Greg Sargent: This is The Daily Blast from The New Republic, produced and presented by the DSR Network. I’m your host, Greg Sargent.
Senator Chris Murphy: Yeah, absolutely. Good to be with you.
Democrats are debating what to demand from Republicans in the White House to restrict ICE. Senator, where are those discussions among Democrats right now?
I think it’s important for us to understand that this is not just about Minneapolis. I understand that the country is seized by the mayhem and the chaos there—the murder of American citizens. But in every state all across the country, there is a degree of terrorism happening. I was in Texas last week, Greg, and I spent the morning at an immigration court. This is a place where legal immigrants are showing up to apply for asylum. And what’s happening there is just fundamentally immoral.
So whatever reforms we construct have to apply not just to what’s happening on the ground in Minneapolis, although I think that should be our primary focus, but to the illegality that’s happening all over the country right now.
Meanwhile, we’re seeing Republicans splitting: Senator Bill Cassidy and others are calling for a full investigation. Some in the administration are leaking that the politics of this have turned against them. Anonymous ICE officials are leaking that there’s extreme frustration with DHS for blaming shooting victims.
Murphy: I don’t know. I’m glad you’re optimistic. I mean, first of all, what a low bar we have for Republicans. I mean, so the story is that Republicans are splitting because they want a state investigation of a murder. Like, I mean, that’s something that we never, ever argued about. Of course, a state has a right to investigate a murder of its citizen. There is no sign that Republicans are breaking on anything that would actually have a substantive change in the way that ICE and DHS are operating.
So I hope that things are going to change in Minneapolis for the sake of the citizens of that city. But I don’t want to put too much optimism in the rumblings we’ve heard out of the White House today. Let’s see for ourselves what happens on the ground.
Reporter (voiceover): Secretary Noem said Alex Pretti committed an act of domestic terrorism. Stephen Miller labeled Pretti a domestic terrorist. Does the president agree with them?
Sargent: And here she basically says Holman will replace Greg Bovino as the point man in Minneapolis, essentially throwing Bovino under the bus.
Karoline Leavitt (voiceover): Mr. Bovino is a wonderful man and he’s a great professional. He is going to very much continue to lead Customs and Border Patrol throughout and across the country. Mr. Homan will be the main point of contact on the ground in Minneapolis.
Murphy: Right. And an assassin, right? I mean, within minutes of that shooting, they were labeling him a domestic terrorist and an assassin, when everyone could see with their own eyes exactly what happened, which was that he was exercising his First Amendment rights, that ICE and CBP approached him, and that he was murdered.
And yes, their bench is Tom Homan. I mean, the problem is the only people that they have available to go in and try to manage Minneapolis are also fundamentally unprepared individuals who have no history of doing anything other than making a mess of people’s constitutional rights. So again, I’m hoping for de-escalation. It just doesn’t appear that by picking Tom Homan, they are paving a path to things being much better.
And requiring Customs and Border Protection to stay confined to the border, as opposed to invading communities in the interior. Is that what Democrats are starting to coalesce around? Is there a group of Democrats who wants that as the basic bottom line?
I also know that these reforms have to be substantive; it can’t just be window dressing. And so I think that the list that you articulated is consistent with those two goals. So yes, we have been talking about de-escalating the practices by requiring warrants for immigration arrests.
And then getting CBP back to its mission, right? It’s trained to be at the border; it’s not trained to do crowd control or criminal investigations. I think that’s really important as well. Again, none of those reforms, even if they were all passed, would fundamentally—would not address every single one of the abuses we are seeing. But it would make Minneapolis much more safe. It would make the cities in Texas that I visited much more safe. It would be a real, important set of reforms.
Murphy: Yeah, I mean, I think—I can’t say that. That is certainly a package that unites a lot of Democrats. I would add to that list restrictions of ICE and CBP operating in sensitive places like churches and schools. But this full conversation with the caucus has really begun after Alex Pretti’s murder. And I think in the next 24 to 48 hours, you’ll, you know, hear what our consensus requests are.
Sargent: Well, so let’s kind of look ahead. Do you expect the entire Democratic caucus to hold the line here? It’s sort of easy to see a handful of Democrats breaking away and supporting continued funding to DHS. How do you see that unfolding?
