Updated

Updated · NBC News · Jul 14

Maine ICE Shooting Jolts 2026 Senate Primary as Collins Faces Heat Over Funding Vote

Updated

Updated · NBC News · Jul 14

Maine ICE Shooting Jolts 2026 Senate Primary as Collins Faces Heat Over Funding Vote

Q: Why was a man with a US work permit facing a final deportation order?

A U.S. work permit does not protect someone from deportation, and the reporting so far does not say exactly why this man had a final removal order. What is known is that immigration advocates said the 26-year-old Colombian man was authorized to work in the United States and had a Social Security number, while DHS told Maine senators he was the subject of a final deportation order that ICE was trying to execute. Those facts are not necessarily inconsistent. A work permit, or Employment Authorization Document, often reflects temporary permission to work tied to a pending case or limited status; it is not the same as permanent legal status and does not cancel a removal order. In practice, people can end up with a final deportation order despite having had work authorization for several reasons. Their underlying immigration case may have been denied or terminated, they may have missed an immigration court hearing and been ordered removed in absentia, or they may have lost the status that supported the work permit, such as asylum-related, parole-based, or other temporary protection. In some cases, a person can still physically possess a valid-looking work card even after the legal basis for remaining in the country has ended. So the short answer is that he could legally have had work authorization at some point and still be under a final deportation order. The specific basis for his order has not been publicly detailed in the reporting available on July 13.

3 articles · Updated · NBC News · Jul 14

A fatal ICE shooting in Biddeford has rapidly reshaped Maine’s Democratic Senate primary, with candidates turning the race toward immigration enforcement and Susan Collins’s record.
Collins is under new scrutiny because she voted last month to fund ICE without a package of policy restrictions that critics say could have constrained the agency.
The victim was a 26-year-old Colombian man whom Maine’s attorney general said was shot by an ICE agent while trying to flee in a vehicle; the FBI and state authorities are investigating.
Democratic contenders including Nirav Shah, Shenna Bellows, Troy Jackson and Paige Loud have denounced the killing, and some have gone further by calling to abolish ICE.
The episode has intensified pressure on Collins in a race already accelerated by a compressed primary calendar, pushing federal immigration policy to the center of Maine’s Senate contest.