Washington, DC – Americans are witnessing the violent, lawless, and devastating toll of Trump’s mass deportation agenda in their own communities, marked by two alarming incidents this weekend – just the latest examples of an out-of-control agency terrorizing communities across the country.
In Austin, an ICE agent shot and critically wounded a man during a routine traffic stop. Wilber Rafael Garces Perez was delivering food for Door Dash when he was pulled over and shot. Austin Police Chief Lisa Davis confirmed local officers were not involved, and Mayor Kirk Watson stressed that residents deserve independent oversight rather than ICE investigating itself. This marks the third Latino man shot by ICE in as many months. In Evanston, Illinois, federal agents pinned and struck a U.S. citizen during a fugitive search before realizing he had no connection to their target – and that he was a U.S. citizen. The man reported injuries to his head, neck, and teeth. Agents fled the scene as protesters gathered, leaving neighbors – not federal authorities – to rush the injured man to the hospital.
These violent encounters reflect the reckless pressure of administration-imposed arrest quotas during a summer surge that saw ICE record more than 50,000 arrests in a single month for the first time in history. That same surge has already claimed the lives of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo and Ruben Ray Martinez in Texas, Johan Sebastián in Maine, and Alex Pretti and Renee Good in Minnesota.
The damage reaches deep into local communities: families are devastated, workers are terrified to show up, businesses are losing staff overnight, and taxpayers are left footing the bill for deadly enforcement operations.
Vanessa Cárdenas, Executive Director of America’s Voice, issued the following statement:
“Whether it is an agent shooting yet another Latino man or federal agents assaulting yet another U.S. citizen Donald Trump’s mass deportation obsession is making us all poorer and less safe. It doesn’t matter who ICE thought either of them was. No family should have to wonder whether a traffic stop or a case of mistaken identity will leave someone they love bleeding in the street. Donald Trump and his allies have built a mass deportation machine that treats every driver, every neighbor, and every bystander as expendable. The country is paying for it in blood, in fear, and at the well being of our economy and security. Voters have made it clear that enough is enough and this November, will hold those responsible for funding this machine of terror accountable.”
