Approximately 7:20 a.m. on July 13, 2026, ICE shot and killed the wrong man in a vehicle stop in Biddleford, Maine. Protesters have flooded Maine communities, including the offices of Republican Senator Susan Collins, whose deciding vote approved an additional $70 billion in funding last month. That funding was supposed to secure additional training and body cams, among other things. The ICE officers involved in the shooting weren’t wearing body cams.
Perhaps because Susan Collins is running for reelection and Republicans are desperate to retain the Senate. The White House issued a temporary moratorium on traffic stops, fueled by another shooting death of the wrong man in Houston, Texas, less than a week earlier. It was beginning to look like, exactly like, ICE was making random stops of cars with brown people inside in an effort to meet a daily quota of 2,000 arrests nationwide.
At 3:43 p.m. on July 14th, ICE issued a memo that vehicle stops were paused “immediately.” Officers were told to prioritize non‑vehicle enforcement methods. Vehicle stops could still occur only for dangerous targets or when accompanied by trained local officers under 287(g) partnerships. It was assumed the memo was released due to the Maine incident. But another ICE-related death may have been the impetus. Between the Maine murder and the release of the statement. Another man died in St, Augustine, FL, while being chased by ICE. I’m wondering if, because he wasn’t actually placed under arrest, he counts toward the quota? Though repeatedly asked for comment, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has issued just one statement with few details in the 24 hours since the death.
“On July 14, DHS law enforcement conducted an operation near St. Johns, Florida. Florida Highway Patrol and HSI are investigating an incident resulting in the death of a Mexican national. We will provide an update when available.”-DHS
A little after sunrise on July 14, the chain of events that led to the St. Augustine death began in the parking lot of a gas station on State Road 16, where Homeland Security Investigations and ICE agents initiated what Florida Highway Patrol later described as an “encounter” with four people inside a vehicle. The early news reports refer to ICE as “responding” to the WAWA gas station, but it appears what they were responding to was the presence of four brown people.
According to FHP, all four occupants fled on foot once the encounter began. One of them — a 28‑year‑old man — ran across SR‑16 in an attempt to escape and entered the roadway at the exact moment a semi-tractor-trailer was passing. The truck driver, a 64‑year‑old man from Lake City, stopped immediately and tried to render aid, but the pedestrian died at the scene. The crash occurred at 6:42 a.m., and within hours DHS issued a brief statement acknowledging the operation and confirming that both FHP and HSI were investigating the fatality.
By that afternoon, state officials and federal agencies had not released further details about what prompted the initial encounter, and Action News Jax reported that ICE and HSI had not yet responded to requests for comment. The incident quickly drew political reaction, including calls for accountability and scrutiny of ICE’s enforcement tactics, while FHP continued its investigation into the circumstances surrounding the death.
In Florida, there were no protests in the aftermath of the death, though the Jacksonville Immigrant Rights Alliance held a protest the Saturday before the St. Augustine death, demanding an end to what they described as escalated ICE raids in the Jacksonville area. St. Augustine is thirty miles south of Jacksonville. After the St. Augustine fatality, the same organization publicly condemned the incident and linked it to a nationwide surge in ICE activity, noting that fear in immigrant communities had intensified.
I’m not saying that Florida, where I live, cares less about the death of a brown man than Maine does. But I’m not denying it either. My wife works in St. Augustine, and we live about thirty miles south. There is no evidence that ICE or HSI agents involved in the St. Augustine incident were wearing body cameras.
In my mind, only agents wearing body cameras should be involved in arrests. The money has been allocated, and the cameras have allegedly been ordered. If agents were forced to wear body cams to arrest someone, they would be rolled out immediately. Otherwise, it’s like, “with all deliberate speed,” which in the case of court-ordered desegregation, took decades. The low bar for my expectations is that America can go a week without the death of another immigrant, especially those ICE wasn’t even looking for.