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A Rare Look Inside Trump’s Immigration Crackdown Draws Legal Threats

A new documentary peers inside the secretive world of immigration enforcement. The filmmakers faced demands to delete scenes and delay broadcast until after the election.

A still from the first episode of “Immigration Nation” shows people who were arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement in New York, including someone who was not the intended target.Credit...Netflix

In early 2017, as Immigration and Customs Enforcement prepared to carry out the hard-line agenda on which President Trump had campaigned, agency leaders jumped at the chance to let two filmmakers give a behind-the-scenes look at the process.

But as the documentary neared completion in recent months, the administration fought mightily to keep it from being released until after the 2020 election. After granting rare access to parts of the country’s powerful immigration enforcement machinery that are usually invisible to the public, administration officials threatened legal action and sought to block parts of it from seeing the light of day.

Some of the contentious scenes include ICE officers lying to immigrants to gain access to their homes and mocking them after taking them into custody. One shows an officer illegally picking the lock to an apartment building during a raid.

At town hall meetings captured on camera, agency spokesmen reassured the public that the organization’s focus was on arresting and deporting immigrants who had committed serious crimes. But the filmmakers observed numerous occasions in which officers expressed satisfaction after being told by supervisors to arrest as many people as possible, even those without criminal records.

“Start taking collaterals, man,” a supervisor in New York said over a speakerphone to an officer who was making street arrests as the filmmakers listened in. “I don’t care what you do, but bring at least two people,” he said.

The filmmakers, Christina Clusiau and Shaul Schwarz, who are a couple, turned drafts of their six-part project called “Immigration Nation” over to ICE leadership in keeping with a contract they had signed with the agency. What they encountered next resembled what happened to Mary L. Trump, the president’s niece, who was eventually sued in an unsuccessful attempt to stop her from publishing a memoir that revealed embarrassing details about the president and his associates.

Suddenly, Ms. Clusiau and Mr. Schwarz say, the official who oversaw the agency’s television and film department, with whom they had worked closely over nearly three years of filming, became combative.

The filmmakers discussed their conversations on the condition that the officials they dealt with not be named out of fear that it would escalate their conflict with the agency.

Image
The filmmakers Shaul Schwarz and Christina Clusiau embedded with ICE for two and a half years to create “Immigration Nation,” a six-part Netflix series.Credit...Christopher Capozziello for The New York Times

In heated phone calls and emails, they said, the official pushed to delay publication of the series, currently set to air on Netflix next month. He warned that the federal government would use its “full weight” to veto scenes it found objectionable. Several times, the filmmakers said, the official pointed out that it was their “little production company,” not the film’s $125 billion distributor, that would face consequences.

The filmmakers said they were told that the administration’s anger over the project came from “all the way to the top.”

Unnerved, the filmmakers said they began using an encrypted messaging service to communicate with their production team. They installed security cameras in their office and moved hard drives with raw film footage to a separate location, afraid of ICE’s increasingly aggressive tactics.

“Experiencing them is painful and scary and intimidating and at the same time angering and makes you want to fight to do the story,” Mr. Schwarz said.

Jenny L. Burke, the press secretary for ICE, said the agency is “shocked by the mischaracterizations made by the production company,” and “wholeheartedly disputes the allegations brought forward by filmmakers of this production.”

She said the agency pushed back against the film only within the confines of the agreement Mr. Schwarz had signed, and that the couple, not the agency, caused delays in the review process. She added that in the many collaborations the agency had embarked on with other media outlets, ICE officials had never been accused of bullying.

“The men and women of ICE perform outstanding work daily that often goes unnoticed or is misrepresented to the point of falsehood,” Ms. Burke said in a statement. “ICE is firmly committed to carrying out the agency’s sworn duty to enforce federal law as passed by Congress professionally, consistently and in full compliance with federal law and agency policies.”

The connections that eventually opened the door for the documentary project were made in 2011, when Mr. Schwarz, an Israeli journalist who first came to the United States as a foreign correspondent and later became a naturalized citizen, embedded with a local ICE field office in Arizona for a project about drug cartels. It never published, but Mr. Schwarz became friendly with the public information officer who coordinated the embed.

