The Trump administration is now targeting its mass deportation campaign on Maine, a state with relatively few residents in the United States illegally but notable African refugee communities in its largest cities.
The Department of Homeland Security named the operation “Catch of the Day,” an apparent play on Maine’s seafood industry, just as it has done for other enforcement surges, like “Patriot” in Massachusetts, “Metro Surge” in Minnesota and “Midway Blitz” in Chicago.
Reports of a surge in immigration arrests have struck fear in immigrant communities of Portland and Lewiston and prompted backlash from Gov. Janet Mills and other Democrats, including a refusal to help ICE agents obscure the identity of their vehicles by issuing undercover license plates.
Mills said Wednesday that if federal agents have warrants, they should show them, but if they are separating parents who have committed no crime from their children, they are “only sowing intimidation and fear and fostering division and suspicion among neighbors.”
Citizens have formed networks to alert neighborhoods to the presence of ICE agents and bring food to immigrants in their homes. Portland’s superintendent said the school district is developing an online learning plan for its students — more than half of whom aren’t white. Many businesses have posted signs saying ICE agents aren’t welcome.
“While we respect the law, we challenge the need for a paramilitary approach,” Portland Mayor Mark Dion said at a news conference Wednesday where he was joined by other local officials. “This council doesn’t stand apart from our immigrant communities, we stand with them.”
Portland and Lewiston have thousands of residents of African descent. Somali immigration accelerated in the early 2000s, leaving Maine with one of the nation’s highest Somali populations.
Now the presence of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents is causing great anxiety in Portland, said city council member Pious Ali, a native of Ghana.
“Our schools have seen about a quarter of immigrants not showing up,” Ali said, and many fear going to work as well: “There are immigrants who live here who work in our hospitals, they work in our schools, they work in our hotels, they are part of the economic engine of our community.”
ICE agents don’t need to spread trauma by smashing doors and windows, he said: “The federal government has the ability to contact these people without unleashing fear into our communities.”
Portland Councilor Wes Pelletier said business owners, teachers and college students have shared information to alert neighborhoods to enforcement activity, while volunteers have delivered groceries and diapers to families too afraid to go outside.
“Every arrest feels like a wound to Portland,” the councilor said.
Gov. Janet Mills speaks about increased ICE presence in Maine
Mills held a press conference Thursday afternoon, addressing the ICE presence in Maine and the fear that is spreading across the state.
“This target of 1,400 people seems pretty broad and we’re hearing that there’s a lot of fear within schools, within the employment community, among businesses who are losing employees who have either been detained or are not showing up…businesses are very worried about being able to carry on, all kinds of businesses who rely on employees who are here legally, lawfully, and who have a good work ethic and a good work record with these employers.”
Mills said she’s hearing that many of the people who are being detained or who are on the target list are family members here in Maine, people who are working here in Maine, people who have children in the school system, people who have children in homes in Maine, and people with no criminal records: “And that’s concerning.”
“Obviously it’s very disruptive to a child’s life, disruptive to a business, disruptive to a school, to a city and town, and tends to engender a lot of fear and anxiety naturally on the part of these families and these communities,” Mills said. “And think what it does to the children to think of their parent being hauled away, a parent with no criminal activity, no criminal charges, no criminal record, being hauled away in their presence and not being told when is mom or dad is coming home. Where do I go next? Who do I turn to? Pretty tough.”
Mills said she’d love to know the numbers of arrests in real time but that it would be hard to determine that without following ICE around, which she’s not going to be doing. The governor said they try to keep track of a lot of anecdotal reports, as do police departments and mayors, who are getting those reports also.
She also noted that people are freely using their cell phones, which is their absolute right, to record incidents they see, as long as they don’t interfere or obstruct.
Mills, a former district attorney and state attorney general, said she knows about crime in the state. She says they take crime very seriously, and are proud of the fact that Maine has one of the lowest crime rates in the country, certainly one of the lowest violent crime rates.
“We take allegations of criminal activity seriously, no matter who the person is. I don’t sense that there’s any greater incidence of crime among non citizens than there is among citizens, in fact I think probably the opposite,” Mills said. “But that’s not what we’re hearing about. We’re hearing about perhaps a handful of people with criminal convictions who, I don’t know what their status is, but you know what I’ve asked for, if you have warrants, show the warrants. In my experience you’ve gotta get a judicial warrant to arrest somebody. It’s not automatic. And they have warrants to come here and arrest people, then that should be public record.”
Mills said in America, we don’t believe in secret arrests or secret police. She said as for Maine, she knows the state’s law enforcement are subject to professional training, substantial qualifications and high expectations or performance standards.
