So...the ICE situation is MASSIVELY out of hand. And there's calls on the left to "abolish ICE." The argument is that ICE was only established in 2003, and not it's basically Trump's little private army of proud boy types who are basically patrolling our streets "looking for immigrants", but hassling and even killing American citizens, and basically acting like he modern Gestapo.
The debate on the matter is a bit disheartening on the left. The democrats in congress just basically approved ICE's funding and are proposing the most mild of mild compromises like "wear body cameras", while leftists are calling for full abolishment of the agency. And like on many things liberal vs leftist, my views are somewhat in between.
ICE was founded in 2003 as part of Bush's national security consolidations. It absorbed several previous agencies, and while it has multiple functions, its biggest domestic one is finding and deporting illegal immigrants. It's always been controversial among LEFTISTS, ie, the types who dont believe we should ever deport illegal immigrants, but it has been used both by republican and democratic administrations to fulfill this role.
With that said, in principle, do I support abolishing the agency? Not really. I believe it depends on who uses it and how it's used. Trump massively beefed it up, expanded it, and weaponized it in the way he's done during this administration. However, given proper constraints, it's been effective, while not being particularly harmful to citizens. The problem clearly comes from Trump's iteration of it, which acts more like a lawless secret police.
With that said, thinking about it, do I support abolishing ICE? I mean, let me put it this way, when you get cancer, you do everything you can to get rid of it. The Trump's second term is basically fascism as a metastasized cancer. ICE has been corrupted, possibly beyond the point of no return. As he attempts his authoritarian takeover, he's radically shifted the culture of ICE to basically act as his private army of brown shirt types. The people they're hiring for ICE are untrained, unqualified, and probably have deeply fascistic beliefs themselves. They literally signed up in order to beat of on immigrants IMO.
We like to talk about police having culture problems in recent years. We did this with defund the police. We talked about how "all cops are b#######s" because of their own cultural problems, where they cover up for each other, and they hire people who fit a certain profile. But now these ICE guys are so bad now liberals and even some leftists are wanting normal police back now. To be fair libs were never truly anti police, that's a far left "leftist" stance, and one that I don't fully embrace (although I kinda see the point of), but honestly, after this administration, I think ICE might be too far gone to salvage. The cultural problems will be too rampant, and the people there too toxic. Because let's be honest, Trump massively expanded them, militarized them, and the people in ICE are...mostly not good people at this point. They're white nationalist yeehaws who wanna beat up on brown people and even libs. And before anyone thinks this is some massive gaffe, uh...just look at comments online, they're like "YOU"RE NEXT LIB!" and crap like that, and even ICE officers themselves are basically talking like they're chomping at the bit to kill liberals and protesters and blah blah blah. So yeah, these guys have a culture problem, it's fascism, which as far as I'm concerned is like a metastasized cancer on this administration, and with the next one, it needs to be excised. Trump's long term success relies in part on consolidating agencies under control of the executive branch under him. Right now, our best defense is good people in say, the US military who have a standard of ethics where they'd refuse unlawful orders. But...it also works the other way. Because if ICE are Donald Trump's brownshirts, and they are, well, yeah. The best way to solve that problem is to nuke it from orbit.
ya know, when I started this article, I really thought I was gonna conclude something like "yeah ICE need a massive restructuring but idk about abolishment", but I think I did talk myself into abolishment here. The issues with its current iteration are too severe.
However, I do want to make one thing clear. I'm not entirely anti law enforcement, or anti cop, or even anti immigration enforcement. My own ideas are more aligned with moderate democrats like Obama and Biden, who deported millions of illegal immigrants, but who did so relatively lawfully. I'm not AGAINST enforcing immigration laws, and I believe the next administration that comes in from the democrats should still maintain some level of law enforcement regarding immigration. But they should focus on criminals, they should focus on new arrivals at the border, and they should always follow the law and the constitution and proper procedures.
My call to abolish ICE is, again, due to what Trump has done to the agency in his second term, and the lingering cultural issues with the agency that likely will persist long after he's gone. Just as Trump came in and tried to purge the executive branch of everyone not loyal to him, the next democratic administration must do the same. We must purge the executive branch and all of its agencies of Trump loyalists. We need to reform the federal bureaucracy back to its pre Trumpian state. We must hire civil servants who care about serving the public and the rule of law and the constitution. We're gonna need to do some heavy chemotherapy on the executive branch in the post Trump branch to minimize his legacy as much as possible. And if that means destroying entire agencies and replacing them with new ones with new people to fulfill several functions, so be it. If it means purging the administration of everyone who wasn't there before January 20th 2025, then so be it. We gotta rescue our country from this attempted fascist takeover, and if that means mass firing anyone associated with this administration, then SO FRICKING BE IT!
And yeah. That's my stance on that.
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