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In their second fatal shooting of the wrong person in just days - and as his three-year-old daughter watched - ICE thugs murdered a young Colombian husband and father legally working in Biddeford, ME for simply trying to driving away. After state Dems blasted the killing and advocates insisted "this has gone too far," ICE waited 12 hours to say they fired "fearing for public safety" while "every law enforcement officer in America was scratching their head trying to figure out what that means."
Talk about following the money. Having somehow railroaded through last year's big obscene bill gifting over $170 billion to immigration and border enforcement - and last month inexplicably adding another $75 billion, seven times ICE’s annual budget (thanks Susan), with virtually no public accounting of how they spend it - the regime is now scurrying to spend their blood money by setting random, armed-to-the-teeth, 2,000-arrests-a-day benchmarks of what have become mere numbers of bodies in an ethnic cleansing of immigrants, brown and black people, or anyone standing near them. What could possibly go wrong?
For starters, a record-breaking mortality rate of 11 people fatally shot, over 20 other deaths in custody, over 70,000 mostly harmless people in concentration-camp-like detention, and a "systemic failure" of accountability. A new report by Physicians for Human Rights and Berkeley's Human Rights Center just added more: At least 412 incidents of "misuse" of brutal crowd-control tactics - teargas, pepper spray, "less-lethal kinetic impact projectiles" from rubber bullets to stun grenades - resulting in over 200 "lasting and traumatic injuries" including blindings, brain trauma, fractures often to journalists, elderly people, children.
As Maine goes, so goes the nation. Monday's murder of 26-year-old Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero came after ICE's relatively brief, grotesquely named Operation Catch of the Day last year that saw the arrest of over 500 people, most with no criminal records. Originally from Bucaramanga, Colombia, Guerrero was legally authorized to be here, worked two jobs, had a Social Security card and was going to a delivery job. After some initial confusion/lies, the regime said he was not the intended target of the endlessly inept, homicidal ICE goons; nor were any wearing body cameras that Congress had appropriated $20 million for.
The same lethal incompetence marked last week's murder in Houston TX of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a father of three who'd spent 35 years building homes and raising his U.S. citizen kids, all of whom he helped get through college. He was shot and killed by ICE agents who said he "weaponized" his vehicle; it took about 5 minutes for Araujo's three passengers, who'd witnessed it all and were quickly detained for it, to refute the claim. So did video footage of the deadly encounter. Again, the goons had the wrong guy - and outdated address info - and none were wearing body cameras Congress generously allocated for them.
On Pool Street in Biddeford, a small southern mill city of about 22,000 with a long immigrant history, marauding ICE agents in an SUV rammed the small white Kia Guerrero was driving to work shortly after 7 a.m. Video shows Guerrero, evidently fearful after armed men rammed him, turning his car around and trying to drive away. ICE agents fired what witnesses said were up to seven shots, and at least four smashed through his windshield - though law enforcement guidelines clearly prohibit firing at a moving vehicle unless there is an imminent threat of death or serious bodily harm, and call for police to (duh) just move away.
A neighbor said he heard a “pop, pop, pop,” looked out his window and saw the car still slowly moving until the SUV hit it again. After the Kia came to a stop, witnesses said Guerrero, bleeding from his head, was pulled from his car; several heard him say, "I tried to stop." Gruesome video shows ICE thugs handcuffing him on the ground, where his soon-lifeless body lay for five hours. Horrified witnesses said goons "yelled" at his young daughter, still in Bluey pajamas, trying to smell some nearby flowers. "I watched a wife fall to her knees looking at her husband’s dead body," said one. "I watched a little girl with a pink backpack crying because she’s never going to see her father again.”
One upset neighbor said an ICE agent claimed, "He tried to run me over." But here, as elsewhere, ICE has "lost the benefit of the doubt," and the city erupted in grief and rage. By mid-day, hundreds of pissed Mainers had marched, chanting "Whose Streets, Our Streets," to rally in Mechanics Park with signs: "Crush ICE," "Due Process For All," "Immigrants Make Biddeford Great," "Extrajudicial Killings Are A War Crime, and "Is This the America We Want?" Sadie Dilboy said Guerrero often came to her laundromat, giving his daughter quarters to buy vending-machine candy: "He was such a good person. He was always cleaning up.” A worker at Applebee’s, where Guerrero often picked up orders, would always ask if we needed anything: "He was always a good smile to see,” thus clearly "one of those dangerous criminal aliens who have turned America into a living hell."
Later, a crowd of protesters swarmed the local office of Susan Collins with fierce chants of "Vote her out!." One prominent sign, speaking for us all, proclaimed, "Get the Fuck Out." Collins, forever on the wrong and bloody side of history and drunken rapists, was the deciding vote last month to approve the extra, mind-boggling $75 billion in ICE funding, though most Mainers want to see it abolished. Last year, after the murders of Alex Pretti and Renee Good, she voted against both language seeking to curtail further violence and funding for mandatory body cameras, which most thugs are clearly not wearing anyway.
