The grabs and deportations may make MAGA types Happy….
But those same actions are NOT helping Republicans as the 2026 Midterm voting begins…..
Trump’s overall Immigration politics ARE Unpopular and actually hurting the Economy……
You can add political damage also….
Battleground Republicans across the country are on defense as ICE operations keep finding their way into local headlines.
A flurry of ICE activity in four rural Kansas towns this week prompted businesses to shutter and public schools to urge families to identify who could pick up children from schools in case their parents were detained. Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kansas) — a normally staunch MAGA defender who finds himself in a tougher-than-expected election — took to social media to say he was “closely following” 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.
Later, he complained that ICE’s failure to communicate with local law enforcement caused “mass disruptions to local communities and businesses.”
“We must keep our communities safe, but it has to be done in a responsible and secure manner,” he said in a statement Thursday evening.
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 — but ICE’s recent record-high arrest rate is still landing hard in some communities.
“It does cause quite a disruption in the community,” said Scott Fischer, the GOP chair in Ford County, one of the counties where ICE activity was reported this week. “We don’t want our community disrupted.”
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 addenouncing Trump’s crackdown. In Michigan, Democrats are calling for an investigation after a man crashed his car and died while fleeing ICE. In Maine, the fallout from a fatal ICE shooting of a 25-year-old from Colombia continues to loom over GOP Sen. Susan Collins’ reelection race. In Texas, last week’s nonfatal shooting of a Venezuelan in Austin is just the latest of several highly publicized ICE operations that have fueled wall-to-wall media coverage.
“There’s already been some blowback associated with what people feel is a little bit of a heavy hand when it comes to immigration enforcement,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas). “Obviously, border security is critical, but I think the administration maybe has miscalculated a little bit. … It is going to be one of the factors people are weighing in the election.”
The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that the department “is focused on delivering the most HISTORIC mass deportation campaign in American history—exactly as President Trump promised.”“The 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,” the statement continued. “We will continue to enforce our nation’s 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.”
The Trump administration’s deportation spree is not widely popular. A new POLITICO Poll finds that a plurality of U.S. adults, 49%, think the mass deportations campaign is “too aggressive,” while 26% find it “about right” and just 14% think it is “not aggressive enough.” And in an election cycle where cost of living is atop voters’ list of concerns, ICE enforcement has become an economic issue too: Immigration raids are affecting workers, from construction sites in Texas to meatpacking plants in Kansas, frustrating business leaders….
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Voters’ concern seems to be building again with the election looming.
“Obviously 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,” said Sofia Kinzinger, a former DHS deputy assistant secretary during the president’s first term, and the wife of Trump-critical former Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.). “Either you speak firmly against it, or you try to justify, which right now is the opposite of what people need….
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