Pressed on Biddeford shooting investigation, Vance shifts focus to drug overdoses

Vice President JD Vance said the federal government is investigating the fatal U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement shooting in Biddeford, but quickly shifted focus to drug overdoses when pressed about updates Monday. 

“What I see from Democrats is people who are far more worried about a shooting involving an illegal alien than they are about the fact that tens of thousands of Mainers died from fentanyl overdoses,” Vance told a crowd at Compotech in Brewer.

“My message to the Democrats who are so worried about that situation is to say: Have a little bit of perspective.”

Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, who ICE agents shot and killed in Biddeford on July 13, was not the target of the operation that had brought the agents to the area, ICE has confirmed. Guerrero had a pending asylum case and a valid work permit, according to his family and the Immigrant Legal Advocacy Project. 

At least 22 people have been shot by federal agents since January 2025, when President Donald Trump began his second term and immigration crackdown. Guerrero is at least the fourth person federal agents killed this year. 

Meanwhile, fentanyl seizures decreased by 39% during the first year of the second Trump administration after ICE shifted the Department of Homeland Security’s criminal investigations arm to conducting immigration enforcement, according to a report government investigators published Friday. 

The report found that the hours dedicated to fentanyl investigations for fiscal year 2025 declined by more than 250,000 hours, or 31%, compared to fiscal year 2024. On the other hand, immigration enforcement saw the largest increase across all investigative categories, rising more than 1.7 million hours, or over 800%, according to the report. 

Vance’s comments came after national Democrats and the attorney for the Guerrero family criticized the federal government’s silence on the fatal ICE shooting during a “shadow” hearing in Biddeford last week.

Every Democratic member of Congress requested information about the shooting in a letter to the Department of Homeland Security on July 15, but they have not received a response, Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, ranking member of the Homeland Security Committee, told reporters in Maine.

Ben Gideon, legal representation for the Guerrero family, said that no federal agency has reached out to the family — including his wife, Karolina Rojas Alvarez, who heard the shots and soon after saw her husband’s body — which would be typical when such an investigation occurs. The state Attorney General’s Office has interviewed Rojas Alvarez.

Vance said on Monday that the federal government is investigating but did not provide any further insight. 

“I’m not going to prejudge the case because I think everybody is entitled to their case, not in the court of public opinion but a court trial by their juries, an actual real investigation, if that’s what ultimately happens,” he said. 

Vance also reiterated some of the agency’s contradictory explanations of the shooting.  

“When you have a law enforcement action, when you have somebody who is committing a crime in the United States of America, and you go and arrest that person — now I believe the person who was shot was not part of the underlying investigation, but when the officers approached the person they were trying to arrest, that person like drove away from the scene,” Vance said. “And what at least the law enforcement officers argue is that that person posed a danger to the community.”

At first, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin told independent U.S. Sen. Angus King that Guerrero “weaponized” his vehicle before being shot by an ICE agent, an explanation the agency has frequently used in other shootings. But ICE later said he attempted to flee and “fearing for public safety” an agent shot him.

States Newsroom reporter Ariana Figueroa contributed reporting to this story.