, but I don't know.
14:44Hey, you guys, there's more of us than there's them! Come on!
14:48Bovino told his agents how to handle the protesters.
14:51Arrest as many people that touch you as you want to.
14:54Those are the general orders.
14:55All the way to the top, everybody f***ing gets it if they touch you.
14:59You hear what I'm saying? Less legals?
15:02Uh, we're gonna look at shipping tractor-trailer loads of that s*** in here.
15:06So, you catch what I'm...
15:07It's all about us now, it ain't about them.
15:10Professional, legal, ethical, moral, you know what we're talking about.
15:13Legal, ethical, moral. You're on camera.
15:16But other than that, it's what we do.
15:19Who city is it, G?
15:20F***ing arse, this is our f***ing city.
15:23We've been vaccinated, Amar!
15:25What does the community do?
15:27As the federal agents faced off against the demonstrators,
15:30they began unleashing tear gas and other crowd control weapons.
15:40The protest escalated.
15:50What you're witnessing in California is a full-blown assault on peace, on public order,
15:55and a national sovereignty carried out by rioters bearing foreign flags
16:00with the aim of continuing a foreign invasion of our country.
16:05We're not gonna let that happen.
16:07Now, Wall Street!
16:08Our Street!
16:09Wall Street!
16:10Our Street!
16:11President Trump would quickly mobilize the National Guard.
16:16Extraordinary images out of Los Angeles tonight.
16:18Hundreds of National Guard troops now on the ground, deployed by President Trump,
16:24even though state leaders say they didn't ask for them and don't want them there.
16:28National Guard out of Berlin!
16:30National Guard out of Berlin!
16:32The administration cited vandalism and attacks on agents.
16:37What we have seen transpire in Los Angeles, California in recent days is shameful.
16:43Left-wing radicals waving foreign flags viciously attacked ICE and Border Patrol agents
16:48as well as Los Angeles police officers.
16:51The mob violence is being stomped out.
16:53The criminals responsible will be swiftly brought to justice.
16:57And the Trump administration's operations to arrest illegal aliens are continuing unabated.
17:03On the ground, Bovino defended the operation.
17:07As for the violence and the demonstrators, violence will not deter us, the CBP mission here in Los Angeles.
17:18We know how to bring about peace, and peace begins with ICE leaving Los Angeles.
17:28Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass told me she was caught off guard by what happened.
17:33Well, I will tell you, when the first raids happened, it felt like, as a city, we just got punched
17:40in the gut. For no reason. It just came out of nowhere. And it was a feeling of, like, the
17:46city being invaded. But it was an invasion of our own government against us.
17:55You had men jumping out of cars with rifles.
18:00They're gonna come to attack us! Look!
18:02What are you talking about?
18:05With very dubious signage or uniforms.
18:11Everybody was horrified and outraged by the aggression.
18:20It was becoming clear that this wasn't just an immigration operation.
18:24It was evolving into something different.
18:27The federal government was also cracking down on demonstrators and arresting them in large numbers.
18:34One of those arrests, down the street from a corner store in East L.A., caught my attention.
18:40Hi. Can we see the footage? The video?
18:44Yeah.
18:45So this is from the raid this morning. And this looks like National Guard troops, eight to 12 of them,
18:51pulling up in two vans, about 5.52 in the morning.
18:55They put a cordon across the street, and they're blocking the street.
18:59And then our understanding is, behind that, they're arresting somebody who was involved in the protest. The FBI is arresting
19:05them.
19:07The man they arrested was Alejandro Orellana, a Marine Corps veteran who was part of a group that had been
19:13protesting the raids.
19:15It was, like, almost exactly at 6 in the morning.
19:18Suddenly, I hear, like, a man over a loudspeaker call my name, telling me that it's the FBI and that
19:26I need to come outside.
19:28They already have, like, their guns out.
19:30They throw the flashbangs in, and they still break down the front door, and they detain my family for, like,
19:34an hour.
