On CBS Mornings Plus Tuesday, co-hosts Vladimir Duthiers and Adriana Diaz, alongside immigration reporter Camilo Montoya-Galvez, finally asked themselves whether or not President Donald Trump’s immigration policy was truly as unprecedented as the media made it out to be. Unfortunately, even with all the information to the contrary clearly laid out in front of them, they came to the same tired conclusion – Trump was taking it too far.
Diaz set the scene by explaining why some might not see Trump’s policy as extreme:
The Trump administration has been clear about its goal, 1 million deportations per year. But internal figures obtained by CBS News show that at its current pace, ICE is on track to only deport around 300,000 in the president’s first year. And even though 300,000 is still high compared to recent years, it’s actually lower than some points during the Obama administration. In fact, in 2012, ICE deportations reached a record high with 419,000 removals
Diaz specifically acknowledged that President Obama’s policy was actually more intensive than even Trump’s was. But instead of allowing actual numbers to mean anything, Montoya-Galvez painted a picture to make Trump’s actions appear worse:
Make no mistake, guys, the Trump administration has given ICE, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, a broad mandate, not only to go after people who are here illegally and also have committed violent offenses, but anyone who is in this country without legal permission, including people who have lost their legal status because of criminal convictions or the Trump administration has ended their temporary programs like TPS, temporary protective status.
Of course, this broad mandate was nothing new. In fact, the Obama administration’s record-setting numbers consisted primarily of people without serious criminal charges. It seemed obvious that was the case, considering just how high the number of deportations was, but that fact, nor Obama’s numbers, never got mentioned again.
Instead, Montoya-Galvez emphasized the increased funding that ICE would be receiving from the Big, Beautiful Bill:
Well, ICE will get $45 billion just to fund its detention network. Right now, the agency is holding about 57,000 detainees in detention centers across the country, including at Alligator Alcatraz in Florida. But that money would help the agency detain more than 100,000 people at any given time.
Funny how the liberal media was just complaining about the conditions in which illegal immigrants at Alligator Alcatraz were living in. Now, when more funding was going to the expansion and construction of detention centers, they still found a way to paint it in a negative light.
The reporter and his hosts continued to relay the same old spiel; masked ICE agents, traumatizing arrests, and authoritarian abuses of power. All the while, they ignored the initial question that the facts silently answered – that Trump’s policy was far from unprecedented.
The transcript is below. Click "expand" to read.
CBS Mornings Plus
July 29, 2025
9:20 a.m. EST
ADRIANA DIAZ: We are about seven months into President Trump’s first term, and it is clear his pledge to get tough on immigration was not an empty promise. We have seen highly publicized arrests in immigrant communities, videos show unidentified officers detaining people on the street. Take a look at this. The video shows a 38-year-old Iranian father arrested while dropping his child off at their preschool in Oregon. The Department of Homeland Security alleges he overstayed his visa. His lawyer says that’s false and that he is in the country legally after marrying a U.S. citizen and filing for his green card, which he had an interview for months ago.
By the way, throughout all of this, the Trump administration has been clear about its goal, 1 million deportations per year. But internal figures obtained by CBS News show that at its current pace, ICE is on track to only deport around 300,000 in the president’s first year. And even though 300,000 is still high compared to recent years, it’s actually lower than some points during the Obama administration. In fact, in 2012, ICE deportations reached a record high with 419,000 removals.
So, are these current deportation efforts as unprecedented as they seem? Here to help break it all down is CBS News Immigration Reporter Camilo Montoya-Galvez. Camilo, you have been all over this reporting, breaking news at every turn. We have these new numbers about ICE deportations, which don’t include CPB deportations, CBP, CPB deportations —
[ON-SCREEN HEADLINE: By the Way; Are Trump’s Immigration Policies Unprecedented?]
CAMILO MONTOYA-GALVEZ: CBP.
DIAZ: Thank you — Coast Guard, et cetera. How unprecedented is this moment? And is there a mismatch between the optics and the history?
MONTOYA-GALVEZ: Well, make no mistake, guys, the Trump administration has given ICE, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, a broad mandate, not only to go after people who are here illegally and also have committed violent offenses, but anyone who is in this country without legal permission, including people who have lost their legal status because of criminal convictions or the Trump administration has ended their temporary programs like TPS, temporary protective status.
So, the categories of people that are now being targeted by immigration officials have broadened significantly. And the administration, again, is not only going after criminals, but also anyone who is here unlawfully. The agency’s tactics have also grown more aggressive as the White House has demanded a sharp increase in arrests. The White House right now is asking ICE to record as many as 3,000 daily arrests. That number is not currently being met.
