ICE ends operation in Maine, governor seeks details on 200 detainees

A U.S. senator says Immigration and Customs Enforcement has ended its “enhanced activities” in the state of Maine, a week after launching what it dubbed “Operation Catch of the Day” — an operation that the premier of neighbouring New Brunswick said made people in her province “very uncomfortable.”

ICE previously said the plan targeted “the worst of the worst criminal illegal aliens who have terrorized communities” and had netted some 200 arrests.

Sen. Susan Collins posted on X Thursday morning that ICE was ending its “enhanced activities” and urged the administration to “get ICE to reconsider its approach to immigration enforcement in the state.”

“While the Department of Homeland Security does not confirm law enforcement operations, I can report that Secretary Noem has informed me that ICE has ended its enhanced activities in the State of Maine,” the Republican senator wrote.

“There are currently no ongoing or planned large-scale ICE operations here.”

Earlier in the week, Collins said she asked Noem to pause the operations not only in Maine but also in Minnesota, where ICE agents have shot and killed two U.S. citizens: Renee Good and Alex Pretti.

In recent weeks, anti-ICE protests and tensions have escalated throughout Minnesota.

On Wednesday, New Brunswick Premier Susan Holt told reporters in Ottawa that the presence of ICE agents at the New Brunswick-Maine border was affecting people with cross-border family and business ties.

“We see what’s happening in the country,” she said. “We see it in New Brunswick right now with ICE agents on the border of New Brunswick and Maine, in Calais. And it makes us all very, very uncomfortable.

“There’s nothing that we recognize in our neighbours right now, with the leadership that they have. We’re eager to support them in a return to the long-standing and strong partnership that Canada and the U.S. have had for generations.”

Residents on both sides of the border have reported the presence of ICE agents in Calais, Maine, an economic hub that shares multiple border crossings with St. Stephen, N.B.

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Some social media posts reported ICE agents “harassing” people crossing from Canada into the city, though Global News has not independently verified those accounts.

Maine Gov. Janet Mills said Thursday morning that while the ICE operation was ending, its conclusion did not “end the pain and suffering” that was “inflicted on communities across our state.”

In a statement, Mills noted that the public still doesn’t know “critical details” about the 200 people ICE says it has detained, “many of whom appear to be here legally, who have no criminal record and who are not the ‘worst of the worst.’”

“The people of Maine deserve to know the identities of every person taken from here, the legal justification for doing so, where they are being held, and what the federal government’s plan for them are,” Mills wrote.

— with files from Global News’ Sean Boynton

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