19:35But, you know, I think to them, it's like, well, this guy's former military. So, like, he has the training
19:40to, like, evade us or whatever.
19:43There was, like, over, like, more than two dozen, like, National Guardsmen just, like, lined up on my street as
19:49they were driving me off.
19:50It's like, who do you think you're dealing with? Like, I'm not, like, Rambo or anything.
19:54Lots of people wearing masks just in case there is more clashes with police tonight.
19:59It all stemmed from a news video in the early days of the protests.
20:03We have people right now, look at this, dropping off food and water.
20:06What are those boxes?
20:07Are those masks?
20:08That doesn't look like food and water.
20:09Yeah, those are...
20:10Looks like masks.
20:10Yeah, no, that's, those are masks, yeah.
20:12A bunch of us took it upon ourselves to, you know, go downtown and give out these resources, the food,
20:23water, and, of course, the PPE.
20:25I don't put on a mask unless you have a plan of not wanting somebody to see your face.
20:30Oriana was soon identified as the driver of the truck.
20:34Americans have to get organized.
20:35And targeted by the conspiracy theorist Alex Jones.
20:39You saw the man handing out the thousands of dollars of face shields.
20:43And then by the Trump administration.
20:46You will see boxes and boxes of very professionalized masks and rioting equipment being dropped off for these protesters.
20:53So it's a good question the president is raising and one we are looking into about who is funding these
20:58insurrectionists and these rioters and these protesters and these illegal criminals.
21:03They're kidnapping people.
21:05I, National Guard, let me my .
21:07The morning after the press conference, Oriana was arrested on charges including conspiracy.
21:15A charge often used for organized crime rings and drug syndicates.
21:20The acting U.S. Attorney, Bill Assaylee, was on the scene promoting the raid to a Fox News crew that
21:27had been given exclusive access.
21:29We have made it a huge priority to try to identify, locate, and arrest those who are involved in organizing,
21:36supporting, funding, or facilitating these riots that are going on.
21:41Neither Assaylee nor anyone from the Trump administration would talk to us about Oriana's arrest or the overall operation in
21:49L.A.
21:52Six weeks later, the charges against Oriana were dropped without any public explanation.
22:00One of the reasons why I feel like they dropped the case is because they looked at the case, they
22:05took a hard look, and especially like these more experienced prosecutors were able to convince Bill Assaylee that, you know,
22:12you're not going to win.
22:13Like, it's a ridiculous case. Like, masks? They're not even, like, you can't assault someone with a mask.
22:21And your feeling is you were targeted. Why?
22:23I mean, it's not just my feeling, you know. It's not because of the masks. It's because you're an activist.
22:31One of the cases we're looking into involves Alejandro Oriana.
22:35Yes.
22:36I sat down with Cuauhtemoc Ortega, the chief federal defender for Los Angeles and the surrounding areas.
22:42He represented Oriana.
22:45The acting U.S. attorney here, Bill Assaylee, seemed to portray your client as like a kingpin of this vast
22:54conspiracy to foment riots.
22:56What did you think of those statements?
22:58I thought they were pretty inaccurate.
23:00My client, our investigation and our trial defense would have shown that our client didn't engage in anything of that
23:08sort,
23:08that this whole situation was blown completely out of proportion and there was no conspiracy.
23:15And I think that we would have succeeded at trial. And my guess is that's why the case was dismissed.
23:22We looked at 116 cases in California like Oriana's.
23:27U.S. citizens who are arrested in protests or bystanders who've been observing the immigration agents.
23:35Many of those cases are still ongoing.
23:37And to be sure, some defendants have been convicted of violent crimes.
23:42But more than 40 cases have fallen apart, with prosecutors dropping charges or juries acquitting defendants.
23:53Ortega's office has represented the defendants in most of those cases.
23:58Cases started getting dismissed or started getting reduced to misdemeanors.
24:02That was very confusing for us at the beginning because we would read the press statements,
24:07we'd see the social media posts, and we were expecting a case that was serious.
