{"id":807885,"date":"2026-07-18T08:51:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T08:51:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/807885\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T08:51:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T08:51:12","slug":"australian-man-detained-by-ice-in-los-angeles-after-earlier-arrest-attempt-in-las-vegas-ice-us-immigration-and-customs-enforcement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/807885\/","title":{"rendered":"Australian man detained by ICE in Los Angeles after earlier arrest attempt in Las Vegas | ICE (US Immigration and Customs Enforcement)"},"content":{"rendered":"

An man believed to be an Australian citizen has been arrested by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE<\/a>) after bystanders interrupted an earlier attempt by agents to detain him.<\/p>\n

ICE Los Angeles said Phu Nguyen, 57, originally of Vietnam, had overstayed his visa, in a post on X.<\/p>\n

Chris Motley, a film-maker, posted footage on social media of an attempted arrest at Harry Reid international airport in Las Vegas on Monday, saying he had heard a cry for help as he walked through the terminal.<\/p>\n

The footage shows Nguyen shouting while a man and a woman wearing surgical masks held him to the ground and handcuffed him.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know what they\u2019re doing,\u201d Nguyen said in the video.<\/p>\n

An airport security officer stood between Nguyen and a growing crowd of bystanders before the two people stood up and walked away, leaving handcuffs dangling from one of Nguyen\u2019s wrists.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere are they going?\u201d Nguyen said.<\/p>\n

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Motley wrote on Instagram that police arrived shortly afterwards but Nguyen was partially handcuffed for over an hour.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe man was checked out by a medical team before boarding his flight, thankfully he was OK and able to catch it,\u201d Motley said.<\/p>\n

ICE Los Angeles, in its post on X, claimed Nguyen had enjoyed \u201cattempts by agitators to help him evade ICE officers at Las Vegas airport\u201d.<\/p>\n

It said Nguyen was taken into custody on Tuesday after he landed in Los Angeles.<\/p>\n

Democratic senator Jacky Rosen, of Nevada, condemned the agency\u2019s \u201cviolent attempted arrest of an elderly man\u201d in posts on social media.<\/p>\n

She wrote: \u201cPlain clothes. No uniforms. No body cameras. No identification. ICE is continuing to act with impunity \u2013 instilling fear in our communities and scaring tourists, which hurts our tourism economy.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Australia\u2019s department of foreign affairs and trade said it was making urgent inquiries after reports that an Australian citizen had been detained in the United States.<\/p>\n

While the department can provide consular assistance to any Australian citizen, it cannot get Australians out of prison.<\/p>\n

The ABC reported that the US Department of Homeland Security described Nguyen as \u201cillegal alien and citizen of Australia \u2026 born in Vietnam\u201d.<\/p>\n

The Department of Homeland Security has been contacted for comment.<\/p>\n

US officials are facing mounting calls to force ICE off American streets after agents killed two men<\/a> who were not the target of enforcement action in less than a week. There have been 22 deaths<\/a> in ICE custody in 2026.<\/p>\n

In a post on X on Friday, top US Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer criticised Donald Trump\u2019s administration<\/a> for its mass hiring of ICE officers to enforce aims of mass deportation.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Trump administration<\/a> rushed 12,000 agents onto our streets without ensuring they were fit to carry a badge and a gun \u2013 and Republicans gave this rogue agency vast power and no accountability,\u201d Schumer wrote.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An man believed to be an Australian citizen has been arrested by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":807886,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-807885","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/807885","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=807885"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/807885\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/807886"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=807885"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=807885"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=807885"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}