CNN's Audie Cornish challenged a conservative panelist to justify President Donald Trump's increasingly unpopular immigration crackdown in the wake of a fatal shooting in Minneapolis.
The Department of Justice has decided not to investigate an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer's killing of 37-year-old Renee Good, while several federal prosecutors resigned rather than investigate the victim's widow, and new polling shows the public has recoiled from the violence captured on video of the enforcement actions.
"Let'sget to the legal point of this,though," Cornish said. "You're saying youdon't have to respond, solet's say you don't respond andthey say you're not cooperating.Smash, smash – now you're in analtercation you don't want tobe in, right?"
Elliott Williams, a former U.S. deputy assistant attorney general and former senior official at ICE, said there's not much a target can do legally until after an interaction with immigration agents.
"Your recourse down theroad is ultimately to file alawsuit over whether it's theviolation of your rights, theviolation of your search andseizure rights, the damage ofyour property, which could takeyears," Williams said, "and it's actually notpractical."
Cornish then turned to The Daily Wire's Rob Bluey, who she has seen defending ICE on social media.
"Let me let Rob get a word in,because sometimes I go onlineand you're out there sayingonline, like, 'This is good, I'mglad the president is goingafter these illegals,' and Idon't hear you addressing thesekinds of questions, which is ifyou're someone who's not inthis dragnet, what are yourrights?" Cornish said.
"Look, I think thatultimately, Audie, a lot of thiscould have been solved had thelocal law enforcement in Minneapolis had a better controlof the situation," Bluey replied.
"Are you going to start carrying papers, Rob?" Cornish interrupted. "Are yougoing to start carrying, like, Real ID?"
"The fact is, he doesn't have to," interjected New York Times podcaster Lulu Garcia-Navarro. "Imean, my daughter said to me inthe car yesterday, 'Hey, mom,we're Hispanic – do you have tocarry ID now? Should I carryID? Are we going to bestopped? Are you going to betaken away?' I mean, you know,this is the reality here, wheremaybe for you, you won't bestopped and you might not bedragged out of your street. Butthere are swaths of people weare seeing native Americans."
"But let him answer this,because I am genuinely curious," Cornish said. "No, I'm curious."
"But again, I think we need totake a step back," Bluey insisted. "We wouldn't bein this situation if we didn'thave, what, 10 million illegalimmigrants coming to thiscountry during Joe Biden's fouryears? Donald Trump wascrystal clear during thepresidential campaign of 2024that he was going to carry outthe largest deportation in United States history. That iswhat he is doing right now."
Cornish pointed out that Republicans would be held responsible for Trump's actions as they make their case to voters in November's midterm elections, and she added that polling shows most Americans believe ICE has made cities less safe.
"Yeah, it's definitely goingto be one of those issues," Bluey argued. "Infact, there are there's a debatewithin the Democrat Party, aswell, over whether or not theywant to go all in on ICE orwhether they should keep thefocus on affordability andhealth care and other issues."
Cornish then reminded the panel that conservatives were suspicious of the Real ID's nationwide implementation just a few years ago.
"Ijust wanted to make sure that,like, you got a chance to answerthis because it's one of thosequestions that within MAGAcircles, I remember the Real ID argument," she said. "We shouldn't haveto carry documents, like, weshouldn't have to have – do youremember covering this? It waslike a story about paperworkthat turned into a story aboutcivil liberties, and these samepeople are saying, well, maybeyou should carry something.Maybe you should prove youbelong here."
Williams then drew on his personal experience working for ICE to dispel Bluey's argument.
"The one thing I would sayis, having worked at ICE forfive years, is, yes, thepresident was not shy aboutsaying this is going to be themost massive deportation effortin history," Williams said. "The problem is thatthe agency is not equipped tohandle that, and when you end up – there's no, I mean, so, forinstance, under the Obama years,you're talking about 400,000removals a year, which wasunprecedented. A lot of people,if the president is talkingabout removing a million peoplea year, that's necessarily goingto involve, number one, hiringagents who are unfit to carryout their jobs. Number two,engaging in pretty rampantviolations of civil rights inorder to hit those kinds oftargets that the president istalking about. So, yeah, thepresident is more than welcometo ramp up or quadruple thecountry's immigrationenforcement, but we are notequipped to do so in a lawful,efficient manner."