ICE Agents In Plainclothes Attempt To Arrest Migrant At Las Vegas Airport, Then Flee When Bystanders Asked Why

A video has gone viral that shows two plainclothes Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents on top of a man they were attempting to handcuff at  Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas, before onlookers asked them what was going on, prompting the agents to simply walk away from the man, whom they left with a pair of cuffs still attached to one of his wrists.

According to NBC News, Las Vegas police have confirmed that the two people in the video trying to handcuff the man were, indeed, ICE agents, and that its own officers conducted a records check and “found no outstanding warrants on the individual.”

“They removed the handcuff from his wrist and notified ICE,” Las Vegas police said in a statement.

The Department of Homeland Security identified the man as 57-year-old Phu Nguyen and said he is an Australian citizen who overstayed his visa. DHS claimed he entered the United States legally on a visa in May 2013, “with permission to remain in the United States until May 26, 2015,” which, of course, still wouldn’t explain why ICE agents needed to arrest him so aggressively, why they were not in any clothing that would identify them as agents, or why they would just up and leave in the midst of that arrest, leaving their handcuffs behind.

DHS did explain that the agents left without arresting Nguyen, who was reportedly allowed to board his flight to Los Angeles, “to de-escalate the situation and for officer safety” after a crowd formed. Nguyen was then arrested (for real, this time) at Los Angeles International Airport.

Yeah — that doesn’t make any sense.

First, it’s not like bystanders were physically preventing agents from making an arrest. One person was simply pointing a camera at them, and others were asking what was going on, especially given that, again, nothing about the officers’ appearance made it apparent that they were federal agents or law enforcement officers at all. There wasn’t even the same degree of bystander outrage that is often directed at agents, usually due to the aggressive manner in which they target and arrest people. There was no chaotic scene to “de-escalate.” Nguyen was on the ground screaming out in distress while people in regular-degular clothes appeared to be trying to apprehend him, prompting people to ask why.

Of course, that’s not the way ICE described what we can all see with our own eyes on social media. Instead, ICE Los Angeles posted from its X account that Nguyen was arrested in LA, “despite attempts by agitators to help him evade ICE officers at Las Vegas airport,” which absolutely did not happen whatsoever.

You see how easily and seamlessly our government lies? If the feds aren’t smearing victims of ICE violence — such as Alex Pretti and Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis,  Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston, and Joan Sebastian Guerrero in Biddeford, Maine — they’re smearing protesters and onlookers, who are always conveniently the aggressors, according to DHS, even when the evidence shows they were not.

Anyway, according to NBC, online records show that Nguyen is being held at the Adelanto ICE Processing Center in California. It’s not clear if he has obtained an attorney.

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