Over the next several years, the officer rose through the agency until he was promoted to oversee the press office at its Washington headquarters. A few times, while Barack Obama was still president, Mr. Schwarz raised the idea of doing a story about the agency’s immigration work, but he got nowhere.

Soon after Mr. Trump took office in 2017, Mr. Schwarz and Ms. Clusiau, a former photo editor for Time magazine who grew up in Minnesota, traveled to Washington and asked the official to lunch, pitching the idea of a documentary series examining how the agency would evolve as Mr. Trump carried out his promise to crack down on immigration. The lunch led to a meeting where the filmmakers convinced high-ranking officials to sign off on the project.

The filmmakers’ lawyer, Victoria S. Cook, negotiated a contract with strong protections for their journalistic independence. It allowed for ICE to review drafts of the series before it was published. But the agency was allowed to request changes only based on factual inaccuracies, violations of privacy rights or the inclusion of law enforcement tactics that could either hinder officers’ abilities to do their jobs or put them in danger. Matthew T. Albence, the current acting director of ICE, signed on behalf of the government.

Over the next two and a half years, the couple filmed a sweeping look at the federal immigration enforcement system, discovering many inherent contradictions.

The Daily Poster

Listen to ‘The Daily’: Inside Trump’s Immigration Crackdown

Two filmmakers were granted rare access to Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations. But with the election looming, the Trump administration has sought to block the release of their documentary.
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transcript

Listen to ‘The Daily’: Inside Trump’s Immigration Crackdown

Hosted by Michael Barbaro; produced by Eric Krupke, with help from Alexandra Leigh Young and Jessica Cheung; and edited by Lisa Tobin

Two filmmakers were granted rare access to Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations. But with the election looming, the Trump administration has sought to block the release of their documentary.

michael barbaro

From The New York Times, I’m Michael Barbaro. This is “The Daily.”

Today: At the start of the Trump presidency, leaders within ICE — Immigration and Customs Enforcement — jumped at the chance to give two filmmakers, Christina Clusiau and Shaul Schwarz, inside access to document the agency’s new hardline agenda. Four years later and with the election approaching, the agents tried to block the release of their film.

It’s Monday, September 14.

Hi, guys.

christina clusiau

Hi, Michael.

michael barbaro

We’re so grateful for your time. Thank you.

shaul schwarz

Sure.

michael barbaro

OK. So we’re going to start.

shaul schwarz

Awesome.

michael barbaro

Christina and Shaul, we know that ICE is a notoriously secretive organization. It is very rare for them to allow journalists or filmmakers access to their operations. But you were able to follow them for nearly three years with a tremendous level of access. So how did you go about getting that access? What’s the story?

shaul schwarz

Yeah. I originally started working with ICE almost a decade ago, doing stories about the drug war. And as part of that I met a ICE spokesman, who was at the time a local Arizona spokesman. As the years kind of progressed, he had moved up the ranks. And actually, during the Obama time, they were not so interested in somebody really taking a deep dive into the agency. And so —

archived recording (donald trump)

I want to recognize the ICE and border patrol officers in this room today and to honor their service, and not just because they unanimously endorsed me for president.

shaul schwarz

When Trump got elected —

archived recording (donald trump)

That helps, but that’s not the only reason.

shaul schwarz

Me and Christina thought maybe ICE would be interested now. They seemed to —

michael barbaro

Huh.

shaul schwarz

— be looking at getting a lot of heat, you know? The campaign of Trump was so on the nose on how tough he was going to be on immigration.

archived recording (donald trump)

For too long, your officers and agents haven’t been allowed to properly do their jobs. You know that right? Do you know that? Absolutely. But that’s all about to change.

shaul schwarz

So we approached the spokesman, who I had, at this point, a long relationship with and at that time was already in D.C. And we pitched him. We said, listen, we think the agency is going to come under a lot of heat. And we would like to see what the men and women of ICE will be up against during this administration. And that’s how it started.

michael barbaro

So kind of counterintuitively, the organization was not interested in having you document them during a relatively low heat moment — the Obama administration. But at its most heated moment, when ICE was under the most scrutiny, they were willing.

christina clusiau

Yeah. I think that under this administration, they realized very quickly that enforcement policies were changing.

archived recording (donald trump)

