Asked a simple question, whether its officers had broken the rules by using racial slurs, the Department of Homeland Security offered everything except an answer. New court filings in a California civil-rights case allege that federal immigration agents referred to Latinos with racial slurs during last year's mass enforcement sweeps, citing body-camera footage and text messages. According to evidence, officers referred to Hispanic and Latino people using terms widely recognised as anti-Latino slurs, among them 'wets' and 'tonks'. Their appearance in official footage and internal messages is what the plaintiffs say lays bare the mindset behind the stops. The refusal to engage with the policy question is itself notable, because DHS, like most law-enforcement bodies, maintains conduct standards that ordinarily prohibit the use of racial slurs by officers on duty.