Has the Trump administration Overplayed Its Hand? Efforts at Mass Deportations of Noncriminals Draws Public Ire
NBC News and other major news networks are reporting that before border czar Tom Homan took over oversight of immigration operations in Minneapolis, he warned that a targeted approach to immigration enforcement would be needed to “keep the faith of the American people.”
Homan, who served as a Homeland Security official under the Obama and both Trump administrations, has said immigrants who have committed additional crimes should be prioritized for arrest and deportation.
In an exclusive interview in June for the forthcoming book by Julia Ainsley entitled Undue Process: The Inside Story of Trump’s Mass Deportation Program,” Homan warned that a failure to prioritize criminals for removal could cost the Trump administration public support. The book publisher describes the book as follows:
"In Undue Process, NBC’s Senior Homeland Security correspondent Julia Ainsley takes us inside the Trump White House to show how Stephen Miller, Kristi Noem, Tom Homan, and other anti-immigration hardliners are executing the administration’s mass deportation plan, seemingly prioritizing spectacle and punishment over security and legal constraints.
Brimming with revelations from sources within ICE and the Department of Homeland Security, Undue Process is a harrowing chronicle of how the Trump administration aimed to create `the largest deportation force in U.S. history,' only to ignite a resistance within the government and across the country as they redefined the limits of executive power."
“I think the vast majority of the American people think criminal illegal aliens need to leave. And if we stick to that prioritization, I think we keep the faith of the American people,” Homan said on June 16, as Border Patrol agents, under the direction of commander Greg Bovino, were conducting their first large-scale raids in Los Angeles.
“And I think the more we do that, the more the American people will support what President Trump’s doing. We got to do it and we’ve got to do it in a humane manner.”
Another news story ("Majority of immigrants arrested by ICE don't have violent criminal records, document shows") reports that "[l]ess than 14% of immigrants arrested by ICE during President Trump's first year back in office have violent criminal records, a DHS document obtained by CBS News shows."