And I’m very happy about it. And you’re very happy about it. From here on out, I’m asking all of you to enforce the laws of the United States of America. They will be enforced and enforced strongly. [APPLAUSE]

christina clusiau

And that they were going to be looked at under a different light. And I think a lot of the officers, at least when we started filming, were feeling that there was a lot that they were up against. And they felt that they wanted to tell their story from the inside.

shaul schwarz

It’s almost like when you’re hated, you have to talk about it, right? So you think of an agency that suddenly, on one hand, the gloves are off. And they have this support. On the other hand —

archived recording (alexandria ocasio-cortez)

We need to occupy every airport, we need to occupy every border, we need to occupy every ICE office until those kids are back with their parents. Period.

shaul schwarz

Everybody were up in arms with them.

archived recording

(PROTESTERS SINGING) Together we will abolish ICE.

shaul schwarz

And then, of course, zero tolerance happened. And then they really were in the hot seat.

michael barbaro

This is family separation?

christina clusiau

Yes.

archived recording (ilhan omar)

We need to abolish ICE — [CHEERING] — and end all inhumane deportation and detention programs.

archived recording

(SINGING) This is for the people who are locked inside. Together!

shaul schwarz

And of course, that kind of gave birth to the abolish-ICE movement and a huge outrage that really sparked the debate.

archived recording

(SINGING) Together we will abolish ICE. This is for the people! This is for the people who are locked inside.

michael barbaro

And what were the specific terms of the agreement that you had with ICE? Once they said that you could come in, what did they ask for, if anything, in return for granting you this access?

shaul schwarz

Yeah. The basics of the agreement was that ICE would see the cuts that we are putting forward and that they would have, say, in three categories: Law enforcement sensitivities, which is really if we are showing kind of how they’re doing their work and kind of giving away police secret tactics and stuff like that. It was privacy issues, meaning everybody in the show had to agree and sign releases that they are willing to participate, both on D.H.S. and the immigrant side. And it was factual incorrectness, if we were just making a mistake. And other than that, the contract stated very clearly that we had the first right amendment to tell our story as we see fit. And really those were what they were going to be allowed to comment on.

michael barbaro

So based on that, it sounds like you had real confidence that you would be given free rein to document what you saw and ultimately include it in whatever you produced.

shaul schwarz

Yeah. Overall, we were happily surprised. They said we were going to get a carte blanche look, that they’re going to introduce us. And once we got to the field in these places, that agents were keen on having us ride along, we got to spend endless time and really see them work. And be with them in the field by ourselves and really do the work we were hoping to do. So we were really grateful for the agents for being kind of, doing their thing and letting us do our thing, be flies on the wall and document.

[doorbell ringing]

anna

I didn’t call you.

agent 1

Yeah. You please open the door.

agent 2

We’re not going to yell out in the hallway through a closed door, ma’am. That’s now how we do business. Please open the door so I can talk to you.

michael barbaro

Well, let’s talk about that documentation. What did you see in those first months in terms of exactly how the agency was changing under this new Trump administration?

christina clusiau

We saw that the scope of ICE’s mandate under this period of time had expanded.

agent

Can we come in and talk to you? We don’t all have to come in, just a couple of us. But I want to show you some pictures. Somebody we’re looking for has been using this address.

anna

Oh. OK.

agent

All right?

anna

You want to come in?

agent

Yeah. If you don’t mind. What’s your name, ma’am?

anna

Anna.

agent

Anna. OK. You mind if I come in?

shaul schwarz

You know, and I think these days were also when the tactic of installing fear were really at its height.

interposing voices

Did you guys [INAUDIBLE]. Yeah. One of my partners.

christina clusiau

You know, under the previous administrations, there were specific priorities, that you could only pick up a felony charge or an egregious criminal. But now, because of this idea of installing fear — of, like, pushing people into the shadows — they expanded that mandate to say there are no priorities. If you’re here illegally, we can come after you. And I think that really put fear into communities. And I think they were successful at it.

anna

OK. But I mean, can I see any paperwork?

agent

Yeah. I’ll give you a card.

anna

No. I mean paperwork saying that you guys have permission to come in here or something.

agent

Oh, no. I have a warrant for him. And I know he lives here. So that’s why I’m in here. Plus, you opened the door and let me in.

