What A Day - The ICE Surge Isn't Over

Episode Date: September 30, 2026

The Venezuelan man who was shot in the back by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer in Austin, Texas, last week has been charged with assaulting an officer. Burundi is the latest country to accept U.S. deportees to a country they have no relationship with, and the U.S. Supreme Court says third-country deportations are ok, for now. A lot is going on in the world of immigration. Jane talks about it all with Sergio Martínez-Beltrán, NPR National Correspondent who covers immigration.Show Notes: Check out Sergio's reporting – tinyurl.com/5n7n48be Subscribe to the What A Day Newsletter – https://tinyurl.com/y4y2e9jy What A Day – YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/@whatadaypodcast Follow us on Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/crookedmedia/ For a transcript of this episode, please email [e-mail]

People are terrified. You can also see that in Little Havana, where you see more and more people concerned of going out. Even those who are citizens, I talked to a bunch of Cubans who have been in the U.S. for the last 40, 50 years. And they even recognize, even though they're citizens now, they say, La Cosa is stadaura. Things are hard out there. Things are complicated. It's ugly out there.

I don't want to go out like that. I'm worried that I might get detainer pulled over and then something could happen. It's Wednesday, September 30th. I'm Jane Koston, and this is Wadaday. Israel and the United Arab Emirates have agreed to work together against, quote, extremist elements today. That comes after a fly Dubai flight bound for Israel was forced to land in Saudi Arabia, after a pilot allegedly attacked another pilot and then attempted to crash the plane.

Here's Israeli president, Benjamin Netanyahu, addressing his country. I spoke with one of the Israeli passengers. He told me the plane went into a spin and began to dive. He told me that against all odds, he managed to break into the cockpit together with one of the crew members, and together they subdued the pilot who carried out the stabbing as he was trying to sabotage the aircraft systems.

In what must have been the most terrifying flight imaginable, the Fly Dubai flight issued an emergency alert and descended 17,000 feet in less than two minutes. Israel scrambled warplanes amid concerns about a possible hijacking. The plane was able to land in Saudi Arabia and another plane flew passengers and crew to their original destination, Tel Aviv. The pilot who allegedly attacked the other pilot has been arrested and is being interrogated by Saudi authorities. In Tennessee, the execution of Krista Gail Pike for a murder she committed at the age of 18 was halted Wednesday, an hour before it was set to begin. A federal appeals court sought to review whether her allegations of childhood sexual abuse and rape were fully considered at her sentencing. Pike, who is now

50 and her boyfriend, were convicted of the 1995 stabbing and beating of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, their classmate at a job training facility in Knoxville. Pike would have been the first woman executed in the state of Tennessee in at least 200 years. Her boyfriend, who was 17 at the time of the murder, was sentenced to life in prison. Pike was diagnosed with bipolar disorder while in prison, which her legal team says also contributed to her mental state during the crime. This day is temporary. And Texas Republican Senate candidate and opponent of marital tranquility, Ken Paxton, was caught on tape saying that President Donald Trump's Texas Trumpapalooza a few weeks ago heard his polling numbers. In the tape recorded at a private fundraiser for Paxton and obtained by the New York Times,

Paxton says of the GOP midterm convention, quote, So to be honest with you, the numbers, when we did that convention, it dropped our numbers. Everybody's numbers dropped right now. Yeah, not good. Indeed. Speaking of Texas, let's talk about the recent shooting in Austin of a Venezuelan man by an immigration and customs enforcement officer. Joining me is Sergio Martinez Beltran, an NPR national correspondent who focuses on immigration. Serio, welcome to what a day. Thanks so much for having me, Jane.

So let's start in Austin, Texas, where a Venezuelan man was shot in the back by ICE officers, and now he's being charged with assault of federal officers. I know that there was a hearing that was supposed to take place today. It was canceled. What's going on with this case? Yes, so we're talking about Wilbert, Gares, as you mentioned, he was shot in the back by federal immigration agents in Austin. And, you know, the way that started, it was a traffic stop, which is something, you know, we've seen the Trump administration do more and more.

