SPAIN PERSPECTIVE

Madrid, July 15, 2026. Two deaths in less than a week, two disputed official accounts: the Spanish press is reconstructing the sequence of events that led the Trump administration to suspend most ICE road checks. ElDiario.es reports that "ICE kills a person in Maine at point-blank range and apologizes in self-defense despite images that rule it out" - the agency cites self-defense despite videos that contradict it. The victim, a 26-year-old Colombian killed on Monday in Biddeford, was on his way to work, according to Mufalo Chitam, director of the Maine Immigrant Rights Coalition, quoted by CNN. Maine's independent Senator Angus King confirmed that the man was not even the target of the ICE warrant.

El País highlights that this shooting occurred six days after the death of Lorenzo Salgado, a 52-year-old Mexican shot in Houston during a traffic stop, also mistaken for another person. The newspaper reports at least 29 shootings involving federal immigration agents since Trump's return to the White House, including eight that resulted in a death, according to the Gun Violence Data Hub. In several cases, authorities claimed that the victims used their vehicle as a weapon against agents - a version that witnesses, relatives, or videos later disputed.

In the face of this accumulation, Mexico is taking a tougher stance. El País details the judicial offensive launched by Claudia Sheinbaum's government, which is preparing a criminal complaint for the death of at least 17 Mexican migrants in detention or during ICE raids, as well as a civil action against private companies managing detention centers. "We can no longer be satisfied with diplomatic letters that have had no result," Sheinbaum said, quoted by the newspaper. This break with usual diplomatic channels, notes El País, comes in an already tense bilateral climate marked by American threats of interference and the revision of the USMCA trade agreement.