California Governor Gavin Newsom is warning that ICE has become President Donald Trump’s “personal police force.”
Newsom sounded the alarm after the president’s border czar, Tom Homan, announced Sunday that ICE agents would deploy to airports starting Monday, amid TSA staffing shortages due to the ongoing partial government shutdown.
Trump had threatened to send ICE to airports on Saturday in an attempt to pressure Democratic lawmakers to fund the Department of Homeland Security.
Newsom’s press office wrote on X, “By sending ICE into airports, Trump is proving the problem in real time. ICE has become the president’s lawless, under-trained, personal police force, deployed to serve his agenda — not the law.”
Democrats in Congress have refused to fund the DHS unless Republicans agree on a set of reforms to ICE after two U.S. citizens were killed by federal immigration officers deployed as part of Trump’s immigration crackdown.
Among the demanded changes are a ban on masks for ICE agents, stricter warrant requirements for public arrests, and ending roaming patrols.
Critics have long accused Trump of turning ICE into a “paramilitary” force as he has sent masked agents into blue cities across the country after Republican lawmakers boosted the agency’s budget to levels greater than the annual military spending of most European armies.
Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey, a Democrat, told The Daily Beast Podcast last month that Americans should “anticipate” that Trump could set out ICE “around ballot-polling places to scare people away” during the November midterms.
Healey pointed out that the president has already taken the extraordinary step of deploying the ICE and the military in U.S. cities, often over the objections of local officials.
In a Truth Social post, Trump wrote, “If the Democrats do not allow for Just and Proper Security at our Airports, and elsewhere throughout our Country, ICE will do the job far better than ever done before! The Fascist Democrats will never protect America, but the Republicans will.”
He added, “I look forward to moving ICE in on Monday, and have already told them to, “GET READY.” NO MORE WAITING, NO MORE GAMES!”
Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens confirmed on Sunday that federal agents from Homeland Security Investigations and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Enforcement and Removal Operations will be deployed at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport on Monday.
It’s unclear where else Trump is planning to deploy ICE on Monday, with Homan telling CNN’s State of the Union that the primary focus will be on “airports where the longest waits are.”
ICE officials were caught flat-footed and are scrambling to enforce the president’s last-minute decision, CBS News reports, citing several DHS sources who spoke with the outlet on condition of anonymity.
“I have no idea what we’re doing‚" one DHS official told CBS News when asked about the president’s decision.
A former senior ICE official told the outlet that federal immigration agents were likely not trained to perform the technical tasks involved in airport security, such as operating screening machines.
The Daily Beast has reached out to the White House and the DHS for comment.
