Homan advocates deportation of illegal immigrants and opposes sanctuary city policies. Within the government,he was among the most strident proponents of separating children from their parents as a means of deterring illegal entry into the country. After 2018,he began contributing to Fox News as a commentator. Despite being a polarizing figure in the Second Trump administration,Homan has worked under both Democratic and Republican presidential administrations.
He was appointed by President Barack Obama as Immigration and Customs Enforcement's executive associate director of enforcement and removal operations in 2013.[5]
By 2014 under the Obama administration,Homan had begun to argue that separating children from their caregivers would be an effective means of discouraging illegal border crossings. The journalist Caitlin Dickerson describes him as the "intellectual father" of the policy,which he outlined years before it was adopted by the Trump administration. “Most parents don’t want to be separated,”Homan told Dickerson. He argued that this fact made separation an effective tool for immigration enforcement:“I’d be lying to you if I didn’t think that would have an effect.”[6]
In 2015,President Obama gave him a Presidential Rank Award as a Distinguished Executive. A Washington Post article at the time stated,"Thomas Homan deports people. And he's really good at it."[7][8]
First Trump administration (2017–2018)
Homan in 2017
On January30,2017,President Donald Trump demoted acting ICE director Daniel Ragsdale to deputy director,a position Ragsdale already held since May 2012,and appointed Homan as acting director.[9]
In May 2017,Homan announced ICE had arrested 41,319 people between Inauguration Day and the end of April,a 38% increase from the same period the year before.[10] The following month,Homan said that illegal immigrants "should be afraid."[11] He has denied saying "aliens commit more crimes than US citizens."[12]
On November 14,2017,Trump nominated Homan for ICE Director.[13]
In February 2018,Homan said that politicians who support sanctuary city policies should be charged with crimes.[14] In April 2018,he and Kevin McAleenan formally advised Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen to implement the Trump administration's "zero tolerance" policy on immigration,including the prosecution of parents and the separation of children from their families. Homan participated in the May 2018 press conference announcing that the policy was going into effect.[6] On June5,2018,Homan appeared for a discussion with the policy director of the Center for Immigration Studies,where he defended the separation of children from their parents.[15][16]
Homan retired from his position as acting ICE director in June 2018.[17][18]
Between Trump administrations (2018–2024)
After 2018,Homan began contributing to Fox News as a commentator.[19]
In July 2019,Homan testified before the House Oversight Committee regarding the Trump administration's family separation policy.[20] He declared that a third of all women who cross the border get raped,and that turning a blind eye to the border would result in an increase of child mortality. He also recounted his experiences which motivated him to become tough on immigration,"So I get there,I’m walking around in the back of a tractor-trailer with 19 dead aliens at my feet,including a five-year-old little boy who suffocated in the back of that tractor-trailer. And I had a five year old at the time. I didn’t sleep for three days."[21]
Homan joined the Heritage Foundation in February 2022 and became a contributor to its Project 2025,which proposes mass arrests,detentions and deportations of illegal immigrants across the nation,though his name is not listed on any specific chapter or policy ideas.[23][24][25]
In November 2022,Homan launched a border-focused project called "Defend the Border and Save Lives" in collaboration with the United West,a Southern Poverty Law Center-designated anti-Muslim hate group. The project,which shares staff and an address with the United West,held a fundraising event at Mar-a-Lago that month,and has been criticized for promoting inflammatory rhetoric about immigration and Muslims.[26]
At a July 2024 National Conservatism Conference meeting,Homan said if "Trump comes back in January,I'll be on his heels coming back,and I will run the biggest deportation force this country has ever seen. They ain't seen shit yet. Wait until 2025."[27] On July17 at the 2024 Republican National Convention,Homan called Biden's immigration policies "national suicide" and told "millions of illegal aliens" to "start packing". Homan said that drug cartels would be designated as terrorist organizations and that Donald Trump would "wipe them off the face of the earth".[28][29]
President-elect Trump announced on November10, 2024, that Homan will be joining the incoming administration as the Executive associate director for Enforcement and Removal Operations ("border czar"),[30][31] writing that "Homan will be in charge of all deportation of illegal aliens back to their country of origin."[32] Trump plans on using the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 in efforts to deport illegal aliens.[33]
In February 2025, Hatewatch reported that Homan met multiple times with Proud Boys associate Terry Newsome. Two of these encounters occurred after the 2024 United States presidential election, presumably to discuss mass deportation. The Southern Poverty Law Center noted that "Homan was also a guest on Newsome’s podcast in October 2024 and was a featured speaker at an anti-immigration event Newsome hosted in Chicago in June 2024."[34]
Also in February 2025, while appearing with New York City mayor Eric Adams on the Fox News program Fox & Friends to discuss Adams' cooperation with ICE on immigration issues, Homan said "If he doesn’t come through, I’ll be back in New York City, and we won’t be sitting on the couch—I’ll be in his office, up his butt, saying, ‘Where the hell is the agreement we came to?"[35]
Again in February 2025, Homan got into a dispute with New York congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez over Ocasio-Cortez educating immigrants about their constitutional rights, which Homan claims "impedes" law enforcement. Homan said that he has asked the Department of Justice to investigate whether Ocasio-Cortez's actions are considered to impede ICE and she can potentially be prosecuted, telling Fox News host Laura Ingraham "maybe AOC’s gonna be in trouble now." In response to Homan's comment, Ocasio-Cortez left a mocking response on social media that stated "MaYbe shE’s goiNg to be in TroUble nOw. Maybe he can learn to read. The Constitution would be a good place to start."[36]
Personal life
Homan has described himself as "a lifelong Catholic,” and has been described as "a devout mass-goer," and has been critical of Pope Francis' position on immigration.[37] He is married to Elizabeth Homan.[38]
Lichtblau, Eric; Apuzzo, Matt; Landler, Mark (January 30, 2017). "Trump Fires Acting Attorney General". The New York Times. Retrieved January 31, 2017. The decision by the acting attorney general is a remarkable rebuke by a government official to a sitting president that recalls the dramatic "Saturday Night Massacre" in 1973, when President Richard M. Nixon fired his attorney general and deputy attorney general for refusing to dismiss the special prosecutor in the Watergate case. That case prompted a constitutional crisis that ended when Robert Bork, the solicitor general, acceded to Mr. Nixon's order and fired Archibald Cox, the special prosecutor.
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