Democrats seek to rein in ICE, Noem after fatal Minneapolis shooting – The Hill

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Democrats seek to rein in ICE, Noem after fatal Minneapolis shooting

by Mike Lillis and Rebecca Beitsch – 01/10/26 5:00 PM ET

The growing uproar over Wednesday’s fatal shooting by a U.S. immigration officer in Minneapolis is spreading quickly on Capitol Hill, where a chorus of Democrats in both chambers are launching a blitz of proposals to rein in President Trump’s surge of federal forces in blue regions around the country.

Democrats are pushing a wide range of responses, including efforts to suspend all Minnesota operations of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) immediately; end qualified immunity for ICE officers more broadly; and call Kristi Noem, the head of the Homeland Security Department (DHS), to testify before Congress.

Still others want to go a long step further and impeach Noem, who has characterized the victim of the shooting, 37-year-old Renee Nicole Macklin Good, as a domestic terrorist who sought to harm federal law enforcers in Minneapolis.

“The murder of Renee Macklin Good is a tragic episode in a story of harm and destruction orchestrated by Secretary Noem and ICE that must not be tolerated anywhere,” Rep. Sean Casten (D-Ill.) said Friday in a statement supporting her impeachment.

Democrats have few tools at their disposal, given their minority status in both chambers. But they’ve been encouraged by a series of recent victories on other hot-button issues — including an extension of ObamaCare subsidies and the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files — which required a buildup of public pressure to win bipartisan support. Some Democrats are ready to launch a similar full-court press in the effort to restrain ICE. 

“You’ve got to take advantage of any leverage that you have,” Rep. Danny Davis (D-Ill.) said. “People are coming up with as many creative ideas in making use [of that leverage].” 

One area where Democrats do maintain influence pertains to government spending. Congress this month is racing to adopt three appropriations packages ahead of a Jan. 30 shutdown deadline. One of those packages will include funding for the DHS, and some Democrats want to withhold their support for that bill to demand new limits on Trump’s deportation forces nationwide.

“We should not be giving money for an increase in the ICE budget,” Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) said Friday. “We should be fighting this.”

Specifically, many Democrats want to adopt new rules for federal immigration officers, including a ban on face masks and a requirement that they show warrants prior to arrests. Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) is expected to unveil legislation promoting those changes, and House Democrats are already jumping on board.

“In many ways they’ve become lawless at this point,” one House Democrat said Friday, requesting anonymity to discuss the strategy. “No search warrants. Masks. Refusing to tell people why they’re being picked up. Deporting people to places without telling their family. You can’t have that.”

Those efforts are being cheered by liberal activists off of Capitol Hill, but they’re also creating new challenges for Democratic leaders who just won a big victory on health care, with the House’s passage of the ObamaCare subsidies, and want to focus squarely on the issue of affordability heading into November’s midterms. 

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) has called the Minneapolis shooting “an abomination,” saying there is no evidence to support the official claims that the federal officer was justified in using deadly force against Macklin Good. 

“Blood is clearly on the hands of those individuals within the administration who’ve been pushing an extreme policy that has nothing to do with immigration enforcement connected to removing violent felons from this country,” Jeffries told reporters this week. 

But he has also declined to endorse any of the strongest proposals being floated from within his own caucus, including the notion of holding up DHS funding to win policy concessions. Instead, he’s said only that Democrats will discuss “a strong and forceful and appropriate legislative response” in the coming days. 

Others aren’t waiting that long. 

Rep. Dan Goldman (D-N.Y.), a member of the House Homeland Security Committee, said there have been discussions both about ways to target ICE funding but also on whether to include “riders” that could prohibit the agency from using funds for certain activities. 

“We are going to continue to press, and I think there is a pathway to accountability through the appropriations process. I believe we should use that. And I think there are lots of different ways of going about it. I’m not necessarily sure which one, but I expect that this will become an issue during the appropriations process,” Goldman told The Hill.

“There’s always the possibility of some degree of funding, but it’s also — you could put a rider in about restrictions or conditions … using funding to say that you can say no funding can be used for X, Y or Z.”

House Democrats have previously had success with similar measures. In one such rider, they barred the use of any funds to restrict lawmakers from making unannounced visits to detention centers. When the Department of Homeland Security tried to change its visitation policy, lawmakers sued and won. 

Goldman alongside Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) also introduced a bill to end qualified immunity for ICE officers.

The officer who killed Macklin Good can face prosecution. But such cases are often an uphill battle because the standard for evaluating excessive force cases largely rests on whether officers felt their lives were threatened.

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