He is the face of President Trump’s mass deportation efforts of illegal aliens in our country. He is Border Czar Tom Homan. He is in charge of implementing President Trump’s immigration agenda and has promised to “run the biggest deportation operation this country’s ever seen.”

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Tom Homan was born on November 28, 1961, in West Carthage, New York, a small town in upstate New York. He describes his hometown as a patriotic, safe, and close-knit community of about 2,500 people. He wishes everyone could live in a safe community, like the one he grew up in. But he believes an insecure border, illegal immigration, and sanctuary cities and states are making that dream out of reach for many Americans and legal immigrants.

He feels blessed to have had a wonderful childhood with loving parents. His friends today are the same friends he had in childhood. He was raised Catholic and considers himself a devout Mass-goer. He received an associate degree in criminal justice from Jefferson Community College in Watertown, New York, and a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice from SUNY Polytechnic Institute.

You might say that law enforcement is the family business, as his dad and grandfather were both police officers in West Carthage. Mr. Homan became a police officer in West Carthage at age 22.

However, a year later, in 1984, he joined what was then called the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) as a border agent. After 9/11, INS was absorbed into the Department of Homeland Security and its responsibilities divvied up to three newly created agencies – U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol, and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

He has worked for six presidents

Mr. Homan has worked for forty years enforcing our country’s immigration laws. He began as a Border Patrol Agent in southern California under President Reagan. He then worked his way up through the ranks as a Special Agent and Deputy Special Agent in Charge on the southern border in Texas.

He was Executive Associate Director of Enforcement and Removal Operations for Immigration and Customs Enforcement under President Obama. During that administration, ICE carried out a record number of deportations.

During President Trump’s first term, Mr. Homan served as Acting ICE Director from January 2017. He was the first ICE Director to come up through the ranks.

During this time, Mr. Homan implemented President Trump’s “zero tolerance” immigration policy that separated children from their parents caught illegally crossing the border.

As a cop in West Carthage, he saw children separated from their parents when he arrested the parent for a crime. He defended the controversial policy, saying, “Those who choose to come between the ports of entry are committing a crime. Children and parents get separated every day across this country when a parent is charged with a criminal offense. It’s sad to see children cry when you take a parent out of a home, but because it’s sad, doesn’t mean that we ignore the law.”

He places the blame for this separation of families on parents who choose to break the law.

He retired in June of 2018 when the Senate never scheduled his ICE Director confirmation hearing. After retiring, he became a Fox News contributor and joined the Heritage Foundation.

In 2020, he wrote an eye-opening book based on his four decades in immigration enforcement called Defend the Border and Save Lives: Solving Our Most Important Humanitarian and Security Crisis.

In his book, he discusses the solutions to America’s illegal immigration problem, including closing asylum loopholes, finishing the border wall, defunding sanctuary cities and states, criminalizing visa overstays, and mandatory E-Verify.

President Trump’s Call

Mr. Homan worked for six presidents who all pledged to secure the borders, but he claims Pres. Trump was the only one who actually did. In his speech at the Republican National Convention (RNC), Mr. Homan praised President Trump, saying, “He created the most secure border in our history, and that’s a stone-cold fact,” he said. “And guess what? He’s gonna do it again.”

In his RNC speech, he advised illegals to “start packing now, ’cause you’re going home.” He warned the Mexican drug cartels that President Trump was “gonna wipe you off the face of the Earth. You’re done!”

Just 5 days after winning re-election, President-elect Trump called Mr. Homan. He tells the story to Miranda Devine on her podcast, Pod First One.

“I was out to dinner with my wife when my phone rang,” he says. “I looked down, and it said, POTUS. And my wife says, ‘He’s asking you to come back, isn’t he?’ So I walked outside and the first thing he says to me is, ‘You’ve been b****ing about it for four years. Come back and fix it.’ How do you say no?” Homan said.

In announcing Mr. Homan’s appointment as Border Czar, President Trump praised his former ICE Director.

