Overview

• Federal agents may resume roving patrols and brief stops in Los Angeles after the Supreme Court stayed a district court order.
• Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote that officers can assess a totality of circumstances where ethnicity, language or location may contribute to reasonable suspicion, though none can justify a stop alone.
• Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented, calling the ruling a threat to constitutional protections against discriminatory seizures.
• The paused injunction from Judge Maame Frimpong, largely upheld by the Ninth Circuit, followed findings of a mountain of evidence that agents made stops without reasonable suspicion based solely on appearance, speech or work sites.
• Recent operations underscore the stakes, including a Border Patrol‑confirmed Aug. 28 Westlake Home Depot action using tear gas and pepper pellets with eight detentions, as DHS signals similar efforts in other cities such as Chicago.