PICUM: No to EU law enabling home raids, policing of public services and racial profiling

The EU is currently negotiating a Deportation (“Return”) Regulation to expand and normalise immigration raids and surveillance measures across our communities. They want to oblige Member States to “detect” undocumented people – turning everyday spaces, public services, and community interactions into tools of ICE-style immigration enforcement. In the US, this has already led to a public health crisis where undocumented people avoid accessing basic medical care for fear of being reported or kidnapped.

In practice, detection measures proposed by the Commission could result in (and indeed some of them are already happening in various EU member states):

• Police raids in private homes, enabling authorities to enter living spaces to search for undocumented migrants – without a judicial mandate – as well as offices and shelters run by humanitarian organisations.

• Police raids in public spaces – such France’s deployment of 4 000 police agents in June 2025 to carry out sweeping checks across bus and train stations, with the aim to arrest and detain undocumented people, or Belgium’s introduction of internal border checks on highways, stations and airports.

• Surveillance and technology – such as the collection of people’s personal data in bulk and exchanged between police forces across the EU and the use of biometric identification systems to track people’s movements and increase policing of undocumented migrants and racialised people.

• Mandatory reporting obligations imposed on public authorities – such as those that have been imposed on the social welfare office in Germany since the 1990s, or those under discussion in Sweden.

• Racial profiling – Checks and controls based on appearance, language or perceived origin, rather than individual conduct, leading to discriminatory targeting of racialised communities, already a routine practice in Europe.

This threat is real and immediate. The European Commission’s proposal explicitly promotes detection measures and, in December last year¹, Member States endorsed a position calling for even more harsh policies, including police raids on private homes to locate undocumented migrants.² Moreover, most of the political groups in the European Parliament, from the liberals to the far right, have presented amendments that support the mandatory inclusion of detection measures. 

Detection measures create fear, discrimination and persecution, and break social ties and communities. They deter people from accessing essential healthcare (including pregnancy-related care, chronic disease treatment and vaccinations), as well as education and social services; trap people in situations of violence, exploitation and abuse; erode trust between professionals and those they serve; enable racial profiling and systemic discrimination; and violate fundamental rights to privacy and data protection.

These risks have been raised at international level. On 26 January, 16 UN Special Rapporteurs, Independent Experts, and Working Groups, addressed a joint letter to the European Commission, the European Parliament, and the Council of the EU, warning that the proposed Deportation Regulation may impose reporting duties on professionals, discouraging access to essential services and undermining fundamental rights.

Embedding detection measures in binding EU legislation would fund, legitimise, expand and standardise them across Europe, and legitimise illegal practices like racial profiling. This would consolidate a punitive system, fuelled by far-right rhetoric and based on racialised suspicion, denunciation, detention and deportation. Rather than protecting fundamental rights, the EU is on course to codify an ideology of criminalisation that targets people simply because of their administrative situation.

Europe knows from its own history where systems of surveillance, scapegoating and control can lead.

We call on policymakers, public authorities, public service workers, civil society organisations and communities across Europe to reject detection in all its forms, and to mobilise against policies that criminalise people on the basis of their residence status and erode fundamental rights for all.

The European Commission, the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union must listen to these concerns and reject the Deportation Regulation.

FOR ORGANISATIONS: SIGN THE STATEMENT HERE

Total Signatories: 112

(last update June 2026)

European networks/organisations:

1. Access Now
2. Border Violence Monitoring Network
3. Bridge EU
4. End FGM European Network
5. Equinox Initiative for Racial Justice
6. Eurochild
7. European Disability Forum
8. European Federation of National Organisations Working with the Homeless (FEANTSA)
9. European Federation of Public Service Unions (EPSU)
10. Europe Must Act
11. European AIDS Treatment Group
12. European Network Against Racism (ENAR)
13. European Network on Independent Living
14. European Network on Statelessness (ENS)
15. European Roma Grassroots Organisations (ERGO) Network
16. European Sex Workers’ Rights Alliance (ESWA)
17. ILGA-Europe
18. International Planned Parenthood Federation – European Network (IPPF EN)
19. Jesuit Refugee Service Europe
20. Migreurop
21. Missing Children Europe
22. Médecins du Monde International Network
23. Oxfam
24. Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants (PICUM)
25. Quaker Council for European Affairs
26. Statewatch
27. Trans Europe and Central Asia (TGEU)
28. Women Against Violence Europe (WAVE) Network

