The heads of the agencies carrying out President Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda delivered a staunch defense of immigration enforcement operations in a three-hour testimony to Congress on Tuesday.
Todd Lyons, the head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, faced the bulk of the highly charged questioning, with Democrats scrutinizing him and Republicans offering broad support.
Lyons stood behind ICE’s tactics, refusing to apologize for the actions of his officers despite criticism that the enforcement operations have trampled on the rights of both immigrants and American protesters.
He was joined by the head of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Rodney Scott, and the director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Joseph Edlow, in speaking before the House Committee on Homeland Security in a hearing called after federal officers killed Alex Pretti and Renee Good in Minneapolis.
Their testimonies are unlikely to quell simmering tensions over the centerpiece policy of Trump’s second term, as his immigration campaign finds itself both flush with cash from a 2025 spending bill and falling in public support.
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A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said the administration will likely win its appeal of a lower court ruling that blocked the end of Temporary Protected Status for people from Honduras, Nepal, and Nicaragua. It paused the lower court ruling while the appeal moved ahead.
Attorneys for the TPS holders said the ruling placed thousands of people who had lived in the country for more than two decades at immediate risk of detention and deportation.
The secretary of Homeland Security can grant TPS to countries where conditions are deemed unsafe for return due to a natural disaster, political instability or other dangers. While it grants TPS holders the right to live and work in the U.S., it does not provide a legal pathway to citizenship.
The Trump administration has terminated TPS for tens of thousands of people as part of its mass deportation campaign.
Press secretary Karoline Leavitt didn’t rule out whether the president would grant Ghislaine Maxwell, the jailed associate of Jeffrey Epstein, clemency in exchange for her testimony.
“This is not something I’ve discussed with the president recently, because, frankly, it’s not a priority,” she told reporters during a White House briefing Tuesday. “He’s focused on many of the issues that the American people are dealing with and providing solutions to those issues.”
Maxwell’s lawyer has said she would be willing to cooperate with a House probe if the president grants her clemency.
It turns out Trump really does want one of the country’s top airports and train stations named for him.
Leavitt confirmed reports from last week that Trump told Democratic Senate leader Chuck Schumer he’d be willing to unfreeze $16 billion in funding for critical infrastructure projects in Schumer’s home state of New York if Schumer endorsed the idea of naming New York City’s Penn Station and Dulles airport in Virginia in Trump’s honor.
“It was something the president floated in his conversation with, with Chuck Schumer,” Leavitt said.
The Trump administration paused funding that would have allowed for building a long-delayed railway tunnel between New York and New Jersey after blaming congressional Democrats for last fall’s government shutdown.
Press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Lutnick “remains a very important member of President Trump’s team, and the president fully supports the secretary.”
Leavitt was questioned after Lutnick testified to Congress on Tuesday that he had met with Epstein twice after Epstein’s 2008 conviction for soliciting prostitution from a child. The statement contradicted Lutnick’s earlier claim that he had cut ties with the late financier after 2005.
Lutnick is the highest-profile U.S. official to face calls for his resignation from lawmakers in both political parties amid revelations of his ties to Epstein.
Leavitt said she did not know if the call had occurred, saying it is something that “may or may not have happened in 2006.”
According to a newly released document, the police chief in Palm Beach, Florida, told the FBI that he’d gotten a call from Trump in 2006 about Jeffrey Epstein and that Trump reportedly said, “Thank goodness you’re stopping him.”
Even though she couldn’t confirm the call, Leavitt said its reported contents confirmed Trump’s repeated claims that he ended his relationship with Epstein decades ago, and that he himself had done nothing wrong.
“This call, if it did happen, corroborates exactly what President Trump has said from the beginning,” Leavitt said.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said her briefing started late because she and the president were watching the new surveillance footage released by the FBI in the case.
“The president encourages any American across the country with any knowledge of the suspect to please call the FBI, who continue to assist state and local authorities who are leading this investigation on the ground,” Leavitt said. “And once again, I will reiterate that the prayers of this entire White House are with Savannah and her family at this time, and we hope this person is found soon and that her mother is brought home safely.”
Leavitt said the president’s reaction to the disappearance was “pure disgust.” She said he would like anyone involved to be punished to the “fullest extent of the law possible.”
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White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that Trump will hold an event Wednesday afternoon to “tout clean, beautiful coal” and lead a separate event on Thursday about ending a 2009 endangerment finding to regulate the greenhouse gases fueling climate change.
