Collins, Mills take different tacks on ICE's sweeping enforcement action in Maine

PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Maine’s leading Republican and Democratic officials, now engaged in one of the nation's highest profile Senate races, offered starkly different comments on Friday as a surge of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents racked up their arrest totals.

Democratic Gov. Janet Mills has challenged immigration officials to provide judicial warrants, real-time arrest numbers and basic information about who is being detained in Maine.

Mills also called on her Republican rival, Sen. Susan Collins, to act after the House's GOP majority defeated efforts by Democrats to curtail ICE funding.

“Let me be clear: Maine will not be intimidated, and the reckless actions that we’ve seen ICE turn to will not be tolerated here in Maine,” Mills said Friday.

Collins avoided criticizing Immigration and Customs Enforcement tactics, other than to say that people who are in the country legally should not be the target of ICE investigations. She also said that policies she has advocated for, including providing body cameras and de-escalation training for ICE personnel, could help improve accountability and trust.

And as protest organizers announced Friday demonstrations against ICE in Maine's largest cities, she urged them to avoid interfering with ICE arrests.

“There are people in Maine and elsewhere who have entered this country illegally and who have engaged in criminal activity,” Collins said in a statement. “They could be subject to arrest and deportation pursuant to the laws of the United States, and people who are exercising the right to peacefully gather and protest their government should be careful not to interfere with law enforcement efforts while doing so.”

Several hundred people gathered at night in Portland’s Monument Square to protest ICE, despite frigid and windy conditions. The demonstration was orderly and attracted a minimal police presence as speakers criticized the enforcement surge and people held signs with slogans such as “ICE Out Maine” and other slogans.

“ICE is terrorizing our community, and they don’t belong here,” said demonstrator Levi Alexander, 22, of Portland. “I’m just here to do my part.”

Mills' run for Collins' seat could ultimately help determine the balance of the Senate. Mills, who is termed out as governor, must first beat oyster farmer Graham Platner, whose outsider campaign is endorsed by Sen. Bernie Sanders, in the Democratic primary. Platner has strongly condemned ICE's surge in Maine, and posted a video on social media Friday offering step-by-step advice on how to resist.

“Over the past couple days, ICE's operations are clearly rounding up people who are legally in the state of Maine,” Platner said in the Facebook reel. “I'm sick and tired of hearing that legally there is nothing that law enforcement in Maine can do to protect citizens from these thugs.”

The enforcement action began Tuesday and has succeeded in removing dangerous criminals from the community, Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement to media on Thursday.

Some of the more than 100 arrests were of people “convicted of horrific crimes including aggravated assault, false imprisonment, and endangering the welfare of a child,” McLaughlin said.

The detentions in Maine, a mostly rural state where about 4% of the 1.4 million residents are foreign-born, have sparked anxiety in Portland and Lewiston, which are home to sizable immigrant and refugee populations, particularly from African nations.

Community leaders say that just like in other U.S. cities where the agency has surged forces, some families are staying indoors, avoiding work and keeping children home from school for fear of arrest.

The enforcement surge has also included the detention of corrections officers vetted by county authorities.

York County officials said one of their jail corrections officers was detained by ICE after being summoned to an immigration appointment this week and as of Friday remained in at a detention facility in Plymouth, Massachusetts.

Separately, Cumberland County Sheriff Kevin Joyce said one of his corrections officer recruits was arrested by ICE despite passing background checks and federal employment verification. The person had no known criminal history and was authorized to work in the United States, he added.

“While enforcement actions are being promoted as targeting the ‘worst of the worst,’ the reality appears far more complicated,” York County officials said in statement.

Cristian Vaca, an immigrant from Ecuador who lives in Biddeford, said ICE agents repeatedly threatened him Wednesday outside his home, where the 28-year-old roofer lives with his wife and young son.

“I’m here legally. I came here in September 2023,” Vaca said, citing his family’s safety and economic opportunity as reasons for the move.

Speaking to The Associated Press in Spanish through a translator, Vaca said he was sitting on his couch when he noticed agents taking photos outside.

Vaca said he has a U.S. Social Security number, a work permit and pays income taxes. A video Vaca took shows an ICE agent speaking to him through his closed front door.

Before turning away, the agent says, “We’re going to come back for your whole family, OK?” A child’s voice can be heard in the background.

Organizers announced more demonstrations, one planned for Friday evening in downtown Portland. A small group of demonstrators also gathered Thursday afternoon and again Friday morning outside an ICE field office in Scarborough.

“Maine is one of those places where you look out for your neighbors and everyone’s there,” said one of the Scarborough demonstrators, college student Ava Gleason. “We’re a community, and to see people come in and rip apart a community is freaking terrifying.”

Willingham reported from Boston.

Protesters rally against the presence of U.S. Immigration Customs Enforcement in Maine, Friday, Jan. 23, 2026, in Portland, Maine. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)

A protester rallies against the presence of U.S. Immigration Customs Enforcement in Maine, Friday, Jan. 23, 2026, in Portland, Maine. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)

Protesters rally against the presence of U.S. Immigration Customs Enforcement in Maine, Friday, Jan. 23, 2026, in Portland, Maine. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)

Protesters rally against the presence of U.S. Immigration Customs Enforcement in Maine, Friday, Jan. 23, 2026, in Portland, Maine. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)

Protesters rally against the presence of U.S. Immigration Customs Enforcement in Maine, Friday, Jan. 23, 2026, in Portland, Maine. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)

A woman films a Homeland Security Investigations agent at a parking lot at Deering Oaks Park, Friday, Jan. 23, 2026, in Portland, Maine.(AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)

Angelica Fisher, left, and Cristian Vaca pose for a photo Thursday, Jan. 22, 2026, at his home in Biddeford, Maine. (AP Photo/Patrick Whittle)

Rosie Grutze protests the presence of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Wednesday, Jan. 21, 2026, in Portland, Maine. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Israel and Iran exchanged fire early Wednesday as Tehran kept up its pressure on the region's oil industry, hitting a ship in the Strait of Hormuz and targeting infrastructure as concerns grew of a global energy crisis.