National organisations:

29. 11.11.11
30. Africa Advocacy Foundation
31. Algeciras Acoge
32. AlgorithmWatch
33. Apoyo Positivo
34. ARCI
35. Asociación Evangélica Nueva Vida
36. Asociación Madrileña de Salud Pública (AMaSaP)
37. Associació del Garraf per la República
38. Association for Integration and Migration (SIMI)
39. Association for Juridical Studies on Immigration (ASGI)
40. Caritas diocesana di Pesaro
41. Centro Sociale Ex Canapificio
42. Cesida (National Coordinator of HIV and AIDS)
43. CGT Ofpra
44. Circuit asbl
45. CIRÉ
46. Civil Rights Defenders
47. CNCD-11.11.11
48. Col·lectiu Agudells
49. Collective Aid
50. Community Rights in Greece
51. Consorzio Italiano di Solidarietà (ICS)
52. Convenzione dei Diritti nel Mediterraneo
53. Coordinamento Fiorentino contro il Riarmo
54. Coordinamento Nazionale Comunità Accoglienti (CNCA)
55. COSPE
56. CSC Brussels
57. Defence for Children International Czechia
58. Defence for Children International Italy
59. Défense des Enfants International Belgique
60. Dynamo International
61. Emmaus Italia ETS
62. Europasilo – Rete Nazionale per il Diritto d’Asilo
63. Federación SOS Racismo
64. Finnish Refugee Advice Centre
65. Fondazione Città Solidale ETS
66. Forum Per Cambiare l’Ordine delle Cose
67. Fucina per la Nonviolenza
68. Fundación Cruz Blance
69. Fundación Entreculturas
70. Fundación de Solidaridad Amaranta
71. Greek Council for Refugees (GCR)
72. Gruppo Melitea
73. Hermes Center
74. Humanity On the Move Association
75. Institute Novact for Nonviolence
76. International Child Development Initiatives
77. Irídia-Center for the defense of human rights
78. Iuventa – Jugend rettet
79. Jesuit Refugee Service Portugal
80. KISA – Action for Equality, Support, Antiracism
81. La Cimade
82. Missing Voices (REER)
83. Mission Lifeline International e.V.
84. Mobile Info Team
85. Movimiento de Mujeres Migrantes de Extremadura
86. Mujeres Supervivientes
87. M.V. Louise Michel
88. No Name Kitchen
89. Ocalenie Foundation
90. Plataforma de Infancia
91. Pilotes Volontaires
92. Progetto Accoglienza e Integrazione Un sole per tutti
93. Red Acoge
94. Red de Mujeres Latinoamericanas y del Caribe
95. Refugees in Libya
96. Rete Vesuviana Solidale
97. Right to Protection Charitable Foundation
98. RiVolti ai Balcani – Diritti in Movimento
99. Salvamento Marítimo Humanitario (SMH)
100. Sea-Watch e.V
101. Sharazade – Cultura e spettacolo senza frontiere
102. SolidarityNow
103. Solidary Wheels
104. Stichting LOS
105. Studio legale D’apruzzo
106. The Swedish IMER Association
107. Tunisian Forum for Economic and Social Rights FTDES
108. Verlata SOC. COOP. SOCIALE A R.L.
109. Vluchtelingenwerk Vlaanderen
110. Watch the Med AlarmPhone
111. WILPF Italia
112. WISH (Women in Solidarity House)

1. Article 6, Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and the Council, establishing a common system for the return of third-country nationals staying illegally in the Union, and repealing Directive 2008/115/EC of the European Parliament and the Council, Council Directive 2001/40/EC and Council Decision 2004/191/EC.  ↩︎
2. Article 23(a), “Investigative measures” Council General Approach on the Return Regulation proposal.  ↩︎