Border Czar Says More Funding Is Needed for Crackdown on Illegal Immigration

Tom Homan is heading Trump’s immigration enforcement efforts.

White House 'border czar' Tom Homan speaks to the press outside the West Wing of the White House in Washington on Feb. 6, 2025. Ting Shen/AFP via Getty Images

The Trump administration’s crackdown on illegal immigration needs more funding, his border czar said on March 4.

“We need more beds, we need more enforcement assets, we need more air flights. This operation is going to cost money,” Tom Homan, the border czar, told reporters at the White House in Washington.

Homan said that the funding would help Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the agency he once led, and other departments locate and deport illegal immigrants.

The required money is significant but “it’s a one-time cost,” unlike the recurring payments for schools, hospitals, and other services for illegal immigrants, Homan said.

Trump, after his second term started on Jan. 20, signed executive orders aimed at curbing illegal immigration into the United States as well as deporting those already in the country illegally.

The number of encounters with illegal immigrants at the U.S.–Mexico border has dropped sharply since then, according to federal data.

“President Trump’s been a game changer,” Homan said, adding later that Trump secured the border “in a matter of weeks.”

Homan has been presiding over the effort to find and deport illegal immigrants in the U.S. interior.

The administration is still in its early days, but the number of arrests has been lower than the final months of the previous administration. Book-ins in January totaled 21,953, down from 22,123 in December 2024, and declined further to about 16,150 in February, according to ICE.

A higher number of arrests, though, are being made by ICE officers rather than Customs and Border Protection, signaling more operations inside the United States than at the border.

“President Trump and this Administration are saving lives every day because of the actions we are taking to secure the border and deport illegal alien criminals,” Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said in a recent statement.

The number of deportations has also been slightly lower under Trump. Officials recorded about 11,800 in January and 10,900 in February, down from 12,301 in December 2024.

Some 43,759 illegal immigrants are currently in custody, awaiting deportation or another action.

Homan said the efforts are going well, but require more funding.

“We’re hitting on all cylinders, but we need more money to do more,” he told reporters on Tuesday.

As part of the heightened enforcement, the Trump administration has been sending some of the most violent illegal immigrants to Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. Some of them have already been deported from Guantanamo Bay to nearby Venezuela.

The American Civil Liberties Union recently sued over the transfers to Guantanamo Bay, alleging they are illegal because the facility is in another country.

Homan said the transfers would continue.

“It’s the perfect place for the worst of the worst,” he said.