President Donald Trump canceled the internal memorandum that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) had issued just 24 hours earlier to suspend vehicle traffic checkpoints, ordering agents to immediately resume that tactic, according to reports from Univision.
The original memorandum, dated July 14, instructed agents to reduce vehicle checks and prioritize other tactics on the ground.
Trump anticipated the revocation hours earlier through his social media platform Truth Social, where he wrote: "WE CANNOT give up one of the most important and effective tools of ICE to combat crime: traffic control!"
The official also warned that yielding at this point would amount to "playing directly into the hands of the criminal," and concluded his message with a direct instruction to the agents: "I.C.E., be prudent, fair, and smart, and go back to doing your very important job."
The temporary suspension had been prompted by two fatal shootings that occurred within just six days, where ICE agents fired at individuals who were not the targets of their operations.
On July 7, an agent killed Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a 52-year-old Mexican who had lived in the United States for nearly 35 years and was the father of three children who are U.S. citizens, as he was heading to work with his construction crew in the Magnolia Park neighborhood of Houston, Texas.
On July 13, another agent shot and killed Joan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, a 26-year-old Colombian from Bucaramanga, in Biddeford, Maine, at 7:00 in the morning. Durán Guerrero had work authorization and a Social Security number, and he was the father of a three-year-old girl.
In both cases, the agents were not wearing body cameras, a factor that has generated widespread criticism, even within the Republican Party.
The shootings sparked protests and raised questions about ICE's tactics. Republican Senator Susan Collins from Maine urged Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin to suspend all non-urgent vehicle detentions and called for the mandatory use of body cameras for all officers.
The "border czar" of the White House, Tom Homan, had attempted to frame the pause as something minor: "It's not a policy change, it's a temporary pause," he said in an interview with Fox News, describing it as "a short-term review to ensure that ICE agents are safe and doing the right thing."
The two shootings in July are part of a pattern of use of force that has escalated since 2025: since the beginning of that year, immigration agents have shot more than 20 people in at least 11 documented incidents, mostly inside vehicles.
Experts in law enforcement and the use of force have described ICE's tactics as excessively aggressive and pointed out that the agents lack the necessary training to conduct traffic stops in accordance with established police standards.
The use of force in ICE detention centers increased by 37% in 2025, with 780 documented incidents, while the death rate in custody reached its highest level in 22 years: 88.9 fatalities for every 100,000 detainees as of May 2026.
Neither ICE nor the Department of Homeland Security responded to media requests for comments.
The FBI in Houston and the Office of Inspector General of the Department of Homeland Security are investigating the Texas shooting, while the agent involved in the Maine case has been suspended and his case is under investigation by the same federal entities.
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