michael barbaro

One of the more notorious examples of this fear tactic under the Trump administration was an increased focus on collaterals, which is ICE-speak for undocumented people who are not the target of raids, but who agents find by accident along the way. And there’s this moment where you’re sort of witnessing agents adjusting to this new approach. Can you tell me about that?

shaul schwarz

You know, I think you’re referring to one moment that we were in a car with an agent. And he was kind of telling us how he typically does not do collaterals.

agent

I don’t really — I don’t do collaterals. I just don’t think it’s right.

shaul schwarz

He really wants to catch real criminals, his targets. When you’re part of fugitive operations, you have targets of people who committed crimes. And that’s who you’re going after.

agent

I know it’s my job. But you know, I got guys that are aggravated felons that I’d like to catch. I don’t care about the guy that’s minding his own business and cooperating with me.

shaul schwarz

And literally, kind of as he was finishing to tell us that —

agent

Yeah. What’s up, man?

supervisor

Start taking collaterals, man. I don’t care what you do, but bring at least two people in.

agent

OK.

shaul schwarz

The supervisor came on the radio. And he’s heard clearly saying, I don’t care what you do, get me two people.

agent

He know you guys were with me, right?

speaker

Yeah.

agent

Yeah. Because that’s a pretty stupid [EXPLETIVE] to say.

shaul schwarz

It’s very clear when you see that scene and what he meant: Just get me two people. Because they wanted to show numbers.

michael barbaro

So what you were seeing here was an individual ICE agent saying that, left to my own discretion, I would like not to arrest a collateral. But you’re kind of seeing this prevailing culture of ICE in that moment, under this administration, kind of winning out. Because here is a boss coming on the radio and making clear that what he’s interested in is just detaining people. Get me people.

shaul schwarz

Collaterals were something we saw on a daily basis for years. Fear will equal don’t come here. Fear will equal make it as hard on them, as bad on them, maybe they will leave.

archived recording (tom homan)

There has been a significant increase in non-criminal arrests. Because we weren’t allowed to arrest them in the past administration. But you just seeing more of an uptick in non-criminal because we’re going from 0 to 100 under the new administration.

shaul schwarz

And Tom Homan, the director of ICE at the time, basically his message was, you should be scared.

archived recording (tom homan)

As I said earlier, if you’re in this country illegally, and you committed a crime by entering this country, you should be uncomfortable. You should look over your shoulder. And you need to be worried.

shaul schwarz

If you’re here illegally, that’s the way it should be. That was part of what they were trying to put out there. And I think some did it happily. And I think some did it less happily. And some did it in certain moments. And I think the agents grappled with it.

christina clusiau

Yeah. I mean, I do think, you know, we did see them grappling with it. That’s for sure. You know, on one side, they are the ones that really know what it means when you take somebody into the system. Because a lot of times, when you pick up a collateral, their entire world begins to crumble. Because they get stuck in the system. Whether or not they’re going to be detained and deported, or they have a court case, or all of these small things now come into the fold. Whereas before, they were just going to work, minding their business.

shaul schwarz

But that deterrence equation of creating fear, of letting a story be heard, of letting people know that we’re going to hold you for long times and detentions. That was by design.

michael barbaro

So as we talked about, this is unfolding during the era of family separations. And here, too, you captured the agents adjusting to this new reality. There’s this scene where you’re with these agents in New York discussing the policy. And I wonder if you can talk us through that.

shaul schwarz

Yeah. We were in the car with Judy, an agent we spent a long time with.

judy

We constantly look like we’re the bad guys, when all we’re doing is enforcing the laws and doing our job.

shaul schwarz

And she was grappling, I think, with this idea of family separation. And —

judy

Luckily for us, we haven’t really been involved in any of that family separation thing.

shaul schwarz

Being part of fugitive operations, she kind of hinted that they don’t do that.

judy

We don’t rip children out of families’ arms and things like that. We don’t do that. It’s just — that’s not what we do.

shaul schwarz

But we proceeded to go to a house with her where she had actually found that target, that person that ICE was looking for.

judy

[SPEAKING SPANISH]

shaul schwarz

And she ends up arresting them. But —

mother

[SPEAKING SPANISH]

judy

[SPEAKING SPANISH]

shaul schwarz

— some of the targets are parents.

judy

This is not going to be easy.

shaul schwarz

The mother asked that the child say goodbye to the father. And she let that happen.

