Tom Homan speaks at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee in July. Trump announced Sunday that the former acting ICE director would oversee border enforcement in his second administration.

Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images

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Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images

President-elect Trump announced Sunday evening that Tom Homan, his former acting head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), would join his second administration to oversee border enforcement.

In his role as “border czar” — which does not require Senate confirmation — Homan will be in charge of the U.S. southern and northern borders, as well as “all maritime and air security,” Trump said in his speech. post to Truth Social.

“Likewise, Tom Homan will be responsible for all deportations of illegal aliens to their home countries,” Trump wrote, adding that “there is no one better to maintain order and control our borders” .

It’s unclear exactly what role Homan will play, because managing immigration requires coordination among multiple agencies under the Department of Homeland Security.

Homan, a former police officer and Border Patrol agent, worked under six presidents during his three decades in law enforcement. He served as executive associate director of enforcement and deportation operations for Immigration and Customs Enforcement under President Obama. Under this administration, ICE has carried out a record number of deportations.

Homan repeatedly praised Trump for being the one who did the most to secure the border.

Sunday’s announcement was widely expected, as Trump had said. during the summer that he would tap Homan to help oversee immigration policies during his possible second term. Speaking at the National Conservatism Conference in July, Homan told to undocumented immigrants to “wait until 2025,” adding: “If you’re here illegally, you better look over your shoulder.”

“Trump will come back in January,” Homan said. “I will be hot on his heels when I come back. And I will lead the largest deportation operation this country has ever seen.”

Homan was behind Trump’s controversial family separation policy

Homan was the face of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown during his tenure as acting ICE director from January 2017 to June 2018.

During this period, he often appeared at White House press briefings to defend his agents’ arrests of undocumented immigrants and call for tougher enforcement. according to CNNAnd applauded Trump for “freeing the shackles” of ICE by allowing agents to make a wider range of arrests.

Notably, Homan was one of the architects behind his controversial project. family separation policy. More than 5,500 immigrant children were separated from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border in 2018 under the administration’s short-lived decision.Zero Tolerance” policy. According to the Department of Homeland Security, in April there were still 1,401 children without confirmed reunification.

Trump signed an executive order ending family separations in June 2018 after widespread condemnation from lawmakers, the public and the Biden administration. officially canceled it days after President Biden takes office in 2021.

Homan retired in 2018 in frustration when the White House failed to advance his nomination toward Senate confirmation, according to the Washington Post. He became a Fox News contributor, joined the conservative Heritage Foundation as a visiting scholar and contributed to Project 2025his controversial plan to overhaul the federal government.

Trump had sought to distance himself from Project 2025 during his campaign, even if it overlaps with his own agenda. Trump has made immigration a major plank of his campaign and has pledged to deport millions of immigrants who are in the country without authorization.

Homan warned undocumented immigrants to ‘start packing’

Homan explained how such expulsions would work in an interview on Fox Sunday morning futures hours before his appointment was announced, saying it would be a “well-targeted and planned operation, carried out… by ICE men.”

“When we go there, we will know who we are looking for, we will most likely know where they are going to be and it will be done in a humane way,” Homan said, adding that the action would focus on the “security threats public and national security threats first.”

But those groups won’t be the only targets, Homan said. CBS’ 60 minutes last month. He said he would resume workplace enforcement once the Biden administration moves away from the controversial practice of massive immigration raids on construction sites in favor of prosecuting “exploitative employers”. He also said in that interview that “families can be deported together,” suggesting that children who are U.S. citizens but whose parents are undocumented should accompany them.

A few months earlier, speaking on stage at Republican National ConventionHoman said Trump would designate Mexican cartels a “terrorist organization” for their role in obtaining fentanyl at the borderwarning: “He will wipe you off the face of the Earth.”

He also addressed undocumented immigrants in general, whom Biden said released into the country in violation of federal law.

“You better start packing now,” he said, to applause from participants holding signs in favor of eviction. “Because you’re coming home.”

Trump’s anti-immigrant rhetoric and policy proposals, while clearly winning over voters, are not being met without resistance.

Since Trump’s election, immigrant rights groups have said they are running ready to challenge his anti-migrant policy through protests, local legislation and lawsuits. And analysts at the Brookings Institution, the American Enterprise Institute and the Niskanen Center say lower, or even negative, net migration to the United States would hurt the country’s economy, because NPR reported.

Homan is not the only person Trump has nominated for his next term. He announced last week that Susie Wiles will be his chief of staff.

On Monday, Trump nominated Rep. Elise Stefanik, the New York Republican who chairs the House Republican Conference, to be U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. That role requires Senate confirmation, which is all but guaranteed in the soon-to-be Republican-controlled chamber.

Sergio Martínez-Beltran contributed to this report.