Soon after Immigration and Customs Enforcement launched a new enforcement push in Maine, Cristian Vaca — an Ecuadorian immigrant living in Biddeford — said he was met with a chilling warning from federal agents at his front door.
In cellphone video Vaca recorded from inside his home, an agent presses his face close to the glass and tells him: “We’re gonna come back for your whole family, OK?”
Vaca later spoke with The Associated Press after the clip circulated online Wednesday, Jan. 21. In an interview translated from Spanish, he said agents arrived in the late morning and began taking photos outside his residence.
“Their threat was always to come back for my family,” Vaca told the AP. “If I didn’t leave and go with them, they would come back for my family. The threat was always against my family.”
He said the warning left him shaken — and focused on protecting his child.
“Honestly, I felt terrified, like any person in this situation when your family is threatened,” he said. “And it made me think about my son and his innocence — that he didn’t know what was happening while I was interacting with them.”
Vaca said he came to the United States from Ecuador in September 2023. He said he has a work permit and a Social Security number, and that he had a hearing scheduled in his immigration case, though he said the court date was later postponed.
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A New DHS Operation in Maine
Federal officials confirmed Wednesday that a new immigration enforcement operation began the day before, titled “Operation Catch of the Day.”
In a statement shared with CBS News, Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said the effort is focused on immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally and have committed crimes. She also criticized Democratic Maine Gov. Janet Mills — described as a 2026 Senate candidate — accusing her of failing to cooperate with federal authorities.
On Friday afternoon, DHS said “the brave men and women of ICE” arrested more than 100 people in the first three days of the operation.
Raids, Protests, and Escalating Tensions Nationwide
The Maine enforcement action comes as ICE tactics in other parts of the country have drawn intensifying criticism, particularly in the Minneapolis area. Recent incidents cited by critics include the fatal shooting of U.S. citizen Renee Good inside her vehicle on Jan. 7, a Venezuelan man being shot in the leg during an arrest on Jan. 14, and reports of harsh treatment toward anti-ICE demonstrators.
Videos showing agents clashing with protesters, crashing into vehicles, and approaching homes in Minneapolis have spread across social media. Trump has also threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act in Minnesota, saying he could use military force if needed to suppress anti-ICE protests.
A Separate Case That Went Viral
This week, a viral image showed 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos being detained by agents in a Minneapolis suburb after his father, an Ecuadorian immigrant, was targeted while the two were returning home from Liam’s preschool.
After his father was detained, ICE agents allegedly asked Liam to knock on the door of his home to see if anyone else was inside — essentially “using a 5-year-old as bait,” The Washington Post reported, citing Columbia Heights Public Schools.
The district said another adult living in the home, who was outside at the time, “begged the agents” to leave Liam with them, but agents refused, according to the outlet.
Liam’s older brother, a middle school student, returned about 20 minutes later to find his father and little brother had been taken away, the newspaper reported.
Data on Who Gets Arrested
Data obtained by University of California, Berkeley’s Deportation Data Project found that nearly 75,000 people arrested by ICE during Trump’s first nine months in office had no criminal record.
The data — compiled by an internal ICE office and made public through litigation — indicated that almost one-third of those arrested in that period had no criminal record. For those with prior convictions, the dataset does not distinguish between minor offenses and violent crimes.
And while information about how many Americans have been caught up in immigration enforcement remains incomplete, ProPublica identified more than 170 cases in which U.S. citizens were detained during raids and protests in the first nine months of Trump’s second presidency.