[baby crying]

mother

[SPEAKING SPANISH]

judy

Listen. She wants him to say goodbye to his daughter. So —

[baby crying]

shaul schwarz

And I honestly think it hurt her.

She’s a parent. She’s the daughter of an immigrant.

judy

We always take into consideration that the children and the family. And we try to make, you know, this probably unpleasant situation just a little bit easier for everyone.

shaul schwarz

But in that morning, Judy was doing exactly her mission. And her mission was different than the systemic separation that was happening at the border at the same time.

judy

Just as a human, you have compassion towards other people. But you know the saying, right? It’s a job. And somebody has to do it. So that somebody is you. And you just have to kind of learn how to separate your personal feelings or your personal emotions from doing your work.

christina clusiau

Yeah. I mean, I think that we have to remember a lot of these ICE agents are career officials. Many of them were ICE agents under the last administration. They’re ICE agents under this administration. And they’re going to be ICE agents under the next administration. The policies and the mandates do shift within whoever’s in the presidential office.

And so I think that something to recognize is the fact that they, you know, they had different mandates under Obama. They couldn’t do certain things. And they could do other things. And then same under Trump. And I think that’s something that they grapple with. They are federal jobs. They are federal employees. They have federal positions.

And I think, you know, there is something to be said that maybe there are a few that say, you know what, I just can’t do this anymore. You know, I don’t agree with the policies. I’m going to quit. But there’s a lot that don’t. There’s a lot that just grapple with it. They just continue doing their job. They do their mission. And — and that’s it.

michael barbaro

We’ll be right back.

So when you went to publish this film, as you said, you had to first run it by ICE. And they were going to put it through their various filters. How did that process go?

christina clusiau

So initially, we handed off the first cut to ICE. And about a week later, we got a phone call from the spokesperson that we had been dealing with throughout the entire process of the show. And he immediately said: We do not like it.

This does not portray us in a favorable light. In the 15 years, I’ve never been called up to the front office in order to talk about a series such as this. And there’s things that we do not like about this. And we need you to relook at some of these issues.

shaul schwarz

He expressed anger that came from all the way to the top. He expressed that this is not what they expected. He brought up, even in that initial phone call, some stuff that legally just didn’t make any sense. It didn’t fall under the three things that they were allowed to comment. He brought stuff like the Hatch Act — that is a old rule that during Soviet times, during the Cold War, government employees cannot try and overthrow a government. It didn’t make any sense.

michael barbaro

Oh, does he mean that he would be accused of violating the Hatch Act? Or the agents?

shaul schwarz

No, that agents in the episode. Because they were speaking about Trump. You know, there was examples of them kind of coming back with pushback. We talked a lot about that collateral scene. One thing they do is use a fingerprinting machine. And they said, well, that machine is law enforcement sensitive, something they had a right to comment about. And so you have to take out the whole scene. Which we were like, all right, take out that shot. But why the whole scene?

And then Christina proceeded to Google to see if anybody else had covered that. And we saw that not only that it was widely covered, that the same ICE-D.H.S. spokesman had actually put that same machine picture and wrote a story about it and sent it to the press. So —

michael barbaro

Wow.

shaul schwarz

You know, and once we would bring these issues, of course they would crumble legally and try to find another. So there was a lot of pushback that really started to draw a quick clear line.

michael barbaro

So they were trying to knock things out of the film?

shaul schwarz

Yes.

christina clusiau

Yeah.

shaul schwarz

But there was something that felt familiar in that mechanism of push.

michael barbaro

Familiar in the sense that you had seen it in operation on the ground in your time with the ICE agents?

shaul schwarz

Constantly. It was part of the machine that we saw.

christina clusiau

We understood from the things we saw exactly what they were trying to do to get us to fold and to comply and to give up. And I think that’s something that we understood from the years of spending with them was that these tactics are something that they use. And I’m speaking now more about leadership and not about the individual ICE agents on the ground, but how these tactics of weaponizing bureaucracy come into the fold. And it’s not just for us. But it’s for everybody.

michael barbaro

In some ways, it seems surprising to me that ICE would find itself surprised by what you captured and depicted in the film. Right? Because on some level, it seems difficult for me to imagine that ICE wouldn’t have imagined that the documentary would capture what it captured. The rules and the policies and these enforcement actions were not a secret.

