Democrats demand answers 6 months after ICE pledge on body cameras

House Democrats demand answers 6 months after ICE pledge on body cameras Comments: by Rebecca Beitsch - 07/30/26 1:35 PM ET Comments: Link copied by Rebecca Beitsch - 07/30/26 1:35 PM ET Comments: Link copied

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Democratic lawmakers on the House Judiciary Committee hammered U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for failing to deliver on a pledge to equip its officers with body cameras amid a rash of deadly interactions with the public.

In a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and acting ICE Director David Venturella, the Democrats noted it’s been six months since the agency pledged to adopt body cameras.

Then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem pledged to equip officers with body cameras in the wake of two killings in Minneapolis earlier this year, a promise made after Congress provided unprecedented levels of funding for ICE that included $20 million in funds earmarked for that purpose.

But in subsequent fatal shootings, including in Texas and Maine, officers have not been wearing cameras.

“In shooting after shooting, we are told that there is no body-worn camera footage of the incident and asked to accept DHS’s account of the incident. Time and again, that account turns out to be a blatant falsehood. It is time for DHS to use the $210 billion that congressional Republicans have given the agency to ensure that every DHS officer is equipped with a fully functioning body-worn camera when conducting immigration enforcement,” Rep. Jamie Raskin (Md.), the top Democrat on the panel, and Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), the ranking member of an immigration focused subcommittee, wrote in the letter.

Neither ICE nor the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) responded to requests for comment.

Since the start of the second Trump administration, DHS officials have shot more than two dozen people, killing six of them.

The lawmakers said the cameras can “provide a corroborating or contradictory account of what happened.”

In the shooting in Texas, which resulted in the death of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, other witnesses in the car said the DHS’s claims that he weaponized his vehicle against officers were completely false.

Instead, they said, they were scared after being trailed by unmarked vehicles that later encircled their work van on both the left and right.

And in the cases of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, the DHS also initially made claims about their deaths that appear to be false. The DHS accused Good of weaponizing her vehicle and Pretti of reaching for a gun to assault officers. Video evidence taken by bystanders contradicted both claims.

“We need these cameras now. DHS and its component agencies have consistently made false and unsubstantiated allegations about people its agents shot, including Renée Good, Alex Pretti, Ruben Ray Martinez, and Marimar Martinez. DHS initially claimed these U.S. citizens, all of whom they either killed or maimed, were attacking law enforcement officers,” Raskin and Jayapal wrote.

“In each case, evidence later emerged that definitively contradicted the government’s claims, showing that DHS made false or misleading statements. In other incidents, it was found ICE agents lied and were the aggressors, resulting in several trumped-up prosecutions against DHS’s victims being dismissed with prejudice.”

“DHS has the resources it needs to make this happen now,” they added.

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