Federal authorities from several agencies made 57 arrests during a September 2025 immigration raid at the Nutrition Bar Confectioners plant in Cato, New York, according to body-camera footage analyzed by The Associated Press. The video, made public as part of a lawsuit filed Thursday, shows officers searching the factory, questioning employees and deciding when to release workers who were U.S. citizens.
Officers arrived after 9 a.m. at the factory in the town of 2,500 people east of Syracuse and briefly discussed forcing entry before a manager opened the front door. They directed the manager to announce their presence over loudspeakers, covered the exits and moved through production areas, the warehouse, offices, storage rooms, hallways and bathrooms while looking for people in hiding.
At a locked bathroom, male officers shouted instructions in broken Spanish to female employees and broke through the door after about 10 seconds. One woman was outside a stall, while another was sitting on the toilet behind a locked stall door when a male officer looked through it. The footage records the officer telling her to pull up her pants and leave the bathroom as she protested that she could not come out naked.
Investigators interviewed the general manager and said they were examining hiring practices and possible fraudulent documents. Employees were lined up and separated into groups of U.S. citizens and potential noncitizens. Officers asked about immigration status, requested documents and questioned workers about how they entered the United States. Some employees were pregnant, and some parents expressed concern about children at home.
Workers who said they would not answer questions before speaking with attorneys were told they would be arrested. In one recorded exchange, an employee asked, “Will you let me talk to my attorney?” The officer raised his voice and continued asking about her immigration status. U.S. citizens were required to provide personal information, including telephone numbers and addresses, before they were permitted to leave.
The lawsuit filed Thursday alleges that authorities overstepped their search warrants during the operation. The body-camera recordings provide a detailed view of how officers conducted the workplace sweep, including their searches behind locked doors, treatment of employees and efforts to distinguish U.S. citizens from potential noncitizens.