ICE agents violently arrest mother and daughter at San Francisco International Airport

On the night of March 22, 2026, plainclothes ICE agents forcibly arrested a woman — later identified by DHS as Angelina Lopez-Jimenez — and her roughly 10-year-old daughter inside San Francisco International Airport, holding the crying woman on the floor and wheeling her away in restraints while refusing bystanders' requests to identify themselves or show badges. About a dozen San Francisco police officers formed a barrier around the agents but did not intervene.

DHS said the family was subject to a 2019 final order of removal and was being repatriated to Guatemala; the arrest coincided with a new federal deployment of ICE agents to U.S. airports.

A basic promise of due process is that when the government uses force it does so openly and accountably — officers identify themselves, and force stays limited to what an arrest actually requires. Pinning a woman to the airport floor and wheeling her away in restraints as her young daughter watched, while refusing to give names or show badges, shows how immigration enforcement can slide into anonymous, disproportionate violence against civilians in a public space, eroding the norms of identification and proportionality that separate lawful policing from intimidation.