Vance: Admin Wants To Avoid ‘Chaotic’ Immigration Enforcement, But Sanctuary Cities Stand In The Way

Vice President JD Vance said on Tuesday that the Trump administration does not want “chaotic” immigration enforcement, but added that federal officials will not stand by when sanctuary cities refuse to cooperate.

During an interview with Fox News host Martha MacCallum, Vance discussed the tactics of U.S. Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement and acknowledged that “none of us like” the videos of altercations between federal agents and agitators, such as the shooting deaths of Minneapolis residents Renee Good and Alex Pretti.

“We don’t want immigration enforcement to be chaotic,” Vance said. “In 99% of cases, you have a federal law enforcement officer, they show up at a jail or they show up somewhere else, they identify a person who needs to be deported, and they get them out of our country… Where you have that chaos in Minneapolis or Los Angeles, it’s because the local authorities are so committed to an open border that they want to put law enforcement at risk. We’re not going to surrender to that. We’re not going to submit to that.”

Some of the largest cities in the United States, including New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago, refuse to work with ICE and hand over illegal immigrants who have been arrested for other offenses. This refusal to cooperate with federal authorities in these Democrat-run cities led the Trump administration to take an aggressive approach to detaining suspected illegal immigrants, including an immigration crackdown in Minneapolis and the surrounding area, dubbed “Operation Metro Surge.”

Vance’s comments come shortly after the Trump administration began removing many federal agents from Minnesota in February after the major surge in immigration enforcement. From the beginning of “Operation Metro Surge,” Democratic leaders in Minnesota opposed Trump’s efforts to detain illegal immigrants, and the outrage over the Trump administration’s actions erupted following the shooting deaths of Good and Pretti, which were captured on video.

Vance said that the administration is not capitulating to Democrats’ demands and that President Trump remains committed to deporting illegal immigrants and securing the border.

“We are going to be deliberate, we’re going to be smart,” Vance added. “We’re going to try to prevent these chaotic scenes that, of course, the Democrats use to [their] political advantage, but we’re going to keep on enforcing the border. That’s the mandate the American people gave us.”

Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, assumed control of the federal operation in Minneapolis last month, replacing Border Patrol’s Gregory Bovino, who was reassigned. Shortly after arriving in Minnesota and meeting with Democratic Governor Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, Homan said that he worked out a deal with the leaders for “unprecedented levels of coordination” on immigration enforcement.

“As a result of our efforts here, Minnesota is now less of a sanctuary state for criminals,” Homan said last week.

Vance’s remarks on Tuesday seem to cut down the middle of a rift in the Trump administration over immigration enforcement tactics. Some Trump officials, such as Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and her top advisor Corey Lewandowski, have pushed for an aggressive strategy and increasing the number of total arrests, Daily Wire immigration reporter Jennie Taer previously reported. Homan and acting ICE Director Todd Lyons, meanwhile, want ICE to prioritize arresting the most violent criminals before nabbing other illegal immigrants.