Now we have all the right-wing media screaming “Democrats are for opening the borders to unlimited waves of immigrants!!! We are being invaded!!! Lock your doors and grab your guns!!!” So how is this going to be any different from the lies about immigration and, more importantly, people seeking asylum that they already peddle?
“Mainstream” in what political demographic? Wouldn’t “reform ICE to end illegal corruption and thuggery” poll better than “abolish ICE”? “Abolish ICE” parallels the “abolish the police” calls from some far-left extremists, and both are losing propositions for Democrats.
ICE is beyond reform. It was always terrible, and now it’s filled with unqualified thugs.
Disband ICE, reinstate the INS (service, it’s right in the name!), let people interview for the job if they still want to patrol borders.
ICE is our brown shirts. They are carting law-abiding immigrants to concentration camps. Everyone they hired since the beginning of Trump II is a cowardly, lawless thug. That can’t be reformed.
You know, he provided a cite.
There’s no way your message has a shred of a chance in a Democratic primary. In the primary, every candidate is going to be scrambling to be the most anti-Trump, anti-MAGA, anti-fascist, anti-ICE candidate of all. And the polling is supporting and will continue to support this, as long as ICE is acting like murderous thugs.
Here’s the poll again, which you seem to have missed:
When ICE hires, they’re not hiring our best. They’re hiring thugs. They’re doing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.
Some context for this discussion:
What most people think of as ICE is one of the sub-organizations, Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO). Traditionally ERO arrests were made when taking custody from other LEO agencies. Training and procedures were built around these situations.
Prior to ERO funding increases, it was about 1/3rd of ICE; 7.5k employees. After the 2025 funding, ERO announced in January that they had hired 12k new personnel which put ERO at a little half of ICE.
But the kicker is that ERO previously only vetted and hired 200-300 people per year.
So we created a situation where:
- We instantly increased hiring 4x to 6x
- And dramatically changed their mission from controlled arrests with other LEO to uncontrolled arrests via raids and traffic stops.
There’s a massive vetting and training issue – much larger then half of ERO or even ICE. This is borne out in all of the arrest shootings and killings. It’s borne out in the lack of bodycams that were explicitly funded. And it’s borne out in the fact that the agents are emboldened to cover their faces.
Yes, “abolish ICE” has the potential to backfire among independents, but “abolish ERO” or “reform ERO” is meaningless.
The size and scope of ICE compared to LEO is much smaller; 35k vs. 850k people. I don’t think “abolish ICE” has the same potential to backfire as “defund the police”.
A purge of incompetent, undisciplined and law-evading leaders and rank and file, and agency renaming, with functions potentially removed from the Department of Justice altogether, might be something the party can sell to the electorate.
If Dems’ platform is confined to “Abolish ICE!”, it’s an open invitation to Republicans to more fervently and gleefully exploit the specter of unrestrained waves of people streaming across the border, which has been such a good election issue for them.
“Fauci and Communism!” probably aren’t enough to sway the midterms in their favor. A simplistic “Abolish ICE!” added on might be another matter.
That’s the responsibility of CBP, part of DHS and a peer to ICE.
One could make the point that voters are too stupid to differentiate, but if so the Dems may as well just throw candy from parade floats.
The critical point. Exploiting the anger at what ICE has been made into under Trump is important but far offset by the stupidity of not acknowledging that there is actual enforcement that is justified and can be done to humane professional standards.
And “Reform ICE” is weak sauce.
The actual idea is “Replace ICE” … Not angry enough maybe but the actual message.
First -
The murderers of Good and Pretti need to be brought to justice. They know who they are, but the government is protecting them. This is wrong in so many ways that I don’t need to elaborate.
Second -
ICE should be renamed.
Third -
Any current officer in ‘ICE’ must have a significant amount of training, or they are out the door.
Fourth -
Any ‘ICE’ officer that has been convicted of a felony needs to be fired.
Fifth -
All ICE officers must undergo psych test similar to what the FBI gets. ICE is nothing more than a bunch of racists with guns.
That’s a start. Or just disband the entire group of thugs. I mean really, can I walk around disguised on the streets with an AR? I suppose that’s actually legal, but come on.
We need to be very nuanced in our messaging otherwise people who pay no attention to truth will misrepresent what we are saying to deceive people who pay no attention to nuance.
Nuanced? No more time for that.
Good people have tried to reason with bullies since the dawn of time. It. Does. Not. Work.
I do not want violence for sure, but it’s time to turn our back on these morons.
In some thread someone said that Trump yells at people. To hell with that. YELL back.
Re-vetting and re-training is the wrong solution.
The core issue is that ICE ERO is now 19k employees and the mission has been expanded to traffic stops, raids, etc.
It needs to revert to it’s former size and scope.
I would think someone clever could come up with some kind of play on words like “Melt ICE” or something along those lines that’s catchy, but maybe ambiguous enough to warrant explanation instead of assumption.
“Melt ICE” is very good.
That depends. If you’re white, it’s actually legal. If you’re brown or black, then every God-fearing American with skin lighter than yours has a fundamental right to shoot you in self-defense as soon as they see you.
ICE is rotten enough that the only way to deal with it is to completely eliminate it and start over. If there are any actual good people in it, then we can give them an opportunity to prove themselves, and then re-hire them. But there’s no way to selectively fire the 99% who are bad while leaving the good 1% in place.
I agree.
But what it will do is put 22,000 armed angry bigots and racists on the streets with no income.
Lovely.
I guess the question is who is gonna be in charge? ICE or the Inserectionist?
I thought my post was sufficiently nonsensical that it would be obviously sarcastic.
But I’ve got it wrong twice in this thread, so maybe I’m being too subtle.
OK, subtlety appears to be disappearing from the world. Well it doesn’t work, ya never know now.
I think it’s because people are getting more and more angry (myself included). The fix is right there but congress won’t do it. It’s maddening.
I think people are underestimating how much of a mandate Dems will have, starting in 2027, to punish Republicans and to start remaking the federal government. This won’t be Joe Biden taking back over the country with a 50-50 senate that includes 2 independents and Joe Manchin.
This will be more comparable to post-Orban Hungary. We’re going to need to start unf***ing a dozen departments that have been purged of experts and filled with hacks and Nazis.