24:12And then we would get the evidence, we would review it, and we would see something else.
24:17Had you seen something like that before?
24:19No, this is very unusual to have a complaint filed where there's factual ambiguities that eventually result in problems for
24:30the government's case.
24:31That's not common.
24:35Greg Bovino would continue leading immigration operations in L.A. through the summer.
24:41Now we're here making Los Angeles a sacred place.
24:45If you've been in policing, as I have, for many years, you come to realize that protests, civil disorder of
24:55various kinds,
24:56are part of the territory that you have to deal with.
25:00Chris Magnus oversaw Bovino when he was head of Customs and Border Protection during the Biden administration.
25:07He's one of those guys that I sort of learned as a chief.
25:14There, you go into a room and there's always somebody like the provocateur,
25:20the guy that's not afraid to ask the tough questions to take the chief on.
25:25In the Border Patrol sector chief meetings, he, he was that guy.
25:31He told me he was concerned that Bovino and his forces were actually instigating some of the unrest in L
25:38.A.
25:39I think there's evidence of that clearly in terms of some of the videos he made
25:44and some of the ways he, you know, ginned up his troops.
25:50And they were treated like troops.
25:52I shouldn't even, you know, it's sad that I would even refer to them in that way.
25:56There are always some protesters in any group that take it too far
26:01that probably will need to be arrested.
26:04But the smart thing to do is you have a specific group of officers
26:10who are trained to be able to go into a crowd and extract those individuals,
26:15but to do it in a way that doesn't inflame the entire group.
26:21But by September, tensions were only rising.
26:25We're just getting this news.
26:27Conservative activist
26:28Charlie Kirk
26:29has been shot.
26:30Wow, this is unbelievable.
26:32Pray for him right now.
26:33Enough is enough.
26:34The killing of Charlie Kirk prompted a wave of harsh rhetoric from the Trump administration.
26:39We have to talk about this incredibly destructive movement.
26:43Left wing radicals and they will be held accountable.
26:46And it must stop right now.
26:49And it would set the tone as the administration's immigration sweeps moved on to a new city.
26:54Chicago.
26:57The Department of Homeland Security says it has begun Operation Midway Blitz targeting Chicago and the state of Illinois.
27:06Governor Pritzker estimates some 200 ICE agents and 100 vehicles are positioned in and around the city of Chicago.
27:19Hey, you speak English?
27:21How long have you been in the United States, sir?
27:23Uh...
27:24You're back.
27:2525.
27:2525.
27:26Yeah.
27:2835 years?
27:29Yeah.
27:29Oh!
27:31Get the f*** out!
27:33F*** you!
27:37Get the f*** out!
27:39Thank you!
27:40Did you guys just roll up on the first Asian dude?
27:44You saw?
27:44Yeah.
27:45Stop f***ing it!
27:47That'd be cool!
27:49As in L.A.
27:51F***ing eyes f***ing Trump!
27:53Agents met fierce resistance here.
27:56Yeah, I got in front of your face!
27:58What about you?
27:59You have your documentation?
28:00Is there a copy of it or what?
28:02I have Bovino!
28:05You did!
28:07Bovino, whatever his name is.
28:09You're a f***ing judge.
28:10She's watching you.
28:11Greg Bovino had been given a new title, Commander at Large for Immigration Operations.
28:16How long have you done the concrete?
28:20Uh...
28:20Eight.
28:20Eight years.
28:21Eight years?
28:22Yes.
28:22Wow, I can tell you do a good job.
28:24I wish I could write my name in the cement there.
28:27I wanted to interview Bovino about what I'd been seeing here in Chicago and in L.A.
28:35Can you tell us anything about what's going on today?
28:38Oh, it's just, uh...
28:40It's called Title 8 Immigration Enforcement.
28:42Okay.
28:43Are you just stopping people who are doing yard work or...
28:46Title 8 Immigration Enforcement?
28:48Okay.
28:49C4.
28:50Those are good.
28:53All right.
