Transcript of ICE Shootings Update, Swift Observatory Rescue, World Cup Final Preview

Two fatal shootings by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers this month.

The administration said ICE agents would stop conducting traffic stops, but then backtracked.

I'm Ayesha Rascoe.

And I'm Scott Simon, and this is Up First from NPR News.

The latest into the investigations of the fatal shootings by federal immigration agents in Texas and Maine.

And an unprecedented mission is underway to save a valuable space telescope that's falling into Earth.

And finally, a world champion in soccer will be crowned tomorrow in New Jersey. Will it be Argentina or Spain?

Well, we don't know, but stay with us. We've got the news you need to start your weekend.

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Earlier this week, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer shot and killed a man in Maine.

It was the second deadly shooting by ICE officers this month. Both of them started as traffic stops. NPR's Sergio Martinez-Beltrán has been covering both incidents and joins us now from Texas. Thanks for being with us.

Glad to be with you, Scott.

There's so many questions about what led the immigration officers to take out their guns and kill these two men who were in their vehicles driving to work. But you bring us a new concern today.

Yes, the latest is that NPR has learned that the ICE officer who allegedly shot Joan Durán Guerrero in Maine had a long history of violent behavior and struggles with serious mental health problems. That officer's name is David Brulette, NPR has reported he's an Army veteran and former police officer. My colleague Vanessa Romo talked to Brouillette's ex-wife, Ashley Brouillette. She said for years she tried to warn the Army and others that her former husband is troubled and abusive.

He'd hit me, choke me.

And there was an incident where we had been fighting and I walked away and I got in the shower and he comes in with a gun and points it at me and tells me that he's going to blow my brains all over the bathtub.

There are no police reports from this incident, so NPR has not been able to independently corroborate Ashley Brouillette's accusations. We've reached out to David Brouillette, but he has not responded. DHS got— without naming the officer— said the agent involved had nearly a decade of law enforcement experience and had the required use of force training. There are also a lot of questions surrounding the killing of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston, Texas. The father of 3 was also killed by federal immigration agents. Like the Maine shooting, Salgado Araujo was not the intended target of the ICE operation, and no publicly available video evidence so far shows that either driver was clearly using their car as a weapon or threat, as alleged by ICE.

And Sergio, neither immigration officer was wearing a body camera. Um, if they had been, there would be footage that people could watch that would shed light on the case, wouldn't there?

Right. 5 months ago, the Department of Homeland Security vowed to quickly send body cameras to every agent across the country, and yet That hasn't happened. Now, the agency says that all of the ICE field offices will have body cameras in the next 60 days. So by September. Now, it's important to note that ICE has been allocated an enormous amount of money, including $31 billion earmarked just for technology, including body cameras. So critics say that if body cameras had been a true priority for the administration, they would have figured out how to get them deployed to all agents sooner.

And as you've reported, Sergio, 2026, is already a record year for deaths of immigrants in ICE detention, but it's also been deadly in terms of ICE shootings and violence on the streets, hasn't it?

Yeah, so at least 7 people have been killed by federal immigration agents during enforcement operations since President Trump returned to office, and there are many other instances where ICE agents have used force against immigrants and other civilians. In fact, the ACLU released a report this week that looks at more than 1,200 enforcement operations involving ICE officers. They found more than 400 instances of agents pushing, tackling, or pinning people to the ground, and using weapons like rubber bullets and tasers. The ACLU also found dozens of times where officers used potentially deadly tactics, including chokeholds.

This week there's a lot of back and forth on whether federal immigration agents were going to continue conducting traffic stops. What's, what's the latest on this?

Yeah, earlier this week, DHS said it was going to pause the traffic stops, but then President Trump ordered the agency to continue them. He called traffic stops an effective tool to arrest undocumented immigrants. So the bottom line is, Scott, they are still happening. There's potential that more of these encounters could quickly go south and turn volatile or deadly.

And Pierre Sergio Martinez Beltran, thanks so much.

You're welcome.

A daring rescue mission hundreds of miles up in the sky is underway.

The mission aims to save a valuable space telescope before it burns up in Earth's atmosphere.

NPR's Nate Rott has been following the effort and joins us now. Welcome.

