Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin’s plan to shut down liberal cities’ airports is getting torn to shreds.
Mullin, who replaced “Ice Barbie” Kristi Noem in March, has repeatedly threatened to remove Customs and Border Protection officers from airports in so-called sanctuary cities, a move that would bar the airports from accepting incoming international flights.
The former Oklahoma senator told Fox News’ Sean Hannity last week, “We’re currently drawing up plans to say listen, in these sanctuary cities where the local radical left Democrats aren’t allowing us to do our job and enforce federal laws, then we shouldn’t be processing international flights into their—into their cities either.”
“They don’t want us to enforce immigration, but they want us to process immigration at their facilities? Nothing about that makes sense to me,” he added.
But the idea is crashing into opposition from business leaders and the travel industry.
“Any reduction in Customs and Border Protection operations at major U.S. gateway airports threatens to cause unnecessary chaos throughout the nation’s air transportation system,” a coalition of 17 travel and business trade groups wrote in a statement Friday.
The coalition, which included the U.S. Travel Association and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said that “operational changes at a small number of gateway airports will quickly ripple across the country.”
“We urge DHS to avoid actions that would create unnecessary operational and economic consequences for communities nationwide,” they wrote. “Now is the time to strengthen America’s gateway infrastructure, not weaken it.”
The DHS and CBP did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The White House referred the Daily Beast back to the DHS when reached for comment.
The Justice Department’s list of “sanctuary” cities, which allegedly have policies that limit cooperation with federal immigration officials, includes several of the nation’s biggest international travel hubs, such as New York City, Los Angeles, Boston, and San Francisco.
The airports in those cities collectively handle hundreds of millions of passengers each year, which generates tens of billions of dollars in commercial activity, while also processing billions in imports daily.
Still, Mullin, 48, has been “obsessed” with his idea since replacing Noem, and keeps pushing it unprompted during meetings at the White House, one Trump official told CNN.
One of the airports Mullin has put in his sights is Newark Liberty International Airport, suggesting he could pull customs officers to quell protests at the Delaney Hall ICE detention center in the city.
“If local law enforcement isn’t going to help, then we have to provide what assets we have,” he told Newsmax last week, adding, “Therefore, we won’t be able to process international flights going to those airports, because those officers will be reassigned.”
But travel industry representatives told The New York Times that shutting down customs at Newark alone would risk an estimated $8 billion in yearly travel spending and about $100 million in daily imports. They added that diverting flights elsewhere could overwhelm an already stressed system.
Pulling customs officers at sanctuary-city airports would jeopardize over $70 billion in U.S. economic activity, the Times reports, citing travel industry estimates.
Moreover, Mullin’s plan would likely throw the FIFA World Cup into pandemonium: The tournament’s final match will be played on July 19th at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey—just a 15-minute drive from Newark International.
Even Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy criticized the proposal when asked about it in a congressional hearing last week, saying that “we shouldn’t shut down air travel in a state that doesn’t agree with our politics.”