shaul schwarz

Yeah. We were surprised, too. You have to remember also we started pretty early in the Trump days. And a lot has changed in D.H.S. And. a lot of people who are now at the leadership have been reshuffled there. And as in many places in this administration, but we can definitely attest to D.H.S., it’s a little bit the yes men that have stayed. And this is an election time. So I think a lot came into that. And we have a very different relationship with ICE agents that we spend time with than with leadership and spokesmen. And they had a very different reaction to the show they ultimately saw on Netflix.

michael barbaro

Mhm. What was their reaction?

christina clusiau

This is mainly the individuals that we were fairly close to throughout the production and that we’ve kind of stayed close to.

michael barbaro

Mhm.

christina clusiau

Those ones, you know, came back. And some of them liked what they saw. Others didn’t like what they saw. It was quite a variety. But I think they understood that we did profile what we saw day-to-day and what they do day-to-day.

shaul schwarz

You know, we had an officer who told us in the show —

officer

You know, it’s unfortunate situation. Because a lot of these guys are hardworking individuals.

shaul schwarz

That he understands the people he’s arresting. And maybe it’s hard for him, because he would do exactly the same. They’re here to work and provide for their family. And they just got caught up in politics, if you look at it. That’s how it is. And when we checked into it with him after the show had been published, we kind of asked, hey, how was the portrayal? What do you think?

He’s like, no. It’s fine, this was the real world. But that line wasn’t so good for me. And I said, why? You’re showing empathy. And he’s like, yeah, but empathy in these days could be looked as: You’re not supporting the mission.

christina clusiau

Yeah.

shaul schwarz

We didn’t see that coming.

christina clusiau

That one really — we didn’t see that one coming. This attitude that, in our minds, we were putting this individual in a place where he was having compassion and empathy towards those that he detains. And in his mind, he was not supporting the mission.

shaul schwarz

But I could see what he meant. And I think that surprised us. Where we were gratified is most agents felt that we portrayed the world as it exists. And certainly, it’s not easy to always look in the mirror. But it was a very, very, very different reaction than —

christina clusiau

We anticipated.

michael barbaro

Well, Christina and Shaul, thank you very much. We really appreciate it.

shaul schwarz

Thank you.

christina clusiau

Thank you.

michael barbaro

ICE has disputed Shaul and Christina’s account of efforts to block the film, “Immigration Nation,” from being released until after the election. In a statement to The Times, the agency said, quote, “The men and women of ICE perform outstanding work daily that often goes unnoticed or is misrepresented to the point of falsehood.” “ICE,” the statement continued, “is firmly committed to carrying out the agency’s sworn duty to enforce federal law as passed by Congress professionally, consistently and in full compliance with federal law and agency policies.

We’ll be right back.

Here’s what else you need to know today.

archived recording (jeff merkley)

It is apocalyptic. I drove 600 miles up and down the state. I never escaped the smoke. We have thousands of people who have lost their homes. I could never have envisioned this.

michael barbaro

At least 25 people have died from the wildfires in California, Washington and Oregon, where the fires have now consumed more than one million acres.

archived recording (jeff merkley)

The east winds came over the top of the mountain, proceeded to turn the fires into blow torches that went down and just incinerated a series of small towns, like Blue River and Phoenix and Talent. You have community after community with fairgrounds full of people, of refugees from the fires.

michael barbaro

In an interview with ABC News on Sunday, Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley blamed the fires on decades worth of climate change. And —

archived recording (alex villanueva)

Seeing somebody just walk up and just start shooting on them, it —

it pisses me off. It dismays me at the same time. And I — there’s no pretty way to say it.

michael barbaro

Authorities in Los Angeles are investigating what they said was the unprovoked shooting over the weekend of two sheriff’s deputies sitting in their patrol car in an incident caught on surveillance tape. The officers remain in critical condition. And the shooter remains at large. But Los Angeles Sheriff Alex Villanueva suggested that the ambush was linked to rising antipathy toward police.

archived recording (alex villanueva)

And this is just a somber reminder that this is — it’s a dangerous job. And, you know, actions, words have consequences. And our job does not get any easier because people don’t like law enforcement. It’s going to be a challenge day after day.