Thank you.

All right, so this almost sounds like the plot of a space thriller. Tell us more.

Yeah, right? It, like, probably would have, like, Matt Damon or Ryan Gosling since they seem to be in pretty much every space movie these days. Yes, yes.

Yeah.

But actually, Ayesha, the hero of this story, if it all works out as planned, is not going to be any single person. It's going to be a robot called Lynk that's roughly the size of a refrigerator, and of course, the many people who designed and built and launched it a couple of weeks ago.

Okay, so where is this hero robot now?

Yeah, so it's launched and it's in low Earth orbit right now. And after it completes a bunch of tests, which are ongoing, it's going to link up with the Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, or Swift for short.

Okay, so tell me about Swift. This is the telescope that Lynk is trying to save, right?

Yeah, that's right. So Swift was launched in 2004 to study something called gamma-ray bursts, which are these super energetic, super rare cosmic explosions that can occur when a star goes supernova or when, like, two dense neutron stars collide. Here's Brad Senko, a research astrophysicist at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center.

They last for only a few seconds, but they radiate more energy in that period of time than the Sun will in its entire lifetime. So these are the most dramatic explosions since the Big Bang?

And Swift was designed to swiftly adjust its position to capture data on them. And it's been used to gather other data too since it's been launched, helping scientists here on Earth better understand our universe.

Okay, I see what you did there with the name Swift and swiftly. But, but why is Swift in trouble?

Yeah, so this part is wild. Senko says pretty much every satellite or object in low Earth orbit is slowly falling back to Earth.

Earth.

But the timeline for SWIFT has sped up by years because of all the solar activity that's been happening recently with our Sun. So there have been a lot of solar flares over the last couple of years which have caused these beautiful auroras. Senko says, like anybody, he appreciates them too. But every time I see one of those, I cringe, because every time the Sun does that, it causes the Earth's atmosphere to puff up, and that leads SWIFT fall at a faster rate. So without any intervention, Ayesha, they now think Swift will reenter the atmosphere and burn up by the end of this year.

Okay, that's really soon.

Yeah. So that's why they raced to launch this robot, which was designed by an Arizona-based startup to try and give Swift a boost. Its goal is to sync up with Swift, to grab onto it with these like 3 lobster-like claw robotic arms, and then gently push it up into a higher orbit. And Ayesha, part of what makes this thing so remarkable is that this has never been done before. Like, the Hubble Space Telescope has been serviced, but it was done by people, by astronauts in space. This is a fully autonomous robot lifting a telescope that was never designed to be lifted.

Assuming this works and that they're able to successfully lift this telescope, could it work for other satellites and telescopes?

Well, that's definitely the hope, uh, that instead of, you know, just letting commercial satellites or research ones reenter the atmosphere and burn up, this technology could allow them to be serviced. So, you know, components could be upgraded, their altitudes boosted, uh, which Senko says would make the space industry much more sustainable. But he also says this technology is likely to draw a lot of interest from the defense community if it works, because, you know, being able to move another country's satellite could be something that governments are interested in doing.

That's Nate Rotte from NPR's science podcast Shortwave. Thank you so much.

Hey, thank you.

The FIFA World Cup is coming to an end tomorrow. New Jersey will host the final between defending champion Argentina and Spain.

It is a battle between two international football heavyweights and could serve as the capstone achievement for the player many call The best of all time, Lionel Messi. Sports reporter Michelle Steele of the Big Ten Network joins us. Michelle, thanks for being with us.

Good morning, Scott.

Boy, Argentina, of course, is the defending champion. Spain is the current European champion, but they have conceded just 1 goal in 7 matches. But, but, but Argentina has these dramatic comebacks. What do you expect to see?

Well, Spain has been just so efficient this tournament. 1 goal allowed in 7 games. Are you kidding me? That is truly outrageous. Meantime, Argentina has turned so many games that look like for sure losers into winners. Remember, they needed kind of a wobbly second half from England to get through. If you like your soccer nice and efficient and tidy, root for Spain. If you like watching a game and having heart palpitations, you're on Team Argentina. My gut says this one goes to extra time. I'm rolling with Spain, but like the youth say, Argentina is a vibe. Anything could happen.

