INTERVIEW: DHS's Harry Fones on Trump's immigration wins, the Democrats' border missteps, and the viral post from Homeland Security Democrats

Across all departments and agencies, the Trump administration is prioritizing safety, at home and abroad.

The Democrats on the House Homeland Security Committee recently took issue with that, mocking some of the administration’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS) staffers with a widely-ridiculed post on X. The Washington Reporter has already interviewed one of the duo — Tricia McLaughlin — and spoke with Harry Fones, the other one in the post, following the Democrats’ attack.

Fones told the Reporter that “the funnier part is is that the Democrats are so disconnected from reality that they think that the actions the department is doing to secure our nation are unpopular and they wanted to take a quick pot shot at us, which, whatever, that's fine, because I've also seen the worst stuff that Democratic politicians have done.”

“Every day they're demonizing our federal law enforcement,” Fones said. “This led to a massive increase in assaults. ICE officers facing an 1000 percent increase in assaults and it is horrific. This is an easy tactic of them to try to scare folks, and it's wrong. They made fun of me. Some friends sent it to me, and then all of a sudden, my mentions started blowing up. They have tried to shame people for doing their jobs. Who cares that they're coming after me?”

Despite the significant increase in attacks on ICE agents during President Donald Trump’s second term, Fones said that agents are excited to actually get to do their jobs again.

“We've actually allowed these men and women to go back to doing their jobs,” he explained. “We are enforcing the laws of this nation. For four years, they were prevented from doing their jobs, and that's one of the things that Secretary Noem did as soon as she came in, which was allowing ICE to actually do their job. And that's a major change. This isn't like a ‘hey, let's go 10 percent faster.’ No, we went from off to on, and you've seen that.”

The results speak for themselves, Fones noted.

“We recently announced our preliminary July numbers for the border, and they are staggeringly low,” he said. “This is the third time under this Trump administration that we have broken border records — in a good way for once, unlike under the Biden administration. We had our lowest nationwide encounters ever. And again, that's the third time we've done this. I think the most staggering fact is that along the southwest border, we had 4,598 apprehensions, which is nearly 500 lower than the daily average under Biden.”

“In an entire month, we had less than what we would have in a single day under Biden,” Fones said.

Following the GOP’s passage of the One Big, Beautiful Bill (OBBB), ICE is about to get even more reinforcements.

“We've got the money to hire agents now, and we're able to be rapidly expanding our operations there,” Fones said. “And it's not just ICE. We're going to be able to use part of that money that is going to CBP to help us finish the border wall, which is a huge tool that helps us have operational control of the border. There's also funding in there for the Coast Guard, and they are playing a major role now that they weren't before, because the southern land border has been secured, we’ve seen a lot more smuggling on our maritime border and they're our front line there.”

Ultimately, Fones would rather face online attacks from Democrats than have ICE agents face physical attacks from illegal immigrants and their allies — but he did note to the Reporter a fundamental misconception about him in the wake of the Democrats’ attempt to mock him.

“The one that made me laugh is how many folks thought I played football,” the mustachioed Maryland man said. “I never played football, I played rugby. That made me chuckle.”

Below is a transcript of our interview with Harry Fones, lightly edited for clarity.

Washington Reporter:

Harry Fones, so great to talk with you — especially after House Democrats made you the point person on the administration’s successes with illegal immigration. Let’s start with the domestic side of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS); what is the most important work that DHS is doing there?

Harry Fones:

The number one message that we've had is that thanks to President Trump and Secretary Noem, our borders are closed, and if you are here illegally, you should should leave. We are even helping people here illegally self-deport using our CBP Home app, which gives users a free flight home, a $1,000 stipend, and we will help you with travel documents..

Washington Reporter:

Tell me about the precipitous drop in the numbers you were just talking about.

Harry Fones:

We recently announced our preliminary July numbers for the border, and they are staggeringly low. This is the third time under this Trump administration that we have broken border records — in a good way for once, unlike under the Biden administration. We had our lowest nationwide encounters ever. And again, that's the third time we've done this. I think the most staggering fact is that along the southwest border, we had 4,598 apprehensions, which is nearly 500 lower than the daily average under Biden. So in an entire month, we had less than what we would have in a single day under Biden.

Washington Reporter:

The Secretary herself was just touring Latin America. What is her message to these countries?

Harry Fones:

Her overall message is that we are working with these countries, and it's in a way that it makes our border more secure. We're signing multilateral agreements that are making our country safer. Other countries now know that we want to put America first. They know that we want to work with them. Countries actually want to work with us.

Washington Reporter:

Closer to home is the new, and viral, push for ICE recruitment. How’s that going?

Harry Fones:

We are gung ho on it. We are focused on cleaning up the mess that Biden left us. There were millions of people who were allowed into our country; it was an invasion, and we're now working to clean that up and we need help. The One Big, Beautiful Bill just passed, and ICE and the Department of Homeland Security gives us the funding to get the job done, and you're already seeing it in action, which is us trying to hire 10,000 new personnel who are going to help us. We are calling on all patriots. We want people to sign up for this, especially veterans. Between veterans and people who are looking to start out the career, this is something that's going to help us secure our homeland; for four years people were allowed in this country, and we didn't know who they were, and now we're trying to change the trajectory of that. And one of the big things you've seen under this administration is all of the criminals we've arrested. Every day, we are posting some of the worst of the worst we're arresting They're rapists, they're murderers, they're child molesters, they're gang members. We need help to continue to get these people out of this country as fast as we can. Nobody wants to be living next to that.

