Trump border czar Tom Homan has pledged to institute a regime of “shock and awe” on the first day of the new administration.
The former acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) took part in Donald Trump Jr’s program on the video streaming platform Rumble this week.
The pair discussed Homan’s plans to put together mass deportations of millions of illegal immigrants.
“What’s your overarching message to Americans who are eager for major border action on minute one? Like, on inauguration day, one second in, how much will you be able to improve the lives of everyday Americans?” Trump Jr asked Homan, according to Mediaite.
“I got three words for them – shock and awe,” Homan replied, arguing that his plan to restrict border access would decrease what he called “alien crime” as well as migrant deaths.
“You’re going to see us take this country back and ... it isn’t just about the deportation operation,” Homan said. “This is about saving the children and about securing the border. What [are] the results? [Fewer] overdose deaths, less sex trafficking, for God’s sake, one of the worst crimes around, [fewer] migrants dying,” he added.
He went on to say that gangs such as MS13 would be taken “out.”
I asked @TomHoman_ what Day One Border Security looks like:
— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) November 15, 2024
Three words.
“Shock and awe” pic.twitter.com/xX2raCRWsj
“I can’t wait to get started. I’m excited about coming back serving this country again,” Homan said. “Took a huge pay cut, but my wife said if you don’t go back, we’re going to get divorced because I’m sick and tired of you waking up everyday pissed off about you not being able to do anything.”
The phrase “shock and awe” usually refers to an overwhelming military onslaught that quickly crushes opposition. It was widely used about the initial stages of the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq.
Homan’s comments come after he claimed that “legal immigrants are perfectly safe” during an appearance on Fox Business earlier this week.
Trump has pledged to deport tens of millions of undocumented migrants, a group which includes people who have lived in the US for decades. Some have also voiced concerns that the administration could go after immigrants who are citizens or try denaturalization of longstanding citizens.
Homan appeared on Fox Business, where host Elizabeth MacDonald showed clips of MSNBC’s Nicole Wallace noting that Homan has connections to Project 2025, the conservative agenda for the next Republican administration that Trump has been attempting to distance himself from, and former Democratic HUD Secretary Julian Castro saying that Homan has a “cowboy attitude.”
Castro also said that Trump’s immigration agenda will need “a lot of pushback” and Ana Navarro, the co-host of The View, said, “When he says ‘Yes, families can be deported together,’ what he is saying, is that US citizens can be deported.”
“Are you saying that, Tom?” MacDonald asked Homan.
The incoming border czar said that US citizens and legal immigrants “are perfectly safe, for God’s sake.”
Homan responded to a question from CBS late last month in which he was asked about going ahead with mass deportations without separating families.
“Families can be deported together,” Homan said at the time.
He also claimed in his Fox Business appearance that the Biden administration has “deported families together.”
“If these people demand due process, they demand the right to claim asylum, they demand the right” to see a judge, “and we give [that] to them at ... taxpayer cost, at the end of that due process, if [a] federal judge [says] ‘You must go home,’ they have to go home,” Homan said. “If they don’t, then what the hell are we doing?”
