After the Associated Press obtained an internal Immigration and Customs Enforcement memo and broke news on Wednesday reporting “Immigration officers are asserting sweeping power to enter homes without a judge’s warrant,” DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin responded on social media.
McLaughlin wrote of ICE agents: “They have an Administrative warrant. Administrative warrants have been used for decades and recognized by the Supreme Court and lower courts. In every case that DHS uses an Administrative warrant to enter a residence, an illegal alien has already had their full due process and a final order of removal by a federal immigration judge. The officer also has probable cause.”
Immigration law expert Aaron Reichlin-Melnick responded: “The Supreme Court has NEVER ruled that an administrative warrant can be used to break into a home. That’s because administrative warrants don’t require any independent oversight; they’re signed by low-level ICE officers themselves.”
Vice President JD Vance, a graduate of Yale Law School, echoed McLaughlin’s argument at a press conference.
JD Vance: “Nobody is talking about doing immigration enforcement without a warrant. We’re talking about different types of warrants that exist in our system. Typically in the immigration system, those are handled by administrative law judges. So we’re talking about getting… pic.twitter.com/oEqf45llsO
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 22, 2026
Vance said: “Nobody is talking about doing immigration enforcement without a warrant. We’re talking about different types of warrants that exist in our system. Typically what happens and not always, typically in the immigration system, those are handled by administrative law judges. So we’re talking about getting warrants from those administrative law judges.”
Former U.S. Representative Justin Amash (R-IL), a graduate of the University of Michigan Law School, responded to Vance’s comments on social media.
ICE’s own guidance says @TriciaOhio is wrong! The Supreme Court has NEVER ruled that an administrative warrant can be used to break into a home. That’s because administrative warrants don’t require any independent oversight; they’re signed by low-level ICE officers themselves. https://t.co/SCKwYouGxN pic.twitter.com/9Pxnxckzkb
— Aaron Reichlin-Melnick (@ReichlinMelnick) January 22, 2026
Amash wrote: “JD Vance isn’t this stupid, so what he’s doing here is deliberate and evil. You don’t just need ‘some kind of warrant’ to enter a home. You need a warrant from the judiciary. He knows this. He knows they’re breaking the law when they enter a home with an administrative warrant. He uses the phrase ‘administrative law judges’ to mislead. An administrative warrant comes from DHS. They are writing their own ‘warrants,’ which makes them no more valid under the Fourth Amendment than if a random person wrote on a piece of paper, ‘I can enter your house.’”
Amash, who served a decade in Congress, left the Republican Party while in office and became a Libertarian in 2020, only to return to the GOP of Donald Trump in 2024.