Recently it was announced by DHS that their agents would be able to enter and seize persons who had final orders of deportation and presumably an administrative warrant (more on that later). There was a lot of pushback including from the likes of Robert Barnes of Barnes Law, who I actually have a great deal of respect for and generally find myself agreeing with. However on this point I found myself at odds with him.
The 4th Amendment to the US Constitution reads as follows:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”
Now when I read that in it's plain language I saw that the conditions were first that the people had a right against unreasonable searches and seizures. Reasonable searches and seizures were not out of bounds. Second thing was the Warrant. It didn't say "judicial warrant" or 'administrative warrant". It said warrant. To my simple, non lawyer mind, this meant that a warrant is a warrant is a warrant.
Barnes, among others pointed out that precedent had been that warrant here means judicial warrant. Personally, I find this to be a made up distinction due to no such qualification being present in the clear text of the 4th but so be it.
The next thing that I, and perhaps a great deal of Americans, thought was that this restraint was due to the presumption of innocence that a person has. If the state wanted to prosecute a person they could not just barge into their property and take stuff. Nor could they just grab them up in the street without some good reason.
But are illegal aliens such persons? Again a lot of Americans don't think so. An illegal alien, particularly one with a final deportation order, has already been given his or her due process of law and has been deemed removable. This means, that unlike the presumed innocent person in the previous example, the alien is already guilty (of being in the country illegally and therefore their seizure, wherever it occurs is reasonable. For what reason is it unreasonable to seize a person who is trespassing.
No one has explained this to me. Rather the argument has moved to, well an admin warrant is essentially not a real warrant. The accompanying argument being that if the seizure of an illegal alien with a final order is allowed without a judicial warrant, then all persons, including citizens may also be so seized. I do not buy this particular argument. It does fail the slippery slope test (logical fallacy) though I am the first to mention that often such "fallacies" do come true.
So not being a lawyer, I'm not particularly versed in the precedents. However; I do follow one online and he lays out a compelling case, similar to what I wrote above AND he provides SCOTUS decisions to support his commentary. I would be particularly interested in how Barnes Law would respond to his argument.
