Overview
In 2025, President Donald Trump’s second-term immigration agenda shifted from border policy to interior “city sweeps,” built around Executive Order 14159 and an operational framework known as Operation Safeguard. These deployments sent Border Patrol and ICE teams into Democratic-led cities such as Los Angeles, Chicago and Charlotte, conducting high-visibility raids framed as targeting “criminal illegal aliens” but in practice sweeping up large numbers of nonviolent workers and families. New Orleans became the latest focus in early December with Operation “Catahoula Crunch” (also called “Swamp Sweep”), an effort to make roughly 5,000 arrests across southeast Louisiana and southern Mississippi using about 250 agents staged in and around the city.
As Catahoula Crunch’s first days unfolded, internal briefings reviewed by the Associated Press revealed round‑the‑clock monitoring of online speech, activist trainings, and protest planning, alongside early arrest data showing that fewer than one‑third of the first 38 people detained had more than minor offenses on their records—undercutting the federal narrative of a violent‑offender crackdown. At the same time, Louisiana’s new Act 399 broadened obstruction-of-justice and malfeasance statutes to criminalize “any act” that could hinder federal immigration enforcement, prompting an ACLU lawsuit and claims of a chilling effect on basic Know‑Your‑Rights work. The collision of an aggressive federal sweep, state laws compelling cooperation, local sanctuary-style consent decrees, and digital surveillance of dissent has turned New Orleans into a test case for how far mass-deportation policy can stretch civil liberties and federal–local power balances.
Key Indicators
People Involved
Organizations Involved
DHS oversees Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and other components responsible for carrying out the Trump administration’s nationwide immigration sweeps.
Border Patrol, traditionally focused on border regions, has taken an unusually central role in interior, city-based immigration sweeps under Trump’s 2025 strategy.
The ACLU of Louisiana litigates civil-rights and civil-liberties cases statewide, with a focus on policing, criminal justice, and now immigration enforcement and free-speech issues.
ISLA provides pro bono legal representation to detained immigrants in Louisiana and runs Know‑Your‑Rights trainings and community education on immigration law.
Timeline
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AP reveals arrest data and chilling effect of surveillance in New Orleans
InvestigationThe Associated Press publishes an in-depth report on the Catahoula Crunch operation’s first days, based on internal records. It reveals that only a minority of the first 38 arrestees had significant criminal histories and that authorities are closely tracking online criticism and protest activity, prompting local officials and advocates to warn of a chilling effect on free speech.
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Online surveillance briefings track protests and public sentiment
SurveillanceLaw-enforcement briefings circulated among federal, state, and local agencies show around-the-clock monitoring of social media, message boards, Reddit threads, and protest organizing related to Catahoula Crunch. The briefings summarize public ‘sentiment,’ track activist trainings on filming agents, and identify locations where immigrants might be found.
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Louisiana AG warns NOPD to fully cooperate or face malfeasance charges
Public StatementAttorney General Liz Murrill sends a letter to NOPD Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick asserting that officers who follow departmental policies limiting cooperation with ICE and CBP could be committing malfeasance in office, intensifying pressure on local agencies caught between state law and federal consent decrees.
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Early raids in New Orleans target workers and neighborhoods
EnforcementJournalists and witnesses document Border Patrol convoys and arrests at big-box stores like Lowe’s and Walmart in New Orleans and Kenner. Residents describe agents chasing people in parking lots and surrounding homes, intensifying fear in Latino-majority neighborhoods.
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ACLU of Louisiana sues to block Act 399 as Catahoula Crunch begins
Legal ActionThe ACLU of Louisiana files a federal lawsuit on behalf of Immigration Services and Legal Advocacy (ISLA), arguing that Act 399’s criminalization of interference with immigration enforcement violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments by threatening Know‑Your‑Rights trainings and other protected speech.
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DHS officially launches Operation Catahoula Crunch in New Orleans
EnforcementDHS announces the start of Operation Catahoula Crunch (previously code‑named Swamp Sweep) in New Orleans, promising to focus on ‘criminal illegal aliens’ released because of local sanctuary policies. Around 250 agents fan out across the metro area, including into heavily immigrant suburbs like Kenner.
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New Orleans braces as next city in federal sweep campaign
Public StatementLocal media report that New Orleans will likely be the next city to experience a Border Patrol–led crackdown. Mayor-elect Helena Moreno circulates Know‑Your‑Rights guides and expresses concern over reports of abuses in prior operations.
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AP reveals planning documents for ‘Swamp Sweep’ in Louisiana
InvestigationAssociated Press reporters obtain internal DHS planning documents showing that around 250 border agents will be deployed to New Orleans and surrounding areas for a two‑month crackdown dubbed ‘Swamp Sweep,’ targeting roughly 5,000 arrests across southeast Louisiana and southern Mississippi.