That’s it for “The Daily.” I’m Michael Barbaro. My colleague, Meghan Twohey will host tomorrow.

They followed Border Patrol tactical agents who took pride in rescuing migrants from deadly dehydration even as the agents acknowledged that their tactics were pushing the migrants further into harm’s way. They showed how the government had at times evaluated the success of its border policies based not only on the number of migrants apprehended, but on the number who died while crossing.

They followed refugees who fled their home countries because their lives were in danger, who had been vetted over several years before their number was called for resettlement in the United States. The filmmakers showed that after Mr. Trump was elected, many of those refugees with preliminarily approved cases were placed instead in indefinite administrative limbo to satisfy promises the president had made to cut refugee resettlement numbers.

They also tracked a grandmother who said she felt pressured during 17 months of detention to give up her asylum claim, which was based on death threats she had received in her home country after refusing to turn over her 12-year-old granddaughter to MS-13 gang members for a forced marriage.

Image
A still from the fifth episode in the series shows a woman at an El Paso detention center, where she had been for 17 months while seeking asylum because of death threats.Credit...Netflix

The filmmakers watched ICE officers on the front lines struggle with the impact of their work on immigrants and their families and cling to the notion that they were simply doing the job for which they were hired.

“I started seeing a lot of officers that I don’t think really believe in it,” Mr. Schwarz said. “But I think you hang on to this kind of stuff because it’s not fun to actually look in the mirror and think about the complexity of what you are a part of.”

Part of what makes the film unique is that the creators were allowed not only to enter certain detention facilities, but to interview people inside and then follow their cases through the labyrinthine immigration system. Typically, during the rare instances when journalists are allowed into government detention centers, they are barred from speaking to any detainees or staff members.

“There was a long time in production where I was feeling that you keep on perpetuating the narrative of people being in the shadows when you’re unable to show them,” Ms. Clusiau said. “I think that was a big part of wanting to get to the heart of these stories and really show people who they are.”

In the end, ICE’s leadership expressed frustration that the documentary, which was supposed to be about ICE officers, included the stories of so many immigrants.

The film showed several parents who were separated from their children at the border, including one father whose 3-year-old son had been pulled away in tears while clinging to his father’s leg.

One scene the agency sought to delete showed officers entering a home seeking a certain immigrant; they ended up arresting that person and two of his roommates, who had been asleep in bunk beds.

ICE officials told them that the scene revealed sensitive law enforcement tactics by showing a machine used for fingerprinting. The filmmakers pointed out that the same machine was featured on the agency’s website. Then, officials said the scene had to be deleted because some of the people shown in it had not signed privacy waivers. But those shown had each signed two different release forms, the filmmakers said, and the agency backed off.

ICE threatened to subpoena their raw footage of the scene in which an ICE agent picks the lock of an apartment building to reach the home of an immigrant who is being targeted for deportation, claiming there would almost certainly be an internal investigation into the incident, and that including the scene would cause the officer to get fired.

In the end, the conflicts were resolved by lawyers on both sides. Ms. Cook, the filmmakers’ legal representative, said her negotiations with government lawyers were much more amicable than those her clients faced when dealing with ICE.

“It became clear that they were trying to intimidate Shaul and Christina into telling what they thought would be a more favorable story,” she said. “This was not surprising since it was in keeping with the way we have seen the government attempt to silence others.”

The filmmakers said they came away with some empathy for the ICE officers, but became convinced that the entire system was harmful to immigrants and their families.

The problem, they said, was summarized in the first episode by Becca Heller, the director of the International Refugee Assistance Project.

“Is a government agency evil? No. Is every single person inside ICE evil? No,” Ms. Heller told the filmmakers. “The brilliance of the system is that their job has been siphoned off in such a way that maybe what they see day to day seems justified, but when you add it up, all of the people just doing their job, it becomes this crazy terrorizing system.”

Caitlin Dickerson is a Peabody Award-winning reporter based in New York who covers immigration. She has broken stories on asylum, detention and deportation policy, as well as the treatment of immigrant children in government custody.  More about Caitlin Dickerson

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section A, Page 1 of the New York edition with the headline: The Film ICE Doesn’t Want Americans to See. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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