(NewsNation) — Incoming “Border Czar” Tom Homan discussed his vision for the border with “NewsNation Now” saying he sees “no other option” than to carry out mass deportations.
Homan, who toured Texas this week, rebuked the notion that mass deportations are anything other than a necessity.
“[Critics] saying, well, that’s that’s radical, it’s racist, it’s un-American. It’s just ridiculous,” Homan said.
“Of course, there has to be an historic deportation operation, because we have no other option.
“If it doesn’t happen, we’re sending out messages to the entire world; you can cross the border legally, which is a crime. You can be released into the United States, either go to court or not show up in court and get an order removal, and we’re not going to remove you. The whole world is going to come to this country.”
Homan also pushed back on sanctuary cities in Democratic states like Colorado, Illinois, and New York, suggesting if they choose not to help ICE, the alternative could be worse.
“if you don’t want to help, I’ve given them a warning, do not impede us. Do not knowingly harbor and conceal an illegal alien from ICE authorities, because that is a crime, and we’ll prosecute those crimes.
“I would think it would be a nonpartisan issue to remove public safety threats out of the community,” he added.
Homan does hope that sanctuary cities “will sit down at the table with us and discuss this.”
Full Tom Homan interview transcript
Q: You said the federal government would take up Texas’ offer of land for the mass deportation operation. What’s that plan going to look like? How many people, how long will they be held for?
“I’m still working on the plan, but the acres they gave us, we’ll use it for, you know, incoming processing and departure locations. So haven’t got the plan fully baked yet, but that offers great. It’s going to say the taxpayers a lot of money from, you know, acquiring land separate from this. So, we’ll use that for distribution. We use that for logistics.
I appreciate Gov. [Greg] Abbott’s willingness to help us out with that land, because, again, it saves the taxpayers a lot of money by doing that.”
Q: You’ve talked tough on illegal immigration. You’ve got the resume to back it up. Will the deportations be at the scale that Trump has expressed — what he promised along the campaign trail — and will military members be used to carry them out?
“Look, I there’s a lot of pushback. I hear from, you know, mass deportation people saying, ‘Well, that’s radical. It’s racist. It’s un-American.’
It’s just ridiculous at the end of the historic, historic illegal immigration where millions of people enter this country illegally, and based on immigration court data over the last 10 years, nearly nine out of 10 of these people will end up with an order of removal because they simply don’t qualify for asylum. What they did is commit asylum fraud.
So, when you have millions of people coming across the border, nine out of 10 will get an order of removal for an immigration judge. Of course, there has to be a historic deportation operation, because we have no other option. If the court order doesn’t mean anything, if the judge order doesn’t mean anything, then what are we doing? You might as well just shut down immigration court. Might as well just forget about due process. You might just take the border patrol off the border. There’s no consequences.
If you want to claim asylum, if you want to see a judge, we’ll make that possible. But the end of that, if you’re order removed, that’s what has to happen. Because if it doesn’t happen, we’re sending a message to the entire world: You can cross the border illegally, which is a crime, you can be released United States, either go to court or not show up in court and get an order removal, and we’re not going to remove you. The whole world is going to come to this country.”
Q: You say you’re not just going to turn off the faucet, turn off the fire hose, but carry out these deportations for the criminals first. But if you’re an illegal immigrant here, that’s breaking the law to begin with. So, does that put everybody in the same category, or could it?
I wouldn’t say same category. The president has been very clear, so have I, that right out of the gate, we’re going to concentrate on public safety threats and national security threats. And we got plenty of them.
Because if you look at the stats, you compare the Trump administration to the Biden administration, the removal of criminal aliens has decreased 74%. We know a lot of criminals came across this border in the last four years. We’ve got a big block of criminal aliens we got to locate and remove from the country, and that’s why I’ve been pushing back on the sanctuary cities and the mayors and governors who are speaking out against it.
I cannot believe, as an elected mayor or elected governor, you do not want public safety threats out of your community. Well, if you don’t just get out of the way because ICE will do it for you, but I would think it would be a nonpartisan issue to remove public safety threat to the community.
But getting back to your point, if you’re in a country illegally, you’re not off the table. It’s not okay to be in this country legally. You enter the country illegally, which is a crime. You’ve been ordered removed by a judge, you got a problem.”
Q: You say, get out of the way, ICE will take care of it for you. So, we’ve got the Denver Mayor Mike Johnston saying they’re prepared for the worst. Would it? Would it come to you guys, getting them out of the way? When you say that, what does that mean? Exactly?
“Well, I’ve been very clear, if they don’t want to help, fine, don’t help. I find incredible you don’t want to help remove public safety threats, but if you don’t want to help, I’ve given warning. Do not impede us. Do not knowingly harbor and conceal an illegal alien from ICE authorities, because that is a crime, and we’ll prosecute those crimes.
When I was an agent, many years ago, I prosecuted US citizens for harboring illegal alien their home, harboring an illegal alien their place of employment. I got no problem, you know, prosecuting others who want to knowingly harbor and conceal an illegal alien. And I’m hoping they don’t do that. I’m hoping a lot of this is just rhetoric … They don’t want ICE in their neighborhoods, but understand that their actions are going to result in exactly that. If they would let me in their jails, the sanctuary city jails — we’re not even given access —let me in your jail so I can arrest the bad guy, the guy you already locked in a jail cell. That means less officers in your neighborhood, because if you don’t let me in your jail and you release this guy, the bad guy, we’re going to go into neighborhood and find him with a whole team of people, and we’re probably going to find others, others that weren’t even on a radar, and they’re going to go too.
