Two deadly ICE shootings in one week reignite concerns about federal immigration enforcement

A fatal shooting Monday involving Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Maine marked the second such incident in six days, reignited concerns about the mission of federal immigration agencies after two civilian deaths in Minnesota this past winter sparked outrage and forced the Trump administration to scale back efforts.

The most recent incident occurred in the morning hours in Biddeford, Maine. As of Monday evening, exactly what happened was still unclear, including whether the victim, whose name had still not been released, was an illegal migrant and if ICE had a warrant.

"We are grieving. We are furious, and we will not allow his death to be treated as routine or inevitable," said Mufalo Chitam, executive director of the Maine Immigrants' Rights Coalition. "How much more harm must our communities endure before those with the power to act acknowledge that this has gone too far?”

The group has also identified the victim as a 26-year-old male from Colombia.

A video circulating on social media shows a car with bullet holes in the front windshield and officers tending to a person on the ground. The incident is being investigated by the FBI.   

The Maine shooting followed a similar incident July 7 in Houston in which 52-year-old Lorenzo Salgado Araujo was fatally shot by an ICE agent. 

The agency said its officers were trying to conduct a vehicle stop as part of a targeted enforcement operation to arrest an illegal migrant and that Salgado Araujo attempted to evade them. 

ICE also said Salgado Araujo rammed an ICE law enforcement vehicle, refused to follow multiple verbal commands, and weaponized his vehicle in an attempt to run over an ICE law enforcement officer – who in attempting to protect himself, colleagues and bystanders “discharged his weapon in self-defense.”

As with the incident in Maine, at least so far, there is no video of the shooting. Agents were not wearing body cameras and others in the vehicle with Salgado Araujo did not record the shooting. 

The back-to-back shootings follow months of relative calm regarding federal immigration enforcement operations after the two civilians were fatally shot weeks apart in January in Minneapolis by federal immigration officers as part of a large-scale operation known as Operation Metro Surge.

Renee Good was fatally shot January 7 by an ICE agent as she tried to drive away and appeared to clip the officer. On January 24, Alex Pretti, who was wearing a registered sidearm, was fatally shot by a Customs and Border Patrol agent when he got involved in a law-enforcement operation.

Those incidents returned to the national spotlight just hours after the incident in the city of Biddeford, roughly 15 miles southwest of Portland.

Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison and Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said federal authorities have begun turning over evidence to state investigators after months of withholding information regarding the cases.

"I remain deeply troubled that the federal government spent more than half a year attempting to conceal this evidence from state investigators, and I hope this is the beginning of a major course correction on the part of the federal government," Ellison said.

Houston officials have raised similar complaints, saying federal investigators have shut them out of the investigation into Salgado Araujo's death. 

“They have the evidence,” Houston Mayor John Whitmire said, according to CNN. “And in this instance, the van, the passengers, the deceased, and they’re tightly controlling it. We’ve reached out to them and asked them to share that information."

The Minnesota killings resulted in significant changes to federal immigration enforcement operations, leading to relative calm until recently.

Kristi Noem and Gregory Bovino stepped down from their respective positions as Homeland Security secretary and Border Patrol chief in the aftermath of the Minnesota operation. 

President Trump later appointed former ICE Director Tom Homan, who serves as the administration's "border czar," to oversee federal immigration enforcement efforts in Minneapolis.

Trump has acknowledged concerns surrounding the Minnesota shootings while at the same time defending his broader immigration agenda.

"He was not an angel, and she was not an angel," Trump said about Pretti and Good during an interview with NBC News. "But still, I'm not happy with what happened there."

Trump also said, following the public backlash from the deaths, that his administration would continue its immigration enforcement nationwide, including mass deportation, but they may require "a little bit of a softer touch" in certain circumstances.

​There had been 10 recorded fatalities from federal immigration officer-involved shootings nationwide since Trump took office and before the Maine incident, according to reporting from the Guardian. The Maine shooting marks the 11th fatality.