🥊 The long shadow of Ruby Ridge
Yes, states can put federal officials in jail.
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This week, we’ve got ideas for how to put rogue federal officials in jail. A teaser:
Homan’s tip line.
A film recommendation for Deputy AG Todd Blanche.
❤️ to the Federal Tort Claims Act.
ICE brought gas. Portland brought the law.
But first, let’s talk about the small town in Idaho that should keep Trump officials up at night.
It’s August 1992, and anti-government separatist Randy Weaver is pinned down in his cabin, surrounded by federal agents, after a surveillance operation went off the rails. Officers have shot Weaver’s dog and pointed a shotgun at his 14-year-old son, a Deputy Marshal has been killed, and Weaver’s family is refusing to surrender. In the ensuing standoff, FBI sniper Lon Horiuchi shoots three people, including killing Weaver’s unarmed wife, Vicki, who is holding a 10-month old baby.
The Ruby Ridge standoff, as it became known, sparked a flurry of civil litigation against the government. But then-U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr (yes, that Bill Barr) refused to charge any federal agent with a crime. That decision closed the door on criminal accountability…until it didn’t. In 1997, just as the statute of limitations was about to run out, local prosecutor Denise Woodbury brought state manslaughter charges against Agent Horiuchi for the death of Vicki Weaver.
As the 9th Circuit laid out, the case turned on two questions. First, was Horiuchi acting within the scope of his federal authority when shooting Weaver? The court quickly concluded he was. And second, did Horiuchi carry out his duties in an ”objectively reasonable” and “necessary and proper” manner? After conducting an exhaustive examination of the facts, the 9th Circuit concluded, in a landmark decision, that Hirouchi was not immune from prosecution under state law. While state prosecutors’ later dropped the case before it went to trial, the 9th Circuit decision remains good law.
Bottom line: A state official prosecuted a federal agent for actions taken during official duties and the case turned on whether the agent’s actions were reasonable. Now jump back to 2025 and ask: Is “reasonable” a word you’d use to describe Trump’s immigration enforcement?
Masked and armed federal agents — seemingly unconcerned with any consequences — patrol the streets of major American cities. Nearly every day there are reports that shock the conscience. A U.S. citizen shot five times by an ICE agent after honking her horn to warn of ICE’s presence. An elderly couple knocked to the ground for peacefully protesting. Children zip-tied and separated from their parents. Tear gas sprayed with such reckless abandon that dogs are vomiting and kids are sick in an apartment building adjacent to an ICE facility.
It’s obvious that Trump’s DOJ won’t discipline federal agents for their actions. But Ruby Ridge reminds us that when federal officials break the law, we don’t need the federal government to rein them in. States have the power to criminally prosecute rogue actors. That’s the legacy of Ruby Ridge.
And it’s not just criminal liability that rogue federal officials face, nor is it just ICE agents that face potential liability. Across Trump’s government, federal officials who break the law can be held accountable under state criminal and civil laws.
Have you accepted $50,000 in cash during a bribery sting? Did you oversee politically-motivated arrests at DOJ? Did you knowingly and intentionally violate a court order to detain people? Did you slap on a DOGE nametag to access data for your own private company?
…well, lawyer up, because we’ve got some ideas you should be worried about.
THE PUNCH LIST
Are you a local prosecutor? Use your authority to investigate whether ICE agents are breaking criminal law. Local prosecutors and state AGs can uncover more facts about potential crimes committed by ICE than anyone else. Follow the lead of Colorado and put the Trump Administration on notice by launching investigations into reports of criminal conduct by rogue agents.
Got a problem with Tom Homan? Flip his immigration “tipline” on its head and create a hotline for reporting federal abuse in your state. Trump’s border czar created an ICE tipline earlier this year to report supposed immigration violations. States can play this game too. Just look at NY AG Letitia James’s ”Federal Action Reporting Form,” IL Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias’s hotline to report ICE agents that swap their license plates to avoid scrutiny, or CA AG Rob Bonta’s new online portal to report misconduct by federal agents.
Are you Governor Wes Moore? Warn Trump officials they’ll face federal criminal liability down the road. The statute of limitation for federal bribery is five years. Federal wire fraud? Also five years. Extortion under the Hobbs Act? You guessed it: five years. Sure, Trump won’t enforce federal criminal laws against his own appointees and allies, but the next president surely can.
