Trump's Immigration Misfire

From the border to Delaney Hall hard-line tactics are eroding support

By: Mike Kelly
Columnist
USA Today Network

..... Donald Trump says he likes to win all the fights he gets into. That's what he wants us to believe, anyway. But when it comes to the long game - the kind of conflict that extends far beyond easy quips like "amazing" and "It's gone well" and requires patience and thoughtfulness - our president falls short.
..... Exhibit A on the global scene is Trump's on-again, off-again tussle with Iran. Another conflict, however, is far closer to home - and perhaps far more impaction on the American spirit than Iran.
..... This conflict involves immigration. And here, Trump, who had a chance to set new standards but instead resorted to his worst thuggish instincts, is losing.
..... The latest scene of failure in Trump's immigration battle is a warehouse-like building in a section of Newark [NJ] that is known mostly for potholes and truck traffic. It's called Delaney Hall - a name that might evoke the image of a setting for a college lecture. bye Delaney Hall is actually a dark blot on what America stands for. And it's not the first blot on Trump's increasingly failed war on immigration.
..... Before Delaney Hall, here was Minneapolis and the ham-handed squads of Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers in street battles in which they shot and killed two protesters. the next battlefield, if we are to believe Trump's so-called border czar, Tom Homan may be the streets of New York City. Just in time for July fourth and soccer's World Cup and the throngs of international visitors. Homan promised to dispatch more ICE officers to patrol New York's streets.
..... Why this sudden ICE attention in New York City? Homan reportedly is fed up with New York Governor Kathy Hocul's refusal to cooperate with the full extent of Trump's immigration crackdowns. translation: She smartly does not want New York City to turn into Minneapolis or Newark. But in true Trumpian fashion, ICE is heading to New York City.
..... "I just reviewed an operational plan," Homan said this week. [06/12/2026] "I'm not going to tell you exactly when it's going to happen, but it's coming.
..... Maybe the thousands of undocumented immigrants and the squad of ICE officers can declare a truce and band together to watch the July Fourth fireworks as America celebrates the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Actually, the reality will likely be far less peaceful. If ICE shows up, we should all expect a far less celebratory display of fireworks.
..... What's striking here is hat the thug-like tactics of trump's ICE police are not going unnoticed by ordinary Americans across the nation. And what was once modest support for Trump's promise to crack down on illegal immigrations has now edged toward a fiasco.

How did we get here?

..... To understand the depth of Trump's failure on immigration let's turn back the calendar to 2024.
..... Trump had embraced a full-throated anti-immigration platform. he called for mass deportation of undocumented immigrants while also drawing attention to what had evolved under the Biden administration into a full-blown crisis at the Mexican border.
..... Trump was right to focus attention on the southern border. During Biden's four-year term, the border was virtually open. What seemed like a vast smuggling industry had evolved in Latin America and had taken advantage of poor migrants, often packing them onto trains or into trucks to transport them to the U.S. border.
..... The influx had become a humanitarian crisis, wit so many desperately poor people arriving in America and with few support systems to help them. Political figures in Texas became so fed up that they bused thousands of immigrants to New York City, which, in turn, had few systems in place. New York's schools reportedly were forced to absorb 60,000 migrant children, many of who did not speak English, many of the basic skills to succeed in a classroom.
.... Another problem involved national security and the danger of criminals and terrorists slipping over what was now a border with few safety checks. Sadly, the Biden administration seemed clueless to the potential problems.
..... To his credit, Trump stopped that. But he didn't stop there. His next step was to deport immigrants. And what might have seemed like an easy policy discussion amid Trump's shallow-thinking campaign aides to deport millions of undocumented immigrants has now turned into a quagmire.
..... And America has noticed the ineptitude from the White House.
..... In July 2024, as Biden dropped out of the race for the presidency and Trump had begun to ballet the new Democratic nominee and sitting vice president Kamala Harris, a Gallup poll reported that 55% of Americans wanted to reduce immigration. It was the first time since2009 that the majority of Americans had sought to decrease immigration.
..... Fast-forward to 2026. As Trump's immigration crackdown has intensified - with scenes of cruel deportations, street fights with ICE agents and prison-like detention centers - the nation's negative views on mitigation have reversed. And the most significant evidence of this reversal can be found among Republicans. In 2024, only395 of Republicans told Gallup hat they felt immigration was beneficial to America. A year later, 64% of Republicans said they supported immigration as a positive influence on America.

American now disapprove

..... Coupling that will the consistently strident support among Democrats for immigration, it appears that America had changed. Today, [06/13/2026] most Americna say they disprove of Trump's immigration strategy.
..... But has he noticed?
..... Of course not. Trump is still trying to promote the kinds of lies and exaggerations about immigration that not only helped him win the presidency in 2016 but propelled him back to the White House in 2024 despite his record of incompetence and alleged criminal links to illegal effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
..... To be fair, Trump was right to call for deportations of criminal immigrants - and most Americans supported him on that. He was also correct in pointing out that far too many immigrants petitioning for asylum in America had become part of a deceitful game over the standards for asylum. But Trump overreached. His tendency to exaggerate for years so much of what he did as a real estate developer has now turned out of be a drag on his presidency.
..... But Trump's lack of deep thinking on immigration and his refusal to understand the nuances in immigration policy also tripped him up badly. He took the ease route of hiring thousands of poorly trained ICE officers, then dispatching them like paramilitary goons to America's streets. And Trump did all this as America was preparing to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence - a document that as written in part because of the thuggish behavior of British solders toward American colonists in 1776.

Blown chance to fix immigration

..... One of the less-discussed tragedies of trump's mishandling of immigration is the fact that he actually had a chance to reform what had become a broken system for welcoming citizens of other nations to America.
..... You don't need a doctorate in sociology to realize hat America's immigration system had become an international joke.
..... But Trump blew his chance. And now, the best he can do is to send ICE officers to a neighborhood in Newark. [NJ]
..... Soon, those ICE agents may descend on the streets of New York City.
..... Happy Fourth of July.
..... We can all thank Donald Trump for the fireworks.

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