Look, I want to ask you about the players to watch. I want to begin with one. Unai Simón. Forgive me if I say Simon. Spain's goalkeeper. I mean, 6 shutout matches. This guy's amazing.

Yeah. Let's hear it for the Spanish Simóns.

Oh, viva Simón! Viva Simón! I like to think we are distantly related. I know, actually, I like to think I'm his uncle and show him—

tell everyone that. Yeah, sure. At the World Cup watch party, you'll go— you're going to on Sunday. 6 shutouts is absolutely absurd. Absolutely. Watch him. On the other side, though, you've got Lionel Messi. He's almost 40 years old. He's playing what certainly will be his last World Cup match. I think he is the GOAT. He's trying to write the greatest final line of the greatest sports biography around. And Spain's counter to that is a wunderkind, a teenager, Lamine Yamal, just 19 years old, playing well beyond his years.

Scott.

And he has been anointed by the hand of God. We've all seen the photograph at this point.

Yes, yes, yes. A baby Lamine Yamal being bathed because his parents won a UNICEF contest by Barça player at the time, Lionel Messi. Yes, being bathed and being photographed. His parents won this contest. And they say to be familiar with your opponent. This takes it to the next level.

Look, tell us about the concerns about the air quality in the Northeast because of all the smoke from Canadian wildfires.

Yeah, of course, the conditions have not been very good over the last couple of days, but it looks like the conditions have improved enough since Friday that Sunday's forecast looks clean and they don't expect really any impact on the match. Hopefully the smoke ends up being be something that everybody forgets about by kickoff and it resolves itself before we have to make it a bigger deal. The forecast looks good.

Look, Michelle, as I don't have to tell you, there was so much controversy surrounding the organizing of the World Cup before it ever began. Now that we're just 2 days from its end, of course, there's the third-place match between England and France this afternoon. What are you going to treasure and cherish as the highlights?

I think I am going to remember the U.S. team the most and winning a knockout match for the first time since 2002 on home soil in front of their own fans. I'll also remember Cape Verde. Boy, what a Cinderella story they had. Population smaller than Louisville, Kentucky, taking Argentina to extra time. They were sort of the honorary sweethearts. And I'll remember the Scottish fans just absolutely taking over, uh, Boston. So many memorable moments. There was a lot of trepidation, I think, before this because the field was so big. 48 teams, 3 host countries. There was a totally new format nobody had run before. But, you know, uh, I have never heard so many Americans with no connection to soccer sort of lament the end of this tournament. That includes me. Does American soccer change meaningfully after this tournament?

Well, I— and I anticipate my next question, of course, because I think certainly ever since I can remember, soccer has always been the next great spectator sport here in America.

Yeah, they're always on the doorstep, right? It's the next big thing. And then another World Cup comes and goes and it kind of drops back to, you know, 5th or the 6th most watched sport in this country. I think just based off the number of people who didn't really, you know, weren't certainly soccer fans and now are locked in for all these games, I think there will be a little bit of a meaningful bump. I'm personally very sad that this tournament is over. On the talent development side, of course, I think there is a lot that remains to be figured out. But as far as Americans watching this game and will we look back on 10 years and say American soccer changed this summer, I think this is the best shot it's had in a very long time.

Michelle Steele, thanks so much.

You bet.

And that's Up First for Saturday, July 18th, 2026. I'm Ayesha Rascoe.

And I'm Scott Simon. Dave Mischich produced today's podcast along with Michael Radcliffe and Gabe O'Connor.

Our editor is Fernando Naro, helped by Eric Westervelt and Melissa Gray.

Our director is Elena Turek, who worked alongside our Technical Director David Greenberg. His engineering team is Simon Laszlo Jansen, Jay Sizz, and Zoe Vangenhoven.

Our senior supervising editor is Shannon Rhodes. Our executive producer is Evie Stone.

Our deputy managing editor is Katherine Laidlaw.

Tomorrow on The Sunday Story, what defines a family? A group of strangers tries to answer that question after DNA tests revealed they were all half siblings conceived through artificial insemination.

Thanks for listening and for supporting your local NPR station. And if you need to find your local NPR station— and really, all of us need to— just go to stations.npr.org.

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