Coal has the dirtiest carbon footprint of the major fuels and is a significant source of planet-warming emissions, which scientists say are contributing to more extreme weather, including droughts, floods and wildfires.
But the administration has played down the health and financial risks of climate change while claiming that its efforts will lower energy and auto costs for the American public.
Leavitt said that the use of coal will lower electricity bills, while the EPA’s removal of the finding on greenhouse gases will create average savings of $2,400 for light-duty cars.
Affordability continues to be a top concern for voters going into this November’s midterm elections.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that the president and first lady Melania Trump will use the trip to meet with military families and special forces members who were involved in the U.S. ouster of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro last month.
Leavitt said both were “greatly looking forward to this visit.”
Democrats are accusing the Trump administration of using the National Park Foundation to solicit money from private donors under the auspices of celebrating the nation’s 250th birthday. They said the administration intends to use the money for some of the president’s pet projects, including his planned massive arch in the nation’s capital.
During a House subcommittee hearing on America’s 250th birthday, Democratic Rep. Maxine Dexter of Oregon voiced concern that a White House-led initiative is taking public money earmarked for a separate, congressionally chartered commission and co-mingling it with private donations. She also said the White House initiative is using the money to push “Christian nationalist propaganda.”
U.S. Rep. Jared Huffman of California accused Republican members of the committee of letting Trump “hijack the country’s 250th anniversary and sell access, hide his donors and rewrite history.”
The White House initiative, named Freedom 250, did not immediately respond to a request for details on its funding, but indicated that nonprofits are not required to disclose individual donors.
The case of Liam Conejo Ramos has sparked controversy over the administration’s crackdown in Minnesota.
Rep. Brad Knott, a Republican from North Carolina, asked Lyons about the case and whether the boy was used as bait to get one of the parents out of the house, as neighbors and school officials have alleged.
Lyons denied that, saying that DHS took care of the boy after his father fled.
He said the boy was upset and officers put him in a vehicle and played his favorite music for him. They later took him to McDonald’s, Lyons said.
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Noting that her New Jersey district will host matches in this year’s FIFA World Cup, Democratic Rep Nellie Pou asked Lyons if he would commit to pausing ICE operations during the events, saying it would “hurt this entire process” if visitors feared they may be “wrongfully incarcerated or wrongfully pulled out.”
Saying he realized her concerns, Lyons said his agency was “dedicated to the security of all our participants as well as visitors,” but did not commit to suspending operations.
Pou warned that “visitors’ confidence is plummeting” given federal activity ahead of the tourney.
Under questioning from Democrats, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick once again downplayed his relationship with Epstein during a Senate subcommittee hearing. He described their contact as a handful of emails and a pair of meetings that were years apart.
“I did not have any relationship with him. I barely had anything to do with him,” Lutnick told lawmakers.
But the recent release of case files on Epstein contradicted Lutnick’s claims on a podcast last year that he had decided to “never be in the room” with Epstein again after a 2005 tour of Epstein’s home that disturbed Lutnick and his wife.
Lutnick said Tuesday that he and his family actually had lunch with Epstein on his private island in 2012 and he had another hour-long engagement at Epstein’s home in 2011. Lutnick is the highest-profile U.S. official to face bipartisan calls for his resignation amid revelations of his ties to Epstein.
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Americans’ attitudes toward the future tend to shift when a new political party enters the White House. For instance, Democrats became more positive about the future after Biden won the presidency, while Republicans’ outlook soured.
Toward the end of Biden’s term and the start of Trump’s second term, Democrats’ optimism fell from 65% to 57%. Republicans grew more hopeful, but not enough to offset Democrats’ drop.
“The regime change in the White House almost certainly was a big driving factor in what’s happened,” said Dan Witters, the research director of the Gallup National Health and Well-Being Index. “And a lot of that was just because the people who identified as Democrats really took it in the chops.”
Democrats repeatedly brought up the issue of immigration enforcement officers wearing masks as they carry out their jobs.
Rep. Tim Kennedy, a Democrat from New York, pointedly asked Lyons if he would commit to making his officers take off their masks and requiring them to wear “standard uniforms with identifiable badges.”
Lyons answered with one word: “No.”
Kennedy called that a “sad response.”
“People who are proud of what they do aren’t hiding their identity,” Kennedy said.
Lyons has said repeatedly that he supports officers who feel that they need to wear a mask to protect their identities and their families.
