‘Inhumane:' Latinas for Trump founder condemns White House immigration crackdown
'This is not what we voted for,' State Sen. Ileana Garcia said in a statement on Saturday. 'I have always supported Trump, through thick and thin. However, this is unacceptable and inhumane.'
The public remarks from one of Trump's longtime supporters come as the president's immigration policies cause stress and uncertainty in South Florida. Trump's executive orders and the Department of Homeland Security's actions have targeted hundreds of thousands of immigrants in the region, including Cubans and Venezuelans — communities that threw their support behind Trump during the November election, helping him win Miami-Dade County.
As top White House aide Stephen Miller reportedly demands 3,000 immigration arrests a day, federal agents in Miami and across the U.S. are swooping into courthouses to detain people and place them in quick deportation proceedings that don't require a judge.
With Trump casting a wider immigration-enforcement net, Latino Republicans in South Florida are balancing their support for the White House and their constituents. Next week, Miami's GOP delegation in Washington is slated to meet with Trump's Homeland Security secretary.
READ MORE: ICE agents in Miami find new spot to carry out arrests: Immigration court
'I understand the importance of deporting criminal aliens, but what we are witnessing are arbitrary measures to hunt down people who are complying with their immigration hearings—in many cases, with credible fear of persecution claims—all driven by a Miller-like desire to satisfy a self-fabricated deportation goal. This undermines the sense of fairness and justice that the American people value,' said Garcia.
Garcia criticized Miller, widely considered the architect of Trump's immigration agenda. She said in the statement that her parents, Cuban refugees, 'are now just as American, if not more so than Stephen Miller.'
'I will not back down. I am committed to being vocal and proactive in seeking real solutions, not engaging in grandstanding like Stephen Miller,' she told the Miami Herald over text.
In a statement, White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson defended the administration's record, saying that 'any illegal alien who is deported from the United States receives due process, and if they have pending asylum claims they are adjudicated by USCIS prior to any removal.'
'President Trump is fulfilling his promise to deport illegal aliens and the American people are grateful,' she said.
She also noted that Trump was the first GOP presidential candidate in nearly four decades to flip Miami-Dade County, pointing to a CBS/YouGov poll conducted one year ago that shows 53% of Hispanics supported starting a program to deport all undocumented immigrants. A more recent UnidosUS study from April found 78% of Hispanics said the Trump administration should focus on deporting dangerous criminals, not law-abiding undocumented immigrants who are long settled in the U.S.
Garcia's statement came a day after GOP Rep. María Elvira Salazar — a strong Trump supporter whose district Garcia represents in Tallahassee — made her own public declarations about the federal immigration agenda. In a separate statement, Salazar said that people navigating their immigration cases, like pending asylum or green card petitions, deserved to 'go through the legal process.'
Salazar, who is Cuban-American, described herself a proud Republican and said that the administration must fulfill President Trump's promises to 'kick out every criminal here illegally.'
But she said the 'uncertainty' in her largely-Hispanic district had left her 'heartbroken' and said recent measures threatened due process.
'I will always stand with justice and with our community,' Salazar wrote on X.
Salazar said that the Miami delegation in Congress, which includes Reps. Carlos Giménez and Mario Díaz-Balart, will be meeting with Department of Homeland Security Kristi Noem next week. The lawmakers have been requesting a meeting with Noem for weeks.
Garcia has supported Trump since his first bid for the office in 2016 and created Latinas for Trump to rally Hispanic women behind the president. She also served as a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security during Trump's first term in office.
On Saturday, Garcia said over text that she hoped to meet with the president, who she described as sympathetic to Cuban political refugees from Cuba and immigrants who came to the United States as children.
'While I stand by my support for him, I will call out harmful actions when necessary,' she said. 'And finally, this isn't about regrets; I have none. It's about addressing issues directly and taking responsibility.'
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