Of Katz and Aliens : Privacy Expectations and the Immigration Raids

This Article examines privacy rights for noncitizens in the context of the recent immigration raids in peoples\u27 homes and the workplace. The Immigration and Customs Enforcement Office is conducting these raids with general or defective warrants and executes them in a discriminating dragnet-style, mostly against Latinos. The Fourth Amendment, however, provides little protection to immigrants and their families. This Article explores how law\u27s construction of immigrants\u27 illegality interplays with Fourth Amendment doctrines of consent, reasonable expectation of privacy, pretextual stops, and administrative searches to deny immigrants privacy\u27s protection. In addition, the Article explores the spread of immigration databases and the proliferation of federal and local regulation of spaces occupied by immigrants within the border to examine the legal justifications for these generalized and defective warrants. The Article concludes by urging courts to reconsider reliance on immigrants\u27 unlawful presence in the U.S. to excuse law enforcement abuses and offers several legal and policy reasons in favor of privacy protection for noncitizens