In response to the deaths of Renee Macklin Good and Alex Pretti, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., is urging his Republican counterparts to “rein in” Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
“ICE is completely and totally out of control and it needs to be reined in, which is why we need dramatic reform at the Department of Homeland Security,” Jeffries told Morning Edition.
On Wednesday, Jeffries and Senate Minority Leader Chuck E. Schumer sent a letter to their GOP counterparts, House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, urging them to reform ICE. It included a list of several guardrails for federal agents — such as prohibiting masks and requiring that immigration enforcement officers wear body cameras to hold them accountable for their interactions with the public.
It is unlikely that Johnson and Thune will agree to every demand. Many republicans say they will support some changes — like ICE agents wearing body cameras. But some GOP members draw the line at getting rid of masks. Republicans haven’t completely shut down the overall proposal, yet, but they will have a short amount of time to negotiate these terms.
Jeffries discussed Democrat’s push to reform ICE with NPR’s Steve Inskeep.
Click the play button in the blue box above to listen to the full conversation.
Transcript:
STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
One player in these negotiations is House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic leader from New York. Leader Jeffries, welcome back.
HAKEEM JEFFRIES: Good morning. Great to be with you.
INSKEEP: Do the two parties agree broadly that you should restrict ICE in some way?
JEFFRIES: Well, Democrats have certainly articulated a position on behalf of the American people that taxpayer dollars should be used to make life more affordable for everyday Americans, not brutalize or kill them. We believe that immigration enforcement should be fair. It should be just. And it should be humane. That is not what is taking place right now. ICE is completely and totally out of control, and it needs to be reined in, which is why we need dramatic reform at the Department of Homeland Security. And Republicans either are going to support those reforms, or they’ll make the decision that they want to shut down other aspects of DHS, like Coast Guard, like FEMA and like TSA, which would be very unfortunate.
INSKEEP: Yeah. Useful point, just to note, that DHS seems to have its funding in place, or rather the immigration authorities have funding in place. Other parts of DHS would be affected here. I want to ask about one of your particular demands. You want agents to take off their masks. As a citizen, I very much understand the case for this. The agent works for me. I’m their employer. I pay their salary. They’re doing my business. They should identify themselves. And when they ask for my ID, I should require them to give their ID. But Republicans respond with this fear of doxing, that agents will be targeted. Do you believe that happens to agents, and can you offer any way to deal with their concern?
JEFFRIES: We want to make sure that ICE agents are conducting themselves like every other law enforcement agency in the country. And that is something that I think is consistent with who we are as Americans. Police officers don’t wear masks. County sheriffs don’t wear masks, and state troopers don’t wear masks. In fact, there’s no evidence that FBI agents wear masks.
And so this is a unique situation in terms of how ICE is conducting themselves. And part of the challenge is that it leads to a view amongst many Americans, I think correctly, that these agents are behaving themselves with violent and brutal impunity, as opposed to being held to standards that are consistent with not using excessive force, not brutalizing people or, in some instances, not killing people in cold blood, as was the case with Renee Good and Alex Pretti.
INSKEEP: I’ll look forward to this fall’s elections because we heard Claudia Grisales there say that both parties want to own this issue. Democrats would like to own this issue of immigration, which has been a big disadvantage for them in the past. But there’s a couple of parts here. One is, don’t kill Americans, so I get that part of your message. But the thing that drew a lot of voters to President Trump on immigration in the first place was a feeling that they wanted border enforcement, a secure border. They didn’t want so many people without legal status getting in. Can Democrats in seeking to get votes this fall commit that they would take care of border security?
JEFFRIES: Yes. We want a safe, a strong and a secure border. We also want to make sure we recognize that we have a broken immigration system, and it should be fixed. But we want to fix it in a bipartisan and a comprehensive manner, not a my-way-or-the-highway approach and certainly not allowing taxpayer dollars to be used to target law-abiding immigrants, to target, violently, everyday Americans or, in some cases, to actually kill in cold blood everyday Americans, horrifying people as we watch this happen in plain sight. And so…
INSKEEP: But you would secure the border is what you’re saying. You would stand for that.
JEFFRIES: We absolutely believe that the border should be secure at all times, but that’s not what’s taking place right now. What we’re seeing is aggressive interior enforcement that’s inconsistent with the promises that Donald Trump made to the American people. He said that he was going to target violent felons. That is something that as Democrats, we support, that the American people support, targeting violent felons who are here unlawfully. But what we’re seeing is that law-abiding immigrant families – in some cases, a 5-year-old boy with a Spider-Man backpack – have been targeted. And that, of course, is completely and totally unacceptable. And we know that the American people have correctly concluded that ICE has gone way too far. Donald Trump has gone way too far. And this is not what people expected to see from this administration in this area based on their own promises to the American people.
INSKEEP: In about 20 seconds, how are you feeling about this fall’s elections for Congress?
JEFFRIES: House Democrats are going to work hard to lower the high cost of living, fix our broken health care system, combat corruption and make sure we take back control of the House of Representatives in the fall.
INSKEEP: Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, the top Democrat in the House of Representatives. Thanks, as always. Good to talk with you.
JEFFRIES: Thank you.
INSKEEP: And we’ll note that, as always, we invite congressional Republicans and the Trump administration on the air. We will hear from them on different days as they accept.
