Trump ‘border czar’ says ICE officer in Maine killing should not have cleared vetting

White House ‘border czar’ Tom Homan speaks with reporters outside the White House, on 20 July 2026. Photograph: Mark Schiefelbein/AP View image in fullscreen White House ‘border czar’ Tom Homan speaks with reporters outside the White House, on 20 July 2026. Photograph: Mark Schiefelbein/AP Trump ‘border czar’ says ICE officer in Maine killing should not have cleared vetting Tom Homan comments on officer’s eligibility to serve after reports that agent’s two ex-wives had accused him of abuse Tom Homan, the Trump administration “border czar”, on Sunday said he did not believe the Immigration and Customs Enforcement ( ICE ) officer at the center of a recent fatal shooting in Maine “should have ever cleared vetting”. Speaking to CNN’s State of the Union, Homan was asked by host Dana Bash about the officer’s eligibility to serve following reports that two of his ex-wives had accused him of abuse. “Should someone with those issues be an ICE agent?” Bash asked. “No, if those … are facts … I don’t think he should ever have cleared vetting,” Homan replied. Homan also said part of an ongoing investigation into the 13 July shooting death Joan Sebastián Durán Guerrero is determining “how … did the vetting process fail”. “When they hire somebody, they put them through a vetting process and look at all that stuff. So I know, based on that information – that’s part of the ongoing investigation,” Homan said. “How … did the vetting process fail? Was that information not available? Did they not know?” He added: “So there’s a separate administrative investigation on what happened here. Did we have that information? Did we not have that information? But the vetting process … if that was factual, he would have an almost impossible time to pass vetting.” The officer involved in the killing of Durán Guerrero, a 25-year-old Colombian man in Biddeford, Maine , has since been identified by news outlets as David Brouillette. The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which oversees ICE, has not publicly confirmed Brouillette’s identity. Since the shooting, two of Brouillette’s ex-wives have publicly described alleged abuse during their relationships with him. One, Lucinda Brouillette, alleged her ex-husband engaged in a “persistent pattern of abuse, intimidation, manipulation, fear and control”. “If you were to ask me whether I believe David Brouillette is capable of this level of violence, my answer is unequivocally yes,” she said in a statement to NPR. Although Homan declined to comment directly on this particular case, describing it as “a rare instance”, he said: “If this person had that type of history, it would have been a vetting issue, and it should have been brought to the attention of those who make those decisions.” He added, in part: “We will see. It’s all being reviewed. We will see where it lies.” The shooting has prompted renewed scrutiny of ICE’s hiring practices. Democrats have called for reviews of the agency’s vetting process. For instance, Mississippi