Donald Trump introduced on Sunday that he’s appointing former performing Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Thomas Homan to function his “border czar,” saying Homan will likely be “in charge of all Deportation of Illegal Aliens back to their Country of Origin.”
“I’ve known Tom for a long time, and there is nobody better at policing and controlling our Borders,” Trump wrote in a submit on Reality Social.
Homan, a Venture 2025 contributor, ran ICE when Trump first took workplace in 2017.
Whereas within the Trump administration, Homan is taken into account the “father” of Trump’s “zero tolerance” border coverage, which led to 1000’s of pointless and inhumane household separations. It took months for most of the youngsters who had been separated from their dad and mom to reunite with their households, resulting in agonizing photos of youngsters in cages in detention services with out their dad and mom.
He additionally made menacing feedback to immigrants, saying at a congressional listening to in 2017 that they “must be nervous.”
“If you’re in this country illegally and you committed a crime by being in this country, you should be uncomfortable, you should look over your shoulder. You need to be worried,” Homan mentioned in testimony earlier than the Home Appropriations Committee. “No population is off the table.”
When requested later by CNN if he regretted these feedback, Homan mentioned no.
“It needed to be said,” Homan informed CNN in June 2017.
Homan lasted solely 17 months within the Trump administration the primary time round. In accordance to The Washington Put up, Homan “retired in frustration when the White House failed to move his nomination toward Senate confirmation.”
However now Homan will likely be again, and is gung-ho on Trump’s plan to hold out mass deportations.
In February 2023, earlier than Trump formally turned the GOP nominee, Homan bragged to right-wing propagandist Charlie Kirk that he can be again in a future Trump administration to assist deport immigrants.
“I’m going to run the biggest deportation operation this country has ever seen,” Homan mentioned.
He additionally spoke in the course of the Republican Nationwide Conference in July, declaring in a speech, “I got a message to the millions of illegal aliens that Joe Biden’s released in our country … You better start packing now.”
In fact, consultants say it is going to be extraordinarily costly to run a mass-deportation operation, costing nearly $11,000 per immigrant.
It’s additionally logistically tough.
Homan mentioned on Fox Information on Sunday that the deportation plan can be “a well-targeted, planned operation … by the men of ICE.”
However quite a few undocumented immigrants have relations right here legally, that means deportations might as soon as once more separate households.
CBS Information requested Homan about this in an interview that aired on “60 Minutes” earlier than the election.
“Is there a way to carry out mass deportation without separating families?” CBS’ Cecilia Vega requested Homan.
To which Homan replied, “Of course there is. Families can be deported together.”
