The DHS blurred it. Trump removed that filter.
A gas station clerk in Fort Myers, Florida, was beaten to death with a hammer on April 3rd. Surveillance cameras captured the attack in full. By Thursday of the following week, that footage had been shared by the Department of Homeland Security — and then by the President of the United States on his personal social media platform.
The man charged in the killing is Rolbert Joachin, a 40-year-old Haitian national. According to local jail records, he faces charges of second-degree murder and criminal property damage. He remains in custody. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has filed a detainer against him, initiating a parallel set of immigration proceedings.
The footage, as described by authorities, shows Joachin smashing the windshield of a vehicle before turning on the clerk and striking her repeatedly with the hammer. She was pronounced dead at the scene. The DHS initially released a blurred version of the video on social media Thursday. Trump then posted it to Truth Social, without the blur.
In his post, Trump described the killing as one of the most vicious things a person could witness, calling Joachin an animal. He directed his anger not only at the suspect but at the immigration policies he says enabled the attack — and at the federal judges he says are blocking his administration's efforts to end those policies. He wrote that a single killing like this one should be sufficient cause for what he called radical judges to stop impeding his immigration agenda.
The immigration history DHS laid out is specific: Joachin first entered the United States in August 2022. He was released into the country during the Biden administration. A federal immigration judge issued a final removal order against him later that same year. He was then granted Temporary Protected Status — a humanitarian designation that allows nationals of countries experiencing ongoing crises to remain in the U.S. on a temporary basis. According to DHS, that status expired in 2024.
Trump has made the TPS program a recurring target, framing it as a mechanism for abuse and fraud. His administration has been working to terminate it, a move that has been challenged in federal court. In his Truth Social post, he tied the Fort Myers killing directly to that legal battle, arguing that the program's continuation amounts to complicity in violence.
This is not the first time Trump has used a crime involving a Haitian national to make a broader political argument. During the 2024 campaign, he repeatedly claimed — falsely — that Haitian migrants living in Springfield, Ohio, were stealing and eating residents' pets. Those claims were investigated and found to have no basis in fact, but they circulated widely and shaped the national conversation around Haitian immigration.
The decision to post unblurred footage of a woman being killed is itself without recent precedent for a sitting American president. The DHS, which first released the video, chose to blur it. Trump removed that filter. The act of sharing the footage — graphic, fatal, and identifiable — sits at the intersection of political messaging and something harder to categorize.
The case against Joachin is still in its early stages. The story of what the president chooses to do with it is already well underway.
Notable Quotes
This one killing should be enough for these radical judges to stop impeding my administration's immigration policies and allow us to end this scam once and for all.— President Donald Trump, via Truth Social
The Hearth Conversation Another angle on the story
What's the thing here that most people will miss if they only read the headline?
That the President didn't just comment on the killing — he shared the footage itself, unblurred, after the government agency that released it had chosen to obscure it.
Why does that distinction matter?
Because there's a difference between describing an act of violence to make a political point and broadcasting the visual record of a woman dying. One is rhetoric. The other is something else.
Is there a legal question here, or is this purely political territory?
Mostly political. A president sharing graphic content on a personal platform isn't governed by the same standards that apply to, say, a broadcaster. But it sets a norm — or breaks one.
What's the immigration timeline actually telling us?
That the system touched Joachin multiple times. He entered in 2022, got a removal order, then got TPS, then his TPS expired. He was still here in April 2026. Whether that's a failure or just how a slow bureaucracy works depends on who you ask.
Trump is blaming Biden and blaming the judges. Is there a factual basis for either?
The TPS grant happened under Biden — that's accurate. The judicial piece is about ongoing litigation over the administration's attempt to end TPS broadly. Whether a judge blocking a policy change is the same as enabling a specific crime is a much harder argument.
The Springfield pet-eating claims are mentioned. Why bring that up here?
Because it's a pattern. This isn't the first time a crime or a rumor involving Haitians has been amplified into a national political argument. The Springfield claims were false. This killing is real. But the rhetorical move is the same.
What should readers be watching for as this develops?
The legal case against Joachin, obviously. But also the court fights over TPS — those will determine whether this moment becomes policy, or stays at the level of a social media post.