Ice agents start, you know, they start or they initiate a traffic stop. In the case of Garses Perez, from what he has said to reporters, is that he didn't know it was ICE agents at the beginning because he was an unmarked vehicle. Eventually, he tried to go park the car somewhere else, and that's when this altercation happened and an officer shut at him. We now have a charging document that where the government says that Garces Perez actually struck an officer with the side view mirror of the car and that he tried to, you know, leave the scene. And that's when a short pursuit or chase happened. And eventually, again, the agents wanted to stop him and shot at him. They're saying that Garces Perez used his car to try to strike one on. of the officers. But a couple of important things are happening here, right? First is that

we haven't seen this before where the person who can be the victim in this situation, which is Garces Perez, who was the one who was shot, is being charged with assaulting and resisting a federal immigration officer. Also, from what we know, Jane, is that Garces Perez still has the bullet lodged in his back. Right. But he's being held in an ICE detention center with a bullet in his back. Right, right. He was sent to the hospital and he was released from the hospital about four hours after he was admitted with the bullet still in his back. He was then sent to the detention center. He went back to the hospital, back to the detention center. And from what we know is that today, he still has that bullet lodged in his back. So a couple of things I want

to ask you. One, we talked about this originally on the show when this incident first took place. One of the officers had a body camera, but initially the idea was that it wasn't on. But now I'm starting to see images of what took place. So does the government have video of this taking place? And also, I think it's worth recognizing that this is not the first time DHS has alleged that a officer was assaulted by someone who then later those assault charges were eventually dropped. I'm not saying that's going to happen here. But You know, when you hear something like this, how skeptical are you given what DHS has said in the past? When I hear something like this, the first thing that comes to mind is I want to see the body camera footage.

You mentioned this in other instances. We have seen federal agents where body cameras, we've been able to see that footage. But in some of these big immigration-related incidents like the shooting of Renee Good in Minneapolis or Alex Freddie or Lorenzo Salgado Arrajo, in Houston in July, or in this case, the Wilbert Garcia-Perez shooting, it seems like there's no body-cam footage. Now, in this particular case, according to this court documents, it sounds like there was at least one body-cam. It's unclear if that body camera belonged to the agent who shot at Garces-Perez, or if he was

the partner officer. So I would be very curious to see that. But, you know, there is usually footage from nearby offices or businesses that can help help us better understand what happened before. Again, with this footage that we've seen from businesses or nearby places, we can see that there was a short pursuit or at least that there was some type of chase at some point. But again, we can't fully see whether Gerses Perez actually struck the agent or what led to

that point of the agent deciding to shoot at Mr. Garses Perez. But that question of body cams is like the one that I keep thinking. You might remember the Trump administration has promised over and over that all ICE officers will have body cameras. They said that was going to happen by September. It is the end of September. And yet in this particular incident, it seems like not everybody had a body camera or at least one that was working or on at the time of the shooting. Right. Former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Christy Noem made that promise with regard to body cameras, but so much of it was about like, you know, officers will be given body cameras, but whether or not they are turned on is another question. But I think that this shooting is part of a, what I've seen referred to as a silent search of ice activity across the country in pretty much every state. Earlier this summer, we had a 24-hour period in which three immigrants died as a result. of encounters with either border or immigration enforcement in Maine, Georgia, and Florida.

And I think that because of Minneapolis, because of Greg Bovino, because of Christy Noem, losing her job, I think that what ICE has been doing has kind of been missed by a lot of people, but can you talk a little bit about this surge in activity? Because as you mentioned, they've been doing more traffic stops. The numbers of arrests, have been going up. They are currently recruiting more ICE officers. They want to add another 5,000. So what's happening? And why are we not hearing as much about it? It's because it is a quieter approach, like you mentioned. Minneapolis was very important for the Trump administration because I think they learned that the approach, this aggressive

made-for-TV approach didn't work. It led to deaths. It led to a lot of pushback from the community. It also led to a few Republicans breaking ranks in that moment. So they have decided to do these partnerships or focus more on partnerships with local law enforcement agencies. It's called the 287G program and, you know, local agencies that participate, they benefit, they get some money. So in some small counties, that money can be used to buy a pickup truck that they need because you only have to, right? So for some of these counties and some of these local law enforcement agencies, this partnership is important. And what that means is that the local police officer, for example, can initiate a traffic stop, ask the person for their immigration status.

