Immigration raid rocks Nebraska meatpacking plant; protesters and law enforcement clash

Editor’s note: Earlier reports indicated that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement conducted raids at multiple locations in Omaha. ICE has since confirmed worksite enforcement operations at one location. The story has been updated.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement carried out its largest Nebraska workplace raid of the current presidential administration on Tuesday.

Federal authorities detained more than 70 people during a raid on the Glenn Valley Foods meatpacking plant near 68th and J streets, ICE said in a statement. 

The large-scale raid also involved the FBI, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the U.S. Marshals Service and Omaha police, according to the plant’s president.  

It led to confusion inside the plant and anger outside of it, as some protesters clashed with law enforcement. It shocked company executives, who said they’d used the federal government’s system to verify the legal status of their employees. And it also set off a fresh round of fear and rumors that plants and stores elsewhere in Nebraska had been raided, or were soon to be. Those reports couldn’t be verified by the Flatwater Free Press on Tuesday evening.  

ICE executed the federal search warrant on Glenn Valley Foods “based on an ongoing criminal investigation into the large-scale employment of aliens without authorization to work in the United States,” the agency said in a statement. During the raid, an undocumented person from Honduras attempted to assault federal agents with a boxcutter, but no agents were injured, an ICE spokesperson said.

It’s not yet known where the workers were taken, but Glenn Valley employees leaving the scene told the Flatwater Free Press they saw dozens of their colleagues being led by agents into a white bus. 

Tensions escalated between protesters and ICE as a procession of SUVs carrying federal agents left the plant after the raid. Several protesters cursed at law enforcement, jumped on moving vehicles and threw rocks and debris at the cars, shattering one window.

Agents in an SUV appeared at one point to accelerate and make contact with a protester blocking the road. They also hopped out of cars to push protesters out of the way. They did not appear to arrest any protesters on the scene.

The raid shocked Glenn Valley Foods President Chad Hartmann, who said company leaders had “no notification, no idea whatsoever” that a raid was coming. 

Glenn Valley, which produces frozen beef, chicken and pork products, has about 140 workers at its Omaha plant, Hartmann said.

The warrant said 107 of those workers would be investigated, Hartmann said. Many of those employees were cleared, he said. “I just don’t know how many were not.”

Hartmann said immigration officials collected each of the plant employees’ I-9 forms in February and reviewed them. He said the company uses the federal system to check the identity and legal status of employees, known as E-Verify. 

“We’ve done everything we’re supposed to do as a company,” Hartmann said.

Several plant workers, including Marisol Mejía, streamed out of the plant after agents had verified their legal status. 

Mejía said federal agents separated the workers into two groups in the plant’s cafeteria: those with documents proving their legal status and those without. 

Agents fingerprinted all of the workers, most of whom hail from Guatemala or the Mexican state of Guerrero, she said, then led those without documents into a white bus with their hands zip tied. 

Natasha Reyes left work to bring legal documents to Mejía, who is her cousin.

From outside the plant, Reyes said, she saw uniformed ICE and DEA agents with their faces covered by masks, as well as some Omaha police officers.

Reyes grew emotional as she spoke about the raid, noting that those arrested have family and friends who depend on them for survival.

“I don’t think that anyone should be punished for going to work,” Reyes said. “It seems like no one has compassion anymore.”

Karla Cabrera’s aunt, who has been in Omaha nearly 20 years, was one of the Glenn Valley workers detained and loaded onto the bus by immigration authorities.

Cabrera, standing outside the plant, said she received a call from her aunt around 9:30 a.m. after agents entered the plant, many wearing masks that covered their faces. Her aunt then left her phone on speakerphone in her pocket, so that Cabrera could hear the commotion inside. Workers hid in the warehouse, she said. 

Cabrera’s aunt told her that officers were demanding that workers sign a document, but the document wasn’t translated into Spanish, so many didn’t know what it said.  

Cabrera said her aunt had no idea where she’s headed.

Anna Hernandez, an Omaha advocate working with the League of United Latin American Citizens, said her organization believed that some workers detained on Tuesday had work permits approved under President Joe Biden that recently were rescinded under President Donald Trump. 

“This is psychological warfare,” Hernandez said. “Families are being broken here.”

State Sen. Margo Juarez, a Democrat whose district includes Glenn Valley, said Tuesday that she went to the Heartland Workers Center near 24th and O streets earlier that morning. The organization had prepared folders with information for workers.

Juarez said the raids will have far-reaching impacts: Children will lose parents and landlords will lose tenants. What frustrates her most, she said, is that Congress hasn’t passed reforms needed for these immigrants.

