CANYON COUNTY, Idaho — The American Civil Liberties Union is urging a federal court to allow a lawsuit challenging a 2025 immigration raid at a family horse-racing event in Wilder to move forward.
The ACLU filed an opposition brief on Monday asking the court to deny motions to dismiss filed by federal, state and local law enforcement officials named in the case.
The lawsuit stems from an Oct. 19, 2025, raid at La Catedral Arena, where more than 200 officers descended on a licensed horse-racing event attended by approximately 400 people, including children and U.S. citizens.
READ MORE | 105 detained in federal raid at Wilder horse track, ICE says
According to the lawsuit, officers arrived in armored vehicles with a helicopter overhead, deployed flashbang grenades and entered with guns drawn. Most adults and many children were zip-tied and held for roughly four hours before being questioned by ICE officers inside a large tent on the property.
About 105 people were transported to immigration detention centers. None of the bystanders were charged with crimes.
Defendants have argued the operation was a routine execution of warrants for five people accused of nonviolent, unlicensed gambling.
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"Warrants for five people accused of unlicensed gambling do not give police a blank check to round up hundreds of people, hold families at gunpoint, or target people based on their perceived ethnicity," said Allison Frankel, senior staff attorney at the ACLU's Criminal Law Reform Project.
Among the lead plaintiffs is Juana Rodriguez, a U.S. citizen who previously told Idaho News 6 that she was zip-tied and held for hours while her 3-year-old son cried out beside her.
"The cruelty that occurred in Wilder is a tragic example of a government operating with reckless violence and unrestricted power," said Paul Carlos Southwick, legal director for the ACLU of Idaho.
The lawsuit alleges federal, state and local law enforcement agencies used warrants for the gambling investigation as cover for an immigration sweep at an event they knew would draw a predominantly Latino crowd.
The lawsuit names ICE, the FBI, Canyon County Sheriff Kieran Donahue, former Caldwell Police Chief Rex Ingram, Nampa Police Chief Joe Huff, Idaho State Police Director Bill Gardiner and the local governments they serve as defendants.
The federal court in Boise has not yet ruled on the motions to dismiss.
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