28:54Hey, thank you, sir.
28:55I appreciate you.
28:56Have a good day.
28:57Hey, Commander, we'd love to arrange an interview for PBS.
28:59What's the best way to do that?
29:00Hey, uh, if you would notify our public affairs officer.
29:03Okay.
29:03Hey, what's your name again?
29:04It's A.C. Thompson.
29:05A.C. Thompson.
29:05Nice to meet you, bro.
29:06I would keep trying to get an interview with him and others at the agency.
29:12Border Patrol agents, they don't wake up in the morning and say,
29:14well, let me see who I can hurt today.
29:16I was able to speak to Art Del Cueto, a retired Border Patrol agent and former spokesman for
29:23the Border Patrol Union.
29:25The kind of thing we're seeing is, you know, we're following the convoy of Border Patrol
29:29agents and they're stopping at the person doing landscaping.
29:34Then they're stopping at the person doing construction work on a house.
29:37Then they're rolling through a strip mall and the first person they see who's not white ends up in a
29:44vehicle.
29:44And I think that's the thing that a lot of Americans find concerning.
29:49Well, I mean, they're arresting it based on intel that they have.
29:54You're not going to go into, you know, a lawyer or attorney building and start, you know, hey, maybe these.
30:01Because, you know, there's they've actually they have a status.
30:04You know, you go into areas where you realize that, you know, whatever crime you're looking for,
30:09that's the area of higher volume of those types of criminals.
30:13But I just I don't see it as, hey, they're arresting brown people.
30:18And I think a lot of it gets overhyped.
30:20Nobody wants to focus on, no, we're arresting individuals because they've committed a crime.
30:24Or we're arresting individuals because they've circumvented immigration law.
30:28Del Cueto now works for a group that advocates for mass deportation.
30:33He told me he'd been in touch with agents in L.A. and Chicago.
30:37And many of them said, look, there was times we were in neighborhoods and we were surrounded.
30:40I spoke to one agent that said, you know, our vehicles, the tires were destroyed.
30:47There was so much chaos that when we came back into our vehicles to leave,
30:51the partner that I had in my group on the passenger, he was no longer there.
30:57Here in Broadview, we have had huge crowds of protesters coming out every Friday for the past month.
31:03The people united will never be defeated.
31:06The Chicago suburb of Broadview was the site of some of the most intense protests against the immigration sweeps.
31:13You're here protecting them. You know this is wrong. You know it's wrong.
31:17On the morning of October 3rd, about 200 demonstrators gathered in front of an immigration processing center.
31:25Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem at the ICE Processing Center this morning.
31:29Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem was on the scene, accompanied by her own video team.
31:35Just wanting to show everybody exactly how nice it is out here.
31:39As was Benny Johnson, a pro-Trump influencer showcasing the operation.
31:44You look at these protesters out here, they don't care about America. They don't care about freedom.
31:48They don't care about what this country is and how special it is.
31:56Johnson showed Bovino preparing to confront the angry crowd.
32:00That crowd there is an unsafe crowd on either side.
32:05We're going to roll them all the way out of here.
32:08And when they resist, what happens?
32:11They get arrested.
32:19For me as an elected official, it was important for me to be present, to witness what's happening.
32:24Juan Munoz came to the protest from a neighboring suburb.
32:28Tell me about October 3rd. Take me through what happened that day.
32:32Yeah, so federal agents started to gather near the fence and started marching towards the protesters.
32:40F*** you, Greg Bovino! You're the scum of the earth!
32:44The Illinois State Police were kind of maintaining us in the free speech zone, in which we were allowed to
32:50be.
32:51Kyle Frankovich was a protester in the crowd that day.
32:54Get the f*** out of our state, you f***ing scum!
32:57Gregory Bovino, he's in charge of the facility there.
33:01He started to yell at the crowd, saying, we're going to clear you out.
33:04Hey, listen, we got one warning, one warning, f***ing!
33:14And as soon as he turned back to his own agency, he said, okay, start to arrest them.
