Current conditions unavailable
A post circulating on social media earlier this week claimed federal agents would set up roadblocks on major Portland-area freeways the week of Thanksgiving in what would be an unprecedented immigration dragnet.
The post warned community members to “stay off the highways” because authorities would be checking the identities of occupants in every car during busy holiday travel.
But there’s no evidence it’s true. A Portland-area lawmaker and other local authorities quickly set out to debunk it.
The rumor was just the latest in a string of false and unverified claims that have spread online in recent weeks amid a sharp increase in immigration enforcement in Oregon, further stoking the fears of a community already on edge over a wave of real immigration arrests.
Since October, armed and often masked federal agents have arrested hundreds of Oregonians, aggressively pulling people out of cars, surrounding them at gunpoint and detaining them even if they are U.S. citizens or the wrong people. Last month alone in the Portland area, federal authorities arrested more than 560 people, an official confirmed.
The vast majority are Latinos, including a growing number of U.S. citizens and people with other forms of legal status, according to the Portland Immigrant Rights Coalition, which runs a hotline for reporting immigration-related arrests and federal agent sightings. The group sends volunteers to verify and document some of the claims.
The list of arrests includes two Gresham men and a Beaverton man arrested in separate cases of mistaken identity and a U.S. citizen detained for seven hours after photographing immigration agents outside a local Chick-fil-A. Farmworkers, high school students and asylum seekers have also been caught in the crackdown.
But the hotline, too, has been swamped by false alarms and duplicate tips, fielding up to 500 calls per day, said coalition board member Natalie Lerner.
It’s “an avalanche of information,” she said.
Immigration rumors abound
Social media has been rife with immigration rumors since President Donald Trump took office in January, vowing to carry out “the largest domestic deportation operation in American history.” But the drastic surge in arrests this fall has led many immigrants on a frantic search for information.
Most have turned to social media, partly due to the decline in traditional local news in Spanish and because many Latino immigrants already get their news through word of mouth and online, said Evelyn Kocher, a spokesperson for the Portland-based nonprofit Latino Network.
“People are very hungry for information. And when it comes to information related to immigration enforcement, time is of the essence,” Kocher said. “Folks are relying a lot more on social media channels because they’re desperate for any news they can find in order to keep themselves and their families safe.”
Social media networks now track immigration agents’ whereabouts in Oregon and report on active enforcement operations in real time. Facebook groups, WhatsApp chats and TikTok feeds teem with daily alerts posted by residents and community activists, including videos of arrests and hundreds of photos of SUVs allegedly linked to ICE agents.
Scores of Spanish-language social media influencers also have emerged. Some, local nonprofits said, seek to capitalize on the community’s fear by soliciting the audiences they’ve accumulated for financial support or pocketing a share of advertising revenue.
Most social posts are unverified and, in some cases, are flat-out false, Kocher said. And it has become increasingly difficult for people to ascertain whether to trust information posted online.
Latino Network directs questions about unverified immigration threats to the coalition-run hotline, Kocher said.
Many of the reports turn out to be false alarms.
The coalition has refrained from posting updates in real time on social media, said Lerner, the coalition board member. That’s partly because it doesn’t have the capacity to do so and also because it does not want to stoke more fear. But, as the hotline has become a hub for arrest data in Oregon in recent weeks, the group has initiated weekly and sometimes daily updates.
“It’s tricky because in some ways, sharing things on social media can spread a lot of fear,” Lerner said. “On the other hand, it’s important for spreading awareness, for letting people know how to stay safe and for alerting people who might not hear so much about this issue to what a serious issue it is.”
Immigrant families hiding
The unending stream of unverified social reports and rumors has deepened anxiety and caused a panic paralysis that has led some families – including those with legal status or who have U.S. citizen children – to shelter at home and abandon regular activities, said Jairo Rodriguez, a spokesperson with Centro Cultural of Washington County, a nonprofit that for more than five decades has provided social services, education and cultural programs to Latinos in the region.
“People have stopped going to work, stopped taking their kids to school, stopped going to their doctor’s appointments,” said Rodriguez.
