ISTANBUL
An Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer suspended after a video showed him pushing a woman outside a New York immigration court has been reinstated to duty, CBS News reported on Monday.
Just days after the Department of Homeland Security criticized the officer’s behavior as “unacceptable and beneath the men and women of ICE” and said he had been removed from duty during an investigation, he has now been reinstated.
“Our ICE law enforcement are held to the highest professional standards and this officer is being relieved of current duties as we conduct a full investigation,” the department said in a statement on Friday. However, the progress of that inquiry is still uncertain.
The videos, filmed outside the 26 Federal Plaza federal building in lower Manhattan, surfaced on social media last week and quickly drew widespread outrage, according to CBS News.
The incident began when the woman and her young daughter tried to cling to her husband as federal agents attempted to detain him. Video shows agents separating the family, with one officer grabbing the woman’s hair. The man was eventually taken into custody.
In another video, the same officer is seen shoving the woman and pushing her to the ground in front of her children, a crowd of photojournalists, and federal and court officials. During the confrontation, the officer can be heard repeatedly saying “adios,” which means “goodbye” in Spanish.
The woman, who told reporters her family is from Ecuador, said she and her daughter were trying to stay with her husband as he was detained.
ICE identified the man as Ruben Abelardo Ortiz-Lopez, saying he illegally crossed the US-Mexico border in March 2024 and was later arrested in June for assault and obstruction, adding that the woman is also in the US unlawfully and faces deportation.
A Homeland Security official declined to comment on the officer’s reinstatement but told CBS News that the woman’s husband is a “criminal illegal alien.”