33:18He is threatening to arrest everybody if we don't move. It's happening right now.
33:22They start pushing people off of where Illinois State Police had told us, like, you can be here.
33:30Cole Sheridan was also there, seen in footage wearing a white bike helmet.
33:35They start yelling at us, move back, move back or you'll get arrested.
33:41And people started to move back, but that's when they started to grab folks from the crowd.
33:52I was holding my phone and had my hands up. There was no aggression.
33:56But I felt somebody be taken down behind me.
34:02I tried to sidestep it, and as soon as I moved to the side, I felt somebody grab my shoulder
34:07and pull me to the ground.
34:10And once I fell into my back, that's when I saw it was Greg Bovino.
34:14And he told me, turn over on your stomach, you're under arrest.
34:18And as I was turning, I was telling him and whoever, you know, he told to arrest me, that was
34:22an elected official.
34:24And, you know, that met with no response, and they took me away into the parking lot.
34:32There are people behind me. I can't move back. They're pushing me.
34:39Then I see the person next to me get grabbed and pulled down.
34:44I try to pick him up. I get pushed over by two agents, end up on top of this person.
34:50I have to kind of push myself up to let him out from under me, but there's already two or
34:54three agents on top of me at this point.
34:56And they have their knee on my back. They're screaming at me, stop resisting, stop resisting.
35:04They pick me up. On my left arm, I'm being held by this very worked up agent who immediately starts
35:14shaking me by the arm and saying, stop resisting, stop resisting.
35:20The agent on my other arm barks at this guy like, hey, you got to calm down.
35:27Not long after Cole Sheridan, Kyle Frankovich was also arrested.
35:32Let him go! Let him go!
35:33They violently grabbed my arms behind my back, zip-tied me, and then started marching me to where they were
35:38putting the other dozen or so of us who arrested that day.
35:43I'm asking, who's detaining me? What am I being detained for?
35:47Eventually, supervisor comes up and says, well, you attacked Greg Bovino.
35:54And I was like, who's that?
35:56She said, well, he's the head of Border Patrol.
35:59Did you think that you were doing anything that would lead to your arrest when you got grabbed?
36:03No. I don't know if I've ever experienced something truly that bizarre and absurd as, like, seeing a law enforcement
36:16agent concoct a narrative to arrest me, to press charges against me.
36:26And that was extremely unnerving.
36:32These are exactly the kind of people that we want to be pissing off.
36:36From the scene, Benny Johnson touted the arrest to his millions of followers.
36:40Probably about a dozen left-wing terrorists arrested for attacking police officers and ICE officers.
36:46These individuals assaulted ICE officers.
36:50Benny Johnson was embedded with ICE.
36:52He was filming and recording and streaming that day.
36:54And I can directly be seen in the video, along with everybody else I was detained with,
36:58as he describes us as being violent extremists who had assaulted federal officers.
37:02He made similar statements on his Twitter account as well, with that video being shown with the posts.
37:09Of the 12 people arrested and shown in the video, only one was charged, Cole Sheridan.
37:15He was held for four days for allegedly assaulting Bovino.
37:19But prosecutors dropped the case after video contradicted the claims.
37:24If there hadn't been a bunch of cameras there, Benny Johnson, the right-wing influencer, Secretary Noem,
37:30if they hadn't been there, do you think he would have been arrested?
37:32It seems unlikely, given how truly weak their case was.
37:44I would kind of imagine that a huge part of it was publicity.
37:48Another part of it was trying to terrify people and try to scare people away from protesting and speaking their
37:55mind.
37:56They're trying to stop us from protesting!
37:58Over the course of a month in the Chicago area, we found more than 100 people who'd been arrested as
38:04they participated in demonstrations or documented the immigration rates.
38:10Like in L.A., a majority of the cases have been falling apart, with prosecutors dropping charges in at least
38:1775 cases so far.
38:21In a statement, the U.S. Attorney's Office said that nearly all the cases were reactive arrests made by law
38:27enforcement in the field.
