With ICE agents constantly in the news and communities feeling the pressure of aggressive enforcement, a lot of people across the country say they have noticed something darker growing, too. As immigration fears rise, more people feel emboldened to act out in ways that cross the line from rude to outright alarming. Shouting slurs at people of color has sadly become common in viral videos, but some individuals take it a step further and try to police others themselves.
That is exactly what happened in Miami, Florida, where a woman was caught on video blocking another group from leaving a parking garage. According to the people filming, she cornered their car and refused to move, accusing them of not belonging there and demanding to know where they were from. In the video, you can hear the passengers shouting for the Miami woman to move her car out of the way. The audio is muffled, so it is hard to make out everything she says, but her tone is clear enough to show she was not welcoming or calm.
At one point, the camera woman tells her she is from Boca Raton, a city in Florida, trying to make it clear that they live in the country and were not doing anything wrong. The Miami woman then seems to tell them to go home. The passengers respond that they would love to go home, but they cannot because she is blocking their exit.
Things escalate when the woman threatens to call ICE on them. That sets off one of the passengers, a man sitting in the back seat. He becomes visibly angry and tries to get out of the car to confront her. The driver attempts to keep him inside, but he pushes past, steps out of the vehicle, and marches toward the Miami woman while shouting at her. It is unclear what he says, but whatever it was, she quickly backs away in fear and retreats to her own car, which was still blocking the garage exit.
The commotion is loud enough that an employee from the location eventually comes over, seemingly after hearing the shouting. The video ends there, leaving viewers unsure of how the situation was resolved.
Online, the reaction was swift and intense. Many commenters were outraged that the Miami woman tried to block people from leaving and even more shocked that she threatened to call ICE on American citizens. “False imprisonment. Call 911,” one user wrote. Another said, “Racists coming out like a zombie apocalypse.” Some viewers pointed out that this is not the first time people of color have been threatened with ICE despite being citizens, and the pattern is worrying.
Others expressed anger and sadness that regular people now feel they must prepare for confrontations like this. A few even discussed the idea of creating a website dedicated to documenting individuals who harass people and throw around ICE threats, especially since these incidents seem to be appearing more frequently online.
