Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin appeared on CNN's State of the Union to answer questions about an ICE operation in the Bronx that ended with a shooting. Agents discharged their weapons at a vehicle occupied by Oscar Belgal, a Dominican national without documentation authorising his presence in the country, leading to his arrest. Belgal sustained a minor surface-level wound. A five-year-old child seated in the rear of the vehicle was not injured.
Footage released by the NYPD showed two officers approaching the vehicle — one in plainclothes, holding a drawn firearm, positioned at the driver's side window, and the other near the headlight on the same side. Belgal reversed the vehicle and moved to leave the scene. A firearm was visible in one officer's hand as that officer struck the window.
The program's host raised two related questions: whether an armed officer in plain clothes, without clearly visible government identification, might prompt a person in a vehicle to drive away, and whether officers would face reduced risk if their status were more plainly displayed. Mullin pushed back, stating that the full weight of the circumstances had not yet been taken into account.
Mullin noted that Belgal had fled from officers approximately one month prior to the incident and indicated that Belgal had been aware law enforcement was searching for him. During the interview, Mullin read aloud from Belgal's criminal record, which listed four robbery charges, two assault charges, one felony larceny charge, a misdemeanour assault count, a weapons possession count, a misdemeanour larceny count, a possession of stolen property count, two drug-related felony counts, and a documented gang affiliation. Mullin stated that Belgal was aware this record placed him under law enforcement scrutiny.
Mullin also told the interviewer that Belgal had been sought in connection with the death of a Customs and Border Protection officer, a killing attributed to the gang with which Belgal was affiliated in the prior year. Mullin stated that the officers had made their badges visible, were issuing lawful orders, and that Belgal had clear awareness of who was approaching the vehicle.
According to the account given, Belgal had been living in the country for approximately three years, had been released on multiple occasions by New York State authorities, and was serving a probation term at the time of the operation.
Mullin also referenced a separate incident from the preceding week in which two individuals — both Dominican nationals with prior criminal records — attacked an NYPD officer in the Bronx with a knife. Mullin stated both had been released by New York State while federal immigration holds were outstanding against them, and maintained that the incident had received no media coverage.
Mullin went on to assert that all three individuals — Belgal and the two people involved in the stabbing of the NYPD officer — should have been removed from the country years earlier, attributing that outcome to New York's sanctuary policies. The host then raised the question of whether agents should have verified that no occupants remained in the vehicle before opening fire, given that Belgal's five-year-old son had been seated in the back.
Mullin questioned who had known that a five-year-old child was present in the vehicle, identifying Oscar Belgal as the person responsible for that knowledge. Describing himself as a father of six, Mullin stated he would have taken every possible measure to protect his child and asserted that placing a child at risk ran counter to anything he would have done.
Mullin stated that Belgal made the decision to accelerate, collide with the vehicle ahead, leave the scene, and then drive toward officers into a second vehicle. Separately, Mullin noted that 258 people currently held in New York State prisons are subject to ICE detainers linked to murder-related charges. Mullin asserted that each of those individuals had taken an American life and that each of those deaths could have been prevented, on the basis that those individuals had no legal right to be in the country. Mullin posed a question to the host about whether the state would be prepared to work alongside federal authorities, given the level of concern being expressed over the methods in use.