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Operation Charlotte’s Web winds down; New Orleans named next target
EnforcementAfter less than a week of raids, a federal immigration crackdown in Charlotte, North Carolina, known as Operation Charlotte’s Web, appears to conclude with more than 250 arrests. Local officials say Border Patrol is shifting resources to New Orleans for an upcoming ‘Swamp Sweep’ operation.
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Louisiana’s Act 399 takes effect, criminalizing interference with immigration enforcement
LegislationAct 399, signed earlier in 2025, comes into force in Louisiana. It exposes local jailers to up to 10 years in prison for refusing ICE detainer requests and makes it a misdemeanor for any member of the public to ‘knowingly’ hinder or interfere with federal immigration enforcement, drawing sharp criticism from civil-rights advocates.
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Operation Midway Blitz launched in Chicago
EnforcementDHS begins Operation Midway Blitz, a multi-agency immigration surge in Chicago framed as targeting ‘criminal illegal aliens’ in response to local sanctuary policies. Thousands are arrested, most for civil immigration violations or nonviolent offenses, raising questions about the operation’s stated aims and legality.
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Camarillo farm raid in California leaves one worker dead
EnforcementICE and federal agents raid greenhouses near Camarillo, California, detaining more than 200 people and causing one farmworker to die after a fall while fleeing. The incident intensifies criticism that Trump’s deportation drive is causing preventable deaths and trauma in workplaces.
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Federal forces and protests in Los Angeles mark first major city sweep
EnforcementFederal and National Guard forces deploy into Los Angeles as part of Trump’s mass-deportation push, sparking weeks of protests and civil unrest. The operation demonstrates the administration’s willingness to use military-style tactics in large Democratic cities and foreshadows similar deployments elsewhere.
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Trump signs Executive Order 14159 on immigration enforcement
PolicyOn his first day back in office, President Trump signs Executive Order 14159, ‘Protecting The American People Against Invasion,’ expanding expedited removal, threatening to cut funds to sanctuary jurisdictions, and announcing an aggressive interior immigration-enforcement agenda that will later underpin city sweeps like Catahoula Crunch.
Scenarios
Catahoula Crunch runs its full course and becomes the model for future Deep South sweeps
Discussed by: Supportive coverage from outlets like Fox News and Breitbart; statements by Louisiana officials; DHS messaging
Under this scenario, federal courts decline to significantly limit either Operation Catahoula Crunch or Louisiana’s Act 399. The ACLU’s constitutional challenge stalls or results in only narrow clarifications, and DHS continues the New Orleans operation for the planned 60 days or longer, edging close to its 5,000‑arrest target by focusing on any deportable immigrants it can locate, not just people with violent convictions. New Orleans becomes a proof‑of‑concept that state governments can pass laws compelling cooperation and criminalizing interference, while Border Patrol and ICE run highly visible sweeps reinforced by online-intelligence monitoring. A perceived success in Louisiana encourages replication in other Deep South and Midwestern states with similar anti‑sanctuary laws.
Courts carve out strong First Amendment protections but leave core raids intact
Discussed by: Legal analysts, ACLU of Louisiana, national civil-liberties commentators
Here, federal courts uphold much of Louisiana’s ability to mandate cooperation with ICE detainers but agree that Act 399 cannot be used against Know‑Your‑Rights trainings, protest organizing, or recording of agents. The ACLU wins a narrow injunction clarifying that speech and peaceful observation are outside the statute’s reach, reducing some of the chilling effect on groups like ISLA. However, judges stop short of restricting Catahoula Crunch itself or of invalidating the broader mass-deportation policy. DHS continues to run large-scale sweeps, but with more explicit protections for observers and activists, and with somewhat greater transparency about arrest statistics.
Federal oversight and consent decrees reassert limits on state-directed cooperation
Discussed by: Immigration-law scholars, civil-rights litigators, some national media editorials
New litigation and federal court rulings emphasize that existing consent decrees and constitutional constraints prevent states from forcing local agencies like NOPD and the Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office to function as extensions of ICE and Border Patrol. Courts either refuse to dissolve the New Orleans consent decree or rewrite it only minimally, and they strike down parts of Act 399 related to compelled cooperation by local officials. In practice, DHS must rely on its own agents and willing state-level partners such as Louisiana State Police, limiting the reach of sweeps in jurisdictions with strong federal oversight. This outcome creates a patchwork of cooperation across the country but slows the expansion of state-driven mass-deportation frameworks.
National backlash to mass-deportation tactics forces strategic pullback
Discussed by: Some national editorial boards, historians drawing parallels to Operation Wetback, advocacy coalitions
If televised images of raids, detentions, and family separations in New Orleans, Chicago, Los Angeles and other cities trigger sustained national outrage—especially combined with widely publicized reports of deaths, abuses in detention, and surveillance of political dissent—the administration may face mounting political pressure, including from some Republicans in swing states. Congress or the courts could respond with funding constraints, oversight hearings, or broader injunctions, forcing DHS to scale back city sweeps and shift to lower‑profile enforcement. This would resemble how backlash against the 1950s Operation Wetback eventually turned it into a political liability rather than an asset.