“And I’ll tell ya, they don’t wear masks to hide their identity, they don’t need to wear masks, they don’t need to hide their identity, and they don’t go out and set numbers and goals and quotas and detain people subject to some quota wherever that may come from. That’s not very professional.”
As for why is ICE targeting Maine? Mills could only surmise.
“Well [Trump’s] gone to a lot of blue states, hasn’t he? He went to Chicago, Illinois, Los Angeles, California, and Minneapolis, Minnesota, all democratic governors. I happen to be a democratic governor. Ostensibly they’re coming here, they say, because of an immigrant population that they find in disfavor, so I don’t know, you’ll have to ask them why they’re here.”
As for there allegedly being 1,400 people in Maine with criminal backgrounds, Mills says, “Let’s see the documents.”
“I’d be shocked if they found 1,400 people with criminal charges against them but what we’re hearing is not that anyway,” Mills continued. “What we’re hearing is that people with no criminal backgrounds are being detained and subject to perhaps deportation, or at least arrest, people who are being torn from their families and from young children, people who are part of the workforce here in Maine, a workforce that we desperately need and desperately value, and that’s a shame, you know? It’s disruptive and it’s causing a lot of fear, unnecessary anxiety in the community and among families who don’t deserve this kind of treatment.”
Mills said school superintendents are very much on alert, particularly in Portland and Lewiston where schools have a fairly high number of children of immigrant families.
When asked about a recently leaked memo, dated May 2025, that shows ICE told officers they can forcibly enter homes during immigration operations without a judicial warrant, Mills said: “That’s very disturbing news assuming it’s true.”
“Look the Fourth Amendment, the basic premise of our Bill of Rights, for god’s sake its words couldn’t be plainer, you’ve got to have a judicial warrant before you enter somebody’s home.”
Dozens of arrests
The enforcement action is arriving in Maine, a mostly rural state with about 1.4 million residents, as confrontations between ICE and demonstrators continue in Minnesota, where ICE is under scrutiny following an agent’s fatal shooting of Renee Good.
ICE didn’t respond to a request for comment Wednesday on the agency’s plans for Maine, where the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that increased enforcement began on Tuesday.
“We have approximately 1,400 targets here in Maine,” Patricia Hyde, the ICE deputy assistant director, told Fox News, adding that agents had made 50 arrests by Tuesday.
“We have launched Operation Catch of the Day to target the worst of the worst criminal illegal aliens in the state. On the first day of operations, we arrested illegal aliens convicted of aggravated assault, false imprisonment, and endangering the welfare of a child,” added Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin in a statement.
No new undercover license plates
Secretary of State Shenna Bellows said state officials received a request from U.S. Customs and Border Protection for confidential, undercover Maine license plates and decided against issuing them. The licenses plates are used on unmarked vehicles, and Bellows said she wants more assurance they will be used appropriately.
ICE’s use of license plates in other states has raised concerns: Illinois Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias, a Democrat, issued a warning to ICE agents last year that swapping or altering license plates is illegal.
“These requests in light of rumors of ICE deployment to Maine and abuses of power in Minnesota and elsewhere raise concerns. We have not revoked existing plates but have paused issuance of new plates. We want to be assured that Maine plates will not be used for lawless purposes,” Bellows said.
Bellows, a Democrat who has repeatedly clashed with the Trump administration, cited accountability concerns.
Customs and Border Protection did not respond to a request seeking comment, but a top Maine Republican said withholding the undercover plates would jeopardize public safety.
“That really, one, puts us at odds as a state. Puts us at one end of an extreme that we really shouldn’t be on,” Senate Leader Trey Stewart said.
Maine’s top federal prosecutor, U.S. Attorney Andrew Benson, joined Democrats in calling for any demonstrations in the state to remain peaceful and civil. Benson, a Trump appointee, warned people to stay out of the agents’ way or be prosecuted.
Schools, Democrats call for caution
Portland Public Schools, the largest and most diverse school district in the state, said in a statement Wednesday that it conducted a “lockout” at two schools to prevent anyone from entering the building during the school day Tuesday because of concerns about ICE activity nearby.
“It was quickly determined that there was no threat to our school communities and the lockouts were lifted within minutes. This is an understandably tense time in our community, as reports and rumors of immigration enforcement actions grow,” the district’s statement said.
Maine Democrats have condemned the ICE activity.
“The Trump administration has deployed ICE agents to Portland, Lewiston, and possibly other Maine communities. This is not about public safety. It is about fear, control, and political theater,” Devon Murphy-Anderson, executive director of the Maine Democratic Party, said in a statement Wednesday.
Associated Press journalist Leah Willingham contributed from Boston.