And if the person says they're undocumented or if they have suspicion of the person being undocumented, they can call ICE. And ICE will be there in a matter of minutes and detain that person and take them away. And so that has led to an increase in arrest. In fact, in August, more than 50,000 people, nearly 51,000 people were arrested by ICE. And that's a monthly record high. We've never seen those numbers before. And the administration, I think, has realized that that is an effective way of increasing their numbers and hitting their quotas and making sure that they are arresting as many people as possible.

The thing is that these partnerships are happening all across the country, including in states like Westford, Virginia, for example, where it's a small state, hundreds of people have been arrested, and now you have more Republicans breaking ranks. Senator Jim Justice from West Virginia recently said that, you know, he felt that the administration was going too far, that the administration needed to rethink their approach to immigration. We saw that in Florida with Congresswoman Maria Lvira Salazar representing Miami, Cuban Americans, you know, saying, hey, Mr. Trump, you're going way too far with this. even though this approach is quieter and it's leading to a bunch of arrests, Republicans are feeling even more uncomfortable now, especially as we get close to the midterm elections.

And when you mention those traffic stops, I seem to remember the term Kavanaugh stop, the idea of, you know, when they say like, oh, this person looks like they might be undocumented, what can that mean? It can mean that people that look like me or people that look like you could be detained or could be stopped at least. list and ask for their documents without any previous suspicious, right? I mean, it's not that the agents might think, and this is what we've seen in the border. In the past, agents could have the suspicion that you crossed the border and they can initiate a stop now. We can see that that's not what's happening. Agents can stop you and ask for your papers, essentially.

And if you're not able to produce them at the moment, you could be arrested. We've seen that happen with U.S. citizens. who have not been able to produce their documents right away, or even with permanent residents, who have not been able to produce their green card, and they end up in detention for a little bit, or at least arrested for a certain period of time. We see this over and over and over,

and it's creating a lot of fear in the community. We'll get back to my conversation with Sergio Martinez Beltran in just a moment. Waterday is brought to you by Trees.com. You've heard me talk about them as fast-growing trees, but now they're Trees.com, the same trusted online nursery with a simpler name. Trees.com is America's largest and most trusted online nursery,

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Terms and conditions may apply. Today's show is brought to you by Into the Mix, a Ben and Jerry's podcast about joy and justice. You'd think challenging the publishing industry would take an army. Well, Marley Diaz started at only 10 years old. She saw whose stories were missing from the books kids were reading and launched a campaign that became a global movement. Now she's asking what it takes to make lasting change. Here host Ashley C. Ford's conversation with Marley today on Into the Mix, wherever you listen to podcasts. Let's get back to my conversation with Sergio Martinez,

as Beltran, understandably. And we've also seen in a widening of who can be detained. Can you talk a little bit about that with regard to TPS and other facets that are tying into just how big the population the administration is now going after has gotten? The Trump administration has been effective at stripping the legal status of hundreds of thousands of people. And they've done it by ending TPS for Haitians and people from other countries. They've done it by pretty much delegalizing people who came legally through a Biden-era program called CBP-1. They have done it by eliminating humanitarian parole for people from Cuba, Honduras,

Nicaragua, and Venezuela. They have been very effective at doing that. And what that has meant is that now we have hundreds of thousands of people, if not millions of people without illegal status in a limbo in this country. Some of them still have asylum cases pending. Some of them are still trying to adjust their status either through marriage or other ways, but that is not preventing them or that is not protecting them from being detained by eyes.

Now we know that people with pending cases are still being sent to El Salvador, Honduras, Mexico, even to third countries like Eswatini. or Congo or other African countries. So it's almost like everybody is on the table if they don't have illegal status. And again, that's different from the past. Also, in the past, the focus has been of people, on people who have had criminal convictions

or who have committed crimes. We now know that the Trump administration, since the beginning, has been going after everybody. They have been doing collateral arrest. They have been arresting people who have no criminal record, no criminal conviction. and those numbers are reflected in the detention numbers. In July, there were about 66,000 people in ICE detention.

