On Sunday's CNN State of the Union, Tom Homan gave an absolute master class in dealing with the liberal media on the issue of ICE operations.
Host Jake Tapper might have thought he'd put Homan, President Trump's border czar, on the defensive by opening the interview by citing a meme Trump posted, based on the movie Apocalypse Now, in which Trump said, "Chicago is about to find out why it's called the Department of War."
Tapper cast that as Trump "escalating his threats against the city of Chicago." It took Homan about five seconds to demolish Tapper's fear-mongering claim.
"We're going to war with the criminal cartels. We're going to war with illegal aliens. Public safety threats that rape children, rape citizens, committed armed robberies, that distribute narcotics that kill Americans."
In response, the most Tapper could muster: "So maybe it should say, criminal aliens in Chicago are about to find out why it's called the Department of War, not Chicago itself."
Weak sauce, Jake!
Homan also blew away Tapper's suggestion that there was something wrong with ICE's raid on a Hyundai plant, given that the illegals rounded up haven't committed "violent crimes."
Homan made a telling point that is too rarely heard:
" Look, no one hires an illegal alien on the goodness of their heart. They hire them because they work them harder, pay them less, and undercut the competition that hires U.S. citizen employees. They drive wages down."
There are several highly-effective communicators in the Trump administration. But for the combination of what he says, and how he says it, it's hard to top Homan—the kind of guy you'd want to go into the trenches with.
Here's the transcript.
CNN
State of the Union
9/7/25
9:23 am EDTJAKE TAPPER: President Trump is escalating his threats against the city of Chicago. Yesterday, he posted this meme that says, "I love the smell of deportations in the morning. Chicago is about to find out why it's called the Department of War," unquote. The image, based on the film Apocalypse Now with Trump as the character from the movie Lieutenant Kilgore in the movie he had just napalmed a Vietnamese village.
Joining us now to discuss is the president's border czar, Tom Homan. Mr. Homan, always good to have you. The governor of Illinois responded to President Trump's post. He wrote, quote, the President of the United States is threatening to go to war with an American city. This is not a joke. This is not normal. Donald Trump isn't a strong man. He's a scared man. Illinois won't be intimidated by a wannabe dictator, unquote.
Is President Trump planning to go to war in Chicago?
TOM HOMAN: Look, I think his words are being taken out of context. I said we're going to war. We're going to war with the criminal cartels. We're going to war with illegal aliens, public safety threats that raped children, that raped citizens, that committed armed robberies, that distribute narcotics that kill Americans. We're at war with the criminal cartels.
And Governor Pritzker protects criminal, illegal alien, public safety threats every day in that state, along with Mayor Johnson. We proved that. The first week of the administration, I went to Chicago. I started an operation there. The first day, we arrested nine sexual predators, most of them child rapists. We arrested nine members of TDA [Tren de Aragua.] Several of those TDA members had an illegal pistol with a switch on it, which makes that pistol fully automatic. We arrested two illegal aliens that had a homicide conviction. That was the first day in Chicago.
So, you know, President Trump and this administration, yeah, we're at war with the criminal cartels and those who want to murder and rape American citizens. You're damn right.
TAPPER: So, maybe it should say, criminal aliens in Chicago are about to find out why it's called the Department of War, not Chicago itself.
. . .
So, should we expect action in Chicago this week?
HOMAN: Absolutely. You can expect action in most sanctuary cities across the country. President Trump's prioritized sanctuary cities because sanctuary cities knowingly release illegal alien public safety threats to the streets every day. That's where the problem is. We don't have that problem in Florida where every sheriff and chief works for us, right, or Texas. So we've got to send additional resources to the problem areas, which are sanctuary cities.
TAPPER: Governor Pritzker says Illinois has not received any notification about any enforcement action from the White House. Will you be coordinating with them about an operation of this size in Chicago?
HOMAN: Governor Pritzker's been notified from day one. Again, I went there and started an operation right after the inauguration. ICE agents have been flooding the zone in Chicago for a while now. So he's aware of what's going on. I mean, he knows we've been there. We were there last week. We were there the week before. Now, again, we're going to send additional resources to all sanctuary cities.
But this isn't new to him. He knows we've been there, and he's failed to work with us. The mayor, Johnson, has failed to work with us. Again, to this day, a significant public safety threat gets locked into a jail in Illinois, in Chicago, Cook County Jail, one of the most target-rich environments for criminal illegal aliens. And we drop our detainers and say, hey, this guy's illegally in the United States. You have custody. And when you're done with him, call us, and we'll come and get him. Let us deal with enforcing our law. And they simply ignore it and release it into the street.
. . .
TAPPER: So there was another ICE operation, pretty sizable. ICE detained nearly 500 people in a massive raid at a Hyundai plant in Georgia. According to ICE, most of those arrested were South Korean nationals, all of them, according to ICE, living in the United States illegally.
Are we going to see more large-scale raids on businesses where so many employees are not in the country illegally [sic, legally], even if they haven't committed violent crime? And what more can you tell us about the Hyundai raid?
HOMAN: The short answer is yes. We're going to do more worksite enforcement operations because, number one, it's a crime to enter this country illegally. Number two, it's a crime to knowingly hire an illegal alien.
And these companies that hire illegal aliens, they undercut their competition as paying U.S. citizen salaries. Look, no one hires an illegal alien on the goodness of their heart. They hire them because they work them harder, pay them less, and undercut the competition that hires U.S. citizen employees. They drive wages down.
And I know this for a fact from my own personal experience of having a roof replaced. I had to call five different companies before I had a company that guaranteed me a legal workforce.
I talked to one company, just a father and son, who laid off 20 citizen employees because they couldn't win a bid. The competition were bidding a lot less for a job because they were paying their employees a lot less to work, because they're illegally in the United States.