Tom Homan, White House border czar, speaks to members of the media outside the White House on Tuesday, June 9, 2026, in Washington, DC, US.
Daniel Heuer | Bloomberg | getty images
white House Border czar Tom Homan blamed New York Gov. Kathy Hochul for the surge she promised on Tuesday Immigration and Customs Enforcement New York City officials.
But Homan did not say when he expected to see an increase in the number of ICE agents when asked by reporters at the White House.
“You can expect more ICE agents to go to New York because Governor (Kathy) Hochul “Signed legislation that ended our … agreements that allowed the agency to delegate state and local law enforcement officers to perform immigration enforcement functions under ICE oversight,” he said.
Agreement under ICE 287(g) The program was used to identify and process removable immigrants who were in jail after being arrested by local authorities on unrelated charges.
“We’re going to increase resources in New York,” he said. we have to.”
But Homan said separately on Chris Cuomo’s SiriusXM show that the surge of ICE agents in New York would not use the same tactics as a previous surge of thousands of immigration agents in Minnesota, where two U.S. citizens were killed by federal agents in separate incidents in January amid tense clashes between residents and federal agents.
“You won’t see Minnesota. I won’t let Minnesota happen,” Homan said on that show Tuesday.
In late May, Hochul signed a law that prohibits local governments, state and local police, and state and local correctional facilities from “entering into 287(g) agreements or similar agreements with the federal government that allow state and local law enforcement personnel and facilities to be used for civilian immigration enforcement purposes,” the governor’s office said in a press release.
Homan said at the White House on Tuesday that the increase in the number of ICE agents in New York is necessary because “they have taken away the capabilities of the prisons in the 287(g) agreements, so it’s just math.”
“An agent can arrest a bad guy in the safety of a prison, which is safe for the aliens, safe for the agent, safe for the community,” Homan said.
“But (Hochul) has decided to end all this, so now we have to send more agents for this work,” he said.
“Governor Hochul may say she supports removing criminal aliens, she wants to work with ICE on criminal aliens,” Homan said.
“But he locked us out of jail. He ended the 287(G) grant. You can’t encash it,” he said. “This is ridiculous. She’s lying to people in New York state.”
Hochul’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Homan’s comments.
Homan told Cuomo on Tuesday that when ICE agents move into New York, “It’s going to be a controlled operation … It’s going to be a targeted enforcement operation.”
“Every day we leave the office, and we know exactly who we’re looking for, the more likely we are to find them, because we have a targeted operation.”
In an apparent reference to tactics seen in Minnesota under other Trump administration officials, Homan told Cuomo, “It’s not going to go around looking for people we don’t know who we’re looking for.” “This will be a well-planned, targeted operation.”
The Trump administration has drawn sharp criticism for its aggressive immigration enforcement actions in Minnesota, which sparked demonstrations and confrontations that ended with the deaths of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretty in Minneapolis.
President Donald Trump sent Homan to Minnesota in late January, seen as part of an effort to de-escalate tensions in the state, and as White House press secretary Carolyn Leavitt said, Trump “does not want any American to lose their life on the streets of America.”
