Recent events in Minneapolis and President Trump’s focus on immigration enforcement has pushed Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) into headline after headline. However, for many Americans, it is still unclear what exactly ICE is supposed to be doing.
ICE’s mission statement is to “Protect America through criminal investigations and enforcing immigration laws to preserve national security and public safety.”
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was formed in 2002 in response to the infamous terrorist attack on September 11, 2001. Within DHS, ICE emerged in 2003 as a merger of the U.S. Customs Service and the Immigration and Naturalization Service.
ICE has now become the highest-funded federal law enforcement agency, exceeding the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Department of Justice (DOJ). Its budget has increased by 13.6% since 2024, reaching $11.3 billion. As ICE has grown, so has its opposition.
On January 7, 2026, Renee Nicole Good was fatally shot by an ICE agent in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Born in Colorado, Good was a U.S. citizen by birth. Her death has sparked outrage across the country, resulting in thousands of anti-ICE protests and a lawsuit from the states of Illinois and Minnesota.
In a July 2020 SiriusXM interview, Tom Ridge–DHS’ first secretary–spoke on the transformation of DHS under the Trump administration. Ridge claimed, “The department was established to protect America from the ever-present threat of global terrorism. It was not established to be the president’s personal militia.”
Although Ridge’s comment is now six years old, his perspective dovetails with many American’s current thoughts on ICE and President Trump’s policies regarding the organization.
The current situation in Minneapolis highlights the current partisan divide in America.
However, according to a poll from the New York Times and Siena University, 56% of Republicans believe that ICE’s tactics “have been about right.” Another poll from Quinnipiac University found that 77% of Republicans believe the shooting of Good was justified. The poll also found that while only 4% of Democrats approved of the way ICE enforces immigration laws, 84% of Republicans did approve.
Despite the large number of Republicans who continue to support ICE, the majority of people polled by both the New York Times and Quinnipiac disapprove of ICE and their tactics. These increasing disapproval rates raise the question: how far has ICE strayed from their mission?
