The blood on the pavement of Elm Street in Biddeford, Maine, was still fresh when the familiar script began to write itself. On Monday, July 13, 2026, an immigration agent fired into a moving vehicle, killing 26-year-old Colombian national Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero. Within hours, the Department of Homeland Security rolled out its usual defense: the driver tried to flee, the officer feared for public safety, and the shooting was an act of self-defense.
It is a narrative that has grown exhausting in its predictability. It is also increasingly detached from reality.
When federal officers pull over moving vehicles to execute routine immigration checks, they are deliberately choosing escalation. Over the last 18 months of this administration’s aggressive mass deportation campaign, at least 22 people have been shot at by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. Nine are dead. More than 50 people have died in ICE custody or detention centers during the same brief period.
This is not a functioning system of law enforcement. It is an agency operating with systemic impunity, encouraged by a White House that views any attempt at accountability as weakness.
Maine Senator Susan Collins expressed deep concern over the Biddeford shooting, even urging DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin to suspend non-urgent vehicle stops. But statements of concern do not stop bullets. If Collins wants to end the state-sanctioned violence occurring on her own constituents’ streets, she has to stop playing polite politics. She holds the ultimate lever of accountability in her hands, and she needs to pull it.
The Reckless Fallacy of the ICE Traffic Stop
Why are immigration officers pulling people over in the first place?
Executing a traffic stop is one of the most unpredictable, dangerous maneuvers a law enforcement officer can perform. In standard policing, officers are taught to avoid pulling over suspects unless absolutely necessary, or unless they have a clear tactical advantage. John Sandweg, who ran ICE during the Obama administration, pointed out the obvious flaw in the current strategy: if the safety of the officer is the primary justification for opening fire, then sending officers to execute traffic stops in the first place is a failure of leadership.
ICE agents do not need to pull over moving cars. They have the ability to monitor suspects and make arrests at their homes, their workplaces, or in controlled environments where the risk of flight is minimized.
Instead, agents are choosing high-stakes, public confrontations. John Gihon, a former ICE prosecutor, noted that standard training for deportation officers explicitly advises letting a suspect go if they refuse to exit a vehicle. You do not stand in front of the car. You do not try to drag them out. You track them down another day. This policy exists to protect the officer, the suspect, and the public.
Yet, under the current administration, those safeguards have been tossed aside. When agents act like cowboy highway patrolmen without the proper state-level authority or training, disaster is inevitable.
A Trail of Tragedies Across the Country
The Biddeford shooting is not an isolated incident. It is the latest chapter in a nationwide pattern of violence that has left families shattered and local communities terrified.
- Houston, Texas: Just days before the Maine shooting, 52-year-old Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a Mexican builder and father of three, was shot and killed by ICE agents during a traffic stop as he drove his work crew to a job site. While DHS claimed the agents were in danger, eyewitnesses stated that officers approached the passenger side and fired directly through the open window—which was down only because the vehicle's air conditioning was broken. No officer was ever in front of the car.
- Minneapolis, Minnesota: Six months ago, a series of immigration enforcement operations resulted in three shootings, including the deaths of Renee Good, a mother of three, and Alex Pretti. Good was shot while driving through a quiet residential neighborhood. Despite bystander videos flatly contradicting the government's claim of self-defense, Vice President JD Vance took to social media to defend the shooter, while the federal government blocked local authorities from investigating the incident.
- South Texas: In March 2025, 23-year-old Ruben Ray Martinez, an American citizen, was shot during a late-night traffic stop.
This is what happens when you tell a federal workforce that they are fighting an existential war at the border. They begin treating every highway, suburb, and local street as a battleground.
The international fallout is already growing. The Mexican government recently filed formal complaints with the Department of Justice and is actively preparing civil lawsuits over the deaths of 17 Mexican nationals who died in ICE custody. When foreign governments have to step in to demand investigations because our own Department of Justice refuses to do so, the breakdown of our legal system is complete.
The Illusion of Reform and the White House Backlash
For a brief moment, it looked like the horror of these twin killings in Maine and Texas might force a change. Following Susan Collins' public plea, DHS leadership quietly directed agents to suspend most routine vehicle stops.
It took less than 24 hours for the president to shatter that fragile compromise.
