A New York poll worker says two federal immigration agents came to her polling place in Syracuse during the June 2026 primary election. She alleged they pressured her to delete a five-month-old Instagram post about an ICE agent who fatally shot Renee Good in Minneapolis. She refused.
Election officials from both parties criticized the visit. State officials are now reviewing what happened.
Paigelynne Gonyea was working at the Central Library on Salina Street on Tuesday, June 23. Per Common Dreams, she got a voicemail from a man who identified himself as Dave Brody, a special agent with the Department of Homeland Security.
He said agents had visited her apartment. He also said they wanted to talk about a social media post she made in January that they claimed had “doxxed an ICE agent back in January.”
According to Syracuse.com, she did not want to meet them alone because, “I’ve seen the news, especially in Minnesota. And I didn’t want anything to happen to me at all.”
Gonyea reportedly told the agents to come to the polling place. They arrived with a folder that contained printed copies of her Instagram posts and a copy of her driver’s license.
They also gave her a written warning. It allegedly said she could face federal and state charges if she did not remove the post.
The post was shared on January 8, 2026. It came one day after ICE agent Jonathan Ross fatally shot Renee Good, a 37-year-old mother and U.S. citizen, during an operation in Minneapolis. Gonyea shared a report from the Minnesota Star Tribune, which had already identified Ross by name. She wrote, “I think today is a great day for Jonathan to be indicted!”
Gonyea says her post was not doxxing. “I didn’t dox his personal information, such as address, phone number,” she told Syracuse.com. “For ICE to come to me over a social media post just feels very 1984 to me. They definitely should have known better to not go into a polling place, even if I said it was OK.”
Internet Reacts to ICE Agents Entering New York Polling Place
The incident sparked debate online, with some expressing alarm over constitutional implications while others focused on the specific legal questions raised by the New York polling place entry.
“First Amendment is being challenged in our faces,” one commenter wrote. Another offered their read on the agents’ motivations: “They are very afraid of the consequences of what they did or they would not be behaving this way obviously.”
A third framed it in broader terms: “When Americans go after Americans it’s over — this thing that we have had for 250 years. OVER.” Others zeroed in on the election law dimension: “ICE must not be allowed to enter any polling place and must stand at least 200ft away outside of all polls.”
One called for collective action: “I think we’ve got to figure out together how to change this.” And another tied multiple legal threads together: “They just want to violate as many amendments as they can in one fell swoop.”
Federal law says armed federal officers cannot be sent to a polling place unless it is necessary to stop armed enemies of the United States. According to Spectrum News, the New York Attorney General’s Office and the State Board of Elections are reviewing the incident. Gonyea has not been charged.
