On a hot June afternoon in Clearwater, Florida, demonstrators gathered near the Pinellas County Jail, waving signs and chanting rallying cries for immigration reform. Their protest, held on June 14, 2025, was just one of many recent actions signaling a remarkable shift in the national debate over immigration and the future of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE). Across the country, from the halls of Congress to the streets of Los Angeles, calls to overhaul or even abolish ICE are growing louder, fueled by mounting criticism of the agency’s practices and the Trump administration’s hard-line deportation agenda.
Democratic lawmakers, once divided and cautious about taking a firm stand on immigration, are now stepping up their oversight efforts. In August, Rep. Joe Neguse and other Colorado Democrats made headlines by showing up unannounced at a detention center in Aurora, near Denver, to scrutinize conditions and demand accountability from officials. "Transparency matters. Oversight matters. Accountability matters," Neguse declared after the visit, according to the Associated Press. This assertive approach marks a clear departure from earlier in the year, when many Democrats were still debating whether to emphasize stronger enforcement or seek a new path forward.
As the Trump administration’s deportation efforts have ramped up, ensnaring not only those accused of crimes but also longtime residents with clean records, Democrats have begun to mobilize. At a July event organized by House Homeland Security Committee Democrats, Rep. Lou Correa spoke passionately about Alejandro Barranco, a U.S. Marine Corps veteran whose father was arrested by Border Patrol agents in southern California after decades in the country. Correa described Barranco and others like him as “hardworking, middle-class individuals — all of us just looking to earn the American dream.” The event’s message was unequivocal: the administration’s actions were “unaccountable, unlawful and unconstitutional.”
While Republicans, like Montana Senator Steve Daines, tout the administration’s post-2024 election crackdown as having delivered “one of the most secure southern borders we’ve had in years,” cracks are appearing in the public’s support for such measures. According to a July 2025 AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll, only 43% of U.S. adults approved of President Trump’s handling of immigration, down from 49% in March. Meanwhile, a Gallup poll found that nearly 80% of Americans now view immigration as a good thing for the country, a significant jump from 64% the previous year and the highest level in the poll’s 25-year history.
Senator Alex Padilla of California sees these numbers as evidence that “the American public is seeing this administration for what it is.” He pointed out that, as of June 2025, “65% of people detained had no criminal record, and 90% had no convictions for violent or property crimes.” Many of those being deported, Padilla emphasized, were the same people the Trump administration had once deemed essential during the COVID-19 pandemic. “That cruel irony is not lost on people.”
Yet, despite the shifting tides, Democrats remain far from united on the path forward. The party is now awash in proposals, many of which aim to move away from broad policies like asylum and temporary protected status in favor of expanding legal immigration avenues. The Center for American Progress, a prominent liberal think tank, has released a framework focused on “safeguarding America’s security,” while the New Democrat Coalition — a moderate bloc of over 100 House members — advocates for “expanding safe, legal avenues for immigration” alongside tougher border security.
Senator Ruben Gallego of Arizona, who narrowly won his seat in a state Trump also carried, has called for tightening asylum restrictions and encouraging other countries in the region to accept more asylum seekers. “What we really need to do is overall fix the broken immigration system,” Gallego said at a recent town hall. “It doesn’t mean that we can’t have border security. We have crossings at almost zero, and I think there should be credit given to the president for that, but why not use this opportunity to pass immigration reform?”
Amid these debates, a bold new idea has emerged from legal scholars and activists: abolish ICE altogether and transfer its resources to state and local police. In an August 27, 2025 article for The Hill, law professor Ilya Somin argued that ICE “has become notorious for its cruelty, abuses of civil liberties and racial profiling,” and that its unpopularity has only grown under Trump’s deportation policies. Somin cited the agency’s routine detention of people with little or no due process, including American citizens, and the use of masks and anonymity by agents to avoid accountability. “The alarming extent of racial and ethnic profiling by ICE is shown by the fact that the agency’s arrests in Los Angeles County declined by 66 percent after a federal court order barring the use of these and similar tactics,” Somin wrote.
Conditions in ICE detention centers, Somin noted, are often “abysmal, featuring overcrowding, inadequate food and denial of needed medical treatment.” He pointed to recent data showing that, as of June 2025, “65 percent of people detained had no criminal record, and some 90 percent had no convictions for violent or property crime.” Somin also highlighted the economic and social harms caused by deportations, which he argued break up families and return people to dangerous situations in countries like Cuba and Venezuela — sometimes even affecting those who had entered the U.S. legally but lost status due to policy changes.
Public sentiment appears to be shifting in favor of such reforms. Somin referenced recent polling that found nearly 40% of Americans now support abolishing ICE, while large majorities disapprove of its actions. He proposed reallocating ICE’s budget — which has ballooned to $28 billion per year under Trump’s "Big Beautiful Bill" — to state and local law enforcement, enabling the hiring of tens of thousands of new police officers to focus on violent and property crimes. “Focusing on undocumented immigrants is a poor use of law enforcement resources,” Somin argued, noting that undocumented immigrants have much lower crime rates than native-born Americans.
While abolishing ICE would not end all deportations — state and local authorities could still cooperate with federal agencies — Somin contended that such a move would “make deportation much more dependent on state and local cooperation and would empower jurisdictions to make their own choices.” He also invoked the Constitution, pointing out that immigration authority was largely left to the states for the first century of American history, and that the Founding Fathers did not envision broad federal power over migration.
For now, most Democrats have stopped short of endorsing the outright abolition of ICE, wary of appearing "soft on crime." But as public outrage over ICE’s practices grows and the party’s base demands action, some are reconsidering. Padilla, for instance, is pushing legislation that would create a pathway to permanent residency for DACA recipients and immigrants who have lived in the U.S. for at least seven years, hoping that Republicans will be swayed by the public’s shifting mood.
Meanwhile, Republicans remain steadfast, insisting that tough enforcement is what voters want and pointing to recent gains in border security. Yet with nearly 80% of Americans now viewing immigration as a positive force, and mounting evidence of the harms caused by aggressive ICE tactics, the debate is far from settled. Whether Democrats can seize the moment to forge a new, unified approach — and whether bold proposals like abolishing ICE can gain traction — may well determine the future of U.S. immigration policy for years to come.
The nation stands at a crossroads, with lawmakers, activists, and everyday Americans all grappling with the question: what kind of country should the United States be, and who gets to call it home?
