Battleground Republicans across the country are on defense as ICE operations keep finding their way into local headlines.<\/p>\n

A flurry of ICE activity in four rural Kansas towns this week prompted businesses to shutter<\/u><\/a> and public schools to urge families to identify who could pick up children from schools<\/u><\/a> in case their parents were detained. Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kansas) \u2014 a normally staunch MAGA defender who finds himself in a tougher-than-expected election \u2014 took to social media<\/u><\/a> to say he was \u201cclosely following\u201d the situation, signaled his displeasure that ICE wasn’t working more closely with local law enforcement, and said he had phoned Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin.<\/p>\n

Later, he complained that ICE\u2019s failure to communicate with local law enforcement caused \u201cmass disruptions to local communities and businesses.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe must keep our communities safe, but it has to be done in a responsible and secure manner,\u201d he said in a statement<\/u><\/a> Thursday evening.<\/p>\n

Mullin took over DHS in March with a mandate to keep immigration enforcement out of the news following a public outcry over the killing of two Americans by immigration agents during enforcement operations in Minneapolis. No subsequent incidents have generated the same type of national attention \u2014 but ICE\u2019s recent record-high arrest rate<\/u><\/a> is still landing hard in some communities.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt does cause quite a disruption in the community,\u201d said Scott Fischer, the GOP chair in Ford County, one of the counties where ICE activity was reported this week. \u201cWe don’t want our community disrupted.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Florida, local officials are warning about the impact of ICE raids on businesses, and a Republican incumbent is on air with a Spanish-language ad<\/u><\/a> denouncing Trump\u2019s crackdown. In Michigan, Democrats are calling for an investigation<\/u><\/a> after a man crashed his car and died while fleeing ICE. In Maine, the fallout from a fatal ICE shooting<\/u><\/a> of a 25-year-old from Colombia continues to loom over GOP Sen. Susan Collins\u2019 reelection race. In Texas, last week\u2019s nonfatal shooting of a Venezuelan in Austin<\/u><\/a> is just the latest of several highly publicized ICE operations that have fueled wall-to-wall media coverage.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere’s already been some blowback associated with what people feel is a little bit of a heavy hand when it comes to immigration enforcement,\u201d said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas). \u201cObviously, border security is critical, but I think the administration maybe has miscalculated a little bit. \u2026 It is going to be one of the factors people are weighing in the election.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that the department \u201cis focused on delivering the most HISTORIC mass deportation campaign in American history\u2014exactly as President Trump promised.\u201d\u201cThe men and women of ICE are enforcing the laws passed by Congress. We do not pick and choose which laws to enforce or where to enforce them,\u201d the statement continued. \u201cWe will continue to enforce our nation\u2019s laws and remove illegal aliens from American communities. Under President Trump and Secretary Mullin, if you break the law, you will face the consequences. Illegal aliens are not welcome in the U.S.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Trump administration\u2019s deportation spree is not widely popular. A new Blue Light News Poll<\/u><\/a> finds that a plurality of U.S. adults, 49%, think the mass deportations campaign is \u201ctoo aggressive,” while 26% find it \u201cabout right\u201d and just 14% think it is \u201cnot aggressive enough.\u201d And in an election cycle where cost of living is atop voters\u2019 list of concerns, ICE enforcement has become an economic issue too: Immigration raids are affecting workers, from construction sites<\/u><\/a> in Texas to meatpacking plants in Kansas, frustrating business leaders.<\/p>\n

In Kansas, where Democrats aim to win a U.S. Senate seat for the first time in nearly a century, ICE\u2019s activity this week has provided another political opening.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not how Washington should be treating Kansans,\u201d Adam Hamilton, the Democratic nominee for Senate, said on social media<\/u><\/a> Wednesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt impacts these operations economically,\u201d said Matt Teagarden, CEO of the Kansas Livestock Association, whose organization released a joint statement Thursday<\/u><\/a> noting the \u201cmassive chilling effect\u201d of ICE enforcement on \u201cthe legal, documented, skilled workers that put beef on the table and keep the cattle supply chain moving.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe’re all for getting the bad actors out of our communities,\u201d Teagarden said. \u201cThe method by which they do that has an impact. We\u2019ve seen it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mullin said in a statement Friday<\/u><\/a> that \u201cICE is not conducting worksite operations in Kansas\u201d but \u201coperations targeting heinous criminals including murderers, rapists, and drug traffickers and illegal aliens with final orders of removal.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some of Marshall\u2019s allies downplayed the possibility that the immigration activity could have political ramifications.<\/p>\n

\u201cSenator Marshall has nothing to do with when ICE decides to do a surge, and I think most people understand that,\u201d said Danedri Herbert, chair of the Kansas Republican Party.<\/p>\n

But others winced at the way ICE conducted itself, even those who say enforcement is necessary to remove criminals.<\/p>\n

