D.C. residents are deeply disquieted by masked feds

At any given time, residents spot groups of people wearing masks and neck gaiters stopping their neighbors. Sometimes they also have a hat and sunglasses, so that no part of their face is visible. They often don plain clothes with bulletproof vests that have little to no identification markers, aside from the word “police.” They’re federal agents — but who is behind the mask and what department they’re working for is often a mystery. 

“Is this MPD? Is this DEA? Is this HSI? Is this ICE?” says Tiffani Johnson, the advisory neighborhood commissioner (ANC) for 4B06. “We don't know.” 

President Trump’s thirty-day crime emergency may have ended, but life in D.C. is anything but back to normal.

From September 11-19, Migrant Solidarity Mutual Aid’s hotline received over 470 calls, according to Amy Fischer, an organizer with the group. People are still reporting masked federal officers “dragging people out of their cars, arresting people out of their work vans, arresting people leaving their homes,” she tells the 51st. 

After the surge of federal agents began, over sixty percent of D.C. residents said they felt less safe, but community members and lawmakers have been especially outraged by the presence of anonymous officers. 

“The message that is being sent to everyone in D.C. is that there's basically just masked goons going around the city, snatching people off the streets,” Fischer says. 

Councilmembers have said unidentifiable federal agents are “harassing and intimidating people in our neighborhoods” and labeled their presence as “oppression”. Posters on sidewalks, buildings, and bus stop shelters demand that officers stop hiding their faces. And residents are constantly documenting sightings of masked federal agents on social media and community forums. 

It’s entirely legal for federal agents to hide their identity, but it’s not necessarily normal — and it’s taking a deep toll on the city.

“The trauma that has already been inflicted will take years to undo”

Although city law mandates that D.C. police officers be identifiable when in uniform, there is no law that requires federal law enforcement officers like ICE agents to show their faces or identify themselves. 

“Until now, it has been taken as common sense that for the safety of all involved, immigration agents should be identifiable,” says Jenn Rolnick Borchetta, the deputy project director on policing at the American Civil Liberties Union. 

That’s not to say there haven’t been past instances of ICE agents obscuring their identity while arresting people. But the number of unidentifiable agents seen in D.C. — and in other states like New York and California — since Trump’s second term began is unprecedented, according to Alicia Yass, the supervising policy counsel for ACLU-DC. 

One part of what makes masked agents distressing for Washingtonians is that it’s not the standard for policing in D.C., says Yass. Under MPD’s code of conduct, D.C. police officers need to provide their first and last name along with their badge number “in a respectful and polite manner,” and they must wear their uniform (plain clothes are only authorized for officers working in specific units).“We're used to that being the norm — and that makes common sense,” says Yass, adding that people should know who they’re talking to and what authority they are acting under.

On community forums like NextDoor and D.C.’s subreddit, residents have been posting about the distress and anger they feel at seeing anonymous federal agents detain and arrest Washingtonians. 

“Saw ICE pulling over two white work vans on the parkway and masked goons just lurking all over the side of the road,” wrote one resident on r/washingtondc. Said another on NextDoor: “Personally, I do not like being terrorized in my own neighborhood, especially by ICE and other unidentified masked individuals.”  

Meanwhile, the city’s sidewalks have been plastered with calls for federal agents to take their masks off, with posters declaring: “Public servants should face the public." The ad campaign was launched late last month by Home of the Brave, a bipartisan anti-Trump nonprofit that includes two police officers who were attacked at the Capitol on January 6.

Johnson, the advisory neighborhood commissioner in Manor Park, has lived in D.C. for 45 years and says she’s seen “the best and worst” of the city, noting the peak of violence in the 1980s and 1990s and the smaller wave during the pandemic. 

“We have a vibrant city. We have come up so much,” says Johnson. But she believes that masked agents will affect how residents see police in the long term, and that there will be residual impacts from this moment. 

“The trauma that has already been inflicted will take years to undo,” Johnson says.

That trauma is magnified among communities who have been targeted by Trump’s takeover. Sandra Benavente, the advocacy manager at immigrant legal and social services nonprofit Ayuda, says that clients across immigration statuses are “experiencing extreme levels of fear” and are hesitant to report crimes. Parents and their children are scared to go to school, take public transportation, get medical care at hospitals, or even go to the library, she adds. 

What Benavente and Johnson are describing isn’t just a temporary setback for D.C. residents’ trust in public institutions — it’s a long-term fracture to a sense of security for many. 

Users on D.C.’s subreddit question how people are supposed to know whether masked agents are actually law enforcement officers, rather than civilians posing as police with the intent to harm others — which has already happened in multiple cases across the country. Back in June, a man in Philadelphia robbed a store by impersonating as immigration agent. His outfit was very similar to what federal agents in D.C. wear: a tactical vest, black baseball cap, and sunglasses.

Unidentifiable officers taking people away “creates a culture where this sort of abuse can so easily take place,” says Jon Lewis, a research fellow at George Washington University’s Program on Extremism.

The White House has said that driving unmarked vehicles and wearing masks have allowed officers to make “targeted arrests”, while the Department of Homeland Security has argued that ICE agents are wearing masks to protect themselves from being targeted online. 

Benavente counters that it pales in comparison to the terror that targeted communities are facing. “ICE agents get to take off their uniform… and go home to their families,” she says. “Immigrants, particularly immigrants of color, do not get to take off their identities and be safe at home, or at school, or at the grocery store.”

“A downward spiral for public safety”

The situation is unlikely to change in the near future. For starters, Home Rule requires that all bills passed by the D.C. Council be reviewed by Congress. 

Ward 1 Councilmember Brianne Nadeau said over email that “we absolutely need all federal agents to be fully identifiable and unmasked,” but that she wasn’t sure if local lawmakers would pursue legislation, since it would likely be targeted by House Republicans.

Even if D.C. were a state or had full control over its own laws, that wouldn’t necessarily solve this issue. California governor Gavin Newsom just signed a law that would ban masks for all law enforcement, but critics raise questions about how a state would force federal agents to abide by the law.

Democratic lawmakers in Congress introduced a bill in July called the VISIBLE Act, which would require ICE agents to wear clear identification and prohibit them from wearing masks — but with Republicans controlling both the House and the Senate, the bill stands little chance.

After Trump’s 30-day crime emergency expired, Mayor Bowser said in a press conference that MPD would return to the “status quo,” and indicated they would no longer be involved in immigration enforcement (though it’s unclear if any other form of meaningful cooperation is still taking place). It wasn’t necessarily surprising — she’s cited masked ICE agents as one of the things that didn't work during the federal takeover.

Days later, Trump threatened to declare another emergency in response, writing that “CRIME would come roaring back.”

But Yass and others argue that the presence of anonymous officers has actually broken down confidence in the criminal justice system. 

When officers aren't willing to identify themselves, “it can leave the impression that they think they're doing something wrong and don't want to be identified, so that leads to a lack of trust,” she says. “If the argument for why this federal incursion on D.C. is happening is to promote public safety and encourage public safety, it's actually having the exact opposite effect.”