Oct. 9, 2025Updated Oct. 11, 2025, 3:26 p.m. ETDays after Florida Highway Patrol and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement conducted a large-scale immigration enforcement raid inside the city of Pensacola, the agencies have not released any information about the action.The raid was the first in Pensacola since Gov. Ron DeSantis announced FHP would enforce immigration laws alongside federal agencies like ICE, and it's still not clear how many workers were arrested.The raid occurred at Outerspaces Landscapes at 500 E. Cross St. in the morning hours of Oct. 9.Several workers appeared to have been arrested. Video posted on social media shows ICE officers, some wearing masks and some not, alongside FHP officers at the business. The streets in a one-block area around the business were blocked by FHP during the raid.Detained workers were placed in a bus labeled "Escambia County Corrections."The News Journal has requested information about the raid from the Department of Homeland Security, ICE, FHP, and Escambia County. So far, Escambia County is the only agency to respond to the News Journal's request.Escambia County spokesperson Davis Wood told the News Journal that ICE requested transportation assistance from the county, but any further information about the operation would have to be released by ICE."Escambia County Corrections periodically provides resources by request for inter-agency operations where multiple arrests are possible, whether it’s a federal, state or local agency," Wood said.Video posted to social media also showed an Escambia County ambulance near the site, but Wood said that ambulance was responding to an unrelated call for service.Pensacola Police Department spokesperson Mike Wood told the News Journal that PPD was not involved in the raid, but one detective was on scene solely as an observer because it was occurring within the city limits.Ellis Bullock, owner of Outerspaces Landscapes, declined to comment to the News Journal on Oct. 9 until he could learn more about the situation.Grace Resendez McCaffery, publisher of the Spanish-language newspaper La Costa Latina and founder of the Hispanic Resource Center of Northwest Florida and South Alabama, told the News Journal that several workers were likely arrested at the site, including workers who had legal authorization to work in the United States.Resendez McCaffery said a woman called her from the bus where the detained workers had been placed. She said the woman was told by one ICE agent she wouldn't be arrested after showing her documentation, but another said to "take her anyway.""They’re not even distinguishing between documented and undocumented," Resendez McCaffery said.The woman later contacted Resendez McCaffery in the evening of Oct. 9, saying she had been released from ICE custody and was back home after being transported to FHP's Pensacola office, then an ICE facility in Mobile, Alabama. Other workers appear to have been booked in other Northwest Florida county jails like Santa Rosa County and Walton County.Resendez McCaffery said it's unclear how many workers were arrested, as she's had several families reach out to her. One report she received said it could be as many as 30, though she is not confident in that number. She said those detained were told they were being transported to the Escambia County jail. As of Oct. 10, families were still waiting for ICE's detainee locator website to provide them with information about where their family members were being held.Through her work with the Hispanic Resource Center of Northwest Florida and South Alabama, Resendez McCaffery has monitored the stepped-up immigration under the Trump administration. She noted that, although there have been other raids in Northwest Florida and many in Baldwin County, Alabama, this was the first large-scale raid to occur in Pensacola.The Escambia County Democratic Party released a statement on Oct. 10 condemning the raid that occurred a block away from the party's office and called it a "cruel and unnecessary display of intimidation.""Families in Escambia County are being torn apart under Donald Trump's wave of immigration raids," Escambia County Democratic Party Chair Derrick Scott said in a statement. "Our values are rooted in compassion, fairness, and keeping families together not ripping them apart."When appearing with DeSantis to announce the arrest of 200 people in late August as part of a four-day operation, Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles Executive Director Dave Kerner said the operation marked a new chapter in immigration enforcement in the state, and these operations will be standard operating procedure. Kerner added Florida hopes to export this model of immigration enforcement to other states."This is the way that it's going to be," Kerner said. "So our immigration units are going to be in every county full time. We're going to be in every community. We're going to touch every corner of this state, and we're going to do our job. And we're going to remove illegal immigrants."