Two immigration detainees were killed and another is in a critical condition after a gunman opened fire at a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in Dallas on Wednesday morning.
The Dallas Police Department said a shooter fired on the facility from a nearby building shortly before 7 a.m., before turning the gun on himself.
Joshua Jahn, a 29-year-old former Boy Scout from Allen, Texas, was identified by law enforcement sources as the suspected shooter, NBC and Fox News reported.
The detainees were shot when the suspect fired “indiscriminately” at the building and at a van in the secured entryway to the building, the Department of Homeland Security said.
Despite the victims of the attack being detainees of the ICE holding facility, FBI Director Kash Patel shared images of bullets recovered from near the suspect’s body that he said suggested a targeted attack against ICE.
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“While the investigation is ongoing, an initial review of the evidence shows an idealogical [sic] motive behind this attack (see photo below). One of the unspent shell casings recovered was engraved with the phrase ‘ANTI ICE,'” Patel wrote on X.
“These despicable, politically motivated attacks against law enforcement are not a one-off,” he added.
Noah Jahn, Joshua Jahn’s brother, told reporters that he didn’t believe his brother was a political person.
“I didn’t think he was politically interested,” he told NBC News. “He wasn’t interested in politics on either side as far as I knew.”
Noah Jahn said his parents had a rifle that Joshua knew how to use, but claimed he was “not a marksman.”
“He would not be able to make any shots like that,” he added.
Police block off I-35E close to a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office after a reported shooting, in Dallas on Wednesday, Sept. 24, 2025. Jamie Stengle—AP Photo
Joshua Jahn was a registered Independent. He faced felony charges for delivering marijuana in 2016.
President Donald Trump and Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Kristi Noem directed blame toward the left for the shooting.
“This violence is the result of the Radical Left Democrats constantly demonizing Law Enforcement, calling for ICE to be demolished, and comparing ICE Officers to ‘Nazis,'” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
“This vile attack was motivated by hatred for ICE,” Noem said in a statement. “This shooting must serve as a wake-up call to the far-left that their rhetoric about ICE has consequences.”
The shooting marks the third reported attack on an ICE or Border Patrol facility in Texas this year, with previous recorded shootings at a Prairieland Detention Center and a McAllen Border Patrol facility. None of the other incidents resulted in fatalities, although several were injured.
Wednesday’s shooting also marks the second time this facility in particular has been targeted, according to local officials.
A spike in political violence
The shooting comes amid a spike in political violence across the United States, and less than two weeks after the killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk at a public event in Utah.
FBI Special agent R. Joseph Rothrock said the FBI was investigating the incident “as an act of targeted violence” during a Wednesday press conference. The identities of the victims will not be released at this time.
Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin later told Fox News that no ICE agents were injured.
Noem and Trump’s pointing at the rhetoric of the left in the wake of Wednesday’s shooting echoes the insistence of a number of figures on the right, including Trump, that the left was to blame for Kirk’s assassination.
Trump has in the wake of Kirk’s death promised to crack down on “radical left” groups and designated “Antifa” as a domestic terrorist organization. In his Wednesday post, he said he would “sign an Executive Order this week to dismantle these Domestic Terrorism Networks.”
“The continuing violence from Radical Left Terrorists, in the aftermath of Charlie Kirk’s assassination, must be stopped,” he wrote, calling for Democrats to “stop this rhetoric against ICE and America’s law enforcement, right now!”
While Trump has asserted that the left is responsible for the majority of political violence, however, data indicates that right-wing extremists are responsible for more political violence.
Possible sniper
ICE Acting Director Todd Lyons told CNN earlier in the day that “a possible sniper” was behind the shooting. Lyons reportedly told the network that the shooter fired into the sally port area of the ICE office, where detainees are brought in.
The shooting prompted widespread condemnation from politicians.
Vice President JD Vance said in a post on X: “The obsessive attack on law enforcement, particularly ICE, must stop. I’m praying for everyone hurt in this attack and for their families.”
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton wrote on X: “Join me in praying for the victims of this heinous shooting. We will continue to do everything in our power to combat the alarming increase of targeted attacks against ICE and all law enforcement by evil, twisted individuals.”
Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas indicated that he and his team were “closely monitoring” the incident and praying for those who were injured. “We are deeply grateful to the brave first responders who rushed to the scene,” he wrote on X.
