On December 24 around 11:00 a.m., Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents opened fire in Glen Burnie, Maryland, nearly killing a man. Tiago Alexandre Sousa-Martins, an immigrant from Portugal, was shot by ICE agents after he allegedly attempted to flee a targeted kidnapping operation.
The shooting took place in a residential suburb, while children were home for the holiday. According to the Baltimore Banner, ICE claimed that Sousa-Martins tried to drive away instead of submitting to custody. ICE alleged that he drove into agency vehicles attempting to box him in and that officers were in the pathway of the van. An ICE spokesperson claimed agents “defensively fired their service weapons, striking the driver.” After being shot, Sousa-Martins’ van veered off the road and struck a tree, injuring a passenger.
Sousa-Martins and his passenger, who was injured in the crash, are both recovering at a local hospital. A Glen Burnie resident and eyewitness, James Hick, told the Banner reporters, “Shot him three times. I see him laid out.” He added, “Guy didn’t deserve to be killed, but he shouldn’t have tried to run them over.” Another neighbor, who did not wish to be identified, told the Banner she saw ICE agents shooting at Sousa-Martins from inside their own vehicles.
No video has been released to corroborate any ICE statements. No claims issued by ICE, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) or any agency under the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) should be accepted at face value. Agents and their leadership routinely lie, including in court.
Last month, in an injunction restricting federal immigration agents’ use of force in Illinois, US District Judge Sara Ellis rejected false testimony from CBP commander Gregory Bovino, writing, “I do not find the defendants’ version of events credible.” She further noted, “Bovino admitted that he lied” about claims that agents were struck by rocks. He also denied using force on a man when video showed him “obviously tackling” that person to the ground.
This is at least the ninth time this year and the second time in less than a week federal immigration agents have shot at someone. On December 22, ICE agents in St. Paul, Minnesota, fired their weapons during another attempted kidnapping operation. In that incident the targeted individual, Juan Carlos Rodrigues Romero, was not struck, but the response again involved lethal force by federal immigration police.
In response to the Maryland shooting, White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller declared on social media that “Vehicle attacks on ICE officers are domestic terrorism.” Miller’s statement reflects the strategy by the Trump administration and the ruling class as a whole to brand all opposition to mass deportations and police repression as “terrorism.” This language is being used to justify the expansion of unchecked state violence against immigrants and the working class more broadly.
The facts expose the fraudulent character of these claims. No ICE agents have been killed in the line of duty this year or in any year. By contrast, immigration police have shot multiple people in 2025, including US citizens. In September, ICE agents shot and killed Silverio Villegas-Gonzalez, a father and worker in Franklin Park, Illinois. At least 32 detainees have also died in ICE custody so far this year under conditions of systematic medical neglect, overcrowding and abuse.
Under these deadly conditions, the Washington Post reported on December 24 that ICE is planning a massive expansion of detention capacity. The Trump administration intends to increase its ability to cage human beings by more than 80,000 by renovating industrial warehouses into mass holding centers.
According to documents reviewed by the Post, ICE plans to create what it calls a “deliberate feeder system.” Immigrants and other targets of the federal government would be funneled into seven large-scale warehouses holding between 5,000 and 10,000 people each, where they would be staged for deportation. An additional 16 smaller facilities would hold up to 1,500 people each.
The parallels to the concentration camp system constructed by the Nazis are unmistakable. Just as extermination camps were built along railway lines to enable rapid transport of Jews and other “undesirables,” the Post reports that these new warehouses would be located close to major logistics hubs in Virginia, Texas, Louisiana, Arizona, Georgia and Missouri.
The larger facilities are slated for Stafford, Virginia; Hutchins, Texas; Hammond, Louisiana; Baytown, Texas; Glendale, Arizona; Social Circle, Georgia and Kansas City, Missouri.
Smaller facilities are planned for Chester, New York; El Paso, Texas; Hagerstown, Maryland; Highland Park, Michigan; Jefferson, Georgia; Jupiter, Florida; Los Fresnos, Texas; Merrillville, Indiana; Merrimack, New Hampshire; Oklahoma City, Oklahoma; Port Allen, Louisiana; Roxbury, New Jersey; Salt Lake City, Utah; San Antonio, Texas; Tremont, Pennsylvania and Woodbury, Minnesota.
The construction of these warehouses would more than double the current ICE detention capacity in the United States. Latest figures indicate nearly 66,000 people are currently in ICE custody. The vast majority, 74 percent, over 48,300 people, have no criminal convictions. Among the more than 17,600 detainees located in Texas, the most of any state, is Dulce Consuelo Diaz Morales, a 22-year-old mother who has been held since December 14 after she was taken by immigration Gestapo after picking up some Taco Bell with her sister in Baltimore, Maryland.
According to her attorneys, Diaz Morales is a US citizen born in Maryland. Her lawyer Victoria Slatton provided a Maryland birth certificate to the Washington Post and to the Department of Homeland Security. Nevertheless, DHS continues to claim she is subject to deportation and refuses to release her from custody.
DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin asserted in an email that Diaz Morales’ “real name” is Dulce Consuelo Madrigal Diaz and described her as “an illegal alien from Mexico.” McLaughlin refused to address the documentation submitted by the family or explain the alleged name discrepancy.
Slatton responded that the difference in last names is fully explained by her client’s parents having two different surnames and that discrepancies of this nature are common among non-English speakers and do not negate citizenship.
As of this writing, Slatton and other attorneys in her firm have still not been permitted to speak directly with Diaz Morales. They only learned that she had been transferred from Louisiana to a detention facility in Texas earlier this week.
In one of the few instances where the Supreme Court has ruled against the Trump administration, on Tuesday several conservatives joined the liberal minority and ruled that the administration could not deploy 300 National Guard troops to Illinois under 10 U.S.C. §12406(3). The Court held that the statute permits Guard deployment only when the federal government is unable to execute the laws with regular military forces. Since the US military has not been deployed domestically in Illinois under the Posse Comitatus Act, the attempted Guard mobilization was ruled unconstitutional.
The majority opinion included Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh, along with the liberal justices. Justices Coney Barrett, Gorsuch and Thomas dissented.
While the Court blocked the Illinois deployment, National Guard troops are being sent to New Orleans through Mardi Gras in February 2026. This deployment of 350 Guardsmen is being carried out with the backing of Louisiana’s Republican Governor Jeff Landry, underscoring that the drive to establish a dictatorship is not the result of Trump alone but a concerted effort by the entire ruling class.
In addition to New Orleans, Guardsmen remain deployed in Memphis, Tennessee and Washington D.C.
The branding of resistance as “terrorism,” the construction of mass detention warehouses and the creeping deployment of National Guard troops are all components of the expanding police-immigration apparatus aimed not only at immigrants but at the entire working class.
Credit: Source link
