Category: Border czar
Another top Trump official is on the way out
Markwayne Mullin, who took over as secretary of the Department of Homeland Security following Kristi Noem’s ouster in March, announced Thursday that there is going to be another senior personnel change at his agency.
Todd Lyons will leave the role of acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, effective May 31.
‘A phenomenal patriot and dedicated leader.’
“Director Lyons has been a great leader of ICE and key player in helping the Trump administration remove murderers, rapists, pedophiles, terrorists, and gang members from American communities,” said Mullin. “He jumpstarted an agency that had not been allowed to do its job for four years.”
“We wish him luck on his next opportunity in the private sector,” added Mullin.
Lyons is a veteran ICE official who has served with the agency since 2007.
Around the time he entered the role of acting director in March 2025 — following the demotion of his predecessor, Caleb Vitello — Noem characterized Lyons as a work horse who, with border czar Tom Homan, had done “incredible work cleaning up our communities and making them safer.”
Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call Inc/Getty Images
In the months since, Lyons has been on the receiving end of relentless abuse by anti-ICE activists such as New Jersey Rep. LaMonica McIver (D), who subjected him to a 3.5-minute rant during a congressional hearing in February. After questioning Lyons’ religiosity, McIver asked him, “How do you think Judgment Day will work for you with so much blood on your hands?”
The radical Democrat who allegedly assaulted ICE officers last year, asked further, “Do you think you’re going to hell, Mr. Lyons?”
When disgraced ex-California Rep. Eric Swalwell (D) demanded Lyons’ resignation in February, he refused, later stating, “I will not resign, because I believe in the rule of law and will continue to uphold my oath.”
A pair of unnamed U.S. officials told CBS News that Lyons was planning to leave the federal government to spend more time with family, including his sons, in Massachusetts.
Prioritizing family was also DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin’s apparent reason for resigning earlier this year.
White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller said in a statement that Lyons is “a phenomenal patriot and dedicated leader who has been at the center of President Trump’s historic efforts to secure our homeland and reverse the Democrats’ sinister border invasion.”
Homan said in a statement obtained by CNN, “I commend him for a distinguished law enforcement career and the countless contributions he has made to protect our country and advance its interests.”
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‘Grow a backbone’: Border czar Homan fires back at heckler who interrupted TPUSA event
Border czar Tom Homan fired back at a heckler during a Turning Point USA conference at the University of Texas at El Paso on Thursday.
During the event, Homan spoke and answered questions from the audience, which numbered roughly 500.
‘I don’t want anybody hurt. I don’t want anybody to die — that includes officers and that includes aliens.’
He compared the border security under the Trump administration to that of the previous White House, describing the difference between them as “night and day.”
“There was 12,000 a day sometimes crossing the border illegally,” Homan said, referring to illegal crossings under the Biden administration. “You know what it was yesterday — 106 across 2,000 miles of border. And those 106, not a single one of those were released into the United States.”
The audience erupted in applause.
Homan debunked the legacy media’s narrative claiming that Immigration and Customs Enforcement is disproportionately arresting non-criminals. He stated that the most recent stats indicated that 64% of immigration arrests were of criminals.
RELATED: ‘He’s not that smart’: Homan lampoons Chicago mayor for pleading with UN to intervene against ICE
Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
He slammed the media and immigration enforcement critics for labeling him the architect of “family separations.”
“It wasn’t done to punish. It was done in an attempt to save lives and stop sexual assaults, and maybe control the border,” Homan said.
“You are a racist!” a heckler shouted. “You are destroying the Constitution!”
The audience responded with boos and drowned out the heckler’s rant by chanting, “USA!”
Homan continued his speech unfazed by the disturbance, explaining that the Biden administration lost track of over 300,000 unaccompanied alien children and had not attempted to locate them. He reported that the Trump administration had already located 40,000 of those children.
RELATED: DHS to increase operations in Twin Cities region as Somali fraud becomes unignorable
Photo by BRYAN R. SMITH/AFP via Getty Images
“Every night [when] I go to bed, I pray for the safety and security of every Border Patrol agent, ICE agent, and I pray for everybody that we’re looking for,” Homan said. “I don’t want anybody hurt. I don’t want anybody to die — that includes officers and that includes aliens. … Call me what you want.”
“Traitor!” a heckler shouted back.
Homan replied by telling the heckler to “grow a backbone, put a Kevlar vest and a gun on your hip, and go secure this border!”
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DHS to increase operations in Twin Cities region as Somali fraud becomes unignorable
As deportation operations continue to clean up sanctuary cities across the country, the Department of Homeland Security is focusing on another hub of problematic immigration: the Minneapolis-St. Paul region of Minnesota.
The Washington Examiner reported that Tom Homan, the Trump administration’s border czar, hinted at an immigration enforcement surge there as soon as this week.
‘Focus is on those Twin Cities more because of the criminal activities there that’ve been uncovered by DOJ and DHS.’
In a Fox News appearance on Tuesday, Homan suggested that plans were already in the works to increase resources in the Twin Cities in particular.
“I can tell you, the focus is there. It’s coming, but I don’t want to give a lot. I can’t tell you how many people are on the ground now, and how many people are going to be on the ground. I’ll leave that to the secretary of homeland security, but focus is on those Twin Cities more because of the criminal activities there that’ve been uncovered by DOJ and DHS,” Homan said in the interview.
RELATED: It’s not ‘racist’ to notice Somali fraud
Photo by Stephen Maturen/Getty Images
Citing an anonymous source familiar with the operations, the New York Times reported that the operation will target Somalis with final deportation orders in the Minneapolis-St. Paul region.
Roughly 100 ICE agents have been called in for the operation, according to NYT.
This surge in law enforcement comes as the federal government expands its investigations into massive COVID-era fraud schemes. Over 75 indictments have already been issued, and Governor Tim Walz has been accused of obstruction in the case.
“Today, I have ordered an investigation into the network of Somali organizations and executives implicated in these schemes,” Small Business Administration administrator Kelly Loeffler said on Tuesday in an X post. “Despite Governor Walz’s best efforts to obstruct, SBA continues to work to expose abuse and hold perpetrators accountable, full stop.”
In his now-infamous Thanksgiving Truth Social post, President Donald Trump highlighted the plethora of problems the state of Minnesota is facing in connection with the Somali community.
“Hundreds of thousands of refugees from Somalia are completely taking over the once great State of Minnesota. Somalian gangs are roving the streets looking for ‘prey’ as our wonderful people stay locked in their apartments and houses hoping against hope that they will be left alone,” he said.
Trump singled out Walz and Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar:
The seriously retarded Governor of Minnesota, Tim Walz, does nothing, either through fear, incompetence, or both, while the worst ‘Congressman/woman’ in our Country, Ilhan Omar, always wrapped in her swaddling hijab, and who probably came into the U.S.A. illegally in that you are not allowed to marry your brother, does nothing but hatefully complain about our Country, its Constitution, and how “badly” she is treated.
DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin stated, “What makes someone a target of ICE is not their race or ethnicity, but the fact that they are in the country illegally.”
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