38:29And they said their willingness to be open-minded and dismiss cases reflected our commitment to do the right thing,
38:36even when a crime was committed.
38:38They are saying things happened when they didn't happen, and then hoping that prosecutors will, you know, move forward on
38:46those charges.
38:46And for the most part, prosecutors are not, I think in part because you have more video footage available than
38:52you did in the past,
38:52and in part because prosecutors are aware that juries are not as quick to defer to federal law enforcement as
39:00they used to be.
39:02Watch out, watch out!
39:07Christy Lopez spent years investigating law enforcement misconduct for the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division.
39:13We showed her footage of the protests and arrests at Broadview.
39:18One of the things I think is how much like a war zone those places look, and they don't need
39:23to be.
39:23These are people protesting in an ICE facility. They don't have weapons. They are, there aren't that many of them.
39:29They appear to be peacefully protesting, some civil disobedience sometimes, but very mild.
39:35Most departments have handled protests like this that have gone on for weeks, sometimes months, without that level of militaristic
39:42response.
39:42There is no threat in most of these instances.
39:45And you're using force that is at best possibly lethal to, you know, a force that can be quite likely
39:50lethal.
39:51To yourself! Watch out! Watch out!
39:57Bobino later spoke about the arrests at Broadview in a deposition for a federal lawsuit against him and DHS.
40:04I believe that all uses of force that I've seen, and all arrests that I've seen have been more than
40:10exemplary.
40:12The federal judge in that case admonished Bovino and his agents for how they were operating
40:18and ordered limits on their use of tear gas and other weapons unless facing imminent physical
40:25threat.
40:27Enrique Bovino was a witness in the case.
40:32They're the ones violent, they're the ones shooting tear gas into communities, they're
40:37the ones shooting pepper balls.
40:38He was filming immigration agents from his bike two weeks after the court order came
40:43down.
40:44There's like 10 cars with them.
40:46They're all right there.
40:49The day that I got the pepper ball to the neck, everyone was just telling them to get out.
40:55Do you have video of it?
41:00It's right here.
41:04Was anybody throwing stuff at them?
41:06Was anybody hitting them with anything?
41:09Nope.
41:10Not at all.
41:11Everyone was just telling them to leave.
41:15That's you.
41:16And that's you getting it.
41:17Yep.
41:18And are you yelling anything or saying anything right there?
41:20You just filmed it.
41:21I didn't say a single word.
41:23You have your meta glasses on.
41:24Yep.
41:27The court order was eventually overturned and the restrictions lifted.
41:36The border patrol still wasn't granting me an interview.
41:40But as the operations were getting more violent, a source within DHS agreed to talk.
41:46If we concealed their identity.
41:47I think it's important the public knows that there's people out there who are also outraged
41:54at the operations being conducted, the way that agents, officers are behaving and conducting
42:04business.
42:04You know, you know you're in the wrong when thousands, hundreds, you know, people are
42:10coming out and yelling at you.
42:13I don't even tell people who I work for anymore because I'm ashamed of them.
42:17I don't know.
42:18And do you think there's more people that feel the way you do?
42:22Uh, I know there is, at least a few for sure.
42:26Do you think we're going to end up seeing any of these agents who may have engaged in misconduct
42:31held accountable?
42:32No.
42:34I don't.
42:35Not in this current administration.
42:39Hundreds of protests are underway or planned nationwide today in response to the deadly
42:45Minneapolis shooting of Renee Goode by an ICE agent.
42:52So we're in Minneapolis.
42:54It's a few days after federal agents shot Renee Goode.
42:58We're hearing that there's going to be more federal agents coming to town, like a thousand.
43:02That's what the news is saying.
43:04And trying to figure out what this is all going to look like.
43:07Rouse, we got to get out.
43:11Daily confrontations were going on between protesters and immigration agents.
43:20The White House today doubling down on their support for the operations.
43:31We were reporting in the neighborhood where Renee Goode had been killed.
