U.S. Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ)
Photo by Rebecca Noble/Getty Images
Democratic Senator Ruben Gallego said ICE needs to be "totally torn down" and fundamentally changed, as Democrats continue to slam the agency following the latest controversies involving the agency, particularly the fatal shooting of Renee Good.
"I think ICE needs to be totally torn down," Gallego added in an interview with CNN's Jaka Tapper. "From my experience running in Arizona, in a very hard, hard state when it comes to immigration and immigration issues, people want immigration enforcement that goes after criminals, right, and focuses on criminals, and immigration enforcement that is actually focused on security, and not the goon squad that has come from Stephen Miller and Donald Trump."
The remarks com as thousands of agents have been deployed in Minneapolis, a city of 430,000. There have been several anti-ICE protests, especially following the fatal shooting of Renee Good. Mayor Jacob Frey has called on the agency to leave the city.
In this context, The Wall Street Journal noted that ICE agents are being given rewards for making arrests even if the people they take in are then released. They are under pressure to conduct apprehensions as the agency set a daily quota of 3,000 arrests across the country.
The outlet added that agents are walking and driving through the city looking for people to arrest, scenes that help explain why they are clashing more with locals than in other cities they have been deployed to.
"Unfortunately, in Minneapolis, I call this a contrast in operations, a vast, conspicuous contrast in operations," U.S. Border Patrol commander Gregory Bovino said last week. "A lot of unfriendly individuals out there, a lot of violence against ICE and Border Patrol."
And matters could escalate further, as the FBI asked agents from field offices across the country to travel to Minneapolis for temporary assignments, NBC News reported. The call is voluntary, sources told the outlet.
Moreover, some 1,500 active-duty soldiers stationed in Alaska have been placed on standby for potential deployment to the city, CBS News reported. Asked about the preparations, chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said "the Department of War is always prepared to execute the orders of the Commander-in-Chief if called upon."
President Donald Trump also threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act to allow federal troops to the city if "don't obey the law and stop the professional agitators and insurrectionists from attacking the Patriots of ICE, who are only trying to do their job." The Minneapolis Police Department said on Saturday that demonstrators of a recent protest remained peaceful in the presence of agents.
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Tags: Ruben Gallego, Democrats, ICE