Landlord, Tenant Groups Go Silent on ICE Subpoena Abuse Claims

Is the Trump administration using ICE agents to strong-arm landlords for information on tenants?

A recent advisory from the Arlington, Virginia-based National Apartment Association, which the Apartment Association of Greater Dallas distributed to its members, indicates as much.

“While the U.S. government originally stated that its initial focus would be the removal of non-citizens with criminal convictions, beefing up border enforcement and terminating humanitarian parole programs, enforcement activity has spread beyond those limits, due in part to increasing pressure on ICE to increase its deportation numbers,” the advisory said.

The Apartment Association of Greater Dallas counts members ranging from global investors to local landlords and covers one of ICE’s most active areas.

The Dallas trade group posted the advisory on its website late last month and then went silent, declining comment when The Real Deal asked to follow up on the broad warning.

That’s part of a pattern that’s played out on the other side of the landlord-tenant equation in Texas. The San Antonio-based nonprofit immigrant advocacy group RAICES also issued a warning but declined to say whether ICE has been pressuring Texas landlords with illegitimate requests.

“Despite agency arguments to the contrary, ICE warrants are agency directives and should not be misconstrued as having the same legal authority of judicial warrants,” RAICES spokesperson Faisal Al-Juburi said. “However, that does not minimize the coercive threat likely felt by anyone, regardless of status, who is approached by masked individuals claiming to be federal enforcement officials.”

A Georgia attorney said his landlord clients received subpoenas from ICE requesting tenant information, the Associated Press reported last month. However, along with Dallas apartment association and RAICES, various Texas and local tenant associations declined to say whether ICE has been serving subpoenas at Texas apartments, much less whether the agency has used them illegitimately.

Reports of ICE agents serving legal papers at apartment complexes have come with little clarity on whether subpoenas or warrants were involved. It’s not clear whether federal agents were accompanied by local police, or whether landlords or tenants were targets or points of contact.

Rumors of ICE inquiries at Texas apartments have been simmering, but little evidence has surfaced.

State Rep. Ana-Maria Ramos, who represents parts of Dallas, posted on Facebook last month that ICE agents had been spotted knocking doors at apartments on Audelia Road, citing a post on a message board.

Others who have been firebrands in opposition to ICE in the past have gone silent more recently when asked for information or comment on the Trump administration’s deployment of the agency in Texas.

U.S. Representative Greg Casar — a former member of the Austin City Council who has inveighed against ICE raids in Texas — did not respond to a request for comment on the most recent ruckus over the agency.

ICE has a field office based in Dallas, and North Texas ICE agents have made more arrests than any other regional office. However, available government data is only current through January.

The data does not indicate how arrests were made — worksite raids, apartments sweeps or individual apprehension. Murkiness aside, the Arlington, Virginia-based National Apartment Association clarified its guidance for members on the difference between subpoenas and warrants.

“Subpoenas are demands for the production of information, with a deadline to produce that information sometime in the future. This means that you can accept the document, regardless of the type of subpoena, and then consult counsel with regard to whether or how to comply,” the advisory stated.

Authors of the advisory letter include former Department of Homeland Security general counsel Jonathan Meyer, who served in the post during the Biden administration.

Landlords are not obliged to surrender residents’ information unless ICE has a criminal warrant, according to the National Apartment Association.