A couple were shot by US Border officers but the incident occurred 400km from the US border, highlighting a a little known rule.
Abisha Sapkota
Following the fatal murder of Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old mother in Minneapolis by a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer, a married couple was shot by another federal agent in Portland, Oregon, just 24 hours later.
This time, the agents involved were from the US Customs and Border Protection (CBP).
The incident has drawn distaste from Portland Mayor, Keith Wilson, who stated, “Portland is not a ‘training ground’ for militarised agents.”
The mayor has called for ICE to “halt all operations” until a full investigation is completed.
This follows the shooting in Minneapolis which the Governor of Oregon, Tina Kotek, described as a “terrible, unnecessary, violent event instigated by the reckless agenda of the Trump administration”.
The Portland shooting occurred in the neighbourhood of Hazelwood, east of the city’s CBD.
In a post on X that was later deleted by the FBI’s Portland office, it confirmed they were investigating an “Customs and Border Protection Agent” in which “two individuals were wounded”.
But what are federal agents from CBP doing in Portland, a city more than 400 km away from the northern border with Canada and 3000 km from the Mexican border?
The answer lies in the “grey zone,” the 160km border enforcement zone.
This grey zone was established in 1953 by the US Department of Justice.
Under federal regulation, CBP’s authority extends to 160km inland from any external US boundary (land and sea).
Because this includes the entire Oregon coastline, Portland falls within their jurisdiction.
But is there a tactical advantage to the presence of CBP over local police or even ICE agents?
ICE agents generally require a judicial warrant to make an arrest in the interior, an arrest within the US, while CBP agents operating within the 160km zone possess the power to conduct warrantless stops, searches (people and vehicles), seizures, and arrest of individuals.
CBP can detain, question, and use force while operating within a 160km distance.
The agents are trained for high-threat environments and it allows the administration to treat any issues with the same force as the border.
This zone now encompasses two-thirds of the American population, allowing the powers at the border to stretch across the country into major cities like New York City, Los Angeles and Washington DC.
Shortly after the shooting, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) released a statement claiming agents were conducting a “targeted vehicle stop”.
According to DHS spokesman Tricia McLaughlin, the passenger in the vehicle was described as a Venezuelan “illegal alien affiliated with the transnational Tree de Aragua prostitution ring”.
The driver was believed to be a member of the Tree de Aragua gang, it’s claimed.
According to the DHS, the driver “weaponised” the vehicle, forcing an agent to fire a “defensive shot”.
The victims, a husband and wife, fled the initial scene to another neighbourhood where they later called for help and were transported to hospital.
The husband is being treated for a gunshot wound to the arm, while the wife was shot in the
chest.
