FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 28, 2026
Baltimore, MD — A federal judge in Minnesota today issued a sweeping order blocking the Department of Homeland Security’s “Operation PARRIS,” finding that the program unlawfully targeted and detained legally admitted refugees in violation of federal law and the Constitution.
“Today’s ruling underscores a painful but necessary truth,” said Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, President and CEO of Global Refuge. “A government that cannot enforce the law without terrorizing lawfully present families and abandoning constitutional limits has lost sight of its most basic obligations.”
The court granted a temporary restraining order enjoining federal officials from arresting or detaining refugees in Minnesota solely because they have not yet adjusted to lawful permanent resident status. The order also requires the immediate release and return to Minnesota of refugees already detained under the policy, with specific protections to ensure individuals are not released into dangerous winter conditions.
In a sharply worded opinion, the court concluded that “Operation PARRIS” represented a dramatic and unlawful departure from longstanding refugee law and agency practice, emphasizing that: “refugees have a legal right to be in the United States […] and importantly, a right not to be subjected to the terror of being arrested and detained without warrants or cause in their homes or on their way to religious services or to buy groceries.”
Operation PARRIS — short for Post-Admission Refugee Reverification and Integrity Strengthening — was launched earlier this month with an initial focus on approximately 5,600 refugees in Minnesota. While DHS described the initiative as a reassessment of refugee cases, the court found that in practice it resulted in warrantless arrests, prolonged detention, and transfers to out-of-state detention facilities.
According to court documents and public reports, federal immigration agents arrested a nursing refugee mother of a 5-month-old and transferred her out of state; in another, officers lured a Somali refugee to his door under the false pretense of a package delivery, slammed him to the ground, and detained him without a warrant; and in a third, an Eritrean mother of three was shackled, flown to Texas, and held for days despite lawful status and a pending green card.
“These incidents are not outliers,” Vignarajah noted. “They are the natural product of a system that replaces legal process with lawless spectacle, careful discretion with brute force, and America’s promise of refuge with a policy of humiliation.”
At Global Refuge, one of the nation’s largest refugee resettlement and immigration services nonprofits, staff have heard daily from families who have expressed fear of going to work, church, school, and medical appointments.
“None of this has made the country safer,” Vignarajah concluded. “What it did was shatter trust between communities and institutions, pushing families into isolation and fear: not because they had done anything wrong, but because the rules were arbitrarily changed overnight.”
##
About Global Refuge:
Global Refuge, formerly Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, is the largest faith-based nonprofit dedicated exclusively to serving refugee children and families. For 85 years, we have welcomed those seeking refuge, upholding a legacy of compassion and grace for people in crisis. We walk alongside individuals, families, and children as they begin their new lives in the United States through our work in refugee resettlement, economic empowerment and employment, and family unification for unaccompanied children. Since our founding in 1939, we have served over 800,000 people from around the globe.
