Footage of a blind man becoming violently detained by federal agents at the ICE building in South Portland has now emerged, and it’s jarring.
Quinn Haberl was wearing a neon vest and sitting on the side of the driveway into the facility. He was sitting by a thick blue line on the ground, which the feds had created to show protestors that crossing it would mean they were on federal property, allowing them to arrest people for trespassing.
In the video, you can see agents circling and encircling around Heberl before they grabbed him by his limbs and started to carry him into the ICE building.
Well, that was up until they dropped him on his head.
They then continued to drag him past the gate with more agents getting involved, cuffing him as he wiggled on the ground. Another agent picked up Haberl’s white cane.
When KION reached out to DHS about this incident, they said:
This rioter was arrested after he blatantly disobeyed law enforcement orders to remain off federal property, obstructed law enforcement, and continued to block the driveway so vehicles could not enter or exit the ICE facility.
Haberl told KION 6 News over the phone that he is too emotional to speak as of Tuesday and too afraid to leave his home, but he wants his story to be told. He has been charged with failure to comply.
This horrific video brings into sharp question the use of force, the treatment of the disabled, and the broader handling of protests by federal authorities. While DHS had framed the arrest as a reaction to obstruction and noncooperation, the video depicts a starkly different narrative, one in which a blind man, quietly sitting and visually identifiable as being blind, is suddenly arrested and physically assaulted.
As Haberl’s case hits the headlines, it reminds us to think not only in terms of policy and procedure but of plain humanity towards every individual—whether or not they cross a line on the sidewalk.
We MUSt prosecute these agents. Handling people like they aren’t human is what the zTrump regime does!
This is a brutal, heartbreaking reminder of what happens when institutions lose their moral choreography. A blind man, peacefully seated, is dragged, dropped, and cuffed…not for violence, but for presence. The blue line becomes a ritual of exclusion, a symbol of state fragility masquerading as strength.
Contrast that with Voice of My People, the film I just wrote about, where a disabled citizen in Zürich not only participates in democracy but enters the Bundeshaus as a member of Parliament. No spectacle. No brutality. Just the quiet beauty of inclusion, ritualized through real representation. He actually becomes a powerful voice of the people. Truly beautiful.
One system punishes visibility. The other honors it.
I stand with those who refuse to let cruelty become normalized choreography.
—Johan