{"id":12603,"date":"2026-07-21T13:42:18","date_gmt":"2026-07-21T08:42:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=12603"},"modified":"2026-07-21T13:42:18","modified_gmt":"2026-07-21T08:42:18","slug":"united-rep-threatens-to-call-ice-on-california-customer-in-viral-video","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=12603","title":{"rendered":"United rep threatens to call ICE on California customer in viral video"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div data-element=\"story-body\" data-subscriber-content=\"\">\n<p>A Mexican American father was floored when a United Airlines customer service agent threatened to call Immigration and Customs Enforcement on him during a heated interaction at San Francisco International Airport.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy reaction was shock, disbelief, anger, embarrassment,\u201d Julio Varela, 54, said in an interview Monday. \u201cIt was so demeaning.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The incident took place Tuesday after Varela said he had spent more than two hours working with United to try to resolve a ticketing issue. As tensions escalated between him and a customer service agent, he took out his phone and began recording.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMaybe we should call ICE on you,\u201d the female employee says <a class=\"link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/bayarea\/comments\/1uxtkt6\/united_airlines_threatens_to_call_ice_on_customer\/\" target=\"_blank\">in the video<\/a>, followed by, \u201cYou don\u2019t act like a citizen, get away.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Varela was so outraged by the comment he decided to post the video on Reddit in an effort to seek accountability. It quickly attracted a massive amount of public and media attention, and a spokesperson for United confirmed Monday that the airline is investigating the incident.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI definitely wanted others to see, and I also want other immigrants or minorities to know \u2014 whether they\u2019re legal, illegal, whether they have their residency or their citizenship \u2014 that if this happens to you, stand up,\u201d he said. \u201cYou have got to fight back.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In the nearly 90-second recording, Varela calls the customer service representative lazy, rude and racist and asks her for her name tag. The heated encounter ends with the woman, who is also recording the confrontation, walking toward him and pushing his phone away. <\/p>\n<p>Varela said he was shocked that someone in California would suggest calling ICE on a Latino person.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSan Francisco is one of the most liberal cities in the nation,\u201d he said. \u201cMaybe if I would have been in Arkansas, I would have said, \u2018Well, yeah, not too surprising,\u2019 but it is super surprising.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Varela is an American citizen and currently lives in San Ramon with his wife and their three daughters. Last week, the family was traveling to Montreal but was initially unable to board their flight because one of his daughters had a problem with the spelling of her name on her ticket.<\/p>\n<p>The ticket was purchased through United Airlines, but the flight was operated by Air Canada, and it proved very challenging to get a new ticket printed with the correct name spelling, he said. <\/p>\n<p>Varela claims that the United customer service agent had a bad attitude from the beginning and informed him that she did not care whether his family was able to board their flight. This made him angry and he called her rude and lazy, he said.<\/p>\n<p>The family was ultimately able to board after an Air Canada representative reissued a ticket; however, the entire airport experience left the family rattled.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is serious to threaten people with ICE after what has happened with ICE,\u201d he said. \u201cThey don\u2019t care if you\u2019re a citizen, don\u2019t care if you\u2019re Hispanic, white, a mother, a veteran. They\u2019ll shoot you, so it\u2019s not a joke.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>A spokesperson for the union representing the employee said they were aware of the video but \u201chave no verification of its authenticity or the full context.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAs depicted, the comments made in the video do not reflect the views or values of the IAM Union,\u201d the spokesperson said in a statement Monday. \u201cAny potential matters arising from this incident will be handled through the appropriate processes established by the collective bargaining agreement.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Varela said it was insulting that the union would question the authenticity of his video.<\/p>\n<p>United Airlines has been in touch with him to hear his side of the story and inform him they are investigating the incident, he said. <\/p>\n<p>Thus far, there has been no information shared on potential disciplinary actions against the employee. <\/p>\n<p>Since the encounter went viral, Varela said he had been inundated with interview requests and was making an effort to continue sharing his story to send a message that racism of any kind should not be tolerated.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m always telling my girls that we need to stand up for what we believe in,\u201d he said. \u201cNow, I\u2019ve got to show them what I\u2019ve been preaching to them since they were born.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Mexican American father was floored when a United Airlines customer service agent threatened to call Immigration and Customs Enforcement on him during a heated interaction at San Francisco International Airport. \u201cMy reaction was shock, disbelief, anger, embarrassment,\u201d Julio Varela, 54, said in an interview Monday. \u201cIt was so demeaning.\u201d The incident took place Tuesday&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12604,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/ca-times.brightspotcdn.com\/dims4\/default\/19e284f\/2147483647\/strip\/true\/crop\/7544x3961+0+534\/resize\/1200x630!\/quality\/75\/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcalifornia-times-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F39%2Fc4%2Fad545c7a41e188d1d75b52c6a3bc%2Fgovernment-shutdown-fleet-week-44019.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12603","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-hub"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12603","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12603"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12603\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12604"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}