In the wake of yet another senseless murder on America's streets in broad daylight, a presumably very concerned Collins urged "a full and impartial investigation." She did not condemn ICE’s actions, nor did she voice sympathy for the man whose life was just snuffed out. Her staff later cited her vote for a few measures - optional body cameras, more oversight of concentration camps, a paltry $2 million for "de-escalation training" - for better ICE "accountability." As local police blocked her office door, they also noted ICE's "work goes far beyond immigration enforcement to help protect our country" - from brown-skinned delivery drivers, taco makers, contractors, landscapers, nurses, abuelas and kids with cancer. So fuck Susan Collins.
GOP gubernatorial nominee Bobby Charles cravenly echoed her: "Maine deserves the truth about what happened." He also urged there be ”no getting ahead of the facts - let facts, not politics, drive our conclusions," adding, "Federal agents put their lives on the line every day...If an agent's life was threatened, he had every right under the law to protect himself." So fuck him too. He wants facts? Being here legally and driving to work should not cause death by rogue morons looking for someone else. Guerrero lay in the street for five hours. His government didn't bother to name him for almost a day, but his neighbors did. We hope his daughter gets the therapy she'll need.
The largest, darkest question: "How many more people 'not the target' will die before someone in Washington decides the answer to a wrong-vehicle stop cannot be seven rounds through a windshield?" Tuesday, ICE told their goons to suspend most vehicle stops around the country; they declined to disclose "law enforcement tactics" but said they're "always evaluating our procedures to (keep) criminals off our streets," in which case they should probably remove all their own sociopaths. But they likely won't. Said Colombian President Gustavo Petro on Durán Guerrero's death: "He was killed because he was believed to be an inferior being with no rights."
Hopefully, his death will impact the electoral chances of Susan Collins, who funded it. Happily, Maine Dems were unshy about voicing their rage at her abetting ICE violence that’s gone on too long. Gov. Janet Mills: “This has to end.” Senate candidate Dr. Nirav Shah, who urged support for immigrants through the Maine Solidarity Fund, blasted Collins for approving billions more for ICE to "terrorize our communities...She gave them a blank check to kill. Maybe sit this one out.” In an angry video, Rep. Chellie Pingree asked ICE, "Why are you in Maine?" given "every report we hear is somebody picked up who's legally here. It's time to get ICE off our streets."
Troy Jackson, a top Senate contender to replace Graham Platner and the only one polls show beating Collins (though several come close) attended a Portland protest Monday, charging "our immigrant communities are under attack" by a rogue ICE that must be abolished. Advocates also argued, "Our communities are hurting." Maine Immigrants’ Rights Coalition head Mufalo Chita: "We are furious, and we will not allow this death to be treated as routine or inevitable." Crystal Cron of Presente!, on another family "shattered by state violence": “To say we are heartbroken does not convey the depth of the exhaustion, terror, or grief we are feeling."
Maine authorities have struggled to get information from the feds, unsurprising given they just, finally turned over to Minnesota investigators evidence from the murders of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in January. It took over 12 hours, till Monday night, for ICE to name their victim and say, in fascist gobbledygook, "an illegal alien" tried to "flee" during "a targeted surveillance" and a goon, "fearing for public safety," "discharged his weapon.” Notably, there was no claim of a driver "weaponizing" his vehicle, leaving national law enforcement "stunned" as to why anyone fired: “If you want to arrest someone, this is a good example of how to do everything wrong."
Murdering brown people in cold blood for no reason is likewise a good example of how to topple democratic governance and the rule of law. “Does the senseless murder of this man make any of our lives better in any way?" asked Kelli Brennan of the Maine State Nurses Association. Critics argue every member of Congress who voted for more money for ICE or DHS has blood on their hands; so do their supporters. During last spring's shutdown, Susan Collins, that act's deciding vote, whined it wasn't "fair" to those thugs to have a "cloud of uncertainty" over whether they'd be paid. “They are keeping us safe,” she mewled. Fuck Susan Collins and the incomparable real-world damage she's done. Vote like your life and many others depend on it, because they do. Fundraiser here.

On the heels of young Canadians suing over Prime Minister Mark Carney’s climate "failure" and people across the country mobilizing to urge the government to "stop fast-tracking destruction," the Liberal leader on Thursday made a pair of fossil fuel-related announcements that sparked fresh anger.
Carney and Alberta Premier Danielle Smith of the United Conservative Party announced that the province is partnering with the federally owned Trans Mountain Corporation and Calgary-based Pembina Pipeline Corporation for a proposed tar sands pipeline that would bring more oil to British Columbia's west coast.
"The proposed pipeline would generally follow the existing footprint of the federally owned Trans Mountain pipeline, running from Bruderheim, northeast of Edmonton, to the Roberts Bank export terminal in Delta, BC, south of Vancouver," the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reported. "Smith said the project would send more than 1 million barrels to Asian markets every day, reducing Canada's reliance on the US."
"The Alberta government's submission to the federal government's Major Projects Office said the project would cost between $35.2 billion and $43.7 billion, including contingencies. Construction would start as early as 2027 and finish by 2034," CBC noted. "As for who foots the bill, Smith said detailed funding and the cost for taxpayers 'remains to be negotiated.'"
Sounding the alarm about the plans with a Friday blog post, 350 Canada country manager Atiya Jaffar wrote, "In other words, we can get ready to expect $35-100 billion of our taxpayer dollars wasted on building this dangerous pipe dream."