So, more agents in the jail means less agents in your neighborhood. So, fighting against ICE, not letting them in the jail, is going to give you the exact same results you don’t want. So, I would think they’d to sit at the table and work with us on this.”
Q: Let’s go ahead and take a look at this headline from USA Today. It says “Tom Homan vs. Stephen Miller: Who will decide Trump’s mass deportation agenda” So, I guess Miller has a bit more of an aggressive approach. Which method do you think the administration is going to go with, yours or his? Or somewhere in the middle? Are you working together?
Look, I don’t believe half the stuff I read in the media, because they take things. They’ve exaggerated things I’ve said, they don’t include things I’ve actually said.
Steve Miller is a smart guy. He was the architect of many of Trump’s first policies in the first administration that were proven effective. It was a game changer. It was the most successful border security plan ever in the history of this nation. So. me and Steve Miller, we’re connected at the hip. We’ll we be working side by side, and we’re on the same page. I guarantee that.
Q: I imagine you probably seen this heartbreaking video captured this week of children abandoned at the border. I’m going to let our viewers take a look … How are you going to help these vulnerable asylum seekers?
Well, thank God that child is alive, because in my career, I’ve held dead children, I’ve held dying children. I talked to little girls as young as nine that were raped by member of the criminal cartel. And that’s why this thing, that’s why securing the border so important. Securing the border saves lives.
So, look, 31% of women that make that journey through the cartels, they’re sexually assaulted. Under Joe Biden, you got almost 4,000 illegal aliens have died across that border. You got a quarter million Americans have died from fentanyl overdoses. Joe Biden’s open border policies are killing Americans in record numbers, killing migrants in record numbers.
When President Trump had illegal immigration down 83 to 90%. When 90% less people are coming, how many little girls like this weren’t left on the border? How many, how many children didn’t die across that river? How many women weren’t sexually assaulted? How many Americans didn’t die from fentanyl because the border was secure? How many women children weren’t sex trafficking to United States President Trump’s policies were humane. People want to call inhumane and racist, no, they weren’t. His policies saved thousands of lives, and we’re going to do it again.
Securing the border saves lives. For the people who want to come to this border and claim asylum, you have right to do that. But we won’t have the remain in Mexico program in place. You can wait in Mexico for your asylum hearing. And when we did that under Trump administration, that took about two months. They stopped coming because they knew they had a fraudulent asylum claim. They weren’t willing to spend all their money, give it to the criminal cartels, just to wait in Mexico. If you really escaping fear and persecution from your homeland, you will wait in Mexico for your hearing.
If you win your hearing, welcome to United States. If you don’t, we don’t have to look for you. Trump’s policies were the most effective policies of my career, and I started 1984 as a border patrol agent. We’re going to go back to those policies and build upon them and finish the job we started.
Q: What would you say to Americans who are no doubt going to be troubled seeing difficult imagery once these mass deportations start, and how bad is it going to get? I mean, family separations? Will that be prevalent?
“Well, we want to see the image. We’re going to show the images on the Trump administration. We’ll be very transparent in what we’re doing. I guarantee you the left side media is going to show a mother crying or child, they’ll grab some image. But I want people to know. Go talk to the hundreds of angel moms and dads that I’ve spoken to, and heard their stories where they buried their children. It was a matter of separation. They buried their children because their children was killed by an illegal alien.
Talk to little girls I’ve talked to that were sexually molested by criminal cartels. Talk to the talk to the parents of the quarter million kids, young men and women who died from fentanyl poisoning, from a poison China sells to Mexican cartels and pushes across this border. The Mexican cartels have killed more Americans than every terrorist organization in the world. That’s why I’m saying secure borders save lives, and we can’t secure the border if we don’t run this deportation operation. We got to send a message to the whole world: Y ou can come to the greatest nation on Earth, but you got to do it legally, not illegally.
Illegal immigration is not a victimless crime. When you overwhelm the system, like they have the last four years, that overwhelms the border patrol, where most border patrols are no longer on patrol, because we’re taking care of this humanitarian crisis.”
Q: It looks like there was sort of a case of, he said she said, with Trump and Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum reporting very different versions of a phone call that they had last week. Trump saying Mexico would agree to stop illegal immigration through Mexico, and she asserted that she had promised no major policy changes. What’s with the different accounts here?
“I would think that President Mexico would do her job for the Mexican people. The cartels are running that country. A big part of that Mexican government, Mexican military are corrupt because the cartels pay them a lot of money. So, you know, they certainly don’t want the gravy train to end.
Bottom line is, it’s against the law in Mexico to traffic in women and children, but they’ve been allowing it for years. It’s against law Mexico for people from other country to transit to the country, to come to United States, but they’ve been allowing it. President Trump’s asking to do the right thing for people.
Like I just said, 4,000 migrants have died across the US-Mexican border in this administration. Isn’t that meaningful to the president of Mexico? And that’s not counting the thousands that die in Mexico, the thousands that are dying in the Darién Gap in Panama.
This is about life and death. I would think the president of Mexico would do the right thing for the Mexican people, and that would be secure the border. We can have fair trade. We have a great relationship, but you can’t let cross-border crime take over either nation. So, I’m hoping she’ll do the right thing. If she doesn’t, I guarantee you Trump will give consequences to Mexico like he’s threatened before. He’ll do it again and he’ll put him in place.
