Police Arrest Man Who Shot Up San Antonio ICE Office
Authorities took a man into custody for allegedly firing a gun at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in San Antonio, shattering several windows.
The San Antonio Police Department responded early Tuesday morning to a shooting that took place at a building that houses the Department of Homeland Security’s ICE division and arrived at the scene at approximately 3 a.m. local time.
The alleged shooter is believed to have fired several rounds at the building from across the highway, according to local reports. No one was injured, however, several of the building’s windows were broken.
Police officers apprehended the man — who has yet to be identified — not far from where the shooting occurred. The FBI is handling the case, a San Antonio Police Department spokeswoman told the Daily Caller News Foundation. The FBI’s San Antonio division did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Law enforcement has yet to determine a motive for the shooting. Some in Homeland Security circles are pointing the finger at those who have vilified immigration officials in recent months.
“Democrats have been spewing this hatred that causes these incidents,” a former immigration official said to the DCNF in reaction to the shooting. “It invokes violence,” he said about Democrats who have called ICE agents Nazis and compared detention centers to concentration camps.
“More and more events like this are taking place, and it’s starting to show a pattern,” the official continued.
If the San Antonio shooter intended to target ICE, it would be the second time in two months that an individual has attempted violence against the agency.
Willem Van Spronsen, a 69-year-old with ties to Antifa, launched an attack in July against an ICE detention center in Tacoma, Washington. Armed with a rifle and flares, the man attempted to light the buildings on fire, but only managed to ignite a nearby vehicle before getting killed in a shootout with police.
Law enforcement discovered a manifesto Spronsen wrote. He called on his fellow “comrades” to arm themselves in the manifesto, and he referred to immigrant detention centers as “concentration camps,” a comparison popularized by New York Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Ocasio-Cortez condemned the Washington state attack in July. Her office did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Tuesday morning’s shooting. Reps. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, two other Democrats who have been vehemently critical of the agency, also did not respond to requests for comments about the shooting.
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