Trump’s ‘Border Czar’ Is ‘Extreme, Ineffective’: Ex-Homeland Security Aide

President-elect Donald Trump’s recently announced pick for “border czar,” Tom Homan, has an “extreme and ineffective” track record, according to the former homeland security adviser to Mike Pence.
Trump wrote on Truth Social late Sunday that he was “pleased to announce” that Homan, his former acting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) director, “will be joining the Trump Administration, in charge of our Nation’s Borders.”
Homan is considered one of the architect’s of Trump’s controversial family separation policy, having proposed separating migrants from their children as a way to deter illegal immigration as far back as 2014. His idea was dismissed at the time, during the Obama administration, but then implemented in 2018 under Trump.
Trump said Homan “will be in charge of all Deportation of Illegal Aliens back to their Country of Origin,” in addition to overseeing the northern and southern borders and “all Maritime, and Aviation Security.”
On Monday, Olivia Troye, who advised former Vice President Pence on national security issues during the first Trump administration, slammed Trump’s decision on X (formerly Twitter).
“Trump’s plan to appoint Tom Homan as ‘Border Czar’ is no accident. Homan’s track record? Extreme & ineffective policies that targeted all immigrants not just criminals,” she wrote. “But the real goal here runs deeper: dismantling DHS & unraveling our homeland security framework as we know it. It’s not about solutions; it’s about disruption.”
When asked by Newsweek what specific policies Troye was referring to in her post, she pointed to the family separation policy, which she called a “stain on the United States” that did not deter migrants or address resourcing issues with the immigration processing system.
Newsweek reached out for comment to the Trump campaign and Homan for comment as well.
In a follow-up post, Troye, now a media commentator and Trump critic, said that Homan spread disinformation about an undocumented immigrant allegedly starting the deadly October 2017 Northern California wildfires.
“In 2017, as acting ICE Director, Tom Homan chose to spread disinfo about the California wildfires saying an undocumented immigrant had started them. He went on to attack the local Sheriff’s office, while they were in the middle of dealing with responding to this natural disaster, asking them to hand over the individual to ICE,” Troye said.
She added: “The immigrant had NOTHING to do with the wildfires. Those of us working at DHS who were actually committed to homeland security watched this with horror internally as it played out. Remember this going forward when things like this happen again.”
At the time of the fires, Homan released a statement on the repeated releases of a “dangerous criminal alien” by the Sonoma County jail. Sonoma County was one of the areas hit by the wildfires.
“This is especially troubling in light of the massive wildfires already devastating the region,” Homan said in the statement.
Meanwhile, Homan told Fox & Friends on Monday that he was “honored” that Trump had picked him to be the “border czar.”
“I’ve been on this network for years complaining about what this administration did to this border. I’ve been yelling and screaming about it and what they need to do to fix it. So when the president asked me, ‘Would you come back and fix it?’ Of course. I’d be a hypocrite if I didn’t.
“I’m honored the president asked me to come back and help solve this national security crisis, so I’m looking forward to it,” Homan said.
He added: “I’ve got to go back and help because every morning…. I’m pissed off with what this [Biden] administration did to the most secure border in my lifetime, so I’m going to go back and do what I can to fix it.”
Trump appointed Homan as acting director of ICE in January 2017, a position he held until his retirement in June 2018.
During that time, he oversaw the first Trump administration’s zero-tolerance immigration policy that resulted in thousands of families being separated at the U.S.-Mexico border.
The Atlantic called Homan the “intellectual father” of the policy in a report in 2022, saying he was among the first to propose the idea of prosecuting undocumented migrants who cross the border illegally with their children and separating families.
The plan was rejected for being “heartless and impractical” during the Obama administration, the report said, but later adopted during Trump’s first term.
In 2023, Homan said he was “sick and tired” of hearing about family separations. “I’m still being sued over that…. I don’t give a s***, right? Bottom line is, we enforced the law,” he said at the Conservative Political Action Conference.
At the National Conservatism Conference earlier this year, Homan said: “Trump comes back in January, I’ll be on his heels coming back, and I will run the biggest deportation operation this country’s ever seen. They ain’t seen s*** yet. Wait until 2025.”
Update 11/11/24, 3:08 p.m. ET: This article has been updated with comment from Troye.