Normalization of digital-intelligence–driven immigration policing
Discussed by: Technology and civil-liberties analysts, investigative reporting (AP and others)
Another path is that the most enduring legacy of Catahoula Crunch is not the number of arrests but the playbook for monitoring dissent. Around-the-clock tracking of social media, Reddit threads, activist trainings and community mutual-aid channels becomes a standard feature of immigration operations, justified as officer-safety planning. Even if portions of Act 399 are narrowed, the underlying capacity for sentiment analysis, protest mapping, and target identification remains and is shared with other law-enforcement agencies. Over time, such practices could quietly migrate into other areas of policing and protest surveillance, making New Orleans a watershed in normalizing intelligence-led suppression of immigrant-rights organizing.
Historical Context
Operation Wetback (1954–1955)
1954–1955What Happened
Operation Wetback was a mid‑1950s U.S. immigration enforcement campaign under President Dwight D. Eisenhower that used military-style tactics to apprehend and deport Mexican migrants, including some U.S. citizens and legal residents. Border Patrol deployed hundreds of officers, vehicles and aircraft to border regions and cities like Los Angeles and Chicago, ultimately apprehending fewer than 300,000 people during the campaign—far less than the 1 million figure often cited by officials and later politicians. Deportees were frequently transported to unfamiliar regions of Mexico under harsh conditions, and there were documented deaths from heat and neglect.
Outcome
Short term: The operation temporarily reduced unauthorized migration from Mexico and allowed Eisenhower to claim a strong border-security victory, but it also produced human-rights abuses and deep community trauma.
Long term: Historians now view Operation Wetback as a cautionary tale about propaganda-driven mass deportations—its numbers were inflated, its tactics brutal, and it failed to resolve the structural economic drivers of migration. Trump’s repeated invocation of the operation as a model underscores how misremembered history can legitimize new crackdowns.
Why It's Relevant
Catahoula Crunch echoes Operation Wetback in combining spectacle, racialized rhetoric, and large-scale sweeps with disputed statistics about dangerous criminals. The historical record shows how easily such campaigns overshoot their stated targets, inflict collateral harm on citizens and legal residents, and leave enduring civil-rights scars even when sold as limited operations.
2019 Mississippi Poultry-Plant ICE Raids
August 7–8, 2019What Happened
In August 2019, ICE agents raided multiple poultry-processing plants in Mississippi, arresting about 680 workers in what officials called the largest single-state workplace enforcement action to date. Many of those detained were Latino, and the raids left children stranded after parents were arrested; more than 300 people were released the following day. The operations drew national attention to the reliance of U.S. agriculture on immigrant labor and to the humanitarian fallout of mass workplace raids.
Outcome
Short term: The raids disrupted local economies, traumatized families and communities, and prompted criticism from religious leaders, advocates and some local politicians. ICE defended the actions as necessary to enforce immigration law and deter the hiring of unauthorized workers.
Long term: The Mississippi raids became a reference point in debates about proportionality and humanitarian impact in immigration enforcement. They demonstrated how large, highly publicized operations could quickly provoke backlash and scrutiny, shaping later conversations about Trump’s second-term deportation plans.
Why It's Relevant
The Mississippi example illustrates how large-scale raids in Southern communities strain local institutions, destabilize families, and raise questions about whether such operations actually target abusive employers or merely punish workers. New Orleans’ Catahoula Crunch, with its big-box-store arrests and economic shock to immigrant-heavy neighborhoods, risks replaying those dynamics on a broader, more militarized scale.
Trump’s First-Term Sanctuary-City Funding Fights
2017–2019 and renewed in 2025What Happened
During his first term, Trump attempted to punish ‘sanctuary’ cities by threatening to cut federal funds, but courts repeatedly blocked these efforts as unconstitutional. In 2025, similar strategies resurfaced, and Judge William Orrick again issued injunctions preventing the administration from denying or conditioning federal funding to dozens of municipalities based on their immigration policies.
Outcome
Short term: The rulings limited the administration’s leverage over sanctuary jurisdictions and affirmed that the executive branch could not unilaterally rewire congressional spending decisions to coerce local cooperation on immigration enforcement.
Long term: Unable to use funding threats as effectively, Trump’s second-term team turned to other tools—such as deploying federal agents directly into cities and encouraging states like Louisiana and Arkansas to pass laws mandating cooperation or criminalizing interference. This shift set the stage for conflicts like those now unfolding in New Orleans.
Why It's Relevant
The sanctuary-city funding fights show a legal and strategic pivot: where direct fiscal coercion failed, the administration is now leaning on display-oriented sweeps and state-level legal innovations like Act 399. Catahoula Crunch thus represents not a standalone crackdown but the latest iteration in a multi-year struggle over who controls immigration enforcement inside U.S. cities.