"Canada is headed in a dangerous direction. Expanding tar sands and the fracked gas industry is like pouring fuel on the flames of the climate emergency," she argued, urging Canadians to pressure their members of Parliament to sign what the advocacy group is calling a "People's MOU," a jab at the memorandum of understanding the federal and Alberta governments signed last year.
This week, heatwaves gripped communities across the country as we marked the 5 year anniversary of the 2021 Heat Dome. And yet, this is the week that Carney, Eby, and Danielle Smith teamed up to announce their plans to burn away our future! 350.org/west-coast-p...
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— 350 Canada (@350canada.bsky.social) July 3, 2026 at 2:44 PM
Smith and Carney's pipeline press conference came after shortly after the PM and BC Premier David Eby announced a "cooperative prosperity agreement" that the Wilderness Committee condemned as "an abandonment of both governments' efforts to fight climate change and protect the environment," given its provisions on the province's liquefied natural gas (LNG) and mining endeavors.
Although Eby, a member of the New Democratic Party (NDP), "has been a prominent critic of the Carney government's work with Alberta on pipeline plans," Politico reported Thursday, the provincial leader cut short a trip to Beijing, where he traveled to meet with PetroChina executives about LNG production, "to be at the prime minister's side" for the announcement.
Eby tried to stress that "this agreement doesn't require us to support any pipeline proposal from Alberta. However, as I've said before, we recognize our constitutional position, and we do not have the authority to stop a new pipeline. We will not be going to court to fight a pipeline project. Instead, we will ensure we fulfill our constitutional obligations in good faith."
"Pipelines are federal jurisdiction," he continued. "That's why this agreement matters. It ensures that the northern tanker ban stays in place, and it ensures that if a pipeline goes ahead, that British Columbians are fairly compensated for the environmental risks we would take on any new pipeline project."
Mark Carney, Danielle Smith and David Eby chose this record shattering #heatwave (which extends into Ontario & Quebec) as the backdrop for their plans to spend billions of dollars of our public $ to extract & export more fossil fuels. How do you feel about that? #cdnpoli #bcpoli #onpoli
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— Climate Justice Victoria (@climatejusticeyyj.bsky.social) July 3, 2026 at 12:01 PM
The Wilderness Committee's conservation and policy campaigner Lucero González responded, "Eby said he will ensure British Columbians are compensated for the environmental damage of another pipeline, but there is no compensation for the extinction of the southern resident orcas."
"How do you compensate for the unimaginable pain of an endangered orca like Tahlequah who has shown us her dead calves throughout the Salish Sea while each new megaproject continues to destroy their habitat?" González inquired.
Pointing to not only the potential increase in tanker traffic and oil spill risk but also the federal government's "proposed evisceration" of the Species at Risk Act, González declared that "Carney is showing us his enthusiastic willingness to accept and fund the extinction of endangered species and a future where oil and private profit are more valuable than the entire Salish Sea ecosystem.
As Politico highlighted, the prime minister's motivations for pushing the new pipeline include combating a separatist movement in one of the involved provinces:
The project is also aimed at easing separatist tensions in Alberta, where voters will decide in October if they want to hold a referendum to separate from Canada. Smith has blamed "10 years of bad Liberal policy" under former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for fueling western alienation, pointing to climate rules and energy regulations she says hurt Alberta’s economy.
In a 17-minute video posted to his YouTube channel earlier this week, Carney acknowledged that his government’s energy policies will increase emissions. He argued that the climate policies championed by Trudeau had become a political wedge—and fodder for Alberta separatists.
Even before the video, advocacy organizations had partnered with a trio of young citizens in June to take legal action over the prime minister failing to bring Canada's 2030 emissions reduction plan into compliance with a key federal law.
Julia Levin of Environmental Defence, one of the groups behind the case, said last month that "PM Carney is betraying Canadians by taking a wrecking ball to our hard-fought climate progress. It is Canadians who are paying the price through wildfires, heat domes, rising food insecurity and high costs of living."
The pipeline announcement begins with Carney acknowledging, without a hint of irony, the “biblical weather” in Ottawa yesterday.Extreme weather huh? Like the kind exacerbated by climate change? You don’t say! Hm!!!!
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— Rachel Gilmore (@rachelgilmore.bsky.social) July 2, 2026 at 8:43 PM
The Wilderness Committee's associate director, Torrance Coste, similarly said Friday that "at a time when people across the country are suffering in extreme heat, wildfire evacuations, and devastating floods, pursuing the expansion of Canada's most polluting industry is utterly despicable."
"In the fight against climate change, Prime Minister Carney and Premier Eby are issuing their surrender, and resigning us to a future of ecological and economic decline," Coste added.
Stephen Harper's dream can finally be realized! And all it took was to screw over the next generations by destroying our climate and the livability of the planet.
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— Charles Latimer (@ch4rlie.bsky.social) July 3, 2026 at 2:52 PM
While Eby flew home to be by the prime minister's side for Thursday's first announcement, the NDP's recently elected national leader, Avi Lewis, delivered a scathing rebuke of a federal government that he said "will protect above all else: the profits of Big Oil."
"As we mark the five-year anniversary of a heat dome that killed 619 people in British Columbia—and as many communities across the country are facing extreme weather right now—Canadians deserve leadership that protects us," Lewis argued on social media. "Instead, this government is doubling down on yesterday's failed solutions and dragging us into further danger, risk, and insecurity."
