The Trump administration significantly ramped up its clash over immigration with officials at the state and local level on Friday after FBI agents arrested a county judge in Milwaukee, accusing her of obstructing an immigration arrest.
“Just NOW, the FBI arrested Judge Hannah Dugan out of Milwaukee, Wisconsin on charges of obstruction — after evidence of Judge Dugan obstructing an immigration arrest operation last week,” FBI Director Kash Patel posted Friday morning on the social media site known as X.
“We believe Judge Dugan intentionally misdirected federal agents away from the subject to be arrested in her courthouse, Eduardo [Flores-Ruiz], allowing the subject — an illegal alien — to evade arrest,” Patel added. “Thankfully, our agents chased down the perp on foot and he’s been in custody since, but the Judge’s obstruction created increased danger to the public.”
Brady McCarron, deputy chief of public affairs for the U.S. Marshals Service, confirmed that Dugan, a Milwaukee County circuit judge, was arrested by the FBI at 8:30 a.m. Friday.
Dugan was charged with “obstruction or impeding a proceeding before a department or agency of the United States” and “concealing an individual to prevent his discovery and arrest,” according to a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin.
An FBI special agent assigned to the Milwaukee Field Office said in an affidavit that Flores-Ruiz was charged on March 18 in Milwaukee with battery, domestic abuse and infliction of physical pain or injury. Agents from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Enforcement and Removal Operations subsequently identified Flores-Ruiz, a Mexican citizen, as “not lawfully in the United States” and obtained a warrant for his arrest.
But when ICE agents came to Dugan’s courthouse April 18 to arrest Flores-Ruiz following his criminal court appearance, the affidavit said, Dugan became “visibly angry” and commented that the situation was “absurd.”
According to the affidavit, Dugan approached a deportation officer with a “confrontational, angry demeanor.” After asking officers from the arrest team whether they had a judicial warrant and demanding that they speak with the chief judge, Dugan then escorted Flores-Ruiz and his counsel out of the courtroom through a back “jury door,” which leads to a nonpublic area of the courthouse.
Flores-Ruiz was chased down by FBI and DEA agents outside the courthouse. After a foot chase, he was arrested.
A week later, Dugan was arrested inside the courthouse.
Dugan appeared in federal court on Friday before being released from custody. During the roughly four-minute hearing, court records show prosecutors advised Judge Stephen Dries that they would present the case to the grand jury and were not seeking to keep Dugan in custody. Dugan’s attorney, Craig Mastantuono, told the court her arrest was not made in the interest of public safety.
Dugan is scheduled to appear in court again May 15.
Since Donald Trump took office in January after campaigning on a platform of clamping down on immigration, his administration has moved swiftly to investigate and prosecute local officials who do not go along with its federal immigration enforcement priorities.
Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the UC Berkeley School of Law, said it’s highly unusual for the government to prosecute a judge for this type of conduct, particularly when it was able to apprehend the person it was initially seeking to arrest.
“I think this is an attempt by the Trump administration to send a message with regard to how aggressive they’re going to be in enforcing immigration law,” Chemerinsky said. “It’s a message to judges that this administration has little respect for the judiciary and isn’t going to let the judiciary get in the way of what it wants to do.”
In a statement to WisPolitics, a political news service, Chief Judge Carl Ashley said he could not comment on Dugan’s arrest. “The judicial code of conduct restricts judges from commenting on pending or impending matters in any court,” he said. “Judge Dugan’s court calendar will be covered by another judge as needed.”
Several local and federal Wisconsin politicians issued statements Friday condemning federal authorities for arresting Dugan, who oversees misdemeanor cases in Milwaukee County.
Milwaukee Common Council Member Peter Burgelis said that Dugan serves the community with “integrity, intellect and an unwavering dedication to constitutional values,” and is a “model of what public service should look like: fair, principled and rooted in justice.”
He said the arrest was shocking and that the public needs to reflect on Dugan’s reputation for defending due process.
“No one is above the law, but no one is beneath it either,” Burgelis wrote. “Judge Dugan deserves the same fair and impartial treatment that she has long ensured for others.”
Rep. Gwen Moore (D-Wis.) said that Dugan’s arrest had “all the hallmarks of overreach” and U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) said that the arrest of a sitting judge is “a gravely serious and drastic move” that threatens to breach the country’s system of checks and balances and separations of power.
“Make no mistake, we do not have kings in this country and we are a Democracy governed by laws that everyone must abide by,” she wrote. “By relentlessly attacking the judicial system, flouting court orders and arresting a sitting judge, this president is putting those basic Democratic values that Wisconsinites hold dear on the line.”
According to a 2022 judicial candidate biography, Dugan practiced at Legal Action of Wisconsin and the Legal Aid Society as a litigation attorney before she was elected. While in private civil practice, she also led several major local nonprofits. She has also taught law as a clinical supervisor and adjunct professor at Marquette University.
This is not the first time that Trump’s administration has moved to penalize a local judge.
In 2019, during Trump’s first presidency, a Massachusetts District Court judge, Shelley Joseph, was federally indicted by the Justice Department on obstruction of justice charges after preventing an ICE officer from taking custody of a defendant who was undocumented. The charges were dropped in 2022 after the judge agreed to refer herself to a forum designed to investigate and address judicial misconduct. In late 2024, the commission filed formal disciplinary charges against Joseph alleging that she engaged in willful judicial misconduct. Joseph has denied any wrongdoing.
Since Trump returned to the White House in January, he has repeatedly lashed out at judges over unfavorable court orders.
In March, Trump wrote on the online platform Truth Social that U.S. District Judge James Boasberg should be impeached. He referred to Boasberg as a “radical left lunatic” and “troublemaker and agitator” after the judge ordered the administration to halt its efforts to deport Venezuelan nationals.
In another post March 20, Trump accused judges of trying to “assume the powers of the presidency.”
“Unlawful Nationwide Injunctions by Radical Left Judges could very well lead to the destruction of our Country!” he said. “These people are Lunatics, who do not care, even a little bit, about the repercussions from their very dangerous and incorrect Decisions and Rulings.”
