Fort Worth Fighting Back Against ICE
By Nisie
September 16, 2026
TAKE THIS JOB AND SHOVE IT
Surely, when a parole officer in Fort Worth, Texas (who will remain anonymous for this story) left their position, they weren't so harsh, but they didn't mince words when explaining why they left their career behind.
As a parole officer (ANONYMOUS), they oversaw a variety of criminal cases in Fort Worth; some cases were cut and dry, but others, they admitted, were more complicated given the circumstances of the crime. Some of their cases involved undocumented immigrants, and that difference would complicate things even further for both the parole officer and the parolee. And, as ICE arrests began to ramp up, being an undocumented parolee increased the risk of deportation. According to (ANONYMOUS), ICE would visit their office maybe once or twice a month, but before they knew it, ICE was going in weekly and arresting parolees.
The increased ICE activity turned the workplace into a hostile environment for (ANONYMOUS) and for those who were trying to do the right thing by showing up for their check- ins. But President Trump and his administration’s anti- immigration agenda do not care whether an undocumented person is “doing the right thing” or not. The President promised he would only go after gang members, violent offenders, and sexual predators, but he lied. According to TRAC Immigration, approximately 70.6% of the 65,765 individuals held in ICE Detention had no criminal convictions.
Innocence doesn’t equate to safety for undocumented immigrants, and being guilty of a crime in America should not automatically be grounds for deportation.
It may be easy to point your fingers at an undocumented person who is on parole and blame them for their precarious position, but it is not always that simple. According to the Innocence Project of Texas, there are an estimated 3,000 to 9,000 innocent people currently in Texas prisons or on parole. Defending yourself in court is very expensive, and court-appointed attorneys cannot provide the same attention as an attorney paid out of pocket. For some, it is cheaper to take the charge and penalties as they stand and try to move on as best they can. But moving on while being undocumented can turn into a game of hide and seek for ICE agents.
Before the major increase in ICE arrests, being convicted of a crime did not mean you would be deported. Crimes like a DUI / Drunken Driving, Assault, Drug Trafficking, and other serious crimes. But now even the smallest crime, or no crime at all, puts an undocumented person at risk for deportation. In Fort Worth, the same trend continues, and (ANONYMOUS) decided they were not going to let ICE officers dictate how they do their job. There were many times when ICE officers would show up to wait for an undocumented person to check in at the office, so (ANONYMOUS) would call and warn them ahead of time and accept a phone call check–in instead. But eventually it became impossible for them to stand by their position if it meant helping ICE arrest someone who did not deserve to be deported. (ANONYMOUS) stressed that they would never help someone who committed egregious crimes but do not believe the legal system is treating undocumented immigrants fairly.
Eventually, they left their position as a parole officer and now dedicate their time to help local nonprofits and plan to start their own organization to help undocumented immigrants navigate the difficulties of ICE arrests and detention.
They Can’t Take Us All
Reports of ICE stalking Fort Worth neighborhoods in Northside, Southside, and other prominently Hispanic areas have increased in the last few months. A year ago, there were whispers of ICE quietly combing Fort Worth streets to locate and arrest undocumented immigrants. Still, many community members and families didn't want to believe it was happening here. When videos of ICE arrests happening on I- 35 started to be shared on Facebook, the comment section was filled with people in complete denial and not believing what they were seeing with their eyes. But now there is no escaping the truth: ICE is here in Fort Worth, Texas, but the Latino community is fighting back.
Unlike Minneapolis, in Texas there is a large number of Latinos who are American, simply because they were born on the right side of the border, and so were their ancestors. Tex- Mex Mexicans make up 70% of the Hispanic population in Texas, and their ancestry goes back to the Spanish and Mexican colonial eras of the 1700s and early 1800s, long before Texas became a U.S. state. The Trump administration and MAGA Republican leaders have made it clear that they want to “Make America Great Again” by removing as many brown people as legally possible. The number of immigrants being deported from Texas alone are astounding.
For Mexican Immigrants and Mexican Americans in Texas, pushing back on ICE arrests will certainly be an uphill battle. Right now, Texas consistently leads the nation in total ICE arrests and detained populations. In July alone, there were10,331 arrests in Texas. North Texas/Dallas Field Office: Fort Worth falls under ICE’s Dallas Field Office jurisdiction, which covers North Texas. Regional data analyses show that Dallas-area ICE operations averaged around 75 arrests per day in early 2026. Despite minimal new coverage of these relentless attacks on Latino neighborhoods, word is spreading in North Texas on Facebook and other social media platforms.
On August 29, 2026, a video was uploaded to Facebook showing multiple ICE vehicles stationed outside a Mexican shopping center located in the Riverside neighborhood of Fort Worth; the video shows at least 20 community members confronting ICE agents and successfully forcing them out of the shopping center parking lot. The ICE field office in Dallas was contacted for comment about the incident, but it did not respond. The Latino community made it clear it Fort Worth, made it clear to ICE agents that day, “You can’t take us all.”
All around the DFW area there are individuals and grass roots organizations dedicated to pushing ICE out of Fort Worth. Will the Latino community be up for this endless fight to protect their family and friends from nonstop threats and surveillance from ICE?
*The use of anonymous sources is generally discouraged. However, in certain cases, anonymity is necessary to protect individuals from harassment or retaliation. Although this parole officer is no longer employed, I have chosen to withhold their identity for the aforementioned reasons.
References:
(dallasmorningnews/posts/a-dallas-morning-news-analysis-of-arrest-and-deportation-data-obtained-by-the-de/1331240402378128/),
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