U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) will mandate that its officers record all vehicle stops using at least one body camera, according to Tom Homan, the Trump administration’s “border czar.” Homan announced the policy on Sunday during the Fox & Friends Weekend program, noting that the agency is under renewed scrutiny following the fatal shootings of two men by federal immigration agents earlier this month.
Homan defended the move, stating that body cameras serve to protect law enforcement officers as much as they provide evidence. “They exonerate more law enforcement than they convict, and I want officers to wear body cameras because I want the American people to see what the officers saw when they took that action,” Homan said. In a separate appearance on CBS’s Face the Nation, Homan clarified that the necessary equipment has already been purchased, and the agency is currently training personnel to deploy the cameras nationwide. He noted that funding for the initiative had previously been delayed during a partial government shutdown earlier this year.
The policy announcement follows two fatal incidents involving ICE agents during traffic stops in Texas and Maine. On July 13, an ICE officer killed Joan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, a Colombian national, in the coastal Maine city of Biddeford, about 15 miles south of Portland. Six days earlier, another ICE officer in Houston fatally shot Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a Mexican national. According to family reports, Salgado had lived in the U.S. for 35 years, had no criminal history, and was nearing legal status when he was pursued and stopped while driving his construction crew to a job site. Reports indicate that neither Salgado nor Durán were the intended targets of the respective ICE operations. Regarding the death of Durán, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) stated that officers feared for their safety; however, immigrant rights advocates noted that Durán was authorized to work in the U.S. and possessed a social security number.
The recent shootings have sparked protests in Maine, Houston, and Boston, while raising questions regarding the lack of body-camera footage in both instances. While ICE launched a pilot program in 2024 across five cities—Baltimore, Buffalo, Detroit, Philadelphia, and Washington D.C.—the Trump administration previously sought to reduce funding for the program by 75%, according to a Reuters report in January. In February, following the deaths of two U.S. citizens during an immigration crackdown in Minnesota, then-DHS chief Kristi Noem stated that the program would expand nationwide as funding became available.
The death of Durán marks the 11th fatal shooting by federal immigration officials since the start of Donald Trump’s second term, including the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, according to a review of public reports. Additionally, reports indicate that the FBI will no longer investigate confrontations involving ICE agents, a decision communicated in a written notice on Thursday. Previously, such investigations could produce information usable in the prosecution of agents involved in violent encounters. Last week, Homan initially stated that the agency would temporarily suspend most vehicle stops to review procedures, though President Donald Trump directed federal immigration agents to resume the practice within 24 hours.
