Tom Homan Plants His Flag in Minnesota and He’s Not Leaving Anytime Soon

When It’s Personal, It Shows

Tom Homan isn’t playing games in Minnesota. The White House border czar made that crystal clear Thursday morning when he told reporters he’s staying put in the Twin Cities until the job is done. Not until it’s convenient. Not until the political heat dies down. Until the problem is actually solved.

That’s the kind of commitment we need more of in Washington. It’s refreshing, honestly. Too many officials parachute into crisis zones for photo ops, deliver carefully scripted remarks, then vanish back to their offices while communities continue to suffer. Homan’s doing the opposite. He’s rolled up his sleeves and planted himself right in the middle of Minnesota’s immigration enforcement challenges.

The meeting he had Wednesday with Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison tells you everything about what serious leadership looks like when it decides to show up. Ellison agreed to notify ICE when local jails release violent illegal aliens. Think about that for a second. We’re talking about criminals who’ve already broken our immigration laws and then committed additional crimes violent ones, mind you. And somehow, we’d reached a point where local authorities weren’t even bothering to tell federal law enforcement when these folks were walking back out onto the streets.

That’s not compassion. That’s negligence dressed up in progressive talking points.

Why This Matters Beyond Minnesota

Homan spelled out the logic during his press conference, and it’s pretty straightforward. One ICE agent can arrest one dangerous individual when that person is behind bars, secure, disarmed. But release that same public safety threat into the community? Now you’ve got agents hunting through neighborhoods, knocking on doors, deploying resources that could’ve been saved with a simple phone call from the jail.

The inefficiency alone should bother everyone, regardless of where you stand politically. We’re burning tax dollars and risking officer safety because some jurisdictions decided federal immigration law doesn’t apply to them. That’s not how our system works. States don’t get to pick and choose which federal laws they’ll enforce based on the governor’s mood or the latest activist pressure campaign.

This situation in Minnesota reflects a broader truth about border security that too many people still refuse to acknowledge. The border isn’t just the physical line between countries. It’s every community where illegal aliens settle after crossing illegally. It’s every jail cell that houses someone who shouldn’t have been in the country to begin with. It’s every school, hospital, and social service stretched thin by populations that arrived outside legal channels.

The Drawdown That Actually Means Something

Homan mentioned the administration is working on a drawdown plan to eventually decrease the federal agent presence in Minnesota. That’s the right approach. You don’t occupy a state indefinitely. You fix the systemic problems, establish working relationships with local authorities, then step back and let the system function as designed.

But here’s the key: you don’t leave until those fixes are real. Not promised. Not planned. Real. Ellison’s agreement to coordinate with ICE on violent offenders is a concrete step. It’s measurable. Either he follows through or he doesn’t. There’s no wiggle room, no ambiguity for lawyers to exploit later.

You know what’s remarkable about this whole situation? How unremarkable it should be. Coordinating between federal and local law enforcement on dangerous criminals shouldn’t require the border czar flying to Minnesota and camping out there. It should be standard operating procedure. The fact that it’s newsworthy tells you how far off course we’d drifted.

What Happens Next

The real test comes in the weeks ahead. Will Minnesota’s cooperation hold when the media moves on to the next controversy? Will other sanctuary jurisdictions watch what’s happening in the Twin Cities and reconsider their own policies? Or will they double down, forcing the administration to deploy this same playbook in city after city?

Homan’s clearly betting that visible, sustained federal presence changes the calculation for local officials. It’s harder to grandstand about resisting ICE when agents are literally working cases in your backyard and the public can see the results. Every violent offender arrested. Every community made safer. Every family that doesn’t become the next victim.

That’s the story that matters. Not the political theater. Not the protests outside government buildings. The actual human beings whose lives improve when we enforce our laws consistently and fairly.

Homan’s staying in Minnesota until the problem’s gone. That’s not a threat. It’s a promise. And frankly, it’s about time someone in Washington made promises they actually intend to keep.

American Conservatives