43:42Agents were surrounding and questioning a man.
43:46Take your guns home!
43:48We don't want guns in our neighborhoods!
43:51We don't need that f***ing hardware.
43:52It's ridiculous.
43:54People were coming out of their houses.
43:56Get the f*** out!
43:58You're not blind here!
44:00The agents started to leave.
44:02Get the f*** out of here!
44:03Move out!
44:03Get her out of here!
44:04Run!
44:05Run!
44:06Run!
44:07One protester was pepper sprayed in the face at close range.
44:19I spoke with the man they were questioning, Christian Molina.
44:24He said the officers had rammed his vehicle.
44:27They hit my car for no reason, man.
44:29They hit me.
44:29What happened?
44:30They followed me for no reason and hit my car.
44:33They looked at me and they decided to pull me over for no reason.
44:36You believe that?
44:38That's a Ford SUV?
44:39Yep.
44:40So they were out of here.
44:41They were citizens.
44:43Suddenly...
44:43Oh, here.
44:44Careful.
44:44Move out!
44:46Someone threw a snowball in the direction of the agents.
44:48Move out!
44:49He's fucking killing this.
44:51Oh, f***ing!
44:52Somebody's killing it!
44:53Turn around!
44:55Turn around!
44:55Get around!
44:56Get around!
44:56Look at them right!
44:58Get around!
44:59One of them tossed a tear gas canister into the crowd.
45:03Don't make this look over there!
45:05Tear gas!
45:07Watch out!
45:07Watch out!
45:08Watch out!
45:09Watch out!
45:09Tear gas in a f***ing neighborhood!
45:11It's peaceful!
45:12People live here!
45:15It's peaceful!
45:16It's peaceful!
45:16It's peaceful!
45:17It's peaceful!
45:18It's peaceful!
45:20It's peaceful!
45:21It's peaceful!
45:21Work it out!
45:23It's peaceful!
45:23An agent pepper sprayed protestors and a news photographer up close.
45:30Another fired pepper balls into the crowd.
45:35I was hit three times.
45:37I got shot repeatedly with pepper balls.
45:39Get your help!
45:39Get your help!
45:40Get your help!
45:41Get your help!
45:41There's some f***ing wars out!
45:43There's a f***ing neighborhood!
45:45I was in the car and they threw the f*** underneath the f***ing car!
45:48Yeah!
45:49Yes!
45:50I can't see!
45:51Save on you!
45:53Hey!
45:53Hey!
45:55Hey!
45:57Hey!
45:57Hey!
45:58Hey!
45:59Hey!
46:06Hey!
46:07Hey!
46:07You need this?
46:10Okay!
46:11Why don't you come out here?
46:12Give me this, Jeff!
46:13All right!
46:15All right, damn it!
46:16Okay!
46:16Danniter f***ing water, it all is super f***ing water, we suck on one.
46:28Federal agents using weapons like tear gas and pepper spray against protesters and bystanders.
46:34The courts would try to rein them in, but they'd move on to the next city and do the same
46:40things.
46:46On local TV, Bovino was unapologetic.
46:50We're here to conduct that Title 8 mission.
46:52It won't stop despite rioters, agitators, and vast amounts of violence against federal officers.
47:00We're not going to stop.
47:02I showed footage from the scene to Christy Lopez.
47:05You're tear gas in a neighborhood!
47:08People live here!
47:10We see just use of excessive force after use of excessive force.
47:15In no scenario is it okay to be pepper spraying people as you're leaving the scene.
47:20It's just they're mad, they're scared, you know, they're able to get away with it.
47:25So they're just using the power they have to use force against people.
47:31I also showed our footage to Chris Magnus.
47:38It's pretty awful.
47:41You know, I mean, one of the things in policing when it comes to use of force, it's proportionality.
47:50Is the force really proportional to what you're receiving or what you're dealing with?
48:00People may well get under your skin under a lot of circumstances.
48:04You don't like it, but professionals don't react to it.
48:07This is what our country has become.