Iran has effectively stopped shipping traffic through the narrow strait off its coast, through which about a fifth of the world's oil is shipped from the Persian Gulf toward the Indian Ocean. It has also been targeting oil fields and refineries in Gulf Arab nations as part of a strategy that appeared to be aimed at generating enough global economic pain to pressure the United States and Israel to end their strikes.

Early Wednesday, Kuwait said its defenses had downed eight Iranian drones over the oil-rich nation and Saudi Arabia said it had intercepted five drones heading toward the kingdom's vast Shaybah oil field. A projectile hit a container ship off the coast of the United Arab Emirates in the Strait of Hormuz.

Israel, which launched the war with the United States on Feb. 28, said it had had begun a new wave of attacks on Tehran, following multiple strikes the day before that residents described as some of the heaviest during the war. Explosions were also heard in Beirut and in southern Lebanon after Israel said it had started a new assault on targets related to the Iran-linked militia Hezbollah.

The attacks set a building ablaze in central Beirut in the densely populated Aicha Bakkar area, engulfing the top two floors of the multistory structure in flames. There were no immediate reports of casualties from the strike, which came without warning.

An earlier Israeli strike in southern Lebanon killed five people in the Nabatieh district, while two more were killed in strikes in the Tyre district and the Bint Jbeil district, Lebanon's Health Ministry said. A Red Cross worker also died early Wednesday of wounds sustained Monday, when his team was hit by an Israeli strike while they were rescuing people from an earlier attack.

Nearly 500 people have been killed so far in Lebanon since Hezbollah triggered the latest round of fighting with Israel when it fired rockets into the country’s north after the American and Israeli attacks on Iran started.

Israel warned of three Iranian attacks across the country early Wednesday, with sirens heard in Tel Aviv and elsewhere but no immediate reports of casualties.

In addition to targeting Saudi Arabia's oil fields, the kingdom's defense ministry said it had destroyed six ballistic missiles launched toward Prince Sultan Air Base, a major U.S.- and Saudi-operated air facility in eastern Saudi Arabia. The ministry also said it intercepted and destroyed two drones over Hafar al-Batin, a major city in the eastern province.

In the Strait of Hormuz, Iran hit a container ship with a projectile off Ras al-Khaimah, the UAE’s northern-most emirate on the strait, according to a monitoring site run by the British military.

It said the “extent of the damage is currently unknown but under investigation by the crew.”

The United Arab Emirates said early Wednesday that its air defenses were working to intercept incoming Iranian fire. The wealthy Gulf nation — home to the business and travel hub of Dubai — said Iranian attacks have killed six people and wounded 122 others there.

Bahrain sounded sirens early Wednesday, warning of an incoming Iranian attack. The warnings came a day after an Iranian attack hit a residential building in the capital, Manama, and killed a 29-year-old woman and wounding eight people.

Oil prices remained well below the peaks hit on Monday but the price of Brent crude, the international standard, was still up some 20% Wednesday from when the war began, and consumers around the world are already feeling the pain at the pump.

The spike in oil prices has been rocking financial markets worldwide because of worries that the war could block the global flow of oil and natural gas for a long time.

Amin Nasser, the president and CEO of Saudi Arabia’s oil giant Aramco, warned on Tuesday that if oil tankers continue to be unable to transit the strait “that will have a serious impact on the global economy.”

The U.S. military said Tuesday it had destroyed 16 Iranian minelayers near the Strait of Hormuz, though U.S. President Donald Trump said in social media posts that there were no reports yet of Iran mining the passage, a prospect that experts warned of in the buildup to the war.

In addition to the nearly 500 people killed in Lebanon, Iran has said more than 1,300 people have been killed there and Israel has reported 12 people dead.

The U.S. has lost seven soldiers while another eight have suffered severe injuries.

Many foreign nationals have been getting out of the Persian Gulf region since the war began, including over 45,000 U.K. citizens, the British Foreign Office said. Some 40,000 people returned to the United States, according to the State Department.

Magdy reported from Cairo, and Rising from Bangkok. Associated Press writers Sally Abou AIJoud in Beirut, Giovanna Dell’Orto in Miami, Julie Watson in San Diego,

People take shelter in an underground metro station as air raid sirens warn of incoming Iranian missile strike, in Ramat Gan, Israel, Tuesday, March 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Oded Balilty)

A man passes in front of a destroyed building that housed a branch of Al-Qard Al-Hassan, a non-bank financial institution run by Hezbollah, which was hit by an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, Beirut's southern suburbs, Lebanon, Tuesday, March 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)

People walk past closed shops at the nearly empty traditional main bazaar in Tehran, Iran, Tuesday, March 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

Motorbikes drive past a billboard depicting Iran’s late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, center, handing the country’s flag to his son and successor Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, right, as the late revolutionary founder Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini stands at left, in a square in downtown Tehran, Iran, Tuesday, March 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

Smoke rises from an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, Beirut's southern suburbs, Lebanon, Tuesday, March 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)