Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin is drawing criticism from immigration hardliners as conflicting messages on deportation expose simmering divisions within President Donald Trump’s coalition, Fox News reported.
Mike Howell, a leader of the Mass Deportation Coalition and president of the Oversight Project, launched a searing rebuke of Mullin’s announcement that DHS was “not conducting worksite operations in Kansas.”
"If Mayorkas tweeted that, I would have immediately called for his impeachment: for flagrant admission that they are not enforcing the laws and faithfully executing them,” Howell told Fox News. “It was amnesty by another means.”
His pushback comes after reported instructions to some ICE offices to scale back arrests of immigrants without criminal histories were rescinded within hours. Administration officials described the instructions as a “misunderstanding” and denied any policy change, according to Fox News.
The network described the confusion as igniting a “MAGA backlash,” with immigration hardliners questioning whether the administration was taking a more scaled-down approach to enforcement than Trump promised.
“The episode nevertheless reinforced concerns among some immigration hawks who say recent public messaging from administration officials has suggested a narrower approach to interior enforcement than Trump campaigned on,” Fox News reported Tuesday.
“This type of ping-pong is deeply unfair to ICE, the men and women there tasked with actually deporting these people,” Howell said.
Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, voiced his own concern.
"The administration does need to get its story straight internally so that they can then present a consistent message externally," Krikorian said.
"You don’t tweet out that you’re not doing what voters want you to do," he added.
