Free Speech For People, a national nonpartisan legal advocacy organization, today submitted requests urging Vermont Attorney General Charity Clark and Chittenden County State’s Attorney Sarah George to open criminal investigations into the unlawful actions of federal agents operating in Vermont.

The submission details a series of unlawful acts by ICE agents on March 11, 2026, after they incorrectly identified a Vermont resident as someone with a warrant out for his arrest. Federal officers engaged in a dangerous chase in a busy street, obtained a warrant to enter a house despite local law enforcement warnings that doing so was not safe and without knowing whether the person in the house was the person they had a warrant to arrest, and ultimately used excessive force both in arresting the individual and two bystanders—none of whom had a warrant out for their arrest—and in dispersing protesters.

“Federal agents did not execute this warrant or arrest these individuals to enforce immigration laws,” said Courtney Hostetler, Legal Director for Free Speech For People. “Federal agents were in Vermont to terrorize a community and to attempt to demonstrate that they can act with impunity. Vermont officials must stand prepared to protect their residents from these abuses.”

“When federal agents intentionally trample on people’s civil rights in violation of state criminal laws, state prosecutors have the power and duty to bring charges; this is doubly so now where the U.S. Department of Justice is complicit in those violations,” said Ben Clements, Chairman and Senior Legal Advisor at Free Speech For People and a former federal prosecutor.

Free Speech For People emphasizes that while federal prosecutors have been compromised by the administration’s own misconduct, state and local authorities retain independent jurisdiction to investigate and prosecute crimes committed within their borders.

“The federal government has made it clear that it will not allow serious internal investigations of its officers,” said Ben Horton, Counsel at Free Speech For People. “Vermont’s prosecutors are one of the only other sources of accountability in these circumstances.”

Read the letter here.