Grace Resendez McCaffery speaks out against an anti-immigrant proposal in Santa Rosa County, Florida, in June 2024.

An Alabama man is suing the Trump administration after immigration agents arrested him twice in three weeks despite having a valid REAL ID and U.S. citizenship.

The new lawsuit alleges that masked immigration agents are targeting people based on their race, ethnicity or occupation and terrorizing U.S. citizens who fit a certain profile.

Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in an emailed statement to USA TODAY that "allegations that DHS law enforcement officers engage in 'racial profiling' are disgusting, reckless and categorically FALSE."

Reports of Americans being detained in President Donald Trump's immigration crackdown are rising, from the Iraq War veteran held for three days in Southern California to the citizens whose apartments were ransacked in a recent Chicago raid.

"I'm suing because it's not right what they did to me," Leonardo Garcia Venegas told USA TODAY. "I don't want it to happen to anyone else."

The lawsuit is asking a judge to block DHS policies that allegedly permit agents to target people on private property without a warrant, who fit a racial or ethnic profile. Garcia Venegas is also seeking unspecified damages.

Detained while working construction

The 25-year-old construction worker said he was preparing to lay the foundation for a new home in Foley, Alabama, on May 21 when five agents in camouflage – three wearing masks – rushed onto the worksite around 8 a.m.

There were two crews on site, according to the complaint filed Sept. 30 in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Alabama.

Five Latino men, including Garcia Venegas, were there to set the foundation. A separate crew of two Black men and two white men were there to deliver the concrete.

The complaint alleges that, without a warrant, "officers ran right past the white and Black workers … and went straight for the Latino workers."

When Garcia Venegas started filming the arrests with his cellphone, an agent grabbed him by the arm and forced him to the ground. Two more agents rushed over and held him to the ground.

He shouted that he was an American citizen: "I'll show you my papers now," he told them, according to the complaint.

The first agent fished Garcia Venegas' wallet out of his pocket and found his REAL ID, an active driver's license only available to U.S. citizens and lawful residents, compliant with federal guidelines. According to the complaint, agents alleged the ID was fake and held him in handcuffs for more than an hour.

The ID was genuine, and the agents released him.

Then it happened again

Still, the encounter shook him enough that he stayed home from work for days, according to the complaint.

Garcia Venegas was born in Florida but spent much of his childhood in Mexico, with his parents, before he returned to the U.S. for high school. He is dark-skinned, still more comfortable in Spanish than English. He feared those characteristics could make him a target.

Not two weeks after he returned, it happened again.

On June 12, Garcia Venegas was working inside a partially finished home, headphones on, listening to music while he finished a job.

Agents "spotted Leo working through the bedroom window, thought he fit DHS's generalized profile of an undocumented worker … and (an agent) entered the home through an unlocked door," according to the complaint.

Agents allegedly entered the private property without a warrant.

They led Garcia Venegas outside; he showed them his Alabama-issued REAL ID and, again, they said it could be fake. They marched him to their vehicle and detained him for 30 minutes before determining his REAL ID was authentic.

McLaughlin, the DHS assistant secretary, said DHS "enforces federal immigration law without fear, favor or prejudice."

"What makes someone a target for immigration enforcement is if they are illegally in the U.S. – NOT their skin color, race or ethnicity," McLaughlin said. "Under the fourth amendment of the U.S. Constitution, DHS law enforcement uses 'reasonable suspicion' to make arrests. There are no 'indiscriminate stops' being made."

Immigration enforcement stirs fears

Situated along Alabama's Gulf Coast near white-sand beaches, once-rural Baldwin County is one of the fast-growing areas in the state, with a population that jumped 66% in two decades to more than 260,000 people, according to the Baldwin County Economic Development Alliance.

Residential construction is booming, and Garcia Venegas has had work nonstop since he went into construction full-time five years ago.

But the continuous immigration raids are chilling the business climate, said Grace Resendez McCaffery, publisher of La Costa Latina, a Spanish-language newspaper distributed in Baldwin and nearby counties.

Even American workers who are Hispanic fear going to jobs in industries that may be perceived by authorities as having undocumented workers, like construction sites and restaurants, she said.

"You are left to prove you are not undocumented," she said.

"We've seen where American citizens are being handcuffed and detained on site until the ICE agents determine they won't take them," she said. "At one point are they going to believe you? If you went through the process of getting a REAL ID, which is supposed to be unquestionable identification, still how can you trust you will be believed?"

When a valid REAL ID isn't enough

It's a question Garcia Venegas has had to ask himself.

Alabama's REAL ID Act was passed in 2005 in a legislative package that included some of the most stringent, anti-illegal immigration provisions in the country. To get his REAL ID, Garcia Venegas had to present government documents to verify his Social Security number and U.S. citizenship.

What more could he do to prove his citizenship?

"It's an injustice what's happening to all of us Latinos, with brown skin," Garcia Venegas said. "It's racism. They've got to stop."

Lauren Villagran covers immigration for USA TODAY and can be reached at lvillagran@usatoday.com.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: A US citizen construction worker was detained by ICE. Twice. Now he's suing.

Reporting by Lauren Villagran, USA TODAY / USA TODAY

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