Washington Reporter:

I assume the Big Beautiful Bill’s funding for ICE recruitment ties in directly with the social media ad campaign that rolled?

Harry Fones:

Yes, it is, we have a once in a lifetime opportunity to use this funding to recruit people to help make our country safe again.

Washington Reporter:

Can you talk about how you are using social media within DHS to incentivize ICE recruitment, and also more broadly about what you hear from ICE agents about the change that they've seen in their day jobs in the past nine months?

Harry Fones:

Well, the day job one is really easy to answer; it is that we've actually allowed these men and women to go back to doing their jobs. We are enforcing the laws of this nation. For four years, they were prevented from doing their jobs, and that's one of the things that Secretary Noem did as soon as she came in, which was allowing ICE to actually do their job. And that's a major change. This isn't like a ‘hey, let's go 10 percent faster.’ No, we went from off to on, and you've seen that. So our agents are happy; they're able to actually do their job. This is an extremely important job, enforcing the laws of our nation. That's what they signed up to do, just like any officer. Any police officer that you meet signed up to enforce the laws, and they're actually able to do that now.

Washington Reporter:

How has this passage of the One Big, Beautiful Bill been used by DHS to kick start this push to recruit more ICE agents?

Harry Fones:

We've got the money to hire agents now, and we're able to be rapidly expanding our operations there. And it's not just ICE. We're going to be able to use part of that money that is going to CBP to help us finish the border wall, which is a huge tool that helps us have operational control of the border. There's also funding in there for the Coast Guard, and they are playing a major role now that they weren't before, because the southern land border has been secured, we’ve seen a lot more smuggling on our maritime border and they're our front line there.

Washington Reporter:

That then leads to the obvious question here — the post by House Homeland Security Democrats, and their attempt to engage with you guys online. Obviously this backfired quite tremendously for them. What do you make of this post that seemingly implied that there was something amiss with you and your colleague, Tricia McLaughlin actually working to secure our borders?

Harry Fones:

Well, we do this as a team. But I think the funnier part is is that the Democrats are so disconnected from reality that they think that the actions the department is doing to secure our nation are unpopular and they wanted to take a quick pot shot at us, which, whatever, that's fine, because I've also seen the worst stuff that Democratic politicians have done. Every day they're demonizing our federal law enforcement inforcement. This led to a massive increase in assaults. ICE officers facing an 1000 percent increase in assaults and it is horrific. This is an easy tactic of them to try to scare folks, and it's wrong. They made fun of me. Some friends sent it to me, and then all of a sudden, my mentions started blowing up. They have tried to shame people for doing their jobs. Who cares that they're coming after me? I think it's far worse what they do to our law enforcement.

Washington Reporter:

You're a Maryland man. You're from Maryland. We saw how the left and a lot of media outlets work hand in glove on stories and narratives that lead to both the demonization and the physical assaults against ICE officers; you have dealt with Maryland politics in previous jobs of yours, and we just saw our senator, Chris Van Hollen, Congressman Kweisi Mfume, and others in Maryland fly down, seemingly our expense, to El Salvador. What did you make of that as both a native of Maryland and also in your current job?

Harry Fones:

The media pushes this narrative that any time we arrest somebody who doesn't have status here, it's an immediate sob story. And what you've seen, and this is one of the things that we highlight pretty regularly, is the type of people we’re arresting. We are going after the worst of the worst, and they tend to be criminals. And I think you're seeing a credibility problem for both the Democrats and the press as they jump in to defend these people. Look at the Maryland man, for example. When that came out, I wasn't exactly proud to be a Maryland man that day. This guy's a domestic abuser, he's now facing federal charges for human trafficking. Don't know if that's the kind of person you want to put stock into defending, but they did.

Washington Reporter:

Why do you think that is?

Harry Fones:

I think that they have such a derangement syndrome when it comes to anything the Trump Administration is doing, that they just have to assume what we're doing is bad. They have always tried to run this playbook, and they don't like the fact that we are enforcing this nation’s laws, so they want to create sob stories, and they're finding that it's backfiring quite a bit.

Washington Reporter:

We've seen the Democrats obviously try and engage more, be online more, appeal to young men more. What do you think the decision to, as you would say, poke fun at you and Tricia with this post in particular, says about the priorities of the Democrats? The Homeland Security Committee is not one where you would think that this would be a wise move for the Democrats on that committee to try and shame the people whose job it is to secure the homeland.

Harry Fones:

They're very lost because their normal tactics are not working. You're seeing the support for us. You saw the support with the election, there's a mandate for us to carry out the promises of the president, which is to secure this nation. They don't have a compelling message against that. Again, they're spending every day defending some of the worst of the worst people. They're people who normal folks would not want living in their neighborhood, and that's what they're choosing to defend. So I'm kind of going to just go ahead and say that they probably just don't have the best judgment on this one.

Washington Reporter:

Finally, what is the favorite response to their tweet?

Harry Fones:

That's a hard one. The one that made me laugh is how many folks thought I played football and I never played football, I played rugby. That made me chuckle.

Washington Reporter:

Well, we are lucky to have you not on the football team, but on on Team USA making us safer every day.