DOJ Files a Suit Against Maryland and Prince George's and Montgomery Counties Over Federal-Agent Mask and ID Laws

The United States brings this civil action for declaratory and injunctive relief against the State of Maryland, Attorney General Anthony Brown, the Maryland Police Training and Standards Commission, Prince George’s County and Montgomery County in the District of Maryland (docketed 10/01/26, Judge Julie Rebecca Rubin). The complaint challenges a state law that bans facial coverings for federal law-enforcement officers and requires identification, which the complaint says the General Assembly passed on April 13, 2026, and the counties’ parallel codes, including Montgomery County’s “Unmask ICE Act.” It rests on intergovernmental immunity under the Supremacy Clause, and DOJ moved for a preliminary injunction the same day.

The complaint quotes a letter from Maryland’s Attorney General to the Governor: “there is a high likelihood that a court would find that application of SB 1’s face-covering prohibition” to federal officers would violate the Supremacy Clause. This is DOJ’s quotation; the letter itself was not read in this pass.

This is a separate case from DOJ’s earlier suit over Maryland’s Community Trust Act. The court has set a hearing on the motions; its date and the earlier case’s briefing are on the CourtListener dockets and are tracked in the cascade-solidarity entry for this suit. No ruling had been entered on the RECAP copy read on the day of this entry’s research.