A Who’s Who of the Incoming Trump Administration: Tom Homan

This past November, Donald Trump announced Tom Homan will join his administration as “border czar,” placing Homan in charge of border enforcement as well as maritime and aviation security.

This past November, Donald Trump announced Tom Homan will join his administration as “border czar,” placing Homan in charge of border enforcement as well as maritime and aviation security. As former director of ICE during Trump’s first term, Homan has remained a staunch ally of Trump and an outspoken advocate for extremist and draconian anti-immigrant policies. 

As director of ICE, Homan oversaw the implementation of some of the Trump administration’s most devastating initiatives, including the family separation policy that tore thousands of children from their parents, mass workplace raids that terrorized immigrant communities, and the expansion of detention facilities that held record numbers of immigrants in inhumane conditions. Since being ICE Director, Homan has worked to advance his agenda through roles as a fellow at the Heritage Foundation, a contributor to Trump’s Project 2025, and as a regular fixture on Fox News, where he is one of the loudest anti-immigrant voices dominating right-wing media. With a history of implementing and defending some of the Trump administration’s most extreme and cruel immigration policies, Homan will not only double down on the cruel measures of Trump’s first term but carry out even more devastating actions in his new role as border czar. 

Snapshot of Homan’s anti-immigrant vision for the future and his longstanding extremist record, including deporting U.S. born citizens: 

  • Homan has described launching the “biggest deportation operation this country’s ever seen,” vowing that “day one – ICE officers across the country will be out on the streets” to round up immigrants nationwide and detain them in internment-style camps while awaiting deportation. 
  • Homan has discussed his plans to deport entire family units, even U.S. citizen children whose parents are undocumented, stating “families can be deported together.”
  • Homan has vowed to slash federal funding to states and municipalities that resist his mass deportation agenda, promising that the Trump administration will cut funding “hugely” to disrupt the lives of residents in those cities.
  • As one of the architects of Trump’s family separation policy that ripped thousands of children from their parents, Homan has continued to defend the program. He has promised to reinstate similar policies under a second Trump administration, vowing to create “shock and awe.”
  • Homan has committed to restarting workplace raids and deploying federal law enforcement into communities to carry out mass arrests.
  • Homan pledged to help Gov. Abbott “finish the job he started” and aims to use Texas’s anti-immigrant policies as a blueprint for national immigration policy.
  • In an interview reflecting on his role in Trump’s first-term and his agenda for his second term, including plans for family separation, Homan expressed admiration for his collaborator Stephen Miller, describing their work ripping children from parents as a “game changer.”
  • Homan embraces the Great Replacement theory and has promoted the narrative on Fox News, far-right podcasts such as those hosted by Charlie Kirk, and at conservative conferences.
  • In 2022, Homan partnered with anti-Muslim extremists to launch Defend the Border and Save Lives, a media campaign and promotional effort tied to his personal brand and book of the same name. The project is closely tied with The United West, an anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant hate group.
  • Homan has also partnered with the anti-immigrant groups Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) and the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR). In 2018, he spoke at CIS to defend the Trump administration’s family separation policy and has appeared in fundraising videos and events for FAIR, both organizations are designated as hate groups by Southern Poverty Law Center.

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