Border Czar Tom Homan has been in Minnesota for over a week now in the wake of a shakeup in how the Trump administration is handling immigration enforcement in the state.
During his first press conference last week, Homan said he had staff from U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement (ICE) “woking on a drawdown plan.” On Wednesday, he announced the feds will withdraw 700 law enforcement personnel from Minnesota immediately.
On Wednesday’s show, Megyn was joined by Vice President J.D. Vance to discuss the latest in Minnesota and how it fits into the Trump administration’s larger crackdown and strategy.
Homan Announces Drawdown
Homan said in an update Wednesday morning that 700 federal agents would be leaving Minnesota – “effective immediately” – due to “unprecedented” cooperation between counties and immigration enforcement officials.
“We currently have an unprecedented number of towns communicating with us now and allowing ICE to take custody of illegal aliens before they hit the streets,” Homan told reporters. “More officers taking custody of criminal aliens directly from the jails means less officers on the street.”
The border czar said he has been in talks with counties in Minnesota that have agreed to let ICE agents take custody of illegal immigrants straight from their jails. Homan said that agreement will allow a single agent to pick up a suspect instead of needing to deploy teams to arrest someone after they have been released.
The 700 being withdrawn will be a mix of ICE and Border Patrol agents and roughly 2,000 federal agents will remain on the ground in Minnesota as part of Operation Metro Surge. Those federal officers will soon be outfitted with body cameras, according to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.
Since Operation Metro Surge began in December, Homan said federal agents have detained 14 migrants with homicide convictions, 139 with assault convictions, 87 with sex offense convictions, and 28 gang members.
Vance Responds
As Megyn noted, Operation Metro Surge has been particularly polarizing. “The example of Minneapolis has been troubling to both sides,” she said. “The left has used it to say ICE is out of control and the Trump administration is out of control, and the right is frustrated that, by some accounts, we appear to have bent the knee there.”
While the focus thus far has been on targeting illegal immigrants with criminal records, Megyn noted that many Americans still support deporting everyone who has entered the country illegally and she asked the vice president what the plan is for “all the others.”
“I like people saying, ‘We recognize you’ve done a lot. Now do more,'” Vance responded. “I think that’s kind of how this should work. Fundamentally, you know, the president and I and the entire administration, we work for the American people, and so I hear these complaints, I hear these criticisms.”
He believes there are important distinctions to be made between the various components of immigration enforcement. “Homan announced a partial drawdown because the local authorities are cooperating with him, and this is why it’s important to segregate,” he explained. “What are we talking about – immigration enforcement or everything else? We’re not drawing down immigration enforcement. We’re drawing down some of the federal officers that were helping the guys do immigration enforcement.”
“When Homan says we’re drawing 700 people down, those are the people who were protecting the ICE officers as they went out and did deportations and immigration enforcement,” Vance added. “Most of the people that we have in Minneapolis, they’re not doing immigration enforcement… Most of them are protecting the immigration officers from the mob that’s forming around them.”
The vice president said increased cooperation in Minneapolis and the state of Minnesota means federal officers can return to doing their job. “We don’t want people there doing, effectively, police work so that they can protect our immigration officers. We want the immigration officers to go and do their work, and, if they get into a problem, they can call local police,” he explained. “As that happens, I think you’re going to see some of that law enforcement shifting to the local police, which is exactly what we wanted.”
That separation of immigration enforcement and policing is why, according to Vance, the surges in “very blue places like Memphis, Tennessee or a number of other cities” have been so effective. “You see the system working as it should,” he said. “An immigration officer goes in, arrests an illegal alien, that person gets processed and deported. And if, God forbid, you have a mob forming, the ICE officers can call the local police and say, ‘Hey, these guys are threatening us. They’re harassing us. They’re maybe even assaulting us.'”
“The reason why Minneapolis was so chaotic is because we had to have all these extra officers doing the job the local police wouldn’t do. If the local police are willing to step up a little bit, I think that’s a good thing, not a bad thing,” the vice president concluded. “If they are in Minnesota doing the very thing that they said they refused to do, I don’t think that’s a surrender on the part of the Trump administration, especially as we continue on immigration enforcement.”
You can check out Megyn’s full interview with Vice President Vance by tuning in to episode 1,245 on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you like to listen. And don’t forget that you can catch The Megyn Kelly Show live on SiriusXM’s The Megyn Kelly Channel (channel 111) weekdays from 12pm to 2pm ET.