Former ICE director calls for 'historic deportations' if Trump is reelected

By Samantha Kamman, Christian Post Reporter Thursday, February 22, 2024

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — A former immigration official during the Trump administration said that there must be “historic deportations” if Donald Trump is reelected president in 2024, stating that there is “no other option” during a recent panel discussion focused on the crisis at the southern border. 

Tom Homan, the former director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, spoke on a panel titled “Trump's Wall Vs. Biden's Gaps” during the 2024 Conservative Political Action Conference. The panel also featured investigative reporter Sara Carter and U.S. House Committee on Homeland Security Chairman Rep. Mark Green, with field reporter Julio Rosas serving as the moderator. 

During the discussion, Homan stressed that there are “consequences” for entering the country illegally and that there has to be “historic deportations,” claiming that there is “no other option.” 

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The former immigration official added that the only other option aside from deportation is to allow illegal immigrants to stay, and if that happens, Homan warned that the United States will “never fix the border.” 

Homan recounted how he has worked for six presidents throughout his career, including former President Barack Obama, stating that every president took steps to secure the border. He also praised the Trump administration’s border policies, calling them “unprecedented.”  

“Biden is the first president who has come into office with an unsecured border on purpose,” the former ICE director claimed. 

Some of the current issues Homan connected to the current administration's border policies included an increase in sexual violence against migrants. 

In November, the international nongovernment organization Doctors Without Borders highlighted a surge in sexual violence impacting migrants traveling from Latin America to the United States. The group published a statement revealing that it had treated 397 victims who survived a sexual assault as they crossed into Panama. 

Ninety-five percent of sexual assault victims were female, according to the group, which noted that it had treated 107 sexual assault survivors in the month of October. 

In addition to an increase in sexual violence, Homan raised concerns about migrants dying at the U.S.-Mexico border and Americans dying due to fentanyl making its way across the border. According to data from U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the agency and Office of Field Operations seized 27,000 pounds of fentanyl in 2023. 

Homan blamed the Biden administration’s border policies for migrant deaths and Americans dying due to fentanyl. The former ICE director believes that the border policies under the Trump administration “saved lives,” and he called for the former president to be reelected in 2024 to “save this great nation.”