The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) on Wednesday cited a U.S. Supreme Court opinion, written last year by conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh, to defend immigration agents who stopped and questioned an American citizen in Illinois because he looked like their target.

In its reasoning, the department said it had been “vindicated” for its practices through the Supreme Court opinion, which said U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents could stop an individual based on reasonable suspicion. Critics have argued that this allows agents to racially profile individuals as potential undocumented immigrants, leading to conflicts between federal agents and U.S. citizens.

On Sunday, a man who has not been publicly identified was briefly detained by ICE agents in the Chicago suburb of Evanston, according to local law enforcement officials, before being found on the ground with multiple injuries.

DHS told Newsweek its agents had approached the man, “who resembled the target,” and that the agents left the scene without further incident “once the individual finally identified himself.”

Ahilan Arulanantham, faculty co-director of the Miñana Family Center for Immigration Law and Policy at the UCLA School of Law, told Newsweek that the Supreme Court ruling was from a shadow docket that meant legal rules government immigration enforcement on the street should be unchanged.

“Under those rules, agents cannot even briefly detain someone to ask questions concerning their immigration status absent individualized suspicion that the particular person stopped is present in violation of immigration law. That longstanding rule enacts the basic principle that we do not live in a ‘show me your papers’ country,” Arulanantham said.

“However, the Supreme Court has permitted ICE agents to flagrantly violate that rule time and time again for more than one year, without explanation. That sad state of affairs threatens the freedom of many Americans, including those subject to racial profiling by ICE agents.”

What Happened in Evanston?

Evanston Police Department told Newsweek that officers found the man lying on the ground around 9:49 a.m. local time Sunday, near Howard Street and Dodge Avenue, after they were called to reports of two men fighting and someone saying an individual would be taken into custody.

The department said the man reported multiple injuries, including to his head, neck and teeth. Witnesses told officers they believed ICE agents had tried to take the man into custody.

DHS told Newsweek that agents had approached the man believing him to be their target.

“The individual was given lawful commands but was not cooperative and refused to identify himself,” a DHS spokesperson said. “ICE officers relied on their training and later left the scene without further incident once the individual finally identified himself. When ICE officers offered the individual assistance, he refused.”

Evanston PD said another of its officers later spotted two SUVs near Dodge Avenue and Brummel Street, a couple of blocks from the incident involving the American citizen. A federal agent wearing a vest marked “police” but otherwise in plain clothes gave a similar account, explaining that once agents knew the man was an American, he was released.

“DHS enforcement operations are highly targeted, and officers do their due diligence. We know who we are targeting ahead of time,” DHS said. “If and when we do encounter individuals subject to arrest, our law enforcement is trained to ask a series of well-determined questions to determine status and removability.”

The federal agent appeared to have blood on his hands, the police department said, which he explained had come from attempting to handcuff the man.

Police documented the Evanston resident’s injuries at a hospital, and an investigation remains ongoing.

Which Supreme Court Ruling Is DHS Citing?

DHS told Newsweek that ICE has the authority for arrests under a law known as 8 USC 1357, which grants certain powers to immigration enforcement officers and other federal employees.

“Law enforcement officers use ‘reasonable suspicion’ to investigate immigration status and probable cause to make arrests consistent with the statute and the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution,” the DHS spokesperson said. “The Supreme Court has already vindicated us on these practices.”

In September 2025, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Department of Homeland Security, following lower court battles over the tactics used by ICE when carrying out enforcement operations—namely, when agents stopped individuals.

Kavanaugh’s concurrence with the majority drew the most attention at the time, as he said agents could argue reasonable suspicion based on factors such as whether people had gathered for day labor, were undertaking specific kinds of work or could not speak much English.

DHS has since justified its agents’ efforts to stop and question individuals under this ruling.

The case itself was born out of the sweeping ICE raids in Los Angeles last summer, during which civil rights groups alleged that Latinos were being stopped because of their race, language, work location or occupation.

A district judge imposed restrictions on such stops, pushing the case up to the Supreme Court, and Kavanaugh’s opinion was part of a stay on that injunction while the case was pending.

Why Critics Call It Racial Profiling

Another part of Kavanaugh’s opinion led to criticism from immigration advocates and attorneys.

“To be clear, apparent ethnicity alone cannot furnish reasonable suspicion; under this Court’s case law regarding immigration stops, however, it can be a ‘relevant factor’ when considered along with other salient factors,” Kavanaugh wrote.

“Under this Court’s precedents, not to mention common sense, those circumstances taken together can constitute at least reasonable suspicion of illegal presence in the United States,” he continued.

Kavanaugh’s colleague on the bench, liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor, argued that the government was trying to defend stopping people based on a combination of factors that essentially built a particular profile.

“We should not have to live in a country where the Government can seize anyone who looks Latino, speaks Spanish, and appears to work a low wage job,” she wrote. “Rather than stand idly by while our constitutional freedoms are lost, I dissent.”

Sotomayor was not alone in her criticism, and in the months since the ruling, Latino Americans have been stopped or detained by ICE agents across the country.

“I can’t know what Justice Kavanaugh thought was likely to result from his opinion in 2025 permitting immigration agents to consider a person’s appearance and the language that agents believe they hear someone speaking when deciding who they suspect of being in the United States in violation of immigration law,” César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández, the Gregory Williams Chair in Civil Rights & Civil Liberties at Ohio State University College of Law, told Newsweek.

“But Kavanaugh’s opinion brought racial profiling into modern-day immigration law enforcement so no one should be surprised when ICE agents mistake U.S. citizens as migrants based on their appearance,” he said. “Combined with a push from the highest levels of the Trump administration to adopt aggressive tactics, it is entirely foreseeable that citizenship or lawful immigration status can’t protect people who look, to immigration agents, like they might ‘come from Mexico or Central America’ and as if they ‘do not speak much English,’ to borrow Kavanaugh’s words.”

Could More US Citizens Be Stopped?

The chances of more U.S. citizens being stopped by ICE agents appears likely, given repeated reports of such incidents in recent months.

While Americans are not required to identify themselves to federal agents who stop them based on reasonable suspicion, Trump’s DHS has sought to prosecute those seen as impeding officers in their work, which could include refusing to identify oneself.