The pipeline's "opaque and confusing public-private partnership ownership structure means it's very likely that we, the public, will not only bear the risks and the damages, but also the lion's share of the costs," he warned. "Canada's New Democrats unequivocally oppose this pipeline proposal. If anything, this is a pipeline to the courts. It ignores the federal government's legal responsibility to meaningfully consult Indigenous nations, including Treaty 8 nations in Alberta, threatens endangered species, and accelerates climate change. It will sow the very divisions the prime minister claims he wants to avoid."
"We do not achieve unity or prosperity from projects that pit communities against one another, all while a handful of oil and gas CEOs walk away with enormous profits," he continued. "While we're stuck fighting yesterday's battles over pipelines, and the prime minister openly admits that our emissions will rise, the rest of the world is racing ahead on renewables. We cannot afford to fall behind while other countries build the industries of the future. "
According to the NDP leader: "Canadians deserve better than being told our only choice is another fight over another pipeline. This country needs an alternative to the Liberal-Conservative consensus that is doubling down on a future of climate-wrecking corporate welfare."
"New Democrats are ready to build something bigger, safer, and better—a Canada that is a renewable energy superpower, with an east-west clean electricity grid and good green jobs in every region," he concluded. "Lower costs for families with home retrofits and heat pumps for all. Investing in the care economy as a nation-building project. That's what it looks like to build big things that actually unite this country."
President Donald Trump's illegal war with Iran is sending oil prices surging—again.
While attending the 36th NATO Summit of Heads of State and Government in Türikye on Wednesday, Trump said that the ceasefire agreement he struck last month with Iran is "over," while adding, "I don’t want to deal with them," in reference to the Iranians.
Shortly after the president's remarks, Brent and West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude oil prices each jumped by more than 4% during Wednesday trading, marking the end of a steady decline in prices that occurred in the weeks since the ceasefire deal was first announced.
Later in the day, Trump went on a lengthy rant about Democrats criticizing his failed campaign promise to bring down the price of groceries starting on his very first day in office, and he falsely claimed that the price of oil "is coming down very big."
At this point, a reporter interjected and said that oil prices on Wednesday were surging upward.
"If we hit Iran, oil goes up a little bit," Trump replied. "That's all right."
Trump on Inflation: And now inflation is way down. Everything is great. The prices are coming down. They made up a phony word: affordability. Oil is coming down very big.
Reporter: Brent crude is up today.
Trump: Every time we hit Iran, oil goes up a little bit. That's all… pic.twitter.com/ZvG0a5RYZh
— Acyn (@Acyn) July 8, 2026
Although the price of gasoline has been following the price of oil downward, any increase in petroleum prices will almost certainly send it back upward.
In a social media post, petroleum industry analyst Patrick De Haan said the renewed fighting between the US and Iran, combined with Russia banning exports of diesel fuel, would likely cause more pain at the gas pump in the near future.
"With news of Russia suspending diesel exports, markets have accelerated their climb," De Haan explained. "In addition, the current national average for diesel of $4.75 per gallon could head back to $5 per gallon in the next week or two, while the national average gas price heads to $4 per gallon."
De Haan added that spot gasoline prices on Wednesday were up by between $0.14 and $0.20, projecting that "today's jumps could start being passed along tomorrow and in the days ahead."
An environmental watchdog group is calling on the White House Office of Management and Budget to withdraw a proposal that it said will give President Donald Trump and his allies unchecked power to control over a trillion dollars worth of federal grants.
Monday marked the end of the public comment period for a proposal from the OMB, spearheaded by Project 2025 architect Russell Vought and issued in late May, that would require all discretionary federal grants to “demonstrably advance the president’s policy priorities.”
As Elizabeth Kolbert explained in The New Yorker:
It would replace the current guidance for signing off on government grants, which generally leaves the task to civil servants and peer-review panels.
Instead, the final say would go to political appointees. All discretionary awards from the federal government would have to be assessed by senior administration officials, who could deny them on the [grounds] that they didn’t fit the President’s agenda. Grants could also be terminated at any time for the same reason.
The rules would affect hundreds of billions of dollars in funding disbursed by agencies ranging from the National Endowment for the Arts to the Transportation Department, to pay for everything from local dance performances to massive infrastructure projects.
Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) filed a formal comment on Monday urging the OMB to withdraw the proposal.
"The scale of what is proposed is staggering," the group said. "This rule would institutionalize corruption and cronyism in the distribution of over a trillion dollars in annual federal funds."
The comment noted the proposal's language forbidding political appointees from deferring to peer review, which the group said will lead grants to be awarded based on ideological conformity rather than scientific merit.
"This language makes clear that the rule's purpose is not to add accountability over expert review but to replace expert judgment with political judgment entirely," the comment says. "Researchers would learn quickly to propose only work likely to survive ideological screening, while federal program officers, many of whom are being stripped of civil service protections, would face pressure to recommend or approve grants to preserve their jobs. "
“This would corrupt scientific judgment at every level of the process,” it adds, noting the Trump administration’s concerted effort to strip away funding for research on health and environmental issues that conflict with his political agenda, including climate science, vaccine safety, chemical safety, and emerging infectious diseases.
