Pingree and top Homeland Security Democrat to hold ‘shadow hearing’ about ICE in Biddeford
People protest the killing of Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero by an ICE agent in Biddeford in July. (Daryn Slover/Staff Photographer)
Mainers will get an opportunity on Monday to attend a congressional event in Biddeford focused on U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree, D-1st District, in Nov. 2025 at Greater Portland Health in South Portland. (Derek Davis/Staff Photographer)
The top Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee, Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, is organizing it with Rep. Chellie Pingree of Maine in response to the fatal shooting of Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero by an ICE agent in Biddeford in July.
The second-most senior Democrat in the House, Rep. Katherine Clark of Massachusetts, also plans to attend.
The event is scheduled to be held at Biddeford High School’s Little Theater on Monday at 11 a.m.
Democratic members of Congress plan to call witnesses, including Mayor Liam LaFountain, Guerrero family attorney Ben Gideon, and advocates from the Maine Immigrants’ Rights Coalition and the Immigrant Legal Advocacy Project.
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The announcement from Pingree’s office said the event will also include people “who can speak to the state of the investigation” into Guerrero’s killing.
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The investigation in Maine is being led by the Office of the Maine Attorney General. No one from the office is currently listed on the witness panel in Biddeford, though more names are expected to be announced. A similar forum last month in Houston included the local prosecutor investigating ICE’s killing of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a Mexican man who had been in the country for 35 years.
The Biddeford event is not an official committee hearing, which could only be convened by the Homeland Security Committee’s Republican chairman.
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Thompson said in an interview that he has been frustrated there hasn’t been more official oversight by Republicans. In the absence of that, he said, “Democrats on the committee have decided we will do our own shadow hearings.”
It will be open to the public, though only witnesses will be invited to speak.
In accepting the invitation to testify, LaFountain said he “expressed my hope that members of Congress from both parties would be invited to participate.”
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Thompson has invited Republicans and witnesses from ICE to participate in similar hearings in the past — including one he organized after Renee Good was shot in Minnesota — but they have not attended, he said.
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Pingree’s office said the Maine event will focus on ICE’s “use of force and abuse of power” in light of Guerrero’s killing. The idea is to let the public “have a formal airing of the circumstances that occurred,” Thompson said.
LaFountain expects to be asked about the use of force by agents on the street, which included a broken car window in his city in February, and about the shooting investigation.
Biddeford Mayor Liam LaFountain issues a mayoral proclamation demanding justice and accountability for the fatal shooting of Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero during the July 21 Biddeford City Council meeting. (Daryn Slover/Staff Photographer)
“I will share the information I have and speak openly about what we know,” he said in a written statement.
Gideon, the family’s attorney, has said that Guerrero was leaving for work on the morning of July 13 when he got in a car at his apartment building. An immigrant from Colombia, he had work authorization and was not a target of ICE’s operation that day. An agent identified as David Brouillette shot and killed him.
One of Brouillette’s ex-wives identified him, saying he called her and admitted to the shooting. ICE has neither confirmed the shooter’s identity nor described the circumstances before shots were fired, and no video of the shooting has emerged. The killing has prompted protests in several Maine cities.
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All of our coverage on the fatal ICE shooting in Biddeford
Pingree’s office said people who want to attend do not need to RSVP. Space in the theater is limited, and the forum will also be available to watch on the congresswoman’s YouTube channel.
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Tagged: biddeford ice shooting, ICE, immigration, Immigration and Customs Enforcement
Rachel Estabrook is an accountability reporter at the Portland Press Herald. Before joining the Press Herald in 2026, Rachel worked in the newsroom at Colorado Public Radio for 12 years. She's originally. More by Rachel Estabrook