“I am pleased to announce that the Former ICE Director, and stalwart on Border Control, Tom Homan, will be joining the Trump Administration, in charge of our Nation’s Borders (‘The Border Czar’),” Trump posted. “I’ve known Tom for a long time, and there is nobody better at policing and controlling our Borders. Likewise, Tom Homan will be in charge of all deportations of Illegal Aliens back to their Country of Origin. I have no doubt he will do a fantastic, and long awaited for, job.”

Tom Homan is NOT the ICE Director. He is the Border Czar, which does not require Senate confirmation. The current ICE Director is Acting Director Todd Lyons.

Biden deliberately unsecured the border

The federal statute on immigration is quite clear: If you show up at the border without proper documentation, or you do not enter through a proper checkpoint, or you overstay your visa, you are in the country illegally, and you will be detained.

“We’re just enforcing the law,” Homan comments.

If you don’t like the law, then change it, he often says. But Congress has yet to do so. “So when you hear a leftist say, if a person is ‘undocumented’ but has not committed a crime, they are not illegal, that is not true, Mr. Homan says. They have entered the U.S. illegally, which, in Mr. Homan’s position, is a criminal act.

Mr. Homan believes that Joe Biden is the first president in the history of this nation to purposefully unsecure the border. “Biden was handed the most secure border in my lifetime. It wasn’t through mismanagement or incompetence that illegals came in; it was deliberate and by design.”

When he worked for President Obama and Joe Biden was Vice President, there was a surge at the border. Obama built detention centers and residential centers. ICE detained people long enough to see an immigration judge to rule on their asylum status. It took about 40 days, and 90% lost their case because they didn’t qualify. They were then put on airplanes and sent home. President Obama deported 5.3 million illegals in his two terms.

But in the Biden administration, his DHS Secretary ordered ICE not to arrest anyone who was here illegally unless they were convicted of a serious crime.

According to Mr. Homan, people from over 180 countries were entering the U.S. illegally under Biden. He signed over 90 executive orders abolishing everything Presidents Obama and Trump had put in place to secure the border and deport illegal immigrants.

One of the most egregious Biden practices was feeding and housing illegals in hotels across the country. In doing so, the detention centers at the border looked empty. If empty, the administration could claim there was no surge or crisis at the border.

According to Mr. Homan, the Biden administration knew that 90% of illegals lost their asylum requests. Priority for hearings was given to those in detention centers, where 9 out of 10 were deported. But if they placed illegals in hotels, they were not considered detained, and their hearing would be in three, five, or seven years.

Liberals were “playing the long game,” says Mr. Homan. They were hoping a future administration would grant them all amnesty. What’s more, the Biden administration was also flying in illegals.

“Why would we go and pick them up in another country and fly them in unless they wanted to overwhelm the system?” asks Homan. “They sold this country off because of political power. There is no other reason why you would open the border. There’s only one reason you would do this, because you saw a future political benefit in doing so.”

President Trump is saving lives

Under Pres. Trump, illegal crossings are down 96%. In May of 2025, Border Patrol released ZERO illegals into the country!

But according to Mr. Homan, under Biden, 31% of women who make the journey through the cartels are sexually assaulted. That’s just the women who admit they were raped.

Children are sexually assaulted and trafficked. The Biden administration lost more than 320,000 children who crossed the border illegally without their parents. Most are released to unvetted “sponsors” who do not have to be family members. Many of these lost children become sex or work slaves.

The Biden statistics are harrowing, says Mr. Homan. Over a quarter of a million Americans dead from fentanyl. Over 4,000 people died during the journey. Over 400 people are on the terrorist watch list, but are allowed in. Over 2 million “illegal gotaways” entered illegally. These are people who are observed crossing the border illegally but are not caught.

So when President Trump enforces the law, illegal immigration quickly falls by 96%.

“How many women and children are not being raped and sexually assaulted?” Mr. Homan asks. “How many children are not drowning in the river? How much fentanyl is not getting in? If the border is closed, how many known sexual predators and gang members are not getting in? Secure borders save lives.”

President Trump’s immigration policies are much more humane than those of President Biden, he concludes. He challenges the Left, who defend their immigration and sanctuary policies as compassionate. “What is the downside to less sex trafficking of women and children?” he asks. “What is the downside to stopping terrorists, criminals, and gang members at the border? What is the downside of a secure border? They don’t answer me.”

