Trump Border Czar Says ICE Made No Mistakes in Minnesota

Tom Homan, Donald Trump’s border czar, denied Monday that mistakes had been made in deadly shootings in Minnesota, and instead blamed the victims of Immigration and Customs Enforcement shootings for causing their own deaths.

Speaking to reporters outside the White House, Homan made the shocking remark while complaining that Democratic lawmakers had wrongfully withheld Department of Homeland Security funding over what they claimed were “mistakes” made during Operation Metro Surge in Minnesota. 

“They kept going to Minnesota, all the mistakes they say happened in Minnesota. I don’t think there’s a lot of—the mistakes they claimed in Minnesota, a lot of them were I don’t think mistakes,” Homan stammered. 
Homan: "All the mistakes they say happened in Minnesota -- the mistakes them claim in Minnesota, a lot of them I don't think were mistakes." pic.twitter.com/GuxODg4lsw
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 20, 2026
It seems that Homan hoped to blame the lack of body cameras in a recent shooting in Maine on Democrats. Instead, he suggested that federal immigration agents had not erred when they shot and killed Renee Good and Alex Pretti, two U.S. citizens who were protesting against ICE’s operations in Minneapolis. When a reporter pressed Homan repeatedly on his outrageous claim, the immigration chief struggled to dodge the question.

“No, I went to Minnesota and I said day one it was not a perfect operation. There were several chains of command, I had a problem with the targeting,” Homan said. 

Backed into a corner, Homan laid out why he believed these people deserved to die. 

“It comes down to one simple fact—these people failed to comply with law enforcement. Even some of the major chiefs in this country, who don’t necessarily agree with this administration, say you gotta always comply with law enforcement,” Homan said. 

“All they had to do was simply comply with law enforcement. If you don’t like what law enforcement did to you, then go to the courts. Sue. Call ACLU. Do whatever you want to do. You should always comply with law enforcement. If they did, they’d be alive today,” he added. 

Homan forgets that in the United States, failing to comply with law enforcement is not punishable by death. Federal immigration officers are similarly welcome to go to the courts and let the criminal justice system hand down decisions on fines and jail time for those who resist arrest or evade law enforcement. Instead, spurred by the Trump administration’s fanaticism, they are killing people.  

Since Trump returned to office, launching a widely unpopular mass deportation scheme, federal immigration officers have shot and killed 11 people.

Last week, an ICE agent shot and killed Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, a 26-year-old Colombian man legally in the United States, while he drove with his three-year-old daughter in Maine. The week before that, an ICE agent shot and killed longtime Houston resident and father of three Lorenzo Salgado Araujo while he was driving. Federal agents claimed that he tried to ram the officers—a claim that eyewitnesses denied and that has crumbled under the slightest scrutiny. ...