An expanded and emboldened version of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrived in California last summer.

The agency’s uptick in immigration enforcement operations in Southern California, beginning in June 2025, sparked protests, with many criticizing ICE’s use of masks to conceal officers’ identities. In response, California lawmakers passed a slate of bills targeting ICE’s aggressive enforcement tactics, including one banning agents from wearing masks.

[Related: ‘This shouldn’t be happening’: Students react to troops, ICE raids in LA]

A federal judge recently struck that mask ban down for violating the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause, which says that states cannot enforce legislation that regulates the federal government.

California lawmakers should not be deterred by this ruling. Lawmakers should amend the mask ban and pass more legislation requiring transparency of ICE operations. State and local law enforcement must also play a more active role in prosecuting illegal ICE activity.

“ICE and DHS (Department of Homeland Security), in general, have prioritized secrecy because they know that Americans don’t support the kind of interior immigration enforcement they’ve been carrying out,” said Graeme Blair, a professor of political science. “It’s not just that they don’t want people to know who ICE officers are – they don’t want them to know what ICE officers are doing.”

ICE’s push for secrecy underscores the need for legislation that forces the agency to be more transparent. When masked ICE agents feel they can act anonymously, they are more likely to act against public interest since it is harder for them to be held accountable. Masks also undermine public trust in law enforcement and make legitimate ICE conduct appear illicit.

California has previously passed legislation aimed at curtailing ICE activity. Older sanctuary state laws limit how much local and state law enforcement can cooperate with ICE. More recent measures target ICE directly, prohibiting them from entering schools and hospitals without a judicial warrant and requiring agents to display their name and badge at all times.

“Noncooperation statutes which have prevented the sharing of information between state and local law enforcement and ICE have proven extraordinarily effective at preventing detentions and deportations from happening,” said Ahilan Arulanantham , faculty co-director for the Center for Immigration Law and Policy.

However, California lawmakers can do more.

California can pass laws authorizing people impacted by ICE misconduct to sue agents, Arulanantham said. State and local law enforcement should also prosecute ICE officers for crimes committed on the job, he added.

Proposed laws that would levy tax penalties on private corporations operating ICE-funded detention centers would also be helpful, said Cole Hoyle, a third-year political science student and political director for Bruin Democrats. Laws such as this could extend principles of noncooperation with ICE beyond state and local governments to private California corporations, further restricting ICE’s ability to operate in the state.

Although federal agents’ shootings of U.S. citizens Alex Pretti and Renee Good in Minneapolis have dominated media coverage, ICE shot a man during a traffic stop in Stanislaus County, fired on a San Bernardino man’s vehicle and shot a TikToker in the San Fernando Valley. ICE has also committed other property crimes and assaults during immigration raids.

ICE did not respond to a request for comment on agency guidelines for officer conduct and transparency in field operations.

California law enforcement has yet to prosecute ICE agents for these incidents. Prosecution could deter agents from illegal behavior. Further, evidence exposed during the trial process could provide transparency into ICE’s operations.

Locally, the threat of ICE raids continues to loom over UCLA, given the rise in immigration enforcement across Los Angeles. ICE and U.S. Customs and Border Patrol arrested more than 10,000 people in L.A. between June and December, according to the DHS.

The university addressed these concerns, with Steve Lurie, UCLA’s vice chancellor for campus and community safety, telling the Daily Bruin in December that the university would notify community members if it could confirm federal agents were carrying out immigration enforcement on campus.

But once again, more must be done.

“Vice Chancellor Lurie said that those notifications could be sent even days after ICE was present,” Blair said. “It’s outrageous that senior leadership is not committing to immediately notifying students.”

UCLA should instead utilize BruinAlert, the university’s rapid response, text-based warning system, in the event of ICE’s presence on campus. Choosing to delay administration response denies student access to real-time information and breeds confusion and distrust.

Granted, there are limits to what can be done in response to ICE. The federal ruling against the mask ban displays this tension. However, challenging ICE conduct must be a central goal for leaders across California from local law enforcement to the UC system to lawmakers in Sacramento.

California cannot allow legal hurdles to deter from protecting immigrant communities. State officials must be decisive in holding ICE accountable.