Bodycam footage exposes ICE’s use of facial recognition in violent Oregon farm worker arrest

Newly released body camera footage left the internet in shock after videos revealed how US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) used facial recognition tech during a violent arrest of farm workers in Oregon. Smashing windows, breaking phones, and detaining seven people based on inaccurate AI matches were later ruled unlawful by a judge.

This time, the Guardian said it obtained body-camera footage from October 2025 that shows ICE officers arresting farm workers in Oregon and using facial recognition software to identify one of the arrested people.

The footage was released in a class-action lawsuit against ICE, as its arrest tactics and racial profiling are being challenged by Innovation Law Lab, an immigrant rights non-profit that filed the class-action lawsuit and represented one of the farm workers.

The operation began around 5:30 a.m., right after ICE agents surveilled an apartment complex using Palantir’s Elite app, which officers use to find areas where they’re likely to locate “targets.”

At first, agents followed a white van leaving the complex after running its license plates. The initial suspicion was that the owner might be undocumented, though the officers never confirmed whether the driver was the vehicle's actual owner.

The recording shows that ICE officers shattered a window of the van carrying workers and dragged a 45-year-old woman, who asserted her right to remain silent and tried to call 911, out of the vehicle. In total, seven people were arrested.

Based on what is seen in the video, the officers were using Mobile Fortify, the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) facial recognition app. However, according to the officers, the app couldn't identify the person whose face was scanned. Per the Guardian, DHS defended ICE’s practice of arresting people without warrants, adding that the detained individuals were undocumented and that three of the workers who were deported had "accepted voluntary departure."

Meanwhile, Mustafa T. Kasubhai, United States District Judge, said in an opinion and order that the Court had already previously described ICE officers’ field enforcement conduct as brutal and violent.

"The persistent intensity of regular ICE immigration enforcement operations

may very well have the intended effect of normalizing this level of violence. If this normalization continues, then even greater harm will be inflicted," the judge concluded, emphasizing that if defendants regarded the Constitution, statutes, and regulations in the first instance, "this case would not likely exist."

Cybernews has previously reported on surveillance becoming an intensifying problem in the US. For example, Cleveland emergency response drones were "accidentally" added to the ICE surveillance network.

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