Taking to social media, Donald Trump blasted his own agency's decision to scale back the practice. In an angry, all-caps post, he declared that the government could not afford to give up "one of ICE's most important and effective Crime Fighting tools, THE TRAFFIC STOP!"
With a single post, the president made his priorities clear. He does not care about the tactical dangers pointing a gun into a moving car poses to bystanders. He does not care about the loss of innocent life. He cares about the appearance of absolute, unyielding force. DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin, who took the job after Kristi Noem failed to secure confirmation, quickly fell back into line.
This leaves local communities and state officials entirely on their own. In Maine, State Senator Mattie Daughtry joined hundreds of protesters outside an ICE facility, declaring that these tactics have no place on the streets of Biddeford. But local outrage cannot stop a rogue federal agency.
Only the United States Senate can do that.
Why Susan Collins Holds the Real Leverage
Susan Collins has spent decades cultivating a reputation as a moderate, independent-minded institutionalist who cares about the rule of law. She represents a state with a strong history of community-focused, restrained policing. The idea of federal agents shooting people in broad daylight in quiet coastal towns goes against everything she claims to stand for.
But Collins is also the chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee. That means she bears direct responsibility for the billions of dollars that pour into ICE’s budget every single year. She has consistently signed off on funding for an agency that operates without basic oversight, without mandatory body-worn cameras, and without transparent investigation protocols.
Writing letters to Markwayne Mullin is a performance. Mullin answers to Trump, not to polite congressional requests. If Collins wants to protect her constituents and restore sanity to federal law enforcement, she has to use her vote where it hurts the administration most.
Right now, the perfect opportunity sits directly in front of her.
The Todd Blanche Confirmation Battle
The Senate is currently holding hearings on the nomination of Todd Blanche to be the next Attorney General of the United States. Blanche, who has served as Trump’s personal defense lawyer, is the administration's pick to run the Department of Justice.
The list of reasons to reject Blanche is already staggering. He is deeply entangled in some of the administration’s most corrupt maneuvers. He played a central role in the cover-up of the Epstein files. He has spearheaded vindictive, politically motivated prosecutions of the president's perceived enemies. Most damningly, he orchestrated a highly suspicious "settlement" of Trump's $10-billion lawsuit against the IRS. That deal allegedly traded tax immunity for the Trump family and established a $1.8-billion slush fund intended to support and pardon January 6 rioters.
This is the man Trump wants to run the nation's chief law enforcement agency.
If Blanche is confirmed, the Department of Justice will become nothing more than a shield for the White House and a weapon against its opponents. Any hope of the DOJ investigating ICE shootings, enforcing civil rights laws, or holding trigger-happy federal agents accountable will vanish entirely.
Republicans hold a razor-thin majority in the Senate. It only takes a couple of defections to block a nominee. Because Collins is up for reelection in a state where Trump’s brand of aggressive, chaotic politics is highly unpopular, she has both the political cover and the moral obligation to lead the opposition.
What Needs to Happen Now
If Susan Collins wants Maine voters to believe she is genuinely horrified by the death of Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, she must draw a hard line. Polite press releases are no longer an acceptable currency.
Here is the blueprint for real action:
- Block the Blanche Nomination: Collins must publicly announce that she will vote "no" on Todd Blanche’s confirmation for Attorney General. She must make it clear that she will not support any nominee who refuses to commit to a full, independent federal investigation into the recent ICE vehicle-stop killings.
- Condition ICE Funding: As Appropriations Chair, Collins must insert strict, binding riders into the next federal budget bill. No ICE funding should be released unless the agency implements an absolute, permanent ban on non-urgent vehicle stops and mandates that all active field agents wear functioning body cameras.
- Support State-Level Investigations: Collins needs to publicly back Maine Attorney General Aaron Frey’s efforts to conduct a transparent, independent state-level probe into the Biddeford shooting. The federal government must not be allowed to hide the names of the officers involved or shield them from local justice, as they did in Minnesota.
The era of hoping this administration will self-correct is over. The president has made his stance clear: he wants the traffic stops, he wants the aggression, and he does not care about the bodies left behind.
Collins cannot have it both ways. She cannot lament the tragedy on Monday and fund the killers on Tuesday. It is time to vote like lives depend on it—because they do.
