The Department of Justice filed lawsuits Thursday against four Democratic-led states that refuse to issue confidential license plates to Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents conducting undercover operations.
The targeted states are Maine, Washington, Oregon, and Massachusetts. Federal prosecutors argue their policies are unconstitutional, discriminatory, and put federal agents at risk by preventing them from operating without detection.
“By denying undercover license plates to Department of Homeland Security components, including ICE, while issuing them to their own state agencies, these governors are pursuing discriminatory and obstructionist policies against federal law enforcement,” acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a statement Thursday.
Confidential license plates are standard tools in law enforcement. They allow agents and officers to blend into regular traffic during operations and, in the case of immigration enforcement, prevent ICE officers from being tracked or targeted by individuals attempting to interfere with federal operations.
Each of the four states has crafted its restrictions differently. Oregon denies confidential plates to all federal law enforcement agencies. Maine will issue plates only after a federal agency demonstrates its vehicles will not be used for immigration enforcement. Washington issues plates to some federal agencies but explicitly excludes the Department of Homeland Security. Massachusetts singles out ICE directly, requiring the agency to certify that vehicles are for criminal investigations rather than civil immigration proceedings before any plates will be issued.
Jacqueline Manning, a spokeswoman for Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey, defended the policy. “Massachusetts is not going to allow state resources to be used to help ICE operate in secret while they are violating people’s rights and making us all less safe,” Manning said. She added that agencies engaged in “legitimate criminal law enforcement work” remain eligible for the plates.
The lawsuits are part of a broader Trump administration effort to challenge sanctuary city and state policies. Federal courts have so far largely rebuffed DOJ attempts to punish sanctuaries by withholding federal funding. Judges have also blocked DOJ efforts to overturn laws such as New York’s restrictions on arrests at state courthouses.
The administration has notched some wins. DOJ successfully challenged California laws restricting anti-masking and forced identification requirements during immigration enforcement operations. Federal courts struck down both measures, finding they violated the Supremacy Clause by singling out the federal government without applying similar restrictions to state agencies.
The Justice Department invoked that same legal reasoning in Thursday’s filings, arguing that states cannot issue undercover plates to their own law enforcement while refusing the same to federal agencies without running afoul of the Constitution.
The legal actions were previewed in DOJ letters sent to all four states in recent weeks demanding they revoke their policies before litigation began.
