House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries went on CNN’s “State of the Union” Sunday morning and delivered what can only be described as dangerous fearmongering about ICE agents at airports — suggesting they might literally kill American travelers. No, really.
When host Dana Bash asked Jeffries to respond to Border Czar Tom Homan’s announcement that ICE would deploy agents to airports as part of the ongoing DHS funding standoff starting Monday, Jeffries didn’t hold back — or bother with anything resembling restraint.
“The last thing that the American people need are for untrained ICE agents to be deployed at airports all across the country, potentially to brutalize or, in some instances, kill them,” Jeffries said.
Kill them. He said that. On national television. He said that about deploying federal law enforcement officers to handle security at American airports, when the only reason that this is even happening is that Democrats refuse to fund the Department of Homeland Security.
“We have already seen how ICE conducts itself,” he continued. “These are untrained individuals when it comes to doing the current job that they have, for the most part, let alone deploying them in close exposure in highly sensitive situations at airports across the country.”
That, of course, is a lie. The agents enforcing immigration law are well-trained, and Jeffries’ claim has been debunked many times over. Of course, Jeffries doesn’t even believe his own rhetoric because if he did, Democrats would fund DHS, but they won’t.
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Bash asked him about the reality of the situation — Homan has a plan that’s moving forward, so what’s the actual deal here? Jeffries predictably pivoted to blaming Republicans for the mess his party actually created, accusing them of choosing to “force TSA agents to work without pay, inconvenience millions of Americans all across the country, and now potentially expose them to untrained ICE agents and create chaos at airports throughout the land, rather than get ICE agents under control.”
Republicans have voted to fund the Department of Homeland Security; Democrats have not. This isn’t complicated.
Then came an interesting moment. Jeffries signaled openness to funding TSA separately, which, as Bash immediately pointed out, would essentially surrender Democrats’ biggest point of leverage. If TSA gets funded on its own, ICE keeps its money either way, and Democrats walk away with nothing to show for a shutdown they helped engineer.
Jeffries, of course, brushed the leverage framing aside entirely. “We never approach these things that are in front of us with respect to government funding in the context of leverage,” he said, which is a remarkable claim given that Democrats have spent weeks refusing to fund DHS specifically over ICE enforcement policies.
And then of course, he doubled down on his ICE agents are going to kill people in airports fantasy, saying, “taxpayer dollars should be used to make life more affordable for the American people, not brutalize or kill them or violently target law-abiding immigrant families, which is what we know ICE agents have been doing.”
Last I checked, people don’t run over agents with their vehicles in an airport. People also tend not to attack security while carrying a loaded gun in an airport.
OUTRAGEOUS
Hakeem Jeffries Claims ICE Agents Will Kill Americans Traveling at Airports
“The last thing that the American people need are for untrained ICE agents to be deployed at airports all across the country, potentially to brutalize or, in some instances, kill them.” https://t.co/Um7zMZYt3H pic.twitter.com/jMLHgu7QXL
— Mr Producer (@RichSementa) March 22, 2026
This entire charade feels no different than every other Democrat shutdown. They literally refuse to fund the government, blame Republicans, and expect the public not to notice which party is voting against the funding.
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