Immigration attorneys have accused the Trump administration of ignoring the Constitution to empower ICE agents in California with broad authority for demographic profiling—relying on “incorrect” and “contradictory” arguments rooted in a “misinterpretation” of a federal judge’s ruling and current laws, as stated on Monday.

“They lack any legal basis for their unprecedented argument that simply facing a preliminary injunction hearing constitutes irreparable harm,” stated lawyers from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and other advocacy organizations in a legal opposition filing on Monday. This is part of a lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security and Secretary Kristi Noem, representing individuals claimed to have been unlawfully stopped and detained during ICE operations in Los Angeles.

The groups filed the brief with U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in opposition to a government motion to stay a lower court order that blocks ICE from conducting “roving” immigration raids, during which agents stop and detain “anyone on suspicion of being unlawfully present in the United States,” per the injunction.

“Relief is immediately warranted to nip this unconstitutional encroachment in the bud,” the Justice Department concluded in its emergency motion.

Immigration lawyers rebuked the DOJ’s filing and arguments in their response, condemning them as “unavailing” and vague, while praising U.S. District Judge Maame Ewusi-Mensah Frimpong’s July 11 order “to protect plaintiffs’ rights” as being appropriately “narrow,” per the brief.

“Their motion is based on a misreading of the order and applicable law and identifies no harm that could justify the extraordinary relief they seek,” the opposition filing said, alleging that the declaration “does not refute the challenged policy” and says nothing about the plaintiffs themselves.

“Defendants submitted a new declaration with their stay motion in an effort to defend the seizures of plaintiffs … But that declaration states only that the detentions of each of those plaintiffs ‘arose or were the result of a targeted enforcement action at a particular location where past surveillance and intelligence had confirmed that the target or individuals associated with him were observed to have recruited illegal aliens to work on landscaping jobs,'” according to the immigration lawyers. “It cannot be that a non-White, Spanish-speaking person’s mere presence at a bus stop — where someone else, associated with different people who lacked legal status, was present at an earlier time — can justify a deprivation of liberty. And, indeed, that is not the law.”

The Trump administration asked the 9th Circuit earlier this month for permission to continue warrantless arrests in Southern California as part of its controversial immigration enforcement efforts.

In a 51-page filing, the DOJ requested emergency relief in the form of an immediate administrative stay, as well as a broader stay pending appeal of the underlying case, to pause the temporary restraining order issued by Frimpong, a Joe Biden appointee. The crux of the dispute has been both the factual way ICE agents are conducting immigration sweeps in the nation’s second largest city and the executive branch’s basic legal authority to conduct such sweeps. One of the government’s central arguments is that it was not given enough time to prepare.

The ACLU and other advocacy groups noted Monday how the district court said it reviewed a “mountain of evidence” documenting the government’s alleged practice of violating the Fourth Amendment during its “roving” immigration patrols. “The government rebutted none of it,” according to the opposition filing.

The Trump administration, per its motion to stay Frimpong’s order, has settled on the argument that her TRO is “confusing” and therefore “will have a chilling effect” on immigration enforcement. The plaintiffs, however, note how the injunction has been in place for 10 days and the government does not “point to any evidence that lawful enforcement is being hampered in any way.”

Writing in the brief Monday, the groups said: “Defendants ask this court to ‘nip’ any further remedial actions the district court might take ‘in the bud.’ But they offer no authority for the novel proposition that merely having to litigate a preliminary-injunction motion constitutes irreparable harm.”

They added that if the Trump administration is not relying “solely on broad profiles” to form reasonable suspicion, then it will have “little difficulty obeying the order.” If they are engaging in such a pattern of “unlawful detentive stops,” as the district court found, then the order is ultimately necessary, according to the immigration groups.

“The district court agreed with plaintiffs and applied settled law to protect their rights,” they concluded. “This court should leave that order in place.”