Since last year, the administration has terminated or frozen nearly 8,000 research grants and has effectively slashed the budget of the National Science Foundation by refusing to disburse funds appropriated by Congress. The agency is on track to issue the fewest grants in more than half a century, according to a report last month from Grant Witness.
The proposal would also allow agency heads to keep grants from being posted publicly whenever they determine that doing so would be contrary to the "national interest," which the rule does not define.
PEER said this change "permits agencies to offer grants by invitation only among preferred recipients with no requirement to explain or justify the determination."
The group pointed to the Trump administration’s pattern of directing no-bid contracts to the president’s family, friends, and supporters.
Trump megadonor and former Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) head Elon Musk, the comment notes, was allowed to oversee the cancellation of the contracts for numerous vendors while never touching any of the more than $19 billion his businesses held in federal contracts.
“This is not a grant reform—it is a blueprint for a spoils system applied to federal science funding,” said Tim Whitehouse, executive director of PEER.
PEER's comment is one of nearly 342,000 OMB has received about the proposal in just over a month, of which 52,000 are publicly posted. The office is hoping to finalize the proposal by October 1 and has denied requests from watchdog organizations to extend the public comment period.
If that happens, Whitehouse has said it would upend the systems of accountability and transparency for scientific funding that have been in place for decades.
“Grant money has historically been distributed through programs authorized by Congress using statutory, regulatory, formula-based, or competitive criteria rather than direct tests of political loyalty,” added Whitehouse. “Placing all scientific research funding under the unreviewable discretion of political appointees is not an administrative reform; it is a recipe for corruption on a scale not seen even in this administration.”
Mainers descended on the city of Biddeford Monday after a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer fatally shot a 26-year-old Colombian man, with protesters demanding an end to a federal agency that has killed citizens and immigrants alike.
"Is this the America we want?" asked a sign carried by a woman through the streets of the city, which is about 18 miles southwest of Portland. Other messages included "Abolish ICE," "ICE Out Now," "ICE Kills," and "Murderers."
The agency's deadly invasions of US cities—including in Maine earlier this year—as part of President Donald Trump's mass detention and deportation campaign have fueled growing calls for abolishing ICE.
"It is horrific. ICE needs to be disbanded. People who work for ICE are untrained. And we want them out of Biddeford," Maine resident Marcia Hanes told WGME. "Killing people in cold blood. They need to be out of Maine. They need to be out of the United States."
While authorities have not named the man killed on Monday, the Portland Press Herald identified him as Joan Sebastian Guerrero, citing one of his neighbors and an immigrant advocacy organization that said it had been in touch with the family.
The Maine Immigrants' Rights Coalition (MIRC) and Presente! Maine said in a statement that "the young man was authorized to work in the United States and had been issued a Social Security number," and that they "are devastated and outraged" by his death.
"Our communities are hurting," said MIRC executive director Mufalo Chitam. "Today, a 26-year-old member of our community is dead following an incident involving ICE. We are grieving, we are furious, and we will not allow his death to be treated as routine or inevitable. How much more harm must our communities endure before those with the power to act acknowledge that this has gone too far?"
As with previous shootings involving ICE and other Department of Homeland Security agents, DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin claimed that the deceased man had "weaponized" a vehicle he was driving, according to US Sen. Angus King (I-Maine).
Videos from earlier shootings have cast doubt on or debunked some of the Trump administration's claims, including in Texas last week. While some clips of Monday's encounter have circulated online, King noted that there is apparently no body camera footage.
"Body cameras were not on the agents. So we have no video evidence of what occurred in this case," the senator said. "We don't know the circumstances at this point, but my statement to Secretary Mullin, I said, 'I'm going to say that you have committed to me that this investigation will be full, fair, and transparent. Can I say that? He said, 'Yes, absolutely.'"
King added that Mullin told him the driver was not the target of the warrant the officers were executing in Biddeford.
The office of Maine Attorney General Aaron M. Frey said that it "is investigating a fatal use of deadly force that occurred this morning," and "Biddeford, Saco, and the Maine State Police are assisting with the investigation as well as federal authorities."
Initial statements indicate ICE "was conducting an enforcement operation related to a final order of removal when the subject attempted to flee in a vehicle in the direction of the officer and was fatally shot," the attorney general's office said. "We encourage any member of the public to come forward if they have information they feel would be helpful to the investigation. Please contact your local law enforcement agency."
Some of the protesters headed to the local office of Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), who is up for reelection in November.
According to the Press Herald:
As the crowd marched down Main Street and gathered outside Sen. Collins' Biddeford office, about a dozen people made it inside the entryway, chanting "Vote her out!" and banging their fists on the office’s locked doors.
Staffers inside could be seen on the phone as the crowd grew. Minutes later, five Biddeford police officers pushed through the entryway and placed themselves between protestors and the door.
"This is your fault Susan!" one man shouted.
"You're a fascist!" another person yelled at the officers.
Collins responded to the shooting by calling for "a full and impartial investigation," and faced fierce responses from some Democrats running to replace primary winner Graham Platner as her challenger in the November election.