48:10Take off your vests, walk away, and say that you will not allow this to ruin our country.
48:16You have a chance to rectify this.
48:19You have a chance to do right by your country that you're so proud of.
48:22But Vino never ended up doing an interview with me.
48:31The Trump administration was continuing to express support for how the operations were being conducted.
48:37To all ICE officers, you have federal immunity in the conduct of your duties.
48:41They reposted comments by Trump's advisor, Stephen Miller.
48:45You have immunity to perform your duties, and no one, no city official, no state official, no illegal alien, no
48:52leftist agitator or domestic insurrectionist can prevent you from fulfilling your legal obligations and duty.
49:00You ready? Yep, let's do it.
49:04We are asking this federal government to stop the unconstitutional conduct that is invading our streets each and every day.
49:12I met with Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey as he and other Minnesota leaders announced a lawsuit they hoped would end
49:21the crackdown.
49:22We've got about 600-plus police officers in the city of Minneapolis.
49:27And ICE and border control is coming in here with approximately 3,000 or more.
49:34Uh, and so this is massively disproportionate.
49:37We've been in the streets here.
49:39It is tense.
49:40Are you worried that more people are going to be hurt or killed?
49:44Yes.
49:50Twelve days later, 37-year-old ICU nurse Alex Preddy tries to intervene as federal agents knock a woman down.
50:00Whoa!
50:01They repeatedly pepper spray him.
50:07Get the f***ing people!
50:10The f***ing people!
50:11The f***ing is wrong with you!
50:12He is pinned on the ground.
50:18Video shows an agent removing a legally owned handgun that Preddy had in a holster.
50:25Then...
50:3110 shots.
50:33What the f*** did you just do?!
50:35What the f*** did you just do?!
50:38What the f*** did you just do?!
50:40This looks like a situation where an individual wanted to do maximum damage and massacre law enforcement.
50:49Alex Preddy's killing was a turning point.
50:52You are so evil!
50:55Torn declarations were submitted in federal court by people who say they witnessed the fatal shooting of Alex Preddy.
51:01They contradict the version of events presented by federal officials.
51:05The U.S. Border Patrol commander at large has been demoted amid the fallout.
51:10Greg Bovino would quickly be dismissed.
51:12President Trump facing growing scrutiny within his own party over how this immigration crackdown is being handled.
51:18And amid political pressure that now included Republicans, the president sent border czar Tom Homan to Minneapolis.
51:27I'm not here because the federal government has carried its mission out perfectly.
51:33President Trump and I, along with others in the administration, have recognized that certain improvements could and should be made.
51:40That's exactly what I'm doing here.
51:44Even though Gregory Bovino is gone, I wonder if his imprint will last through all the federal agencies that are
51:49continuing to go out in the street.
51:50I wonder if anything will change, really.
51:54He was the one who was the tip of the spear for this new type of immigration enforcement across the
51:59country.
52:00Sixty-five percent say immigration and customs enforcement has gone too far.
52:06The mass sweeps and violent clashes have subsided for now.
52:11But immigration arrests continue in large numbers.
52:17And in cities around the country, there are deep scars and fear about what lies ahead.
52:34Go to PBS.org slash Frontline.
52:38President Trump would quickly mobilize the National Guard.
52:42For more reporting on this story with our partners at ProPublica.
52:46And are you yelling anything or saying anything right there?
52:49No, I didn't say a single word.
52:52And see more of our work with reporter A.C. Thompson.
52:55Connect with Frontline on Facebook and Instagram and stream anytime on the PBS app, YouTube, or PBS.org slash Frontline.
53:06For morecio-block games, you can end up remainshouette.
53:13Campaign with Frontline on Twitter, Java is found.
53:13One of the net worth data to save for the state of the continent and its
53:33On this and other Frontline programs, visit our website at pbs.org slash Frontline.
53:55Frontline's Caught in the Crackdown is available on Amazon Prime Video.
54:23Frontline's Caught in the Crackdown
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