On Monday, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries spoke on “The View,” expressing concerns that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) was targeting “law-abiding immigrant families.” He also did not rule out suggestions from fellow Democrats to defund the agency.
Alyssa Farah Griffin, a co-host on “The View,” inquired whether Jeffries endorsed the idea of defunding ICE and questioned the strategy’s effectiveness for Democrats in the lead-up to the 2026 midterm elections.
Jeffries, D-NY, responded by stating, “I certainly believe that we require assertive oversight concerning the overly aggressive actions we’re observing from ICE and the Department of Homeland Security,” as he addressed the panel.
“Donald Trump and Republicans promised to go after violent felons, but instead they’re going after law-abiding immigrant families. And in fact, in some cases, deporting American citizens and children, some with cancer. And America is better than this, and that’s the reality,” Jeffries continued.
Jeffries also responded to a question from co-host Ana Navarro, who pressed him on what he would say to Latinos who feel hopeless about the Trump administration’s immigration policies.
“We are seeing sort of an unprecedented flood of extremism being unleashed on the American people, and it’s happened from the very beginning,” he said of Trump.
“But I think we can never lose hope in the resilience of the American people to face turbulence, and this is an incredibly turbulent moment, but to power our way through it and to come out stronger on the other side. It’s not to say it’s going to be easy. It will be challenging, but I still believe in the fundamental goodness of the American people,” Jeffries added.
Jeffries said it was important to secure the border, but also said Congress needed to fix the broken immigration system.
He told the co-hosts, “As House Democrats, our view is that while we work on making sure that the border can remain secure, while we work to fix our broken immigration system, we also are going to stand up for dreamers, farm workers and for law-abiding immigrant families at all times.”
