Trump immigration roundups like in KC are ‘cruel, chaotic’ and out of step | Opinion
Long before federal agents with Homeland Security Investigations raided Mexican restaurants in Kansas City, Kansas, and Lenexa last week, I worried about the plight of our Latino brothers and sisters in America.
HSI is an investigative arm of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, better known as ICE.
The aggressive immigration policy we’ve seen playing out since President Donald Trump took office again in January is cruel and inhumane. Hard working immigrants seeking a better life in this country are being uprooted and deported without even so much as a hearing. Due process used to be a fundamental constitutional right even for noncitizens, but that is seemingly no longer the case.
On Wednesday, HSI agents took into custody seven El Toro Loco employees in KCK and four more at the restaurant’s location in Lenexa, The Star reported.
As for Friday, only three people detained at the El Toro Loco locations had been released, according to KCUR.
In a statement released one day after the raids, El Centro, a local nonprofit that serves Hispanic families in the metropolitan area, rightfully condemned the feds’ actions as unjust and dehumanizing.
“Not only are the actions focused on individuals who are working and contributing to our community, they are done unjustly and without due process,” the statement read.
According to federal agents, the raid was linked to suspected criminal labor exploitation, The Star reported. As such, immigrant rights advocates here wondered why these potential victims of human trafficking were taken into custody.
I think it’s fair to wonder whether something much more sinister is at play. What we are witnessing develop in real time — the whitewashing of America through extreme policies that target minorities, immigrants and other nonwhite, heterosexual subgroups saddens me.
I absolutely abhor what this country is becoming: intolerant and hateful. And I feel bad for my Latino brethren and other ethnic groups who face the everyday threat of being uprooted from America, and in some cases sent to foreign countries they weren't even born in.
Case in point: The Trump administration deported more than 250 Venezuelans to a mega-prison in El Salvador, and for months refused to identify the detainees and barred them from contacting their families or attorneys, according to NPR.
Eventually, the prisoners returned to their home country as part of a captive exchange between the U.S. and Venezuela, NPR reported.
Immigration raids without court hearing
Most of us would agree anyone in this country illegally should do everything in their power to remain here as the law permits. And I am OK with violent criminals — or as Trump once mused, the worst of the worst — being deported, but only after they’ve had their day in court.
However, any American who is OK with nonviolent immigrants being sought, detained and deported without so much as a court hearing should do some real soul-searching. Due process is the American way — or at least it used to be.
But as we saw play out in a recent immigration crackdown at El Toro Loco restaurants, Latinos in Kansas City and elsewhere are at a crossroads in this country, and that should worry all of us.
“Everyone on U.S. soil, regardless of their immigration status, have constitutionally protected rights, yet these rights do not seem to matter to agents who are carrying out immigration enforcement, whether they are from ICE, DHS, or deputized agents from the DEA or KBI,” El Centro wrote in its statement.
On July 24, my colleagues and I on The Star Editorial Board sat down with Janet Murguía, CEO and president of UnidosUS, an advocacy group formerly known as the National Council of La Raza, the nation’s largest Latino civil rights and advocacy organization.
UnidosUS’ annual conference begins in Kansas City on Tuesday and there is a healthy fear — rightfully so — that ICE and other immigration agents could be out in force during the three-day Beacons of Change meetings. Contingency plans, parameters and proactive steps have been taken to protect attendees, according to Murguia.
She added that under this administration, large-scale immigration raids in Kansas City and other cities are inevitable.
“The scale and intensity of more chaos and cruelty is, I believe, what they have planned and what we have to plan and protect our community against as best that we can,” Murguia said during our hourlong conversation.
Murguía also spoke on a number of issues affecting the Latino community — education, health care and a dwindling workforce in that population were among them. But at the top of the list were immigration and the decline of civil liberties in America.
“These actions do not reflect the full freedoms of the Constitution that we have believed in for many years,” she said.
Record high polling: ‘good for the country’
It is encouraging to me that U.S. views on immigration are changing since Trump took office in January. A Gallup poll released in June determined that 79% of U.S. adults — a record high — believe immigration is a good thing for the country. Just last year, 64% of adults shared that sentiment.
Another sign that this administration has gone too far with its anti-immigration efforts: A CNN poll released last month found 55% of Americans said Trump has gone too far in carrying out deportations. After Wednesday’s raids in Kansas, I believe he has as well.
And as Murguia said, we all have a duty to denounce these abhorrent acts.
“I don't think the American people support chaos and cruelty,” Murguia said. “They want solutions. I think that is why we are seeing polling numbers reject these types of approaches. We’ve got to continue to push back, to lift up the truth, to tell these stories and to make sure everyone is aware of what is happening.”
This story was originally published August 4, 2025 at 1:57 PM.