Scarborough Condemns ICE Shooting Near Child in New York City

Concerns about federal immigration enforcement tactics intensified in New York City after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent shot a Dominican man inside an SUV in the Bronx on Thursday, October 8, 2026. On Friday, October 9, Morning Joe co-host Joe Scarborough criticized the operation, emphasizing the danger posed to a five-year-old child seated in the vehicle's back seat.

The man, identified as Oscar Belgal in previous reporting, was struck in the neck but survived. According to the account discussed on the program, the agent fired multiple shots through the SUV's front windshield while the child was inside.

Scarborough also challenged the Department of Homeland Security's response, arguing that the agency had shifted public attention toward the injured man's criminal record rather than the risks created by the shooting.

Scarborough opened his criticism by asking viewers to consider the circumstances of the incident in a residential neighborhood during the afternoon school pickup period.

"Just put yourself in this scene here. You're in a residential neighborhood. Thursday afternoon.

It's around four o'clock. You've gone to pick up your children from school. As school is let out in New York, that's the time an ICE agent unleashed a hail of gunfire into a car that had a five-year-old baby sitting in the backseat.

The man in the car was hit in the neck. He survived. The boy, only by the grace of God, was not hurt."

Scarborough said on Morning Joe.

He then cited law enforcement practices concerning vehicles in motion, arguing that shooting at them can expose passengers and bystanders to additional danger. He pointed to restrictions adopted by police departments, including the New York City Police Department.

"Law enforcement agencies like the NYPD have spent years learning a hard lesson that they live by: Don't shoot at moving cars. It just puts more people in danger, it just puts more people in the line of fire. Almost every department limits it and most ban it outright, and the reason is simple.

Bullets don't know what children are sitting in the backseat of those cars." Scarborough said.

Scarborough distinguished his criticism of the operation from the broader question of whether immigration laws should be enforced. He also referred to other incidents involving federal immigration enforcement in Minneapolis, Maine and Houston.

"This isn't about whether immigration law should be enforced. This is about whether enforcing them gives anyone a license to keep gambling with the lives of five-year-old children, with Americans, with immigrants. Twice in Minneapolis.

Killing Americans, killing immigrants in Maine, killing immigrants in Houston and now shooting into a car in New York City." Scarborough said.

He argued that the absence of additional injuries did not make the operation's risks acceptable. His remarks focused on the potential consequences for children, immigrants and residents near enforcement actions.

"ICE got lucky this time. But luck is not a policy," Scarborough added, noting, "This whole idea about immigration, 'We're going to make the streets safe from gangs!' Really? Why is it that these communities that they were supposedly supposed to protect, they're actually scared of these ICE agents who act like thugs, who aren't trained?"

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani had publicly called for ICE to leave the city following the shooting. Scarborough's criticism also addressed the agency's enforcement tactics over the preceding two years.

"It is beyond outrageous," Scarborough said on MS NOW.