"Sen. Collins voted for the Republican bill to give ICE another $70 billion to terrorize our communities with no accountability. Maybe sit this one out," said Nirav Shah, who previously led the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention and then served in leadership at the federal CDC. "I'm running for Senate to end this blank check, stop ICE's lawlessness, and protect Mainers."
Jordan Wood, another Senate hopeful who was previously a congressional chief of staff, told Collins, "What it requires is for you to have the courage to stop funding this lawless agency that's been terrorizing our streets for over a year."
"ICE needs to get out of Maine," Wood said. He called for ICE to be "abolished and replaced with a new agency that protects and serves the people," and will "not murder them."
The national progressive group Our Revolution—which is backing former Maine Senate President Troy Jackson as Platner's replacement—declared: "Collins voted to hand ICE $70 billion. No reforms. No accountability. She funded this. She owns this. Vote her out!"
As with previous ICE shootings, Monday's deadly encounter drew alarmed responses from across the United States. "When is shit like this going to end?" asked US Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.).
In Minnesota—where federal agents fatally shot US citizens Renee Good and Alex Pretti, and injured Venezuelan national Julio Sosa-Celis, in January—Democratic Gov. Tim Walz said: "Americans are once again watching in horror as Trump's lawless federal agents took another life—this time in Maine. We must seek accountability and justice and an end to this madness."
The elected attorney in Minnesota's Hennepin County, Mary Moriarty, announced Monday that after "six months of relentless collective effort," prosecutors had finally "obtained hard drives of previously withheld evidence" about the shootings from the federal government.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Monday announced what he characterized as a "campaign to dismantle" the International Criminal Court, the Hague-based tribunal tasked with investigating and charging individuals with war crimes and other violations.
In a video posted to social media, Rubio accused the international court of "waging a war against our country—not with bullets or missiles, but with statutes, compacts, and the force of so-called international law." The top American diplomat threatened that the US "will teach the ICC the full meaning of American resolve."
The US State Department said in a statement that Rubio's new campaign against the ICC would "feature a whole-of-government response to systematically disable" the court's "ability to operate, target American servicemen or officials, or otherwise threaten American sovereignty." The US is not party to the Rome Statute, the 1998 treaty that established the ICC.
US President Donald Trump and his subordinates, who have been accused of myriad violations of international law, have adopted an increasingly aggressive posture toward the ICC since taking power last January.
In a February 6, 2025 executive order, Trump declared "a national emergency to address" the purported "threat" posed by the ICC and announced sanctions against court officials, including its judges. The president's order cited the ICC's "investigations concerning personnel of the United States and certain of its allies, including Israel," which is also not party to the Rome Statute.
In November 2024, the ICC issued arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defense minister, Yoav Gallant, for alleged war crimes committed in the Gaza Strip.
Rubio warned in an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal on Monday that US officials accused of international crimes could be next to face ICC action.
"Border Patrol agents working to remove violent criminals from our country, US Marines risking their lives to restore order in the Western Hemisphere, federal prosecutors working to dismantle terror networks plotting attacks on the American homeland—all would face the constant risk of persecution for the 'crime' of defending our country," Rubio wrote. "Using all the tools at our government’s disposal, working beside every ally with whom we can make common cause, we will dismantle the ICC—brick by brick, if necessary."
Raed Jarrar, advocacy director of the human rights group Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), said in response to Rubio's op-ed that "when the world’s most powerful country aims to dismantle the world’s only permanent international court, it sends the message that the powerful are above the law."
"It is not the ICC that Rubio is dismantling brick by brick, but the rules-based international order that grew out of the ashes of World War II,” said Jarrar. "Rubio’s attack doesn't just underscore US hypocrisy, but undermines access to justice across the globe, from Ukraine to Sudan and could amount to obstruction of justice, a crime under the Rome Statute in and of itself."
In his op-ed, Rubio pointed to DAWN's call earlier this year for Iran and other Middle East nations to grant the ICC jurisdiction to investigate apparent war crimes committed during the conflict launched in late February by Trump and Netanyahu.
Omar Shakir, DAWN's executive director, said Monday that Rubio mischaracterized the group's call as focusing solely on actions by US personnel. That move, said Shakir, "begs the question: Is the secretary of state worried because he knows US personnel committed war crimes in Iran?"
Under Rubio's plan, the State Department is threatening to impose "increased sanctions against the ICC and affiliated organizations," hit court personnel with "visa revocations and travel bans," and pressure other nations that aren't party to the Rome Statute to "leverage their diplomatic networks to take similar actions alongside" the Trump administration.
Kenneth Roth, the former executive director of Human Rights Watch who has demanded international accountability for the Trump administration over its illegal assault on Iran, wrote Monday that Rubio "can't even make an honest case for attacking the International Criminal Court."
"He makes it sound like the ICC acts out of the blue anywhere it wants when in fact it acts only against crimes committed on the territory of states that have invited it," Roth wrote. "He never explains why the United States should be able to commit crimes on the territory of those states with impunity, contrary to the desire of their sovereign governments for an international backstop to reinforce justice for such crimes."
A coalition of conservation groups sued the Trump administration in federal court on Tuesday over its move to rescind the regulatory definition of "harm" in the Endangered Species Act so that extractive industries can degrade crucial habitats.