Todd Lyons got into a heated exchange with Rep. Dan Goldman, D-N.Y., who was comparing masked ICE agents to the actions of those in Nazi Germany and the former Soviet Union.
The ICE chief interjected that the congressman was asking “the wrong type of questioning,” but Goldman cut him off.
“If you don’t want to be called a fascist regime or secret police, then stop acting like one,” Goldman said.
“This is not the America I know and love,” he said.
Goldman went on to call explanations as to why federal immigration agents were wearing masks during operations due to fears of doxing “outright bogus.”
The CIA is changing the way it buys technology from the private sector.
The new procurement rules announced by CIA Director John Ratcliffe on Monday are designed to hasten the evaluation and authorization of new private contractors. The CIA often works with private tech companies on specialized software and equipment for the agency’s classified work, with the relationships governed by rigorous procurement and security regulations.
Speeding up the process of vetting and implementing private sector partnerships will help the CIA keep up as technology transforms the intelligence field. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has announced a similar effort for the Pentagon.
“CIA’s rapidly evolving mission demands a radical shift towards a culture of speed, agility, and innovation,” Ratcliffe said in a statement announcing the changes.
The Trump administration has revoked the U.S. visas of two Pacific island politicians over charges they engaged in significant corruption while in office.
The State Department announced Tuesday that it had rescinded visas for the president of Palau’s Senate, Hokkons Baules, and Anderson Jibas, the former mayor of a Marshall Islands community that includes the well-known Bikini atoll where U.S. nuclear testing took place decades ago. The revocations also include their immediate family members.
The department said that Baules had accepted bribes in exchange for advocating on behalf of Chinese government, business and criminal interests. It said Jibas had stolen or otherwise misused U.S. taxpayer funds intended to compensate survivors and descendants of the nuclear testing in the 1940s and 1950s.
Palau and the Marshall Islands are independent Pacific nations, though they hold close ties to the U.S.
The special election is being held to fill the seat vacated when Mikie Sherrill stepped down to become governor.
Analilia Mejia overtook Malinowski by a narrow margin on election night. The Associated Press has not yet called the race.
“I look forward to supporting her in the April general election,” former congressman Tom Malinowski said in a statement.
All three counties in the district report some mail-in ballots yet to be processed. Also, mail-in ballots postmarked by election day can arrive as late as Wednesday and still be counted.
She had the endorsement of noted progressives, including Sanders, an independent from Vermont, and U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York.
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The Trump administration admitted that it mistakenly deported the Babson College student to Honduras. But U.S. Attorney Leah Foley said it won’t return Any Lucia Lopez Belloza because immigration officers followed both the law and the Constitution in enforcing her removal order.
Foley said in court filing Friday that to obtain a student visa as the judge suggested, Belloza must show she was allowed into the country, which she can’t due to the removal order. And she said only consular officers — not Secretary of State Marco Rubio — have the authority to an issue a student visa.
The 19-year-old freshman was detained and deported as she prepared to fly from Boston to Texas to surprise her family for Thanksgiving. Her lawyer Todd Pomerleau said the government’s response “spills a lot of ink on the difficulty of a student visa, but it fails to address the numerous simple solutions available to itself to rectify its ‘mistaken’ deportation.”
A federal judge has blocked part of a California law that would ban federal immigration agents from covering their faces, but ruled that the agents are required to wear clear identification showing their agency and badge number.
Judge Christina Snyder said she issued the initial ruling Monday because the state’s mask ban as enacted doesn’t also apply to state law enforcement authorities, discriminating against the federal government. She said future legislation would pass muster if it applies to all law enforcement agencies.
“The Court finds that federal officers can perform their federal functions without wearing masks,” she wrote. The ruling will go into effect Feb. 19.
California became the first state to ban most law enforcement officers from wearing facial coverings. The Trump administration’s challenge argues that the law threatens the safety of officers facing harassment, doxing and violence, and violates the Constitution because the state is directly regulating the federal government.
They’re saying the country would be less safe if federal funds expire at the end of the week, and the agency enters a shutdown.
Republicans listed the tens of thousands of employees who would go without paychecks — from the Transportation Security Administration, Federal Emergency Management Agency and others, including ICE and Border Patrol.
“It will have a great impact,” said Lyons, the acting ICE director. He said a shutdown would particularly harm the department’s task forces on transnational crimes and terrorism.
Democrats are pushing for restraints on ICE operations as part of negotiations over funding.
