New details about a program from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) are getting attention after the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) published a trove of internal documents about ICE’s ‘Citizens Academy’ programs. The academy trains civilians to operate multiple firearms,…
Customs and Border Protection, the federal agency tasked with policing international borders in the U.S., is set to receive billions in additional funding after Congress passed its latest spending package. The agency, which has long avoided accountability, has a troubled history of law enforcement away…
Aid workers say Border Patrol is intentionally neglecting its humanitarian duties to asylum seekers arriving in the harsh Arizona desert.
Tijuana, Mexico — Eduardo seemed not to notice the soft midday rain slowly dampening his clothes and beading up on the sleeves of his jacket. Just a couple hundred feet from where the Pacific lapped the beach of both Mexico and the U.S., drawing no…
When protests broke out several weeks ago in a Minneapolis, Minnesota suburb over the police killing of Daunte Wright, tensions were already high thanks to the trial of Derek Chauvin, the police officer found guilty of murdering George Floyd. State and local authorities were ready…
Arivaca, AZ – The government ramped up its efforts to stop humanitarian workers on the U.S.-Mexico border and raided the ‘No More Deaths’ aid station, Byrd Camp, arresting over 30 people.
The Friday, July 31 raid featured the U.S. Border Patrol, an armored vehicle, two…
Tucson, AZ – Federal officers within the Border Patrol and Fish and Wildlife Service began a campaign of targeted government surveillance against No More Deaths (No Más Muertes aka NMD) in 2017.
A recently filed court motion submitted by the Attorney of defendant Dr. Scott…
U.S./Mexico border – Hundreds of faith leaders and allies marched to the United States border wall just south of San Diego in solidarity with the migrant caravan. They were met by Border Patrol agents and Department of Homeland Security police who arrested over thirty clergy…
Tijuana, Mexico – After fourteen days of an ongoing hunger strike to bring attention to human rights violations against the migrant caravan, members of Pueblos Sin Fronteras met with Mexican officials at the National Institute of Migration (INM). They also met with U.S. Officials at…
Tijuana, Mexico – On Monday, December 3, 2018, Unicorn Riot witnessed migrants arrested by U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents after crossing the border wall near the Pacific ocean. The arrests came as numbers of migrants desperate to seek asylum in the United States grow,…
Tijuana, Mexico – The influx of migrants from Central America arriving near the United States border continues. We returned to the Benito Juarez Stadium over the past two days. The first day, we spoke to Maria Louisa about her month-long voyage north, and the violence…
Tijuana, Mexico – Groups of asylum seekers that marched to the U.S./Mexico border to protest delays in the asylum process on November 25 were tear gassed by police forces from the United States. The march from Tijuana ran into lines of Mexican riot police as…
Mexico/U.S. Border – Unicorn Riot sent a team of two that spent five days from November 15 to 20, 2018 along the United States/Mexico border south of San Diego, California as caravans of asylum seekers arrived in Tijuana, Mexico. We witnessed coils of razor wire…
Tucson, AZ – In an Arizona federal courthouse on Wednesday, November 21, Border Patrol Agent Lonnie Swartz was declared not guilty of a lesser charge of involuntary manslaughter in the killing of 16-year-old José Antonio Elena Rodriguez. The jury will return on December 11 to…
Tucson, AZ – On Friday, November 16, a jury in the federal court in Tucson began deliberation in the ongoing second trial of Border Patrol agent Lonnie Swartz, who killed 16-year-old José Antonio Elena Rodriguez in 2012. The first trial this spring failed to convict…
Tucson, AZ – Border Patrol agent Lonnie Swartz is being retried in court for the 2012 cross-border killing of 16-year-old José Antonio Elena Rodriguez. In April 2018, Swartz was found not guilty of second degree murder with hung jury on lesser charges of manslaughter. A…
President Donald Trump has deployed thousands of active-duty soldiers to the US/Mexico border to support the Department of Homeland Security in stopping a caravan of Central American migrants from seeking asylum in the United States.
A plan enacted on October 26, called “Operation Faithful Patriot“,…
Centennial, CO – In the evening of Sunday, July 29, 2018, a coalition of many local immigrant rights and social justice groups gathered outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Denver Field Office to hold an encampment vigil.
Watch our live coverage below from Monday…
Unicorn Riot obtained confidential Department of Homeland Security manuals showing how DHS’s largest investigative arm, Homeland Security Investigations, advised its agents to conduct their operations. Part 2 of the Icebreaker series covers the HSI “Search and Seizure” and “Asset Forfeiture” handbooks.
Some of the material…
Ajo, AZ – Hours after the release of a report titled ‘Interference with Humanitarian Aid: Death and ​Disappearance on the US-Mexico Border‘, which exposes the US Border Patrol’s efforts to destroy water, food, and blankets left by humanitarian aid workers, agents arrested an aid provider…
Sonora Desert, Arizona – Volunteers at a humanitarian aid camp in the Sonora desert called “No More Deaths” reported that they have been surrounded by Border Patrol since 4:30 pm June 13th. The camp is currently under threat of a raid and Border Patrol continues…
Denver, CO – More than two months have passed since Jeanette Vizguerra, an undocumented mother and immigrant rights activist, entered into sanctuary at the First Unitarian Society in Denver.
Jeanette Vizguerra: Life in Sanctuary from Unicorn Riot on Vimeo.
On Wednesday, February 15, 2017, Vizguerra…
In late February, Unicorn Riot dispatched a small media team intent on learning more about the ongoing border crisis to the desert borderlands of Arizona in the southwest United States. While there, we learned how the new Trump regime’s policies were impacting the local community. …
Phoenix, AZ – Guadalupe Garcia de Rayos may have become the first person to be deported due to Trump’s executive order on immigration. On Wednesday, Feb. 8, 2017 while completing a routine immigration check-in, Garcia de Rayos was taken into custody; she was deported to…