"Since 1973, the ESA has served as the nation's most effective conservation law, saving numerous imperiled species from extinction and moving them toward recovery," states the complaint, filed in the District of Washington state. It argues that the rescission "defies the text and purpose of the statute, 50 years of administrative policy, and US Supreme Court precedent."'
The coalition is made up of the Center for Biological Diversity, Columbia Riverkeeper, Conservation Law Foundation, Conservation Northwest, Friends of the Wild Swan, Oregon Wild, Sierra Club, Swan View Coalition, and WildEarth Guardians, and is represented by Earthjustice.
"Preventing harm to wildlife by protecting where they live, eat, and sleep is a basic foundation of the Endangered Species Act," said Earthjustice attorney Kristen Boyles in a statement, also stressing that the decision conflicts with not only the ESA but also decades of legal precedent. "Now more than ever, imperiled fish, birds, and wildlife need protection to survive and recover."
Ben Greuel, wildlife campaign manager at Sierra Club, warned that "without the habitat protections offered by the harm rule, countless species would be forced onto a path towards extinction."
For example, "roads built for logging and other human access destroy grizzly bear habitat and the bear's ability to safely use its habitat," said Swan View Coalition chair Keith Hammer. "Weakening the harm rule will allow industry to devastate the habitat grizzly bears and many other wildlife species depend on for their survival."
Noah Greenwald, endangered species co-director at the Center for Biological Diversity, pointed to not only grizzlies but also some of the other specific species that could be impacted by the administration's decision.
"It's beyond tragic that as the world's scientists warn us of an extinction crisis threatening to unravel our shared future, the Trump administration is yanking basic protections from our most endangered wildlife," Greenwald said. "There's just no way to protect endangered animals like spotted owls, Florida panthers, or grizzly bears without protecting the places they live."
In fact, as Oregon Wild staff attorney John Persell, noted, "habitat loss is the leading driver of extinction."
"This gutting of the Endangered Species Act is part of a broader assault on our bedrock environmental values," Persell also emphasized. "From public lands to wildlife to clean air and drinking water, the Trump administration is determined to waste, loot, and pollute America's natural heritage."
Separately, the group Defenders of Wildlife sent a letter to the departments of Commerce and the Interior about its intent to sue over the ESA rescission, which was published in the Federal Register on Tuesday by their respective agencies, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Fish and Wildlife Service.
"The law has been clear for decades," said Jane Davenport, senior attorney at Defenders of Wildlife. "Rescinding this definition is wholly out of bounds and misaligned with the vast majority of Americans who support protecting and recovering endangered species."
"We will use the full force of the law to fight back and prevent industry from unfettered destruction of critical forests, streams, deserts, oceans, and coastlines," Davenport pledged.
The rescission came just a day after President Donald Trump signed proclamations dramatically shrinking the size of two national monuments in Utah, Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante.
As with Trump's repeated attacks on the ESA, his targeting of the two monuments dates back to his first administration.
Taylor McKinnon, Southwest director at the Center for Biological Diversity, said Monday that "gutting Utah’s national monuments to enrich polluting extractive corporations shows Trump's extreme disdain for Americans' shared natural heritage. It's a national embarrassment. These monuments protect some of America's most iconic landscapes and rich biodiversity. We'll fight like hell to safeguard their future."
"This case will expose the scheme that sought to criminalize the Palestine solidarity movement in the US."
A lawsuit filed by former Columbia University student organizer Mahmoud Khalil wasn't his first legal challenge stemming from his arrest last year for his Palestinian rights advocacy, but he emphasized that his decision to take members of the Trump administration and private pro-Israel organizations to court was "about far more than what was done to" him when he was detained for 104 days.
"This case will expose the scheme that sought to criminalize the Palestine solidarity movement in the US," said Khalil in a statement. "It is about a coordinated, ongoing plot to punish, silence, and intimidate everyone who dares to dissent and speak out for Palestinian liberation. We will hold them accountable.”
Represented by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and the law firm Beldock Levine & Hoffman, Khalil sued the Heritage Foundation, Canary Mission, Betar, Trump administration adviser Stephen Miller, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin, his predecessor Kristi Noem, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, and John Armstrong, an official at the State Department’s Bureau of Consular Affairs.
The lawsuit was filed under the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871, which was passed to stop efforts by vigilante groups like the KKK to coordinate with the government to strip individuals of their constitutional rights.
"Mahmoud is now using this statute to affirmatively challenge the illegal, anti-Palestinian, and anti-democratic public-private conspiracy to harass, intimidate, and punish Palestinians and their allies," said CCR.
Khalil: “I will not stop fighting until everyone who willingly contributed to my missing the birth of my son and to taking 104 days of my life from me answers for what they’ve done.” pic.twitter.com/x6iTgoxsXa
— Erik Uebelacker (@Uebey) July 14, 2026
As the Trump administration continues its efforts to deport Khalil, the lawsuit traces the alleged public-private conspiracy against pro-Palestinian organizers to October 2023, when Miller "vowed to punish Palestinians and their supporters through arrest and deportation."
A year later, the Heritage Foundation published Project Esther, which conflated criticism of Israel with antisemitism, claimed all pro-Palestinian organizers were Hamas supporters, and pledged to execute a plan to deport foreign protesters “when a willing administration occupies the White House.”
