Officer shot at ICE facility as border czar blames political rhetoric

Border czar Tom Homan demanded Democratic politicians tone down their rhetoric against immigration officials after a Texas police officer was shot outside a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center over the weekend.

“The rhetoric against the men and women of ICE is skyrocketing, especially by members of Congress,” Homan told “America’s Newsroom” on Monday. “We have senators, we have congresspeople [who] compare ICE to the Nazis, compare ICE to racists, and it just continues. So the public thinks, well, if a member of Congress can attack ICE, why can’t we?”

The rhetoric “has to stop,” he warned, “or it’s a matter of time one of the ICE officers goes down or a criminal goes down. We’ve already seen an officer go down.”

The officer was shot Friday night near the Prairieland Detention Facility in Alvarado, Texas, authorities said. 

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The Department of Homeland Security said that more than a dozen agitators slashed the tires of federal vehicles and damaged security cameras at the ICE facility. The attack follows ongoing protests outside a DHS detention facility in Portland amid backlash against President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement agency. 

Homan said that attacks against ICE officers and federal agents conducting immigration enforcement are up nearly 700% compared to the same time last year. 

Democratic Rep. Stephen Lynch of Massachusetts and Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz were criticized by conservatives in June after they compared federal immigration operations to the Gestapo, the infamous secret police force in Nazi Germany.

Homan called on blue state politicians to be more responsible in their criticism of immigration officials, reminding them that these officers have families too.

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“We’re talking about life and death here. These men and women of ICE, the men and women of border patrol, they’re mothers and fathers too. They don’t hang their heart on a hook when they go to work,” he said.

The Trump official also told protesters to “go protest Congress” if they don’t like the country’s immigration laws.

The attack on law enforcement followed Trump signing his $3.3 trillion “big, beautiful bill” into law on Friday. The bill adds 10,000 ICE agents and directs $46.5 billion for border wall construction, $45 billion to expand immigration detention capacity, $30 billion for ICE hiring and training and $6 billion for border technology and surveillance.

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Homan said the additional funds will help immigration officials be more efficient in their operations and “make America safer.”

“We have less than 5,000 deportation officers at ICE. We have over 20 million illegal aliens in this country,” he said of the challenge agents are dealing with.