A U.S. Army spokeswoman on Monday confirmed that a handful of active-duty members were among those taken into custody as a part of a large immigration raid at a Colorado Springs makeshift nightclub early Sunday.
The Army said their cases will be handled internally and stressed they were “innocent until proven guilty.”
The soldiers may be the only U.S. citizens who face consequences as a result of the early-morning raid Sunday that increasingly looks like a broad enforcement of civil immigration laws rather than a police effort to get drugs off the street or arrest dealers.
More than 100 people were detained in the raid at an events facility in southeast Colorado Springs. But federal officials acknowledged that almost all were placed in immigration detention for possible deportation in the future.
Federal officials took to multiple social media accounts Sunday and Monday, boasting that more than 100 people had been turned over to immigration officials and were inside a party at the facility using drugs and committing sex acts. They furnished no proof of any of those allegations on Monday.
Authorities did not announce how much, if any, narcotics were seized. But the seemingly small haul didn’t deter some of the nation’s highest-ranking law enforcement officials from going online to tout the effort.
As with a previous DEA raid in January in Commerce City that didn’t result in any criminal charges, DEA Special Agent in Charge Jonathan Pullen said people were “dumping the drugs” when they got inside so it would have been hard to find criminal blame.
Videos and statements posted on various X accounts showed dozens of men and women spilling out of an abandoned building at 4 a.m. with their hands raised. Some immediately got down on their knees and put their hands behind their heads.
Officials say more than 300 law enforcement officers, from the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Drug Enforcement Administration, among others, were on scene.
U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said on X that a number of those inside the club were gang member “terrorists” and noted that cocaine, methamphetamine and pink cocaine were seized.
So far, no federal or local criminal charges have been filed against anyone. A spokeswoman from the U.S. Attorney’s Office declined to comment on the raid. Bondi noted that two people, amid more than 100, inside the club had existing warrants.
DEA Special Agent in Charge Jonathan Pullen told reporters early Sunday morning that Colorado Springs was safer as a result of his agents’ work.
“This is an underground illegal nightclub, there was significant drug trafficking, prostitution, crimes of violence, we had active duty service officers running security at the club,” he said at sunrise, near the scene on Sunday. “We had more than 100 illegal aliens at the club and they were taken into custody by ICE.”
Pullen, who has previously acknowledged that sending people through immigration proceedings is easier than proving criminal cases in court, said there were “more than a dozen” active-duty service members in the club during the raid -- either as “patrons” of the club or working as armed security.
“Only those here illegally or those with warrants were taken into custody,” a DEA statement said later. “Most partygoers were eventually released.”
Army Criminal Investigations officials were on the scene and Emily Peacock, a spokeswoman for Fort Carson Garrison Public Affairs, acknowledged “there were some Fort Carson service members present at the location during the operation.”
“Each person involved in this incident is presumed innocent until proven guilty,” she said in an emailed statement. “We will look at everyone’s situation on a case-by-case basis. Illegal activities of any kind do not represent our military values.”
The building targeted in Colorado Springs is in a strip mall – but isn’t far from a neighborhood.
Erica DeBoer is unhoused and was nearby when she woke up around 4 a.m. to the sound of what she thought was gunfire. It turned out to be paint guns, which, she said, seemed like officers were using to black out security cameras.
She said it wasn’t the first time people had gathered in the building to party near where she is sleeping.
“Every weekend you’d hear the music,” she said, noting she sometimes heard arguments or fights breaking out late at night in the parking lot.
She was ushered across the street by local police at around 4 a.m. and was able to come back and retrieve her belongings at around 10 a.m.
This isn’t the first time a makeshift party was raided by the DEA that resulted in far more deportation cases than criminal charges.
In January, the DEA shut down a club on north Federal Boulevard in Adams County, which they said was tied to drug trafficking and narco distribution operations. They also said it was heavily attended by Venezuelan gang members. They never ended up filing any criminal charges on that case, and immigration lawyers have said a number of those detained by ICE and billed as gang members aren’t actually gang members at all.
One Venezuelan man who was picked up in that Adams County raid has since become part of a lawsuit seeking to prevent his removal from Colorado to a prison in El Salvador.
A federal judge in Denver has blocked the Trump administration from using the Alien Enemies Act as pretext to remove people from the U.S. without immigration proceedings. That case is on appeal now to the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
| This story is part of a collection tracking the impacts of President Donald Trump’s second administration on the lives of everyday Coloradans. Since taking office, Trump has overhauled nearly every aspect of the federal government; journalists from CPR News, KRCC and Denverite are staying on top of what that means for you. Read more here. |
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