An Idaho ICE Raid Rounded Up Hundreds. The Fallout Could Change How ICE Operates

People first noticed the black helicopter in the sky. It was a chilly Sunday afternoon a year ago at La Catedral Arena, a popular track for horse racing outside the Idaho town of Wilder. Hundreds had gathered at the arena for a festival celebrating horse racing and Mexican culture. As the military-style helicopter hovered above them, attendees from the rural, predominantly Latino community, began to get nervous.“Something is wrong,” Ivan Popoca, who attended the festival with his two kids, remembers thinking.Within minutes, the festival grounds descended into chaos. Backed by armored trucks and snipers, more than 200 members of law enforcement stormed the grounds, some shot rubber bullets into the crowd and hurled flash-bang grenades into vehicles where people had fled to hide. Hundreds of people, including teens as young as 14, were detained and zip-tied.When it was all over, federal authorities had arrested 105 people for alleged immigration violations. Yet on paper, this wasn’t an immigration raid at all. The only warrant for the Wilder raid was secured by the FBI. Its target: the owner of the track and four others for alleged unlicensed gambling. Twelve months later, the Wilder...