Here & Now

US Rep. Scott Fitzgerald on De-escalation and Funds for ICE

Frederica Freyberg:
The ICE surge is ending in Minnesota. White House Border Czar Tom Homan announcing the move as U.S. Senate Democrats vote to block funding for Homeland Security over demands for stricter rules of engagement for immigration agents.

Also this week, the House passes new election rules aimed at preventing noncitizens from voting. Tonight, we’re joined by Republican U.S. Representative Scott Fitzgerald from Wisconsin’s 5th Congressional District. And Congressman, thanks very much for being here.

Scott Fitzgerald:
Good to be with you.

Frederica Freyberg:
So a busy week, as always, in Washington. What’s your reaction to the immigration enforcement surge ending in Minnesota?

Scott Fitzgerald:
I mean, I think the president handled it very well. Tom Homan has become a figure that, quite honestly, is very well trusted by both sides of the aisle. If you go back even to the Obama administration, the president had a relationship with Tom Homan. And ever since then, he has been obviously a figure that’s high profile but I think what the president did there made a lot of sense. De-escalate, bring down the temperature. Let’s figure out how to do a better job of this. And so far, it’s — it seemed to have worked well.

Frederica Freyberg:
So how would you grade the overall operation making mention here, of course, of the two U.S. citizens killed by agents in the midst of it?

Scott Fitzgerald:
Yeah, both obviously very unfortunate incidents. I think it did show that the idea that if you were going to go into any community in the United States and you were going to receive resistance from local law enforcement, or if there was going to be kind of this situation where ICE was not really operating under the idea that they were going to be able to go in and apprehend people using some type of detain order, then what you would end up with is this back and forth in the streets. And certainly that wasn’t productive. So, you know, unfortunately the border was open for four years under the Biden administration. And one of the things that President Trump ran on was that he was going to apprehend those that had criminal records and deport them. And, you know, but how that was going to be accomplished is — has varied from state to state.

Frederica Freyberg:
Do you feel as though law enforcement should be better at de-escalating a special — especially after seeing what happened in Minnesota?

Scott Fitzgerald:
Well, I think we’re in uncharted waters, right? I mean, this is not something that the average law enforcement agency has really dealt with in the past. If there was not such a high number of illegals and those with criminal records, it’s very easy for them to simply go to any county jail where they’ve already been apprehended and there would just be a turnover to ICE. And other than in some sanctuary cities, that is the way it’s always happened. Now there’s a much higher number of illegals in the states right now than we’ve ever seen before. But, you know, that process has always served us well, but we find ourselves in a different position right now.

Frederica Freyberg:
Meanwhile, the stopgap funding for Homeland Security expires at midnight. What’s your response to Democrats demands for new rules for ICE and other agents, including not wearing masks and requiring the use of judicial warrants?

Scott Fitzgerald:
Yeah, I mean, I think if you look at the laundry list of things that Senator Chuck Schumer had rolled out from the Senate, it was kind of dead on arrival in the House. So there would have had to have been some other type of negotiation. And it appears that the White House did kind of make a run at it, that they were trying to pull together a list that might have been acceptable, but the ten or so items that the Senate had laid out was not going to happen. So we find ourselves in a unbelievable situation, I think, of the Democrats kind of holding this up again, and a very small government shutdown related to Homeland Security, which makes no sense because ICE is funded. It was funded in the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill.’ There’s still excess dollars there. Homeland Security says they can operate for months with ICE being able to still accomplish their jobs. But yet you’re shutting down things like the Secret Service and you’re shutting down TSA at the airports, and you’re shutting down the Coast Guard operations. So there’s all these other provisions and parts of Homeland Security that are going to be left unfunded. And they all run out of money at different times. So it’s — this really is the most political move we’ve seen so far, I think from, from the Senate Democrats.

Frederica Freyberg:
Would you like to see a surge of immigration enforcement in Wisconsin?

Scott Fitzgerald:
I’ve been asked that question specifically about like the city of Milwaukee. I don’t, I don’t think it’s been necessary. I know some people disagree with that, but we just don’t see the numbers that we’ve seen kind of in some of these other areas. But I know Madison is a sanctuary city. There doesn’t seem to be the level of, of, certainly, I guess, animosity between local levels of government and ICE being able to do their job. So it just doesn’t appear to me that we would be at the top of the list where maybe those ICE agents may end up. So it’s, it’s kind of, I guess, a wait and see, but doesn’t, doesn’t appear to be the — a good thing for Wisconsin and I think maybe not necessary for ICE.

Frederica Freyberg:
On elections legislation ahead of the midterms, new requirements would require proof of citizenship to register and vote. Now, Democrats, of course, say this is voter suppression and solution in search of a problem, because non-citizen voting is a small number. What about that?

Scott Fitzgerald:
I mean, I’ve been through this as majority leader of the Wisconsin State Senate. I’ve now been through it through numerous bills in the House of Representatives. Listen, at the end of the day, 85% of Americans think that you should have to present some form of ID when you go vote. It’s bipartisan support. The response from the other side of the aisle has been, I think, almost laughable in that they continue to just pretend like that, that type of poll number or support for voter ID doesn’t exist.

Frederica Freyberg:
But this is…

Scott Fitzgerald:
There’s no other reason to support it other than people are not presenting their IDs at the polls.

Frederica Freyberg:
Congressman, this is something more than that though, right? It’s a passport or a birth certificate to register to vote, which is a higher bar than just a photo ID.

Scott Fitzgerald:
Yeah, I mean, there’s a lot of criticism from the other side of the aisle. I mean, you can nitpick any of these bills by saying that you’re asking for more information other than a driver’s license. But in most states, I mean, the documents that you need to provide to get that driver’s license, unless there’s a full out kind of anybody who shows up, gets that initial document, they fill it out and they’re granted a driver’s license. It is still some form of ID. And I, and I’m not saying that, you know, the bill, the SAVE Act, which I think is well done and has been crafted correctly, I, you know, I’ve never been a big supporter of just federalizing these election laws. I think it’s important to keep some of these things decentralized. So for me, somebody that served in the state legislature for so long, I mean, there is part of this discussion in which I’m saying, listen, this is what American people need to believe in the election cycle, especially in Wisconsin, where I run into constituents all the time that still think that the 2020 election was manipulated by rules related to COVID. It happens all the time. I run into people all the time that talk to me about that. This would instill some — what I, what I think some concrete evidence that people that show up at the polls have some type of document in their hand, some type of, of driver’s license in their hand to prove that they’re a citizen and prove that they’re a Wisconsinite and they should be voting in that election.

Frederica Freyberg:
Congressman Scott Fitzgerald, we leave it there. Thank you so much.

Scott Fitzgerald:
Thank you. Good to be with you.