Border Czar Tom Homan said he’d reached an agreement with local leaders that would allow him to pull agents out of the state
Panicking Donald Trump is pulling hundreds of his ICE anti-migrant agents out of Minnesota – roughly a quarter of the total deployed – following a huge backlash.
Some 700 agents from the reported 3,000 armed heavies involved in what local leaders have branded an “invasion” of the state will be withdrawn, Tom Homan said this morning.
He said the “drawdown” was as a result of an agreement being reached with local county jails to hand “threats to the community” over to ICE rather than releasing them.
This, he suggested, would require less manpower than seeking to detain undocumented people accused of committing crimes on the street.
He said at a press conference in Minneapolis: “Let me be clear, President Trump fully intends to achieve mass deportations during his administration, and immigration enforcement will continue every day throughout this country.”
Local leaders had described the surge of thousands of armed agents into the city as an “invasion” – and warned the real intention was not law or immigration enforcement, but intimidation, preparing the way for ICE to be used to pressure voters during the midterm elections in November.
He said “moving forward” ICE would be pursuing targeted operations, based on reasonable suspicion.
Asked if he thought the operation had been a success, he said he did.
“I think it was very effective as far as public safety goes,” he said. “Was it a perfect operation? No.”
And asked if ICE would stop broader patrols and random citizenship checks, Homan added: “We’re doing targeted enforcement operations. But when we go to arrest targets, if we find an illegal alien there, they’re coming.”
Trump has been rocked by a series of negative polls, as American voters pushed back against his mass deportation programme.
An IPSOS poll released on Monday found 62% of Americans thought ICE officers had gone too far – an increase over the 58% found in a poll taken before the shooting of Alex Pretti.
Asked about the shooting, just 33% thought it was a necessary use of force, with 43% saying they were not sure.
Trump’s overall approval rating slumped to 37% in a Pew poll this week – with 50% saying his administration’s actions had been worse than expected.
Just over a quarter of Americans (27%) said they supported all or most of the President’s policies and plans – down from 35% a year ago. According to Pew, that change came entirely among Republicans.
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