Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) said Sunday that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is not delivering on what the public wants, saying it’s serving as a “goon squad” for the Trump administration.
The Pentagon has ordered around 1,500 troops to prepare for deployment to Minnesota, according to multiple outlets citing defense officials. The city of Minneapolis is receiving national attention after the shooting death of Renee Good amid ICE’s deportation efforts.
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Gallego said President Donald Trump views the military as his “toy” and wants “nothing more” than to intimidate “blue cities.” He also argued that ICE needs to be “totally torn down” from its current duties.
“From my experience running in Arizona, in a very hard, hard state when it comes to immigration and immigration issues, people want immigration enforcement that goes after criminals, right? And focuses on criminals. And immigration enforcement is actually focused on security and not the goon squad that has come from Stephen Miller and Donald Trump. One that issues warrants, one that doesn‘t have people mask and acting like we‘re a third-world police force,” Gallego said on CNN’s State of the Union.
What we‘re seeing right now is not what we want from ICE, and we can create and have a force that‘s actually focused on immigration and on security, and not this type of intimidation that‘s happening right now,” Gallego said.
The Arizona senator also said he is talking with Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT), who wrote on X earlier this month that Senate Democrats cannot vote for a budget for the Department of Homeland Security that doesn’t “restrain” the agency. Gallego added that he’s aware of the implications of possibly shutting down ICE funding but said Congress can’t keep funding the “goon squad.”
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U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez ruled Friday evening that ICE officers can’t arrest or pepper-spray protesters if they aren’t directly engaging in violence. The order will remain in place until the operation concludes or “conditions change such that it is no longer necessary.”
Gov. Abigail Spanberger (D-VA), who was inaugurated on Saturday, issued an executive order that superseded former Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s order expanding state law enforcement’s collaboration with ICE. The governor argued her predecessor’s order led to the public being “deprived of critical public safety resources.”
