Mark Kelly hits Trump over ‘photo op’ immigration raids
Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) on Wednesday hit President Trump over what he called “photo op” immigration raids following the president’s flurry of immigration orders.
“I think an [Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)] raid, to me anyway, when you’re going into a school or in a community, you do it very publicly with cameras, you’re looking for a photo op … you’re looking to intimidate people,” Kelly said.
Kelly’s comments at the “Politico Playbook: First 100 Days: Immigration” event follow Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem joining agents working on an immigration enforcement operation in New York City on Tuesday morning. The newly confirmed DHS secretary shared a video of the operation the same day that showed law enforcement taking away a man in an undisclosed location in the city.
“Enforcement operation in NYC. Criminal alien with kidnapping, assault & burglary charges is now in custody – thanks to @ICE,” Noem said in a Tuesday morning post on the social media platform X alongside the video. “Dirtbags like this will continue to be removed from our streets.”
Kelly said Wednesday that “ICE raids into schools, scaring kids, when the plan was to go … look for criminals, I think this is … kinda flipping the script on the … on the American public.”
Trump made immigration central to his 2024 presidential bid, and members of his administration have taken concerted attempts to tout any action taken on the matter during his first few days in office.
A top Department of Justice (DOJ) official and President Trump’s “border czar” were recently in Chicago overseeing “immigration enforcement efforts,” according to officials.
On Sunday, the Drug Enforcement Agency’s Chicago division posted photos of “border czar” Tom Homan and acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove on social media. Bove and Homan, according to text that accompanied one of the photos, were at “an operational pre-briefing in Chicago on Sunday.”
“President Trump received a historic mandate from the American people to secure our border, mass deport illegal immigrants, and put American citizens first,” a spokesperson for the White House, Kush Desai, said in an email to The Hill. “He will use every lever of executive and legislative power to deliver for the American people.”
This story was updated at 5:41 p.m.
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