Border hawk Thomas Homan is getting a prize border security job in the new administration, incoming President Donald Trump said in a message via his Truth Social media network.
Homan is an experienced border officer who served as acting chief of the vital Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency in 2017 and 2018. The agency is responsible for finding, arresting, and deporting illegal migrants. Homan strongly supported Trump during the 2024 election.
However, the statement did not say Homan would be nominated to run the Department of Homeland Security or the ICE agency. If nominated and confirmed by the Senate for either job, he would have the funding, personnel, and legal authority to deport many illegal migrants.
Instead, the statement suggests he will serve as a “Border Czar,” and will play an advocacy and coordinating role within the White House staff:
[Homan] will be joining the Trump Administration, in charge of our Nation’s Borders (“The Border Czar”), including, but not limited to, the Southern Border, the Northern Border, all Maritime, and Aviation Security. I’ve known Tom for a long time, and there is nobody better at policing and controlling our Borders. Likewise, Tom Homan will be in charge of all Deportation of Illegal Aliens back to their Country of Origin.
If Homan is working within the White House he will have some political authority — not legal authority — to push Trump’s Secretary of DHS and its ICE agency to enforce the nation’s popular immigration laws. He would not need confirmation by the Senate.
Trump has repeatedly promised a massive deportation effort after the inflow of roughly 9 million illegal migrants during President Joe Biden’s tenure.
Trump’s deportation push will likely first target the roughly 1.3 million illegals who have exhausted their legal appeals to stay in the country.
Next, his deputies will try to deport many of the migrants who have been convicted of committing major crimes.
“1.3 million migrants have already had their asylum case adjudicated, been in front of a judge, and the judge says, you do not qualify under the law,” Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), told CNN on November 10 “We’re the party of the rule of law … Their case has been had. They’re supposed to be removed.”
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Trump’s officials are also expected to deport many of the illegals who are jailed by state officials for various major and minor crimes, as well as migrants unlucky enough to be caught in the company of other lawbreakers.
The deportation push will be loudly resisted by business-backed pro-migration groups and by pro-migrant reporters in the establishment media.
Trump has not announced who he will be hired to run the sprawling DHS agency. If confirmed by the Senate, that person will have a large role in picking the new ICE chief.
The DHS agency is far broader than border control.
It also controls the inflow of visa workers, the award of green cards and citizenship,anti-terrorism work, airline security, the U.S. Secret Service, disaster aid and FEMA spending, cooperation with many foreign countries, drug smuggling, national cybersecurity, and much else. That task is far wider than Homan’s vital experience in border management.
In 2018, Trump inadvertently chose an establishment careerist — Marine Corp. General John Kelly — to run the agency. He then replaced him with another careerist, Kirstjen Nielsen, and then Chad Wolf, a former lobbyist for the Indian companies that use H-1B workers to replace American professionals.
Trump only gained control of the border when he intervened in 2019 and threatened Mexico with massive tariffs.
His top immigration aide, Steven Miller, played a valuable role in the White House by cajoling and threatening agency officials to rewrite and update regulations, including a regulation barring poor migrants from getting green cards.
But the failure of Trump’s DHS officials to aggressively push a reform agenda allowed President Joe Biden’s pro-migration deputies to reverse many of Miller’s gains.
In 2024, however, Trump may be more careful to dodge reliance on the many establishment careerists who have deep personal and economic ties to pro-migration groups and companies.
