A D.H.S. Capturing Places Portland Again Underneath the Microscope
Phrase in Hazelwood unfold rapidly. When Andrea Valderrama, who represents Outer East Portland within the Oregon State Legislature and lives within the neighborhood, noticed her elementary-school-aged daughter an hour later, she was horrified to be taught that her youngster was already conscious of an incident. “It was not the usual, ‘How was your day at college?’ dialog,” Valderrama instructed me. “It was a sign, as a mother, of the affect these ICE enforcement actions are having on our kiddos.”
The district Valderrama represents is forty-eight per cent nonwhite, and seventeen per cent determine as Hispanic, together with Valderrama, whose dad and mom are Peruvian. “East Portland has a big variety of immigrants, refugees, and households of coloration,” she mentioned, “extra so than different elements of the town.” The group had been besieged by D.H.S. raids since Trump retook workplace. Valderrama described “ICE brokers breaking down doorways” and “inflicting property injury, drawing weapons commonly.” This has affected the disposition of the neighborhood. “There was elevated worry and concern as a result of there’s been an elevated use of extreme drive and violence and traumatic separation of households,” she instructed me.
Now, only a day after the deadly capturing of Good, in Minneapolis, two individuals had been shot down the road from Valderrama’s residence. That night time, she joined Mayor Wilson and different group leaders to handle the general public. “My household got here to this nation fleeing actually the identical kind of violent ways that we’re seeing in my neighborhood and on this metropolis and throughout this nation,” Valderrama mentioned from the rostrum. The mayor, after questioning D.H.S’s model of occasions, had a message for the Feds. “We’re calling on ICE to halt all operations in Portland,” he mentioned, “till a full and impartial investigation can happen.”
Practically all of the questions on the press convention have been for Bob Day, Portland’s chief of police. A ginger-haired former aspiring pastor, Day appeared visibly troubled by the capturing. Did he count on the Feds to contain his division within the investigation? “I’m not precisely positive,” he mentioned. “Frankly, there’s loads of competing pursuits, as we all know.” Simply earlier than the briefing, D.H.S. alleged the 2 capturing victims had ties to Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan transnational group accused of crimes together with kidnapping, human trafficking, and contract killings. Is the gang energetic in Portland? “I don’t have any info that may hyperlink that at the moment,” Day mentioned. He didn’t even know the victims’ names but.
All through the night time and into the subsequent morning, the story ran by means of the maw of cable information and social media, following the identical patterns because the story of Good’s killing earlier within the week. Observers have been both on the aspect of the capturing victims, who have been recovering within the hospital, or on the aspect of the federal brokers, who had reportedly been assaulted with a automobile. Besides on this case, with no video footage, the web and talk-show combatants had much less to attract from.
On Friday, simply earlier than 8 A.M. native time, D.H.S. introduced new particulars on X, writing that Nino-Moncada “is a legal unlawful alien from Venezuela and suspected Tren de Aragua gang member” and was “arrested for D.U.I. and unauthorized use of a automobile.” The put up additionally accused Zambrano-Contreras of taking part in “an energetic position in a Tren de Aragua prostitution ring” and being “concerned with a previous capturing in Portland.”
Hours later, Day held one other press convention. Standing on the identical podium, he was much more solemn than earlier than. He recapped the occasions of the prior night time, when a whole lot of individuals exterior Metropolis Corridor and outdoors the ICE facility protested the shootings in Portland and Minneapolis. Six individuals had been arrested for disorderly conduct. And he introduced that, after performing some digging into the division’s backlog of instances, there was “a nexus” between the capturing victims and Tren de Aragua. A capturing within the space, in July, 2025, had ties to one of many victims, he mentioned. However he couldn’t say which sufferer, Nino-Moncada or Zambrano-Contreras, was linked to the prior capturing, or what precisely these ties have been, though he famous that they weren’t recognized as suspects. He may solely say that, within the aftermath of the July capturing, a sufferer in that incident had instructed police that Tren de Aragua was concerned. (An lawyer for Nino-Moncada characterised accusations of his connection to Tren de Aragua as “with out proof,” whereas an lawyer for Zambrano-Contreras mentioned that the federal authorities “has a well-documented historical past of constructing false and inflammatory statements about immigrants, Venezuelans particularly.”) Day additionally mentioned that Zambrano-Contreras had as soon as been arrested for prostitution. (It was unclear if she was charged with a criminal offense, or if Nino-Moncada was charged after his D.U.I. arrest. However earlier this week, Nino-Moncada was charged with aggravated assault of a federal officer, in reference to the Border Patrol capturing. He pleaded not responsible.)