The agency is conducting about 1,000 arrests on a daily basis, but that is obviously a significant number. And ICE, again, just got $75 billion to bolster enforcement efforts. It is now the highest funded law enforcement agency in the country.
VLADIMIR DUTHIERS: So, earlier this year, the Trump administration reversed a policy that protected people from being detained in what are called so-called sensitive locations, like, for example, a preschool parking lot. In this video, you see the father is dropping his child off at school. He has to explain to the child what is happening. In that particular case, the officers did allow the father to drop the child off at the daycare before he was arrested. They say that the child was unharmed, although you know, all of us know what it’s like to witness something like this.
The question for you, Camilo, is what is the administration’s stance on locations like this? And why are they going after somebody, if you believe what the lawyer is saying, that he is actually going through the proper channels to receive his residency and ultimately his citizenship, if that’s what he’s looking for?
MONTOYA-GALVEZ: Well, the Trump administration, soon after taking office earlier in the new year, discontinued in reverse two Biden administration and Obama administration memos that had prohibited ICE agents from going into those sensitive locations like schools, churches, vaccination sites, and other places where people get key services and arresting people there. Now, those facilities and those locations are fair game for ICE enforcement.
The agency, however, is still saying that they will only go into those locations to arrest somebody who potentially poses a threat to national security or public safety because they have committed a violent felony, that they are not targeting schoolchildren or churchgoers, for example. But obviously, in some of these cases, we have seen that the agency is targeting people who have no criminal record.
The agency, in this case of the man from Iran, has not alleged that that person poses a threat to public safety. They have alleged that he overstayed his visa. That would not classify him as a public safety threat. So, it is still very much unclear how the agency is actually implementing this guidance on the ground. But at a high level, they continue to say that they are targeting the worst of the worst and that they will only go into these sensitive locations to arrest public safety threats.
DIAZ: You mentioned the increased funding ICE is getting. A lot of that coming from the big, beautiful bill, big, beautiful law now. What is ICE planning to do with that money?
MONTOYA-GALVEZ: Well, ICE will get $45 billion just to fund its detention network. Right now, the agency is holding about 57,000 detainees in detention centers across the country, including at Alligator Alcatraz in Florida. But that money would help the agency detain more than 100,000 people at any given time.
Another $30 billion would fund every single stage of the deportation effort, from boots on the ground, more deportation officers, 10,000, according to the ICE director, and also more deportation planes and agreements with local jurisdictions like Florida and in Texas that are helping the administration by deputizing their law enforcement as immigration officers.
DUTHIERS: Camilo, before you go, can you clarify for us? I mean, we’ve seen videos where agents, presumably, we don’t know where they are working because they wear a number of different identifications. They say police, they say Customs and Border Patrol.
MONTOYA-GALVEZ: Or they have masks.
DUTHIERS: But most importantly, they are covered, they’re masked, they’re like this. This is —
DIAZ: You can barely even see the eyes, yeah.
DUTHIERS: — you can’t see anybody. I understand that the agency may say that they don’t want people’s lives at risk who are doing these jobs. But are we to assume that everybody who is approaching somebody who’s undocumented is a Customs and Border Patrol agent or is a member of ICE or is even ATF? I’ve seen guys wearing ATF badges. We don’t know because we don’t know, they don’t identify themselves.
MONTOYA-GALVEZ: It’s a good question. The ICE director told me that the only reason he’s allowing the agents to wear masks is because he’s concerned about them getting doxxed. But he said they should still be wearing vests that identify their agency and you are right.
Some of these ICE agents are working alongside folks from the ATF, the DEA, the IRS, the State Department Security Service and CBP Customs and Border Protection because the Trump administration has enlisted manpower from across the federal government to now carry out these arrests and deportations. But they should still be wearing insignia on their vests that identify their agencies, even if they’re wearing masks.
DIAZ: Really quickly, Camilo, there has been a shift in public opinion on this. I mean, President Trump was —
MONTOYA-GALVEZ: Yes.
DIAZ: — elected largely because of his stance on immigration and deportation. How has the public opinion changed?
MONTOYA-GALVEZ: Well, mass deportation no longer enjoys broad support among the American public. It did at one point last year and earlier this year, mainly because of the chaos and perceived illegality that many people saw at the U.S.-Mexico border under the Biden administration.
But now there is growing concern among Americans that ICE and the Trump administration is not only targeting serious criminals, but also people who have been law abiding and only have that immigration offense on their record.
DUTHIERS: Camilo Montoya-Galvez, one of the most deeply sourced reporters covering this for us. Thank you very much, as always, my friend. That was today’s By the Way.