President Donald Trump’s border czar says it’s “taking too long” for Congress to provide funding for his ongoing border operation.
Tom Homan told Semafor Monday that 100,000 migrants have already been deported from the country, but that his department has “a limited amount of funds,” which is why “we’ve got to have Congress fund this operation.”
“And to do more, we got to buy more detention beds. We need more flights. We need more officers. We need more overtime,” he said. “Bottom line is: The more money we get, the more successful we will be.”
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Ever since coming into office, Trump has made clear that one of his top priorities was immigration, signing multiple executive orders related to immigration—including declaring a national emergency at the border and ending birthright citizenship.
Though many of his orders have been legally challenged, the administration has continued its deportation efforts.
“We got a strong president, President Trump. He puts Americans first,” said Homan.
He added: “A lot of countries that weren’t taking back their people are taking back their people because of President Trump.”
And if they refused to accept deportations, Homan said the administration had a “second option” of sending them to another nation that’s “willing to accept them.”
But Homan might not see any substantial funding for a while.
In February, House Republicans brought to the floor a budget resolution using the reconciliation process, which is a tool that would allow them to bypass filibusters in the Senate.
Yet Republicans have been divided on whether or not they want a two-bill approach or Trump’s preferred option: “one, big beautiful bill.”
“I support any approach that gives us the money we need to do this operation,” Homan said. “Is it taking too long? Yes, it’s taking too long. I wish they would have passed it by now.”
The two-bill approach would prioritize securing funding for border security and defense faster, with tax cuts being dealt with at a later time in separate legislation.
Homan had been pushing for the Senate to approve border funding, seemingly siding with the two-bill approach, though he never explicitly backed either strategy.
“I’ll leave it up to the Hill to do their job. I think the American people think President Trump [has] a mandate — this immigration issue is a number one issue,” Homan said.
The one-bill approach was what Republicans ultimately went with, though the lengthy approval process is still underway.
The budget resolution still needs to be approved by both the House and the Senate, with any disputes between the two causing further delays.
The administration filed a request last week for contractors to submit proposals to provide $45 billion worth of new detention facilities and services, ranging from security guards to medical support, over the next two years.
This would increase ICE’s budget by six times, adding to the money it would already receive from the current budget plan.
Kevin Landy, a former ICE official under President Barack Obama, said that this sudden request comes because “the administration is very concerned that they don’t have enough detention capacity to accomplish their immigration enforcement needs.”
Last year, Congress gave ICE funding to detain a daily average of 41,500 people, but they have already gone above capacity with around 47,900 people being detained as of March.
Trump also slashed the Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman, which provided resources for detainees, in March. The White House’s request now puts these services in private hands.
Homan’s haphazard approach to deportations has also angered many critics. One case in particular has landed the administration in hot water recently, with authorities admitting that they mistakenly deported a Maryland man with protected status to El Salvador.
Trump administration officials have since refused to bring him back, with a federal judge calling the move “wholly lawless.”
On March 15, three planes of alleged gang members also landed in El Salvador, despite Judge James “Jeb” Boasberg ruling mid-flight that the planes had to turn around.
According to Politico, Boasberg told government attorneys Thursday that if they “really believed” that “everything you did that day was legal and would survive a court challenge, you wouldn’t have operated the way you did.”
