Gov. Janet Mills has called for federal immigration authorities to “show the warrants” if they have come to Maine to arrest immigrants who may be here illegally.
That message was delivered during a Thursday press conference as U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement ramps up arrests in the state.
“If they have warrants to come here and arrest people, then that should be public record,” the governor said in response to questions from reporters in Portland.
ICE agents have arrested at least 50 people so far this week during a surge centered around Lewiston and Greater Portland. The agency reportedly has a quota of 1,400 arrests — which Mills on Thursday called “pretty broad” — for its operation here, known as Catch of the Day.
“You know in America, we don’t believe in secret arrests or secret police … It’s one of the foundations of our country and our Constitution,” Mills said.
Mills had few details to share about the nature of ICE’s operation, noting that anecdotally people with criminal records have been detained but also others with no apparent criminal record and are here legally. That’s caused anxiety and fear within schools and the business community, according to Mills.
She expressed skepticism about whether ICE will find 1,400 people within the state’s immigrant community who are wanted criminals, saying she doesn’t believe immigrants are any more likely to commit crimes than those born here.
A 2024 study by the National Institutes for Justice that looked at Texas Department of Public Safety data over a six-year period found that undocumented immigrants were arrested at less than half the rate of native-born U.S. citizens for violent and drug crimes and a quarter the rate for property crimes.
It’s unclear what specifically has drawn ICE to Maine. No reason has been shared with Mills, who directed that question to the agency. ICE has been keeping the state’s congressional delegation in the dark.
But it comes after the Trump administration has sent scores of agents to Minneapolis in the wake of a welfare and Medicaid fraud scandal centered on Minnesota’s Somali community. Similar allegations have been leveled against a Maine immigrant health provider also involving the state’s Somali community. Most of the Somalis in Maine have acquired citizenship since first arriving in the early 2000s or were born here. Both Lewiston and Portland have large Somali populations.