It just took 72 hours for an Immigration and Enforcement (ICE) officer, Victor Mojica, to be back on the job after being suspended during this time. According to NPR, the officer was suspended after he was caught on camera roughly pushing a woman into the hallway on several cameras.

The reports state that Victor not only pushed that woman into the hallway but also knocked her to the floor despite her while she was screaming. After the clip of this incident that took place at an immigration court in New York circulated online, it forced the Homeland Security Department to place the officer on administrative leave.

It is said that this was one of the rare incidents where such a leave was publicly announced. But just the following Monday after the incident, Victor was back on the job. The agency did not provide an explanation.


According to further reporting by NPR, it is said that Victor was allowed to get back to his job even before the investigation into this matter was finished. Homeland Security Department’s internal watchdog was looking into this case, and nearly 2 months after the incident, they concluded that what happened was not severe enough to qualify as a criminal probe.

After the details about the investigation have been revealed, several critics have been questioning the accountability systems of DHS and whether the way they were overseeing the entire incident was effective enough or not.

As the pressure from the Trump officials to increase deportations has risen, and the internal watchdog agencies have weakened, the critics and former ICE officials are worried that limited transparency around discipline could further damage public trust in federal law enforcement.

Jason Houser, former ICE chief of staff under President Biden, said, “That’s the scary part, that this is just one small case of a larger systemic issue of how law enforcement is being hyper-politicized.” As per him, this incident will only add to the negative view of ICE officers.

When Victor was suspended for his behavior towards the woman, DHS released a statement to criticize his actions. The statement read, “The officer’s conduct in this video is unacceptable and beneath the men and women of ICE,” Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary of media affairs at DHS, said at the time.

“Our ICE law enforcement is held to the highest professional standards, and this officer is being relieved of current duties as we conduct a full investigation.”

As noted earlier, Victor was back on the job and resumed his whole duty within days of the incident, despite the pact that NPR had previously reported the officer’s past use of force incidents. Trump advisers, including Stephen Miller, publicly highlighted this decision, but officials did not offer any explanation for why he was cleared to return to work.

Well, this is not the first time such an incident has come to the fore. While similar incidents continue to surface, questions about the current oversight mechanisms being strong enough to maintain public confidence have arisen.