The Trump administration is discarding its shock-and-awe publicity tactics on immigration after mass deportations were met with mass backlash.
Why it matters: The White House has become allergic to the edgy memes, embedded camera crews and cosplaying officials that dominated former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem's tenure.
- A former DHS official said "cooler heads have prevailed" in the White House and are re-calibrating the messaging, naming chief of staff Susie Wiles and her deputy James Blair as among the cooler heads.
- But other White House staffers, such as deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller, have pushed DHS into some of the confrontations that tanked public opinion, as Axios has previously reported.
- "Everything I've done, I've done at the direction of the president and Stephen," Noem told a person who relayed her remarks to Axios back in November.
Between the lines: "There was a priority on people seeing the enforcement actions," the former agency official told Axios about the aggressive tactics of 2025.
- "Some of the law enforcement actions you see, even if they're hardened criminals, it can be hard optics. They can be hard to stomach when you're seeing really physical altercations," the former official said.
- "You have the base that is demanding this action, and you need to get them out for the midterms. And if they're not seeing it, to them, it's not happening."
Flashback: Noem, dressed as an ICE agent, spent parts of last year trailing agents making arrests around the country. The Trump administration said it wanted to emphasize "the visuals."
- For about nine months, Border Patrol official Greg Bovino was plucked from the El Centro sector to lead interior enforcement in cities with often violent tactics and rabid social media promotion.
- Last May, Miller told reporters that Trump was elected in large part to "deport the illegals" and "remove the people from this country that we don't want here." Soon after, federal agents swarmed Los Angeles.
That's changed this year: Today, the administration realizes its polling numbers have plummeted on immigration enforcement and Miller has been less present in media appearances on the issue, although he's still firmly entrenched in his role.
- New DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin's first press stop (in business attire) was to promote FEMA's efforts in North Carolina.
- Bovino's social media accounts were deleted and Trump called in White House Border Czar Tom Homan to become more involved with ICE's operations.
The latest: Homan said he's actively working on plans to change ICE's social media presence, in an interview with America First Legal's podcast.
- "I think that's gonna be important because we can't lose the faith in American people," Homan said, adding it was needed to combat fake news.
What they're saying: "Nobody is changing the Administration's immigration enforcement agenda," White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said in a statement.
- "Thanks to President Trump's strong immigration enforcement policies, approximately 3 million illegals have left the United States, either through forced deportation or self-deportation, with zero illegals coming through the most secure border in U.S. History for nine straight months," Jackson said.
- "We will continue to highlight on social media enforcement actions our officers have taken against the worst of the worst," DHS spokesperson Lauren Bis said in a statement.
The big picture: The messaging and optics may be changing, but ICE deported more than 400,000 people in fiscal year 2025, and the infrastructure to carry out the mass deportation agenda is firmly in place.
- There have never been more people in immigration detention as DHS has expanded contracts with private detention companies and has plans to retrofit 11 already-purchased warehouses in to mega detention centers.
- More than 1,400 287(g) agreements have been made to utilize the workforces and jail spaces of local law enforcement and sheriffs offices.
- Thousands of new ICE agents have been hired and are working through federal law enforcement training to get on to the streets.
The bottom line: But no one expects Mullin to have a long honeymoon period, despite the current retreat.
- "The difficulty will be pushing back against Mr. Miller," a former senior official said.
- "I haven't heard yet. I will, I'm sure: When people there believe at the White House that the dust has died down—then we look, we got two and a half more years," the official said. "It won't die down."