“There is no doubt that these employers need the workers, right?” Juarez said. “Now look at the impact it’s going to have on all of us — not just them directly, it’s going to ripple from there. It’s an extreme frustration of mine.”

State Sen. Dunixi Guereca, a Democrat who represents parts of South Omaha, said the big question right now is where ICE is going to take people. Right now he said the focus is on getting people resources and making sure families with detained loved ones reach out for support.

Guereca, the son of Mexican immigrants, said South Omaha has been a “gateway to America for over a century.”

“This is a place where people come to seek their American dream, work hard and raise their families in peace,” he said. “These types of outdated tactics do nothing but spread fear.”

Mexican Consular Jorge Espejel said he was frustrated that federal authorities didn’t notify the consulate of the raid or to let consulate officials speak with Mexican citizens caught up in the raid.

Omaha Mayor John Ewing expressed sympathy for the families impacted by Tuesday’s raid, adding that he hopes those detained are treated fairly by the legal system. 

The Democrat, who took office this week, said in a Wednesday press conference that ICE raids create uncertainty and fear that hold Omaha back from “being as productive and as welcoming as I would like us to be.”

“We’ve heard a lot of talk, but we don’t have anything specific that tells us this is going to happen again,” Ewing said. “We’re hoping it doesn’t obviously because of the chaos it creates in the community.”

He called on Congress to provide a path to citizenship for “hardworking people in these communities.”

Republican Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen offered support for the ICE raid, noting that former President Joe Biden’s immigration policy “absolutely failed the American people for four years.”

“We have to address the issue of illegal immigration, and I support the work of our federal partners to ensure that the law is followed and I remain supportive of President Trump’s efforts to secure the border,” Pillen said in a Wednesday statement.

Omaha Police Chief Todd Schmaderer said Wednesday his department received a vague heads-up about 10 days ago that ICE and Homeland Security may be coming to town.

OPD officers played only a “peripheral” role during the raid by providing traffic control after federal authorities requested their help on Tuesday morning, Schmaderer said.

When asked how OPD’s cooperation with ICE could affect public trust in local police, Schmaderer said Omahans should feel completely comfortable dialing 911 in an emergency regardless of their legal status. 

“I can ensure the public that the Omaha Police Department will not be involved in checking immigration status,” Schmaderer said. “I need victims to come forward. They will not come forward if they’re fearful (of) Omaha Police Department being immigration officers.”

Douglas County Sheriff Aaron Hanson said Tuesday morning that Homeland Security contacted his office roughly a week ago to help with an investigation.

The federal agency typically does not share details about its plans, Hanson said. Instead, he said, they let agencies like Hanson’s know where they will be, when they will be there and what kind of help they need. Hanson said his deputies were helping to control traffic and “maintain safety” in the area where the federal agents were operating.

Tuesday’s raid was the largest documented immigration enforcement action in Nebraska since 2018, when ICE officers raided a tomato greenhouse and potato processing plant in O’Neill. That raid — which targeted 17 people for exploiting illegal workers, fraud and money laundering — led to the arrest of 133 people for immigration violations. 

The raid at Glenn Valley came less than a week after immigration sweeps in Los Angeles triggered protests that saw some protesters clash with police, the Associated Press reported. President Trump then mobilized the California National Guard over the objection of the state’s governor. 

Protests have since spread to cities across the country. 

At the intersection of 33rd and L streets in South Omaha, people started gathering Tuesday afternoon to protest the immigration actions earlier in the day. By 5 p.m., the crowd had grown into the hundreds. They waved Mexican and American flags and held signs with slogans like “Abolish ICE” and “We are and Always Will Be a Nation of immigrants.”

Megan Stanek, who attended the protest with her 9-year-old son, said that she came to show her support for the migrant community.

“I work at a school with a big migrant population, this is absolutely going to affect some of those kids I work with,” she said.

Earlier in the day, a crowd of Lincoln residents gathered in front of the City-County Building for an impromptu protest against ICE enforcement action, also holding signs supporting immigrants. One protester, Celeste Timberlake, brought a gong and struck it as passing cars honked. 

Sophie James, a member of the Isanti Dakotah Nation of Nebraska, attended the Lincoln protest and described the federal government’s immigration enforcement actions as hypocritical. 

“Once America acknowledges that they took this land illegally, and wrongfully, they can’t say who belongs here and who doesn’t,” James said. 

Flatwater staff members Sara Gentzler, Joshua Shimkus, Chris Bowling, Bob Glissmann, Emily Wolf and Shelby Rickert contributed to this report.