WEST PALM BEACH, Florida — In an incident that encapsulates the United States’ deepening descent into authoritarian immigration enforcement, an 18-year-old American citizen was violently arrested by border agents during a traffic stop in Florida, dragged from his car, assaulted, and illegally detained — all while repeatedly asserting his citizenship.
Kenny Laynez-Ambrosio, born in the United States and holding valid documentation, was stopped on May 2 in North Palm Beach while traveling with his mother and two undocumented passengers. His mother, who was driving on a suspended license, was pulled over by local police. But what should have been a routine citation quickly turned into a nightmarish federal overreach.
Within minutes, officers from U.S. Customs and Border Protection descended on the vehicle. Video footage secretly recorded by Laynez-Ambrosio showed officers tasing him, punching him, and dragging him out of the vehicle in front of his screaming mother. At one point, an agent told the teen, “You’ve got no rights.” He was held in handcuffs for six hours and then slapped with an obstruction charge — a charge his legal team says is retaliatory punishment for filming the abuse.
The situation has sparked outrage among civil rights organizations and legal scholars, who call the incident a textbook case of racial profiling, constitutional violation, and the use of immigration enforcement as a cudgel against citizens — particularly Latino ones — who “look foreign.”
Despite providing documentation and asserting his citizenship at every stage, Laynez-Ambrosio was treated as a “deportable body” rather than a rights-bearing citizen. One Border Patrol agent, unaware he was being recorded, boasted that he’d earn a “$30,000 bonus” — suggesting an unspoken incentive structure behind federal detentions. The video evidence not only corroborates the abuse but underscores how profit and racism now drive enforcement priorities.
Worse still, this is not an isolated case. The state of Florida has increasingly become a staging ground for anti-immigrant hysteria, amplified under policies championed by both state and federal actors. The notorious “Alligator Alcatraz” detention center — a sprawling Everglades compound plagued with reports of sewage leaks, medical neglect, and psychological torture — opened last month to fast-track deportations. There, hundreds of migrants, many with pending asylum claims, are subjected to squalid and violent conditions while the state boasts of its deportation “efficiency.”
The deeply disturbing arrest of Laynez-Ambrosio throws into sharp relief how U.S. immigration enforcement has blurred the lines between law and lawlessness, between due process and dystopia. The Constitution becomes a suggestion, not a safeguard, when federal agents decide someone “looks” undocumented.
Legal experts warn the broader message is unmistakable: that in today’s America, even citizens — if brown, poor, or unlucky enough — are not safe from state-sanctioned abuse. Kenny Laynez-Ambrosio’s story is no anomaly. It’s the rule in a country rapidly hollowing out its democratic core under the guise of border security.
According to The Guardian, Laynez-Ambrosio was released six hours later, but not before being charged and traumatized. Civil rights groups are now demanding a federal investigation into CBP’s use of force, its adherence to legal standards regarding citizen detentions, and any possible incentive bonuses tied to arrests.
