from #DropSiteNews
Nathan Bernard and Ryan Grim
Feb 13, 2026
Despite sub-zero conditions, the crowd gathered for the state’s first large-scale #ICE protest, an “ICE THEM OUT” rally. That week, masked federal agents launched “Operation Catch of the Day,” a mass #deportation campaign aimed at the nearly 6,000 #Somalis who live in #Maine. By operation’s end, the administration claimed to arrest over 200 “#immigrant offenders.” Many of these Mainers are now being held at a Massachusetts facility attorneys found to have “inhumane” conditions.
The Lewiston event featured many of the state’s prominent #Democratic politicians.
Gov. Mills was notably absent.
“Governor Mills did not reach out to me, or to the organizing team ahead of the January 24 rally"...said Safiya Khalid.
"Federal records obtained by WIRED show that over the past several months, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) have carried out a secret campaign to expand ICE’s physical presence across the US."
"The Trump administration’s immigration courts suddenly began fast-tracking dozens of cases by Somalis seeking asylum in what their lawyers fear is a coordinated effort to deny them asylum and deport them without due process, NPR reports."
"The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals allowed President Trump to proceed with ending deportation protections for more than 60,000 migrants from Nepal, Honduras and Nicaragua, when it stayed a lower court ruling that had blocked the deportations."
"What this moment reveals is not merely the fragility of white political innocence, but the durability of a system that has survived Reconstruction, Jim Crow, civil rights reform, and the carceral turn by continually redefining violence as order."
"Trump sicced his droogs on Minneapolis because he’s a racist who hates Somalis, and his lawless campaign has spread to Maine, of all places, because it’s another state with a Somali population whose voters rejected him in 2024."
President Donald Trump’s administration is ending temporary protected status for immigrants from #Somalia. That's according to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi #Noem.
"Trump is a prolific purveyor of hate speech who has managed to normalize vile attacks on immigrants from dozens of countries. In the beforetimes, it would have been unthinkable for a president to engage in racist hate speech in the Oval Office in front of reporters. Today, that fact did not make the front page of the New York Times."