Native American actor says she was detained by ICE officers who said tribal ID ‘looked fake’ | ICE (US Immigration and Customs Enforcement)
A Native American actor known for his role in Northern Exposure said he was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers in Seattle, Washington, and that officers told him his tribal ID “looked fake.”
Local actor Elaine Miles claims she was stopped by four masked men as she walked toward a bus stop in Redmond. He gave them his identification card from the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation in Oregon, but was told by an ICE agent that “anyone can do that.”
Miles, who also starred in the films The Last of Us, Smoke Signals, The Business of Fancydancing and Skins, told ICE representatives to call the tribal registration office number on the card.
According to the match report by Seattle TimesThe officers refused. Miles called the office himself, whereupon an officer tried unsuccessfully to take his phone. The men then released him, got into their vehicle and left.
Miles claims something similar happened to his son and uncle; they had previously been detained by ICE officers who did not accept their tribal identification and were later released.
According to a post Facebook Miles told the group as part of the Lakota People’s Law Project: “Tribal IDs; the government gave us those damn cards like a purebred dog! It’s not fake!”
Miles’ statement dovetails with other Native Americans caught up in the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigrants. Native News Online reports A local woman born in Phoenix was reportedly mistakenly detained by immigration authorities after being released from prison in Des Moines, Iowa.
“We’re talking about racial profiling here,” Seattle-based Indigenous rights attorney Gabriel Galanda told the Seattle newspaper. “People are pulled over or detained on the street because of the dark color of their skin.”
Galanda said the agents’ refusal to acknowledge Miles’ identity points to “quite a bit of ignorance in the community and in the government about tribal citizenship.”
According to media reports, the actor’s encounter with ICE agents occurred the same day that ICE agents made several arrests at Redmond’s Bear Creek Village shopping mall, prompting the city council to turn off license plate-reading cameras.
Earlier this year, the Navajo nation announced it was taking steps to protect its community from federal immigration actions amid reports that some Native Americans had been seized in U.S. deportation raids.
Miles said that after he was taken into custody, he was now afraid of leaving the house alone or at night. Galanda said the possibility of Native Americans being detained is a reminder of the country’s troubled history with Native peoples.
“It is also deeply troubling that in 2025 the first people of this country will essentially have to look over their shoulders,” he added.