Have a law degree? Get familiar with the Federal Tort Claims Act. The FTCA is the Trump 2.0 version of the Administrative Procedure Act. Yes, that’s a bad lawyer joke, but it’s also true: So much of Trump’s lawlessness is happening in the streets, not just in the Federal Register. The FTCA is one antidote — it allows individuals to recover damages from the federal government when federal employees commit torts like using excessive force or destroying property. The law has its limits (administrative exhaustion is… exhausting), but it allows petitioners to build a factual record, put rogue federal officials in the spotlight, and make violating the Constitution more expensive.
☎️ Have an FTCA claim? We can find a lawyer to litigate it. ☎️
Are you a state legislator in Oregon? Extend statutes of limitations to ensure accountability post-Trump. Right now, states can prosecute federal officials under state law - and Trump’s pardon power does not extend to state crimes, as Colorado AG Phil Weiser recently reminded the President. But we get why it’s hard to bring these cases when Trump still holds the purse strings and threatens retribution. At the very least, states should sidestep Trump by extending statutes of limitations for crimes like assault, bribery, false imprisonment, and kidnapping. In the Beaver State, the statute of limitations for misdemeanor assault is two years — the legislature could extend it to four. It would send a strong signal to rogue officials: The actions you take now will follow you when Trump can no longer offer protection.
Work for a state AG? Seek a court order enjoining rogue ICE agents from entering state property without a warrant. In Cedar Point Nursery v. Hassid, the Supreme Court held that government-compelled access to property — even brief, temporary access — is a per se taking that triggers the Fifth Amendment. States can use that holding offensively: if ICE is accessing state or local buildings without consent or judicial authorization, that’s an unconstitutional taking. AGs, cities, and counties can go to court and seek injunctions blocking further federal access to state schools, courthouses, prisons, and other facilities unless and until the federal government obtains a warrant or pays just compensation.
TODD BLANCHE IS NOT A LEGAL MOVIE BUFF
Assaulting a 79-year old car wash owner in Los Angeles. Causing blunt force trauma to a farmworker’s head during a raid in Ventura County. Breaking the car window of a U.S. citizen and veteran. Those are just a handful of the allegations against ICE that led to Reps. Nancy Pelosi and Kevin Mullin putting out a statement ahead of rumored raids in the Bay Area warning that California “state and local authorities may arrest federal agents if they break California law.”
In response, Deputy AG Todd Blanche sent a threatening letter to California elected officials calling potential arrests of federal agents “illegal and futile,” stating that federal agents are immune from state prosecution while “in the performance of their official duties.”
Did Blanche skip Laura Dern and Randy Quaid’s The Siege at Ruby Ridge? Yes, Blanche’s letter is correct that federal officials are generally immune when lawfully performing their “official duties” — but that’s not what is at issue here. State officials are calling for the investigation and prosecution of rogue federal agents acting beyond the bounds of what immunity protects — actions that are not, as the 9th Circuit said after Ruby Ridge, ”objectively reasonable.”
But don’t take our word for it. Ask the University of Wisconsin Law School.
FIGHTING FIRE WITH FIRE
🥊 ICE brought gas. Portland brought the law. Two weeks ago, Dan Jacobson and Jacobson Lawyers Group sued ICE for poisoning residents of an apartment building in Portland when chemical munitions were shot at protestors of a nearby ICE facility.
🥊 Protect and serve. In Minneapolis, Mayor Jacob Frey signed an executive order barring ICE from using city-owned spaces for staging their operations, and Police Chief Brian O’Hara warned that officers who don’t step in to protect people from the use of unlawful force by ICE agents will be fired. Mayors and chiefs around the country: your move.
🥊 Habba’s out. Back in June, the Campaign for Accountability filed a bar complaint against Alina Habba for her pattern of politically-motivated arrests, prosecutions, and investigations. A few months later, she’s out — forced to resign after a federal court ruled that her appointment was unlawful.
Counter Punch is a collaboration between Evergreen Legal and Salt River Valley Project — two organizations that believe punching back is the policy playbook this moment demands. It’s how we fight a rigged system, make courage contagious, and deliver for people against the leaders holding them down.