Less than a day after U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement told its agents to temporarily stop most traffic stops, President Donald Trump is pressuring the agency to back down from the policy change.
That policy change, which does not include pursuits targeting people with violent criminal histories wanted for deportation and is not permanent, comes on the heels of fatal shootings that claimed the lives of 52-year-old construction worker Lorenzo Araujo in Texas last week and 26-year-old Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero on Monday morning in Biddeford, both of which occurred during attempted traffic stops.
U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, said Tuesday that she called on Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, who oversees ICE, among other agencies, to cease all “non-urgent” vehicle stops, saying that Guerrero’s death, while still under investigation, raised “sufficient critical questions.”
An ICE spokesperson declined to confirm the policy shift in a statement to the Bangor Daily News.
Now Trump is pushing for his administration to reverse course, saying that the tactic is key for achieving his immigration agenda objectives.
“In order to do this, we must be strong, tough, and smart, and we CANNOT give up one of I.C.E.’s most important and effective Crime Fighting tools, THE TRAFFIC STOP! Once we do, we are playing right into the criminal’s hands. The Radical Left Dumocrats would like to see this done, but it won’t happen on my watch,” the Republican wrote early Wednesday morning on his personal social media platform, Truth Social, before thanking readers for their “attention to this matter!”
Guerrero was shot and killed about 7 a.m. at the intersection of Pool and Hill streets, where he encountered two or three agents with ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations division.
Questions continue to swirl around what took place between Guerrero and the agents before Monday’s shooting.
Four or five shots were fired when the Colombian allegedly tried to flee from agents, who haven’t been publicly identified but have been placed on administrative leave. The agent believed to have fired the fatal shots was hired by ICE this year, according to The Atlantic magazine. The agent has worked in federal law enforcement since 2017, including with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs police force. The BDN hasn’t independently confirmed the agent’s identity.
In a Monday evening statement, an ICE spokesperson said that Guerrero was in the country illegally and had a final removal order against him. But Mullin, who previously suggested Guerrero had “weaponized” his white Kia, told independent U.S. Sen. Angus King that Guerrero wasn’t actually the target of the agents’ administrative warrant.
Two immigrant advocacy groups here, Maine Immigrants’ Rights Coalition and Presente! Maine, said in a joint statement that Guerrero, who leaves behind a wife and young daughter, had authorization to work in the United States and had been issued a Social Security number.
The ICE agents weren’t equipped with body cameras, for which Congress approved $20 million in funding, meaning there’s apparently no direct video evidence of what happened between Guerrero and them in the moments before the shooting.
Several federal, state and local law enforcement agencies are participating in the investigation, which the Colombian embassy said it will be monitoring as it stays in touch with Guerrero’s family here. On Tuesday, Colombian President Gustavo Petro called the shooting murder, saying that Guerrero was “killed because he was deemed an inferior being devoid of rights.”
In a Tuesday letter to Homeland Security Inspector General Joseph Cuffari, Maine’s congressional delegation called for him to “prioritize” a “comprehensive, transparent, and expedited investigation” into Guerrero’s death.
This may be at least the 11th fatal shooting involving ICE agents since President Donald Trump’s second inauguration. That doesn’t include deaths of those in the agency’s custody. As of July 6, at least 21 people have died in immigration detention centers in 2026, on top of 33 who died last year, according to the National Immigration Project.
Earlier this year, Maine became the latest state to see a surge in ICE agents as part of the Trump administration’s Operation Catch of the Day. That surge was cut short amid a nationwide pushback against the agency’s tactics following the fatal shootings of two protesters in Minneapolis.
Of the nearly 200 detained in Maine during the January ICE surge, only 11 had criminal convictions, undercutting the Trump administration’s claim that it was targeting the “worst of the worst.”
