From FEMA to law enforcement, mass deportations erode public safety

Law and order were the centerpiece of President Donald Trump’s 2024 campaign, with immigrants repeatedly painted as a threat to the safety of American citizens. Today’s mass deportation agenda is a direct outgrowth of that campaign rhetoric.

Yet experts say the administration’s dragnet approach to detaining and deporting immigrants is in fact eroding public safety amid rising political violence in the country.

“America needs national leaders who will work to bridge the divide, calm fears and focus on keeping all our communities safe,” said Joanna Kuebler, chief of programs at America’s Voice.

“Unfortunately, this administration is pursuing a different track, pledging retribution, stoking division, scapegoating immigrants and pursuing a mass deportation agenda, all of which are at odds with public safety.” 

Kuebler’s remarks were delivered during a September 24 virtual briefing organized by America’s Voice on the public safety impacts of the administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement tactics.

The briefing came on the heels of a shooting at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in Dallas early Wednesday that claimed the lives of one detainee, leaving two others critically injured. Authorities described the shooter, 29-year-old Joshua Jahn of North Texas, as being ideologically motivated, with the words “ANTI-ICE” painted in blue letters on ammunition found at the scene.

Jahn died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound at the scene.

Wednesday’s attack also follows the September 10 killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, part of a string of high-profile attacks in recent months targeting political figures on both the left and the right.

“Under no circumstances should we allow political violence, nor should we normalize it,” said former Capitol Officer Harry Dunn, who was present during the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. “I endured political violence in its highest form,” he said.

Referencing Trump’s remarks during Kirk’s memorial service in which the president declared, “I hate my opponents,” Dunn stressed the need for politicians to “be very careful” in how they discuss political violence.

Rafael Lemaitre is the former Director of Public Affairs at FEMA. He said the diversion of funds away from the agency and toward stepped-up immigration enforcement leaves communities at heightened risk.

“Right now FEMA is being gutted,” said Lemaitre. “Millions of dollars are being diverted from vital resiliency and mitigation efforts and towards performance politics and mass deportations.”

In July, the administration announced that it would reallocate $271 million from federal agencies, including $155 million from FEMA, to support deportation efforts. The increase, along with recent legislation, brings the current ICE budget from its previous $8 billion to more than $28 billion.

Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren called the stripping of FEMA funds a “cruel, dangerous move—especially at the height of hurricane season.”

According to Lemaitre, Hurricane Katrina in 2005 laid bare FEMA’s shortcomings in both capacity and funding. Later administrations, both Democrat and Republican, worked to shore up the agency, which “proved its mettle” in subsequent disasters.

“Today we are on track to painfully relearn the lessons of Katrina because of the Trump Administration’s hollowing out of the agency,” stressed Lemaitre, noting a 20% staffing cut, the cessation of training for first responders, and the cancellation of contracts for sheltering and logistics.

As for deportations, Lemaitre said the ongoing raids by ICE and Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) agents are eroding trust in federal agencies in some of the country’s most vulnerable communities. FEMA, he said, “needs to have trust so people listen, and lives are saved.”

Former ICE Chief of Staff Jason Houser was also scheduled to speak during Wednesday’s briefing but was unable to attend given the events earlier in the day in Dallas.

In testimony delivered before Congress in May, Houser echoed Lemaitre, saying tactics targeting immigrants regardless of whether they have prior criminal convictions “put ICE officers at greater physical risk, weaken community trust, and undermine effective enforcement.”

Data suggest that up to 70% of those in ICE detention have no criminal background.

The net effect, Houser added, is to make the job of immigration enforcement “more complex and dangerous,” increasing the likelihood of a public backlash and complicating efforts to target genuine safety threats. ICE agents become “the face of a broken system,” he said.

ACoM reached out to Houser for comment but did not hear back by the time of publication.

Concern for the safety of immigration officers has been cited by the administration as one reason for the masking of ICE agents. But according to Dunn, while threats to law enforcement are an everyday reality, public safety “overrides” the concerns of officers who are themselves public servants.

“When law enforcement feels empowered and that there are no consequences, that is a recipe for disaster,” said Dunn, adding, “We need to build trust.”