\u201cI’d sure ask that we go back to some of the concepts of working with local law enforcement who actually know the area better, and I think that might have improved things tremendously,\u201d said Kansas State Rep. Jim Minnix, a Republican who represents Scott County, where some of the ICE activity occurred.<\/p>\n

Texas has become the epicenter of ICE activity: One in five ICE arrests<\/u><\/a> nationwide this year has occurred in the Lone Star State. Sunday\u2019s Austin shooting came on the heels of a fatal ICE shooting<\/u><\/a> in July. In South Texas, local news is consumed with a story of two teenagers who were stopped by ICE agents en route to a military recruiter\u2019s office, one of whom was beaten on the side of the road<\/u><\/a>. After17-year-old Luis Ochoa spoke out to say he was<\/u><\/a> pepper sprayed and detained, his mother was quickly deported<\/u><\/a>.<\/p>\n

Bobby Pulido, the Democrat running in Texas\u2019 15th District, said his campaign has received more than 80 requests from South Texans asking for immigration help. The campaign passes those requests to pro bono attorneys, he said.<\/p>\n

“Every single day we’re having people reach out. And it’s very frustrating, because we can’t help everybody,\u201d Pulido said. \u201cI\u2019m not a congressman.\u201d<\/p>\n

His opponent, GOP Rep. Monica De La Cruz, has attempted to separate herself from the administration\u2019s immigration crackdown: She hit the airwaves with an ad this month<\/u><\/a> featuring a woman touting De La Cruz\u2019s work getting her husband, who had legal status, released from immigration custody.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have been very direct with the White House, with leadership, that enforcement policy should be focused on the criminals and on the cartels that are terrorizing our communities,\u201d De La Cruz said during an appearance on a conservative radio show Thursday<\/u><\/a>. \u201cThey should not be on hardworking immigrants that are navigating the immigration process.”<\/p>\n

Maine Democrat Troy Jackson has made Duran Guerrero’s death a key focus of his Senate campaign, hosting a town hall<\/u><\/a> in the city where he was killed earlier this month and frequently criticizing<\/u><\/a> Collins for voting to fund the Homeland Security Department. In response, Collins has emphasized<\/u><\/a> she supports guardrails for ICE officers like body cameras and deescalation training.<\/p>\n

In South Florida, public pressure is growing this week<\/u><\/a> against policing partnerships with ICE as businesses report a dropoff in sales<\/u><\/a>. GOP Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar released an ad<\/u><\/a> \u2014 in both English and Spanish \u2014 that criticized the Trump administration for going \u201ctoo far\u201d on immigration. In the ad, she claims that half of the people detained in July \u201chad no criminal record\u201d and says Hispanics who backed Trump in 2024 feel \u201cbetrayed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Liliam L\u00f3pez, president of the South Florida Hispanic Chamber of Commerce and the U.S. Hispanic Women\u2019s Chamber of Commerce, said that her communities \u201care really, really hurting\u201d from the ICE crackdown.<\/p>\n

“All elected officials of the Republican Party that think that their constituents are being affected in an adverse manner should speak up, like Congresswoman Salazar did,\u201d she said. \u201cYou can’t do what this administration is doing because it doesn’t work. It just doesn’t work.”<\/p>\n

The concerns from vulnerable Republicans come as Mullin seeks to balance pressure from immigration hardliners with public backlash. When he took over the department in the spring, the administration moved to make its arrests of unauthorized immigrants more discreet,<\/u><\/a> but the dip in visible deportation operations \u2014 coupled with messaging missteps wherein Mullin seemed to indicate an openness to some legal pathways for would-be immigrants \u2014 prompted considerable pushback<\/u><\/a> from some of the loudest anti-immigration voices in Trump\u2019s coalition.<\/p>\n

DHS then recalibrated its messaging to highlight increased deportations and project continued operational toughness, in an effort to shore up support from that section of the president\u2019s base.<\/p>\n

The reported lack of body camera footage in the Austin shooting in particular has frustrated even some of Mullin\u2019s defenders, given consistent pledges from DHS that the technology would be deployed and operational by the end of September.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf the public report is accurate, that\u2019s unacceptable,\u201d Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said. \u201cMarkwayne needs to pull these folks in and say, every piece of equipment you have, whether it\u2019s a camera, a handgun or a mace canister, you show up to work with it every day or you\u2019re failing to do your job.\u201d<\/p>\n

Voters\u2019 concern seems to be building again with the election looming.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously for Hispanics, but I think just all voters in general right now, their main issue is overreach. They feel that there’s been abuse of power from everywhere,\u201d said Sofia Kinzinger, a former DHS deputy assistant secretary during the president\u2019s first term, and the wife of Trump-critical former Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.). \u201cEither you speak firmly against it, or you try to justify, which right now is the opposite of what people need.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jessica Piper contributed reporting.<\/i><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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