A Colombian man was fatally shot by an ICE agent this morning in Biddeford, Maine. Sen. Angus King says he was told the man had “weaponized” his vehicle when the shooting occurred.
Transcript
AILSA CHANG, HOST:
An Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer shot and killed a man in Maine today. According to the office of independent Maine Senator Angus King, the victim was a man in his 20s, and he was not the target of the warrant that ICE was trying to serve. Maine Public’s immigration reporter Ari Snider has been following this story and joins us now. Hi, Ari.
ARI SNIDER, BYLINE: Hi, Ailsa.
CHANG: Hi. OK. Can you just take us through what happened today?
SNIDER: Yeah. So we first heard about this shooting this morning in Biddeford. It’s a small city about 20, 25 minutes from Portland. We’ve got a reporter who lives in Biddeford, so he was able to get to the scene very quickly. A couple others of us hustled down there as quick as we could. And the story that my colleagues and I heard from witnesses and neighbors was that an ICE agent had shot and killed someone in a car. And then, as the morning went on, we had that story corroborated from state officials and immigrant rights groups. They were saying that the man was in his 20s and from Colombia, and I’ve also been hearing that he has a partner and a young child.
CHANG: And now you know from Senator King’s office that this man who was shot to death this morning was not the man that ICE agents were looking to remove from the country, right? Well, what kind of explanation are we hearing as to how this all happened?
SNIDER: Well, in short, no detailed explanation as of yet. That piece about the victim not being the target of the warrant – we just learned that from a spokesperson for Senator Angus King’s office. That’s very, very new information and…
CHANG: OK.
SNIDER: …Basically, he told us that the victim was, quote, “not the target of the warrant.” And that’s it. And so the spokesperson says that that info comes from the Department of Homeland Security secretary, Markwayne Mullin. We don’t know much more than that. As of now, we’re still waiting on ICE to release more info. It certainly raises more questions – right? – than it answers.
The details are sparse, but the state attorney general’s office says ICE officers were conducting an operation relating to a final order of removal when, quote, “the subject attempted to flee in a vehicle in the direction of the officer and was fatally shot,” end quote. Now, of course, we got that statement before we learned the victim was not the target of the operation. But either way, the state attorney general’s office says it’s investigating in cooperation with local, state and federal law enforcement.
CHANG: OK. And, Ari, can you talk a little bit about Biddeford, the city where this all happened, and what the reaction has been like there so far?
SNIDER: Yeah. So Biddeford’s a small city. It’s maybe, you know, a little over 20,000 people, and it’s got deep immigrant roots, in part ’cause it was a mill town, and so it drew a lot of French Canadians. And now it has growing immigrant communities from other parts of the world, in part because people are being priced out of Portland, which is not far away, but it’s quite expensive.
The reaction there today on the ground was swift. Many residents said they’re in shock that something like this could happen in their small town. You know, the shooting took place in the morning, and by noon, a couple hundred protesters were marching through downtown. Biddeford resident Kelsey Cummings was among those protesters, and she spoke with one of my colleagues.
KELSEY CUMMINGS: And we don’t need the thoughts and prayers. This was so preventable. We’ve been screaming about this. This is just crazy. This – all of us are here because we live a block away in each direction. This is affecting all of us.
SNIDER: Protesters gathered across the street from Republican Senator Susan Collins’ office. Among their chants was that they want no more funding for ICE. Collins said in a written statement that quote, “the shooting in Biddeford requires a full and impartial investigation of what happened.”
CHANG: And real quick, Ari, what is the context here? Like, what has ICE enforcement looked like in Maine so far?
SNIDER: We saw a gradual but steady increase in arrests last year, a big surge in January when about 200 people were arrested in less than a week. Even with that dramatic increase in enforcement, we haven’t seen any shootings, fatal…
CHANG: OK.
SNIDER: …Or otherwise, until now.
CHANG: OK. That is Ari Snider of Maine Public. Thank you so much, Ari.
SNIDER: Thank you.
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