More than 70% did not have a criminal conviction. We're going to talk about the third party removals in just a minute because the Supreme Court made a ruling about that yesterday. You mentioned how we're coming close to the midterms, and I'm interested to hear more. There are a host of communities, you know, Latino communities across the country that were strongly supportive of Donald Trump in 2024. strongly supportive of Republicans. I mean, obviously, many Cuban Americans in Miami have been supportive

of Republicans for decades. How is that, is that starting to change? Is that starting to shift? Because I do think that there were a host of people who were thinking, okay, you know, they want to go after criminals. I don't support criminals who are coming into this country illegally. You know, that's totally fine with me. And now they're seeing what's happening now and going, like, this isn't what I supported at all. Yes, I was actually in South Florida a few weeks ago, and you could see the Cuban Americans who supported President Trump being very uncomfortable. They, of course, wanted the Trump administration to deport criminals, but now they're deporting their cousins who just showed up a few years ago through CBP1, and they helped them come to the U.S. by giving them money or by giving them housing. So now things are changing.

And that's what I'm saying. People now see this. A lot of Republicans are seeing this as, wait, this is going way too far. Little Haiti in South Florida, the heart of the Haitian community there is empty. It's a ghost town. People are not going out. Shops are closed. The church attendance has gone down.

People are terrified. You can also see that in Little Havana, where you see more and more people concerned of going out. Even those who are citizens. I talked to a bunch of Cubans who have been in the U.S. for the last 40, 50 years. And they even recognize, even though they're citizens now, they say, La Costa Estabura. Things are hard out there. Things are complicated.

It's ugly out there. I don't want to go out like that. I'm worried that, like, I might get detainer pulled over, and then something could happen. So more and more people are feeling this burden of these policies, and that's why they are pushing back. and they're being more vocal. One thing that Congresswoman Maria Alvira Salazar said in her ad to President Trump was that the Hispanic voters felt betrayed.

And I think that's something that the Trump administration is probably thinking about or considering as we head to the interim elections because clearly there's a lot of discontent out there. So let's talk about those third country removals. Yesterday, the Supreme Court ruled that the Trump administration can keep doing. that temporarily. There will be a hearing in December and then a final ruling next year. But what are these third country removals look like? Because they're sending people who are not from Burundi to Burundi. What does this mean? And how are these countries even chosen? So this third country removals is this program pretty much that allows the U.S.

government to send an immigrant to a country that is not the country. of origin of that person. So, for instance, there might be a Cuban who might face persecution if the person is returned to Cuba. And so the administration cannot deport them there, and instead they decide to send them to Burundi or Heswatini or somewhere else.

Those countries are getting money from the US government. They are, you know, for some of those countries are getting millions of dollars, which is huge for them, just to like welcome this migrants and have them there and at times keep them in detention there. The thing is that there's no commitment necessarily from these countries

that they're not going to send these migrants back to Cuba once they are in those countries. So the administration, the Trump administration, certainly is not sending them to Cuba, but Eswatini, for example, can eventually send that person to Cuba. And so it's almost this funnel, right? like the person might still feel the same harm or be harmed the same way as if that person would have been, you know, returned to Cuba in the first place.

And the other thing, too, is that with these folks, many of them say they didn't know they were going to end up in Eswatini or Burundi or somewhere else. Many of them say that they thought they were actually going to go either to Mexico or another third country, but not these African countries

where they have no connection to it so far. It's expensive for them to eventually go home So it's a way they say of a torture for them since they didn't choose that. So I'm curious with you. We've mentioned the midterms coming up. Let's say Democrats take control of the House or take control of Congress. How could these policies change, even with Trump still in the White House? How could these policies change if Democrats take control of Congress?

They could change pretty drastically because the Trump administration has done a lot of his policies via executive order. And that's something that Democrats could certainly reverse. We've seen it in the past. When President Biden got into office, he reversed via executive order or executive action many of Trump's immigration policies. So if the Democrats were to win the midterms and eventually a Democratic president will be in power in four years or two more years, we could see that change in that way.

But certainly if Democrats win the House and the Senate, they could apply pressure on President Trump. And he might be pushed. Now, it's kind of hard to see that happening, right? But certainly, depending on how the midterms go, we could see the president being pushed a little bit and maybe changing some of his tactics here. Sergio, thank you so much for joining me. Thanks for having me. That was my conversation with Sergio Martinez Beltran. He's an NPR national correspondent with a focus on immigration.

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