ICE Operations: What Americans Actually Want  

President Donald Trump says a “softer touch” may be needed to carry out his immigration enforcement agenda.

“I learned that maybe we can use a little bit of a softer touch, but you still have to be tough. These are criminals – we’re dealing with really hard criminals,” Trump told NBC News following the deaths of Alex Pretti and Renee Good in Minneapolis in January.

Two separate polls confirm the president’s conclusions are in line with the American public’s view of U.S. immigration policy.

A recent NPR/PBS News/Marist poll found that 65% of Americans feel that Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have gone too far in enforcing immigration laws. But recent polling from the group Cygnal shows that 54% of Americans support ICE enforcing U.S. immigration laws to remove illegal aliens from the country. The same poll found that 61% of U.S. voters support deporting illegal aliens.

“I think what those two polls are actually doing is talking about policy, and they’re talking about the execution of policy,” Meaghan Mobbs, director of the Center for American Safety and Security at the Independent Women’s Forum, says.

“Americans support the policy, which is deportation, but like President Trump said, perhaps there’s a way to go about it that’s not exactly how it unfolded in Minneapolis,” Mobbs explains on this week’s edition of “Problematic Women.”

“I think that’s the threading of the needle where [Trump] said, we’re going to keep doing it, but maybe with a ‘softer touch,’ which I do think means increasing communication with local and state authorities, [and] I think means messaging it more effectively.”

Mobbs joins “Problematic Women” to discuss Trump’s decision to deploy border czar Tom Homan to Minnesota and Homan’s actions since he arrived in the Twin Cities. Plus, we discuss the extent to which U.S. support for ICE comes down to a PR and messaging battle.