Longtime Democratic strategist James Carville has advised members of his party against using the phrase “Abolish ICE” as protests opposing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement continue in Minneapolis and across the nation.
Carville, in remarks on his “Politics War Room” podcast with Al Hunt, chimed in after his co-host raised an issue with Democrats using the word “abolishing” rather than calling to reform the agency or to start “making ICE work.”
“‘Defund the Police’ are the three stupidest words in the history of the English language,” said Carville, comparing the anti-ICE phrase to a slogan that grew in popularity amid the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests.“The left is universally wrong about everything.”
Carville argued that Americans want to have some form of “immigration and customs control” before noting that he finds recent actions by ICE to be “horrible.”
His remarks arrived over a week after an ICE agent, Jonathan Ross, shot and killed Minneapolis resident Renee Good in her vehicle. Heated clashes between protesters and federal authorities have continued in the Minnesota capital since.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey has come out against “abolishing ICE” while at least one House Democrat has used the phrase to push legislation to dissolve the agency, declaring that ICE is “totally out of control” and “beyond reform.”
A recent poll by The Economist/YouGov found that 46% of respondents supported abolishing the agency.
On his podcast with Hunt, Carville claimed that some ICE agents are “dedicated law enforcement professionals” before adding that he suspects the number is a “smaller percent than you imagine.”
“And a lot of them are just a pack of people that couldn’t get a job anywhere else that figured they got a chance with not very much training to carry a badge and a gun and shoot people,” he added. “That’s the real danger.”
Carville stressed that an agency enforcing immigration and customs affairs in the U.S. is necessary. He said it’s dangerous not to have an “expert workforce” dealing with such matters.