Murphy: Well, I would be a fool to make a prediction. Obviously, we have a really diverse caucus. I think we held together very well when we were demanding an end to the plan to increase people’s health care premiums. But then in the end, we had a handful of Democrats that crossed over and ultimately agreed to something that was not sufficient to protect our citizens.
Sargent: Right. Just to clarify for people, what you’re referring to there is that Democrats want to advance other appropriations bills separate from DHS funding before the deadline. Do you expect Trump and Republicans to agree to that? I guess indications are that they won’t. If not, what happens then? You really need Democrats to hold the damn line here and refuse to budge, right? Until they get what they want in terms of DHS restrictions.
I don’t think the Department of Defense budget or the Department of Transportation budget actually have sufficient restraints against Trump’s illegality in those departments. But I submit that there are probably enough Democrats who will cross over and vote with Republicans to fund DOD, the State Department, the Department of Transportation, and the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Sargent: Right. And given the emergency that is clearly unfolding in places like Minneapolis, you would think that it would be an easy case for Democrats to make. They could just say, Look, we’re in the middle of an actual serious emergency. Americans are getting killed by their own government. You know, we’re not doing this. We’re not going to vote for a funding bill if you’re not going to have a real debate over what to do about this, right?
(a) This president has lost any political advantage he has on the issue of immigration and border security, because people don’t believe anything that’s happening in Minneapolis has to do with border security. But (b) it’s not really an issue about immigration or border security any longer. It’s an issue of abuse of power. It’s an issue of humanity and morality.
Sargent: Right. And I think a lot of liberals worry that the Democratic leadership in the Senate and potentially maybe a small block of senators doesn’t see it the way you see it. And I think you’re absolutely right. I’d even go further and say, I think Trump is losing the country on immigration itself.
Murphy: I do think that we’ve reached another one of these breaking points where the public is looking at a runaway democracy and they feel like maybe no one can save it. Well, Senate Democrats are in a position to save it because they do need our votes to fund this illegality.
The whole country is seized by what they have seen—the statistics suggest that 80 to 90 percent of Americans have seen these videos—and they desperately want somebody to stand up for the rule of law. So yes, if we do not make a fight right now, I think it could result in just a massive withdrawal of participation in our civic life.
Sargent: Right. And to be clear, you’re also talking here about the Democratic base. The Democratic base would just withdraw if they actually see their leaders in this situation not standing up.
And a lot of Democratic activists who we rely on to protect our democracy—they’re the ones that show up at these national and local protests. I think many of them will also start to scratch their heads and say: Wait a second, if I’m alone out here and my national leaders aren’t willing to fight, then it’s not worth it.
We’ve got to show strength. And I will say in the past, Republicans have just waited us out because they thought that we would break. And we have broken in the past. And this would be, I think, a very dangerous moment for us to do that because of the very specific moral question being put to the nation: Does the president of the United States get to murder American citizens? The answer to that question has to be no, but it likely will only be no if we’re in a position to win this fight.
I think I’ve seen some people suggest a move by Democrats almost similar to Europe defending Greenland, which ended up humiliating Trump. Where are you on that? Would you like to see something even bigger at this point, given the existential nature of this moment?
We can decide—not to shut down the entirety of these operations because, as you know, even if the Department of Homeland Security didn’t have appropriations funding, they still have $70 billion left over from the reconciliation bill—but it is not easy for them to transfer over all their operations from regular budgetary appropriations to money from the Big Beautiful Bill. It would slow them down. It would slow the illegality down. So I just think we should focus on this legislative moment in which we hold power; we can constrain their illegality. That probably is the most important thing: to show people that we’re not willing to back down.
Murphy: Well, I plan for success always. So I’m planning for success here. And listen, we’re going to be in constant contact with our colleagues. I’m sure there will be offers from Republicans or even offers from the White House to make paper changes, executive orders—things that might look different in Minneapolis to try to distract you from the fact that there’s still a dystopia happening in San Antonio.
Sargent: Senator Chris Murphy, best of luck at this mission. It’s pretty damn important. Thanks so much for coming on with us.
Murphy: Thanks, man.
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