ICE Officer Relieved of Duty for ‘Unacceptable’ Conduct After Shoving Woman to the Ground in Viral Video

Officials from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer seen on video shoving an Ecuadorian woman to the floor has been relieved of his current duties, and an investigation has been launched.

The footage, which went viral on social media, showed the officer pushing a woman into a wall and then to the ground at the immigration court at 26 Federal Plaza in New York City on Sept. 25.

DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said the officer in question has been suspended in the wake of the incident.

“The officer’s conduct in this video is unacceptable and beneath the men and women of ICE,” McLaughlin told The Epoch Times’ sister media outlet NTD in a statement.

“Our ICE law enforcement are held to the highest professional standards, and this officer is being relieved of current duties as we conduct a full investigation.”

The woman—an asylum-seeker identified as Monica Moreta-Galarza—was pleading with ICE agents not to take her husband away when the altercation took place, she told ProPublica. After the incident, she went to the office of Rep. Dan Goldman (D-N.Y.) to seek support.

Goldman, reacting to McLaughlin’s announcement that the officer involved has been relieved of his duties, wrote in a post on X: “Glad to see @SecNoem heed the calls I made yesterday for DHS to take disciplinary action against this agent after the outrageous assault against Monica and her children.

“The Secretary must take action to prevent something like this from happening again by DHS, here in NYC, or anywhere in America.”

Goldman and other Democrats have been critical of the tactics used in the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement effort.

He recently sponsored a bill—the No Secret Police Act—that would bar DHS agents from wearing face coverings while on duty and require that their departmental affiliation is clearly identified. The bill aligns with state legislation recently adopted in California that bans federal immigration agents and other law enforcement personnel from wearing masks while on duty.

The Trump administration has said masks are essential to agent safety, as immigration enforcement has become an increasingly politically charged issue, sometimes sparking violent anti-ICE protests.

In response to the California law enforcement mask ban, McLaughlin said DHS would not comply, calling the law “unconstitutional” and accusing California Gov. Gavin Newsom of “fanning the flames of division, hatred, and dehumanization of our law enforcement.”

DHS said that ICE agents clearly identify themselves during operations, wearing vests marked with ICE/ERO or Homeland Security and using vehicles with obvious insignia. The masks, the agency said, protect officers from being targeted by “highly sophisticated gangs like Tren de Aragua and MS-13, criminal rings, murderers, and rapists.”

Assaults on ICE officers have risen by more than 1,000 percent this year, McLaughlin noted, adding that agents and their families are “being doxxed and targeted.”

Amid the rise in violence against ICE agents, Attorney General Pam Bondi said on Sept. 26 that Justice Department agents would be deployed to ICE facilities to protect federal personnel.

Bondi stated on X that the department’s Joint Terrorism Task Forces have been instructed to investigate those who are found to be engaged in “acts of domestic terrorism,” such as repeated acts of violence and obstruction against federal agents.