“I’ve seen too much death”

Mr. Homan has been smeared by the left as cruel and heartless. But he has seen way too much tragedy to believe an open border is a good and humane situation.

The tragedy that haunts him is a May 2003 human smuggling incident in Victoria, Texas. Sheriff deputies had found an abandoned trailer truck. When they opened the back, they discovered 19 illegals dead from dehydration, including a five-year-old boy. At the time, Mr. Homan’s son was five years old. That incident changed him forever.

He wrote in his 2020 book, “It appeared that the father was embracing and comforting his son at the time of his death. Several survivors later testified that the innocent little boy was the first to perish, crying, ‘Daddy, Daddy, I’m dying.’ I knelt down and put my hand on his small head, and I prayed for him.”

“Don’t let anyone tell you that illegal immigration is a victimless crime. Our crisis on the border is actually hundreds of crises and crimes—every single day,” he also wrote.

He’s spoken to so many young girls who have been raped by drug cartel members. One girl he spoke with was just nine and had been raped multiple times by six different men.

He’s met with too many angel moms and dads whose children have died at the hands of illegals. “Talk about family separation. These families bury their children,” he says. “Where was Lakin Riley’s due process when she was murdered by an illegal, or 12-year-old Jocelyn Nungary’s?”

“I’ve seen so much tragedy at the border. So much death,” he says. “But I’m glad to be back and I’m not going away because I know how important it is to secure the border. We’re going to find every one of those missing children. We’re out there every day looking for them.”

He admits that he’s taken a lot of hate from the left. But just two weeks ago, they found a young girl of 14 pregnant and living with adult men and rescued her. So he’s not stopping, no matter what they say.

Death Threats

Mr. Homan is married with four children. But I am going to say very little about his family due to safety concerns. Mr. Homan and his wife are living apart because of the death threats he receives.

“My wife’s living separately from me right now… mostly because of the death threats against me,” he said. “She’s someplace else. I see her as much as I can, but the death threats against me and my family are outrageous.”

Mr. Homan has a security detail now because of the threats. He remains determined to make America safe, even in the midst of protests and riots. ICE is out there every day rounding up criminal aliens, and he says they’re not going to stop. ICE is enforcing the law.

“We have the most secure border in the history of our country thanks to Donald Trump. We’re removing a significant amount of security threats and more illegal aliens because of Donald Trump’s vision and leadership. I’m proud to work with him. I believe in what he’s doing,” says Mr. Homan, one of the fearless heroes of the Trump Administration

“When justice is done, it brings joy to the righteous, but terror to evildoers.” (Proverbs 21:15)

“For the Lord is a God of justice. Blessed are all who wait for Him.” Isaiah 30:18

“No weapon forged against you will prevail, and you will refute every tongue that accuses you.” Isaih 54:17 NIV)

Let Us Pray for Tom Homan

1. Pray for God’s protection – physical, spiritual, and emotional protection – for Tom Homan, his family, and all Border Patrol and ICE agents.
2. Pray for an end to illegal immigration in our country.
3. Pray that God would pour out His virtues of courage, integrity, perseverance, justice, and mercy on Mr. Homan and everyone involved in immigration enforcement.
4. Pray that God would give Mr. Homan a full measure of His wisdom and knowledge in his pursuit of the law.
5. Pray that Mr. Homan would not tire in his work and that God would strengthen and encourage him in the face of adversity.
6. Pray for an end to “sanctuary” policies in our cities and states so that justice, law, and order may return to the streets of America.
7. Pray for Mr. Homan’s faith to deepen and for him to grow closer to God. If he has not already, pray that he comes to a saving knowledge of Jesus.

Add your prayers for Tom Homan in the comments below.

Belinda Brewster analyzes cultural, political, and world events from a biblical worldview. Belinda’s passion is to equip, support, and encourage parents and grandparents who are courageously battling against the spiritual and cultural forces impacting children and grandchildren. Photo Credit: Gage Skidmore from Surprise, AZ, United States of America – Thomas Homan, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=157319996.