They're unidentified, no badge number, no unit number, no identifier of the branch of government they belong to, and by unmarked cars I should have been clearer, literally civilian cars with seemingly no law-enforcement modifications/attachment.
There are videos of people just getting picked up for seemingly no reason.
Idk. I think they've gone a little bit too far down the
urban war fighter / special forces persona but I've seen 'police' velcro tags, (subdued) agency identifiers and radio /call signs identifiers on their (camo) uniforms in most pictures. I'd fully expect them to announce / verbalize "police" or "federal agent" when making an arrest however.
CBP / USBP likely doesn't maintain a fleet in the areas they find themselves thrust into for nebulous reasons. .Those could very well be rentals or admin cars from the federal parks service for all we know. It would sort of be silly if regulations mandated black/grey Ford Taurus with 8" aerial mounted on the roof or the perp gets a freebie on a technical foul.
The feds clearly don't care very much about the state's usual MO or guidelines on uniforms/ vehicles, that's for sure.
Making an arrest within a crowd is likely to cause injuries to their personnel / the public so I could see "low key" and the element of surprise being favored as an alternative. It speaks to the fact that there is probably a lot of surveillance / intel processing behind the scenes.
I think protesters may have been operating under the belief that they're untouchable within a group setting and that there is no willpower at the municipal level to intervene. This would be intended to drive the point home that they can be found and held accountable just the same. There's definitely a "message" being sent here.
I still think it's theatrics and a misguided show of force for the most part. Do I think it's good "governance" Nah.
But I wouldn't default to all of it being "unfounded" or labeling this as extraordinary rendition with the suspension of habeas corpus. I don't think people are going to "black sites"