WASHINGTON – House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., criticized the Department of Homeland Security for what he described as “un-American behavior” in arresting U.S. citizens during Thursday’s House Democratic Steering and Policy Committee hearing.
“They are brutalizing and killing American citizens and violently targeting law-abiding immigrant families who are contributing to this great country,” Jeffries said. “The tactics are cruel, unacceptable, corrupt and unconstitutional.”
The hearing on Customs Enforcement accountability comes amid progressive Democrats’ calls to impeach DHS Secretary Kristi Noem over the Trump administration’s deportation policies and broader demands for DHS reform.
Anthony Galloway, pastor of Wayman AME Church in Minneapolis, testified on ICE operations in Minnesota and said agents have aggressively confronted frightened residents, including himself, leaving families living in fear and churches struggling to hold communities together.
“Are we a nation that condones violence for political gain, or are we a nation that chooses mercy over fear and power?” Galloway asked.
Last Wednesday, President Donald Trump announced the withdrawal of 700 federal agents from Minnesota involved in “Operation Metro Surge”, with around 2,000 agents remaining. Trump admitted his administration could use a “softer touch” in executing his immigration crackdown, simultaneously saying the administration’s approach would remain “tough” and urging local officials to cooperate with federal immigration officers.
Mendota Heights Police Chief Kelly McCarthy said ICE agents’ tactics do not resemble standard law enforcement training.
“From the demeanor to the widespread use of chemical agents on people just observing, just engaging in their constitutionally protected behavior, is not something that we teach in Minnesota, nor is it something that would be accepted,” McCarthy said.
This reconsideration in Trump’s surge follows criticism of immigration enforcement’s aggressive tactics. Public outrage intensified after Minnesota residents Renee Good and Alex Pretti were fatally shot in confrontations with federal officers.
Homan announced Thursday morning that it was ending its immigration enforcement operation in Minnesota. Homan said a “significant drawdown” is taking place and will continue into the next week, while saying the Trump administration will continue its deportation agenda.
“We have a lot of work to do across this country to remove public safety risks who shouldn’t even be in this country,” Homan said.
Nayna Gupta, policy director at the American Immigration Council, testified that the Trump administration’s pledge to target “the worst of the worst” has instead led to unlawful actions, including the arrest of immigrants with no criminal records.
“From day one, it has rejected long-standing DHS policies, pushed outdated immigration laws to their extreme, and unabashedly violated the Constitution,” Gupta said.
Marine veteran Alejandro Barranco testified at the hearing after his father, Narciso Barranco, an undocumented immigrant, was beaten and detained by immigration agents while landscaping outside of an IHOP in California in June 2025. He said that as a Marine, the situation feels like a betrayal.
“It’s just not right, and it’s not something that I would have ever thought I would have lived,” Alejandro Barranco said.
Gupta called out the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” which she said would allocate more than $170 billion towards border and interior enforcement, with $75 billion going to ICE. She also described the abuses of refugee and undocumented families in detention centers and called for accountability measures.
“We must reform the outdated laws that left millions of hard working non citizens vulnerable, and that left these agencies free to defy basic law enforcement standards, undermine our safety, and to easily violate the law,” Gupta said.