More than anything, “Abolish ICE” distills neatly into four syllables the Left’s anger over the treatment of illegal immigrants under President Trump. It’s a slogan rooted in something more visceral than substantive, much like “repeal and replace.”
For Democrats, there’s no alliterative effect to squeezing “replace” into their catchphrase (though that turned out to be more of a cosmetic flourish for Republicans anyway). It should not be lost, however, that the party actually has no concrete plan to replace the department they seek to abolish. Some say they do. Sens. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., and Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., have creatively assured the public their approach to ICE would not involve so much a total abolition as a “[start] from scratch” or a “reimagin[ing]” of the agency. (“Reimagine and replace,” might make a nice 2020 slogan for Gillibrand.)
[More: Trump: ‘Democrats have a death wish’]
Asked “what comes after ICE” on Wednesday, meteoric New York congressional candidate Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez also hoped to “reimagine” the immigration system.
Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Wis., has lead the legislative charge to abolish ICE, introducing legislation that would accomplish the deed. Here’s how he described the process that legislation would set in motion: “[M]y bill would dissolve ICE within six months and create a commission to provide recommendations to Congress on how the US government can implement a humane immigration enforcement system that upholds the dignity of all individuals. The commission would then transfer necessary functions that do not violate basic human rights to other agencies.”
A six-month dissolution, followed by the creation of a commission that would provide replacement recommendations to Congress, and a transferring of unspecified functions to other agencies. In short, Pocan’s plan to abolish ICE comes with no clear concept of what a post-ICE world would look like. That would be incumbent upon his commission to establish.
Abolishing the agency may be the least efficient part of that plan. If Pocan and his bill’s supporters concede ICE performs “necessary functions,” why not establish the commission to perform a comprehensive overview of the agency and then determine how to whittle it down to those essential, existing components? Because they’re working backwards from the slogan, and that wouldn’t satiate the base’s visceral demand.
When Republicans threatened to bring Pocan’s bill to the floor for a vote, hoping force vulnerable Democrats on the record, the Wisconsin congressman said he would oppose his own legislation rather than partake in a political stunt. But like Republicans, some of whom bucked when the opportunity to “repeal and replace” Obamacare presented itself in earnest last year, Democrats don’t seem prepared to deal with the political or logistical consequences of legislation built around their sloganeering. And the ones who are still remain too far outside the mainstream.