The Heritage Foundation said a “public-private partnership" would be required to carry out Project Esther. The lawsuit alleges that Canary Mission, an anonymously run Israeli surveillance and doxing organization, and Betar, a self-described vigilante group with a history of surveilling and harassing supporters of Palestinian rights, provided that partnership.
"Between March and May 2025, Miller, Rubio, Noem, and Armstrong used ICE to arrest or to try to arrest at least nine students or scholars pre-selected by the private groups," said CCR. "The federal defendants continue to seek Mr. Khalil’s deportation and pursue the conspiracy through sham, corrupted immigration proceedings under their control. Working together, the government and private co-conspirators sought to deny Palestinians and their supporters their constitutional rights: to equal protection, to freedom of speech and travel, to freedom from punitive detention, and, ultimately, to exist in this country."
As The New York Times reported, former Heritage Foundation national security director Robert Greenway said two months after Khalil was arrested that it was “no coincidence that we called for a series of actions to take place privately and publicly, and they are now happening.”
CCR pointed to a "range of harms" Khalil has suffered as the result of being targeted by the Trump administration, starting when he was arrested in March 2025. During three months in detention, he was sent to Jena, Louisiana—nearly 1,300 miles away from his family and lawyers—and was forced to miss the birth of his first child. He also faces "an ongoing threat to his lawful immigration status in the United States," with his attorneys preparing to appeal his deportation case to the US Supreme Court.
Baher Azmy, legal director for CCR, said that "the brazenness of this conspiratorial plan is matched only by the exquisitely detailed and shamelessly public record the conspirators produced of a collaborative plan to silence the growing student movement protesting US support for Israel’s genocidal campaign," referring to the country's assault on Gaza that began in October 2023 in retaliation for a Hamas-led attack.
“The conspirators acted through forms of state repression and arbitrary detention that numerous courts have found are blatantly unconstitutional," said Azmy. "They targeted Mr. Khalil, smeared him, and subjected him to the torment of detention for nothing other than being Palestinian and supporting Palestinian rights in order to send a message of terror across the student movement for Palestine."
"The KKK Act was designed to prevent conspiracies to stifle advocacy for political freedom," he added, "and together we are demanding accountability for this outrageous injustice.”
"The scale of the outbreak is at least two to four times the number of cases that we have found," said WHO emergencies director Chikwe Ihekweazu.
The Ebola outbreak sweeping the Democratic Republic of Congo is the fastest-growing ever, the World Health Organization warned Tuesday, as a shortage of funding, strained health infrastructure, and a strike by frontline medical workers threaten efforts to contain the deadly virus.
“We've seen the fastest growth in a single month since the outbreak started, and of all the Ebola outbreaks that we have managed,” WHO Health Emergencies Program executive director Dr. Chikwe Ihekweazu told reporters in Geneva. “Over the last few days, we've seen some of the highest numbers of new infections in a single day."
“A few days ago, we saw over 80 cases confirmed in a single day,” he added.
Experts are particularly alarmed that the majority of new infections—roughly 80%—are coming from what the WHO called “unknown chains of transmission."
“You have to imagine that this is a fire,” Ihekweazu said. “There's something driving the fire in its heart, and it's also expanding at the same time.”
The WHO said that 95% of all new Ebola cases are in Ituri province, where the outbreak started in May, but the virus is now spreading to two new provinces, Haut-Uele and Tshopo.
The Ebola virus causes widespread and often catastrophic damage to the body’s blood vessels, immune system, and organs and typically kills between 25% and 90% of infected people, depending upon the strain of the virus and quality of available medical care.
Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) government figures show nearly 2,000 confirmed infections and more than 700 deaths, but WHO officials say the true scale could be two to four times higher because many infections and deaths are going undetected.
Wessam Mankoula, an epidemiologist with the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Ethiopia, noted during a press briefing last week that 112 healthcare workers have been infected with Ebola in DRC, 32 of whom have died.
There have also been around 20 Ebola infections and at least two deaths during the current outbreak in neighboring Uganda.
“Perhaps the most alarming finding is that many newly reported cases are individuals who died in their communities, without ever reaching a health facility and receiving care," Ihekweazu said.
There is some good news, with Ihekweazu noting that "treatment capacity now exceeds 700 beds and continues to increase each week; laboratory capacity has expanded dramatically... and contact follow-up rates are approaching 80%."
However, frontline health workers at an Ebola treatment at Rwampara General Hospital in Ituri province have gone on strike over unpaid salaries and bonuses, poor working conditions, and shortages of protective equipment.
Congolese Health Minister Roger Kamba assured workers that the government has "the means to sort this out."
Critics say US President Donald Trump’s ideologically driven decision to withdraw the US from the WHO, his administration’s dismantling of the US Agency for International Development (USAID), and reduced funding for the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s global public health efforts have also adversely affected the response to the current Ebola epidemic, compared with 2014 and 2019 outbreaks.
The current Ebola outbreak comes in a region already ravaged by armed conflict, displacement, and other challenges. Health officials stress that getting a grip on the outbreak will require not only medical intervention but also rebuilding trust with communities rife with fear and misinformation, and ensuring health workers are paid and protected.
"This outbreak requires resources that match the scale of the challenges that we are facing," Ihekweazu stressed Tuesday. "And this is not a burden DRC can be allowed to carry alone."