The nonprofit has been swamped with calls from residents seeking to verify some of what they read online, Rodriguez said. It, too, has worked with the hotline to report and dispel immigration-related rumors.
“The challenge has always been the timing because people want to know in the instant but it takes time to verify information,” he said. “We know ICE is present in our region and their presence has sent shockwaves throughout our communities. But we also know that the way we talk about these things matters. We need to confirm things before we start spreading more uncertainty. Because when rumors and speculations get highlighted without confirmation, it multiplies the fear even further.”
While it’s important to document immigration arrests, Rodriguez said, posting videos of arrests on social media also can put those detained or their families at risk, he said.
Instead of posting online, Rodriguez said, community members should send the videos to the coalition’s hotline to verify and potentially provide for the legal defense of people detained.
Rodriguez also warned that some social media influencers are trying to monetize the suffering the community is facing.
“Those arrests are the people’s worst day in their lives,” Rodriguez said. “We have to be careful not to make someone’s worst day into online content for us to digest.”
Those who want to support immigrants can instead volunteer with the PIRC coalition, contribute to a food drive or help connect immigrants with free legal counsel, he said.
“Let’s think about how we can show up for our community members who are living with fear knowing that they still have a life to live,” Rodriguez said.
Oregon officials debunking claims
Local authorities in recent weeks have worked to dispel the most misleading claims.
The Oregon State Police called this week’s posts about immigration checkpoints on local freeways “rumors.” Capt. Kyle Kennedy, a state police spokesperson, said the agency is “unaware of any plans” related to an immigration roadblock. The Oregon Department of Transportation, which federal agencies would need to coordinate with about any roadblocks, said the same.
“We have no information supporting the claim that roadblocks are planned on Oregon highways, and we have not received any related notifications from the federal government,” said ODOT spokesperson Katherine Benenati.
State Rep. Ricki Ruiz, D-Gresham, was even more emphatic. “A coordinated, multi-highway ICE checkpoint operation would require massive staffing, formal public notice, coordination with state and local law enforcement and would immediately impact commuters, emergency services, freight and daily travel,” Ruiz wrote on Facebook.
But immigration officers in Oregon do randomly run car license plates for names and birthdates of registered owners to check if the owner is in the United States unlawfully. Earlier this month, a federal judge found the practice led to the illegal detention of an asylum seeker.
PIRC, the Portland-based coalition, urged immigrants this week to be aware of whose car they’re traveling in and to consider public transit instead. Lawmakers in Oregon and elsewhere have urged governors to block the sharing of state driver and motor vehicle information with federal officers, something Oregon is pursuing.
Another social media post had claimed federal agents had “surrounded” Hillsboro’s Century High School and were questioning students. School district officials refuted the claim, saying Hillsboro police told them an ICE vehicle was involved in a crash two blocks away, which led to a large number of ICE agents congregating in the neighborhood.
The district said agents had not come onto school property and the school did not receive any reports of ICE stopping students.
Social media commenters have also claimed that federal agents were “trying to force their way” into Randall Children’s Hospital at Legacy Emanuel in North Portland. The post included photos of men in law enforcement uniforms who the author claimed were immigration agents.
The hospital quickly disputed the claim.
“We are aware of a photo on social media reportedly showing ICE officers at Randall Children’s; however, the individuals in the photo are Legacy safety & security officers,” Legacy Health told The Oregonian/OregonLive.
Federal officials told KOIN News that immigration agents had transported an injured detainee to an area hospital that day but had not done any enforcement there.
Lerner, of the coalition that runs the hotline, said the best thing community activists can do is share the context each time they post – including the time, date, location and verified details about what they witnessed. People who rely on online information, in turn, should look for that context when judging whether a location is safe, and before reposting for others to see.
That’s especially crucial because social media reposts or algorithmic resurfacing can make posts from days or weeks earlier appear new.
“People can always call us if they see something and they aren’t sure,” Lerner said. “Our goal is to right-size the amount of fear that people have so that we can be as clear eyed about the threat that we’re facing and we can respond critically to what’s actually happening.”
©2025 Advance Local Media LLC. Visit oregonlive.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
