INTERVIEWER:
00:02:46
But their name isn't on it, right? But when it comes to the masks, I don't know of another law enforcement agency in the country that has an 8,000% increase in threats. Just yesterday, the director of ICE, his wife was filmed walking to work. His home address has been doxed. His kids have been dox and filmed, so I don't know of another agency in this country that has an 8,000% increase. And look, let's remember why we're here, Ed. We're here because the last four years, over 10 million illegal aliens crossed that border released in this country unvetted. ICE has to do a law enforcement response to deal with the last four years of open border, where they claimed the border was secure every day, and it wasn't. What's so wrong about obtaining a judicial warrant to enter private property? That's not what a federal law requires. Congress themselves wrote the Immigration Nationality Act that gave power on administrative warrant to arrest somebody. And that's what's set up in federal statutes. So if Congress wants that change, then Congress can legislate. But right now, ICE is acting within the framework of federal statutes enacted by Congress and signed by the president. Well, as I recall, you have previously said that you thought judicial warrants were necessary for searches. There's been this change in policy in that now ICE can go with these administrative warrants that are issued by ICE personnel. Why your change of heart? I mean, clearly, at one point, at least, you agreed that was necessary. No, I don't have a change heart. What I understand, and I wasn't part of the discussions, that DOJ interpreted that law saying in certain circumstances, administrative warrant on somebody has a final order of removal already has a due process issued by a federal judge, they can enter a premises. I'm not a part of that discussion, but that's the DOJ guidance. Last week, you announced the months long operation known as metro surge in Minnesota is winding down. ICE, of course, is going to maintain a presence in the state, but not at the levels we've seen in recent weeks. If things keep winding down, when should that surge be over? Well, look, about as of-- we already removed, well, over 1,000 people. And as of Monday or Tuesday, we'll remove several hundred more. We'll get back to the original footprint, with the exception of the agents there to do the fraud investigation, will stay there and continue their work until they're done. The agents investigating the church issue where the people went into the church, they'll stay and get that work done. But there will be a small force, a security force, what we call RFQs that will-- our security forces that will respond to when our agents are out and they get surrounded by agitators and things got out of control. And they'll remain for a short period of time, just to make sure the coordination, the agreements we have with local and state law enforcement stay in place and they respond to a public safety threat when needed. And so, hopefully, those security-- that small footprint security forces can remove-- can be removed fairly quickly. I'm hoping. I think things are going in the right direction, and I got faith that will continue that way. This was the largest deployment of federal immigration agents in Department history. Do you anticipate there will be others on the scale seen in Minneapolis? I think it depends on the situation. I've said from day one that we need to flood the zone and sanctuary cities with additional agents. The number of agents depend on the situation on the ground. How many known criminal targets are out there because we know we have a problem in sanctuary cities, because we know there are really some public safety threats in the public. So rather than arresting that one criminal in jail, one agent arresting one criminal Alien, the safety and security of a jail, which is safer for the agent, safer for the aliens, safer for the community, they release them in the street, now we've got to send a whole team, or six or seven people. That is a win we had in Minnesota, everybody, because now we have agreements and coordination with jails. We can rest that public safety threat and the safety security of jail, which means we don't have to send six or seven people out to look for them. So I'm hoping other sanctuary cities look at what happened in Minnesota and how we got to the place, which I think is a good place. I hope more people pay attention to that, and we work with these states to let our officers in the jail. You can't-- a lot of politicians are out there on the left and the Democrats saying, OK, ICE, we agree, you should be focusing on public safety threats. You should be focusing on illegal aliens who have committed serious crimes in this country, but they lock us out of the jail. You can't square that. If you really want us to focus on the criminals, then let us in the jail. That's the safest, most secure place to do our work. A few other things quickly if we can, as the surge winds down in Minneapolis, one of the more dramatic incidents now is very much in question as you know, two ICE agents are now on administrative leave pending an internal investigation because video evidence shows their sworn testimony appears to have been untruthful. Only hours after that incident occurred, you'll recall, DHS had said the ICE officer who shot the migrant they were targeting was being ambushed and feared for his life. That now appears to be untrue. You take that incident, combined with the two deadly shootings in Minneapolis, and an incident in Chicago recently where evidence contradicted the government's claim, a woman rammed an agent's vehicle, and I wonder, does this all just further undermine trust in ICE across the country? Well, look, my first press conference in Minnesota, I said I was bringing in additional internal affairs agents in, just to make sure officers in the field were doing the right thing. And every one of those instances you just talked about were turned over to internal affairs. I know the FBI is investigating. The case is also, so we'll see those investigations lead. But as the ICE director said on Friday, people will be held accountable and they'll be fully investigated. And how that investigation comes out, then disciplinary action or prosecutions will occur. Right. And Wall Street Journal report published in recent days, I'm sure you've seen it, details widespread concerns with the leadership of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and her chief advisor, Corey Lewandowski. The report says you rarely speak with the Secretary or Lewandowski, despite the fact that you oversee immigration issues as well, from the White House perspective, and that you've repeatedly complained to the White House about them. What is your concern with Secretary Noem and Corey Lewandowski? Look, it's one team, one fight. I'm not playing in that media. They're trying to divide this administration. They want to attack the men and women who work in this administration. Look, do me and Secretary Noem agree on everything? No, that's why we have discussions. That's why every day we have a multi-agency conference call and meeting and we discuss going forward, and we have different opinions. Well, those different opinions are worked out and we move forward. The bottom line is we have the most secure border in the history of this nation. We got record numbers of criminal aliens arrested and deported in this country because this is one team, one fight. The results speak for themselves. But you don't dispute you've had disagreements with them at times, even if they've been resolved? I have a disagreement with-- we got many federal agencies, and it's not out of control disagreement. I want to do it this way. Someone wants to do it this way, then we talk about what works best in this situation. We all come to agreement in the end, but it's a discussion of different ideas. I've been doing this for 40 years. We have the Rodney Scott that runs CBP, he's been doing it for 30 years. So we all come to the table, we come up with different ideas, but we settle on a mission. And I think the results of this mission speaks for themselves. Again, the most secure border in history of this nation, because of our collaboration and record numbers of criminal aliens being arrested and deported, results speak for themselves. Tom Homan, the White House border czar, thank you for spending some of your Sunday with us. We appreciate it.
