Border czar Tom Homan pushed back forcefully against Florida Democratic Senate nominee Angie Nixon’s claim that Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents would racially profile Black Americans, dismissing the allegation as “ridiculous” and saying ICE does not make arrests based on race.
“We don’t arrest people based on the color of their skin. I’m actually an equal opportunity deporter. I deported people to 180 countries last year,” Homan said during an appearance on “Saturday in America.”
He added, “I don’t care if you’re from Asia, you’re from Europe or you’re from other countries. If you’re in the country illegally, you will be deported, regardless of the color of your skin.”
Nixon, who recently secured Florida’s Democratic primary victory, has made ending detention centers and abolishing ICE central parts of her platform, describing mass incarceration and mass deportation as “moral failures.”
Her campaign website also says ICE “cannot be trusted with the power it has” and calls for dismantling what she describes as the agency’s “terror tactics.”
Homan rejected those characterizations, saying, “It’s just lie, after lie, after lie, to try to vilify the men and women of ICE.”
Nixon expanded on her criticism during a recent episode of the “QNA: Questions Need Answers” podcast, where she accused Republicans of “literally trying to kill us” and again took aim at ICE.
“Like, actually state-sanctioned violence. They’ve been doing it in the Black community. And they’re doing it even more so now with ICE. ICE is now a weaponized paramilitary force that is designed to terrorize us,” she said.
Homan doubled down in defense of the federal immigration agency, maintaining that agents follow the law when conducting enforcement operations.
“That’s a ridiculous statement,” Homan said. “We don’t racially profile. Everybody we talk to, we have reasonable suspicion of aliens to talk to them and to arrest them we need probable cause. That’s what the law says. And that’s what we do.”
The border czar blamed sanctuary policies for incidents of violence that have occurred during enforcement operations, like Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, who was fatally shot in July as agents tried to arrest him in Houston.
Homan argued that the policies increase risks associated with immigration enforcement, saying they prevent agents from taking custody of illegal immigrants while they are incarcerated, forcing officers to instead conduct arrests in communities.
“What sanctuary cities do is not only… give sanctuaries to criminals, it makes the community less safe because they’re releasing public safety threats back into the public,” he said.
“It puts our officers at greater risk. It puts the alien at greater risk because anything can happen during a street arrest,” Homan added.
The Department of Homeland Security similarly rejected Nixon’s racial profiling allegations, telling Fox News Digital on Friday that her comments are “disgusting, reckless and categorically FALSE.”
DHS also said immigration status determines who is targeted for enforcement, not race or ethnicity.
