Colorado lawmakers should move swiftly and decisively on Senate Bill 26-005, a proposal that restores a basic American principle too often denied in the shadows of modern immigration enforcement: Where there are rights, there must be remedies.
The bill, introduced on the first day of the 2026 legislative session by Aurora Democratic state Sen. Mike Weissman, would allow people injured or who suffer losses by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers or other federal agents during civil immigration operations or lawful protests to sue those responsible in state court — even when the defendants claim immunity.
That simple premise is hardly radical or reckless. The Constitution guarantees the right from unreasonable search and arrest, and it guarantees free speech and the right to peacefully protest. The proposed law is common sense based on fairness and the reality of what the nation is like under the Trump administration.
You don’t have to look any further than this week to see why this bill is critically needed.
ICE agents in St. Paul Minnesota broke down the door of a naturalized U.S. citizen and pulled him out of his home at gunpoint clad only in underwear and a blanket into a frigid front yard. The ICE agents had no warrant, and it appears the arrest was a case of mistaken identity.
So who pays for the ruined door? Most likely the victim.
For generations, the courts have been the place to stand up for victims wrongfully injured or ripped off by the corruption or ineptitude of others.
Someone injured in a grocery store where a heavy item improperly stocked falls off a store shelf can and should expect compensation, whether damages are inflicted on members of the public intentionally or not.
The government, and police, rarely should be exempt, and rarely is, from being held accountable for damages or injuries caused to a person deliberately or through negligence. Aurora is no stranger to paying out millions and millions of dollars to people who were wrongfully injured or killed by police here.
Federal police should be treated no differently, and especially poorly trained or badly led agents under the current administration.
SB 26-005 seeks to reaffirm that idea at a moment when it is under unmistakable strain. The urgency for this measure is not abstract. It is written in blood, shattered glass and clouds of tear gas all over the Minneapolis area and likely headed here.
Weissman said he began working on the bill months ago, but its relevance was seared into the national consciousness Jan. 7, when Renee Good, a 37-year-old mother of three and an American citizen with ties to Colorado, was shot and killed by an ICE officer in Minneapolis. She was fatally shot at point-blank range while behind the wheel of her SUV, in broad daylight. Federal officials claimed the shooting was in self-defense. City and state officials, citing bystander videos, reject that account.
But far more protesters and people wrongfully approached by ICE agents as suspects have been injured by excessively aggressive ICE and federal agent tactics.
Anyone injured by malfeasance or malicious behavior should be compensated, and state courts are the only realistic and practical way to make that happen.
By explicitly rejecting defenses such as sovereign immunity, qualified immunity and supremacy clause immunity, the bill ensures that federal badges do not become shields against accountability when constitutional rights are violated.
The measure is carefully drafted and grounded in Supreme Court precedent. It’s tailored to fit within Colorado’s permissible authority.
It excludes state and local police, whose conduct is already governed by Colorado’s police accountability laws, sponsors say.
This is not Colorado acting alone or acting out of turn. Illinois, California, Massachusetts, New Jersey and New York are pursuing similar paths to protect innocent state residents who become victims of bad actors or bad policing.
States of varying political hues are reaching the same conclusion. When federal enforcement turns abusive, states have both the right and the responsibility to protect their people.
Colorado needs to act now. Incidents in cities across the country are expectations of what we can expect soon in the Aurora-Denver metro area.
Every morning before sunrise, hundreds of federal officers in tactical gear pour out of an unmarked building near an airport in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, forming convoys of hulking SUVs and vans. They have become feared fixtures in the Twin Cities, particularly in immigrant neighborhoods. Protesters gather, chanting and waving signs. By nightfall, confrontations escalate. Federal officers fire tear gas and flash grenades. People are dragged away, injured.
There are increasing cases like that of Christian Molina, a Minneapolis man driving his car to a mechanic when federal officers began following him. Unsure who they were, he kept driving. They hit his rear bumper. They demanded papers. A crowd gathered. Tear gas filled the air. Then the officers left, leaving Molina with a mangled car and a question that cuts to the heart of SB 26-005.
“Who’s going to pay for my car?” he asked.
Without a law like this, the answer will be: the victim.
Colorado legislators should not look away. Passing SB 26-005 will not end aggressive federal immigration enforcement. But it will make clear that Constitutional rights do not evaporate at the sight of a federal badge, and violence without accountability has no place in a state governed by law.
I would rather see a law which allowed victims of crimes by known criminal illegal aliens to sue the state and Democrat party leaders which harbored and released them despite having ICE detainers.
I am in complete agreement with this opinion. It is a fact that ICE is rounding up more immigrants who are not, nor ever have been violent criminals, as candidate Trump promised he would focus on before he was elected. Now this effort has morphed into a mean-spirited targeting of brown people under unqualified secretary Kristi Noem. These are people who came to this country like almost all of our ancestors, unless you are native American. This country has a history of vilifying immigrants before understanding that each wave of immigrants adds to the richness of our culture. We must protect the rights of people living, working, and paying taxes in our state. I’m exhausted from the constant vilification of brown immigrants and the obvious racist policies that allow white South African people into our country and deport brown immigrant populations who are trying to follow our broken immigration laws. This should not be who we are. We are better than this! If Trump were working to fix our broken system, that would be acceptable, but his administration is pursuing a vile and racist agenda, which must be stopped!
Mikey appears to be beyond help so I offer this to those readers amenable to reason. If you place 100 jelly beans in a canister, 90 of them red and 10 yellow, mix them up and blindfold yourself, then select 10, you will likely find that you have many more red than yellow. In fact, the most likely event is you will have 9 red and one yellow. Does this mean you are prejudiced against red jellybeans. No, silly. It is just a statistical probability.
Most illegal immigrants are latino. Therefore it stands to reason that they are most likely to be apprehended. Add to this that Venezuala opened their prisons and sent their convicts to the U.S. and this increases the probability that they are over-represented in apprehensions. I would ask any readers to remain open-minded to not fall for the race-baiting efforts by the Aurora Sentinal editorial staff or poor Mikey. Race-baiting and class warfare are common strategies by the left to encourage resentment and get us fighting with one another so they can slip in and take over.
” It is a fact that ICE is rounding up more immigrants who are not, nor ever have been violent criminals,”
I’m just fine with ICE rounding up people like Romeo Pérez-Bravo, who steal the identities of actual citizens like Dan Kluver, kill people in drunk-driving wrecks, cause them to be subject to years of abuse by the IRS, cost them thousands of dollars on taxes for income that the victim of the ID theft never earned, and threaten to put a felony charge on someone’s record for something that they had nothing to do with. I’m very fine with them rounding up and deporting people who have benefitted from blue bughive “catch and release” policies.
Injury isn’t just violent action, which is why illegals need to be deported regardless of whether they’ve actually been violent or not.
The assertion by the Department of Homicide and Shanghaiing (DHS) that the 4th Amendment to the United States Constitution does not apply to them is all the evidence needed to justify this legislative proposal. When federal agents unconstitutionally break down the front door of a home the agents involved, and their superiors must be held financially liable. Federal agents should, in these circumstances, also be responsible for physical and mental health treatment of those they injure.
Translation: Laurence wants more US citizens to have their identities stolen by illegals.