During a pointed exchange, Lyons declined to apologize to the families of Good and Pretti, or comment on the Trump administration’s claims that the two Americans killed during protests over the immigration enforcement actions in Minneapolis were involved in domestic terrorism.
Lyons said he welcomed the opportunity to speak to the families, but would leave the comments to others in the administration.
Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., pressed him to resign. Lyons declined.
Republican Sen. Susan Collins announced her reelection bid Tuesday, betting that she can hold onto her Maine seat despite a renewed Democratic effort to oust her amid immigration enforcement in the state.
The 73-year-old has won five terms by casting herself as a reflection of Maine’s independent spirit, occasionally clashing with Trump while largely supporting his agenda.
Now Collins faces outrage over immigration enforcement tactics that could become a political liability for Republican candidates across the country. In Maine, hundreds of arrests included people who have no criminal records.
Collins has taken credit for stopping the enforcement surge in Maine by speaking directly with Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. Democrats accused her of not going far enough. Gov. Janet Mills and oyster farmer Graham Platner are leading candidates to unseat Collins.
Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas said he “commended” the decision to replace Gregory Bovino as Trump’s point person on large-scale immigration crackdowns with border czar Tom Homan, “a consummate professional.”
McCaul went on to ask Lyons if he felt Homan’s presence was bringing the situation “under control.”
Lyons turned his response toward referencing people who have protested the agents’ actions, noting a “de-escalation in the fact that the protests ... have subsided, and ICE has been allowed to do their targeted, intelligence driven enforcement operation.”
Speaker Mike Johnson says he’ll be meeting with Senate Majority Leader John Thune in the afternoon to discuss the GOP’s options regarding a Homeland Security funding bill.
Congress has funded DHS through Feb. 13th. Democrats are demanding changes to ICE as part of a spending bill. Johnson said he’s optimistic about avoiding a shutdown of the agency.
“I’m very hopeful. I mean, we still have some time on the clock. When there’s a will there’s a way.”
He also was highly critical of Democrats, and said it’s the workers at agencies such as FEMA, Secret Service, TSA and the Coast Guard who would be most affected by a funding lapse.
“The reason they are in the Homeland Security bill is because those are the agencies charged with keeping Americans safe,” Johnson said. “Why would Democrats play political games with that?”
With Trump’s push to nationalize elections, Thompson asked the officials to answer directly if they are involved in any efforts to show up and guard voting precincts, with the midterms set for later this year.
Lyon and Scott each replied, “No, sir.”
Joseph Edlow honed in on fraud in his opening remarks, saying his Citizenship and Immigration Services agency has made more than 33,000 fraud referrals to law enforcement over last year.
“Fraud isn’t just a paperwork issue, it’s a national security and public safety concern,” Edlow said.
He also advocated for an end to multiple deportation protections, including temporary protected status. The Trump administration has aggressively sought to remove TPS, exposing hundreds of thousands of more people to removal as part of the administration’s wider, mass deportation effort.
Todd Lyons, the acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, says officers will not be dissuaded from their mission — even in the face of intimidation from the public.
“The family of ICE personnel have been made to feel unsafe in their homes,” he testified.
He said even his own family has faced harassment. But he warned that those trying to intimidate ICE officers “will fail.”
“We are only getting started,” he said.
The ICE director listed statistics to show how well his agency has been carrying out the president’s immigration agenda. Lyons said ICE had conducted 379,000 arrests, and removed over 475,000 people from the country in 2025.
“The president tasked us with mass deportation, and we are fulfilling that mandate,” Lyons said.
He also said the money provided by Congress is enabling the agency to increase how many people it can detain at any one time and beef up the number of daily removal flights.
JD Vance and Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev held up the signed document to applause from the audience of government officials, and delivered brief statements but took no questions from journalists in the room.
Vance said the U.S. relationship with Azerbaijan is an “underappreciated but very, very important partnership and friendship for the United States.” He said the signatures make clear the partnership is “one that will stick, is one that would continue to produce great fruits for both of our peoples.”
Aliyev said the partnership opens new opportunities for cooperation with the United States.
“For us it’s a great honor to be a strategic partner to the most powerful country in the world,” he said.
Rodney Scott, who leads Customs and Border Protection, stressed in his opening statement that border agents work “tirelessly” to keep Americans safe, touting improvements to the U.S.-Mexico border wall and land entry points.
Scott said the billions of dollars in funding from Trump’s tax cuts bill have led to improved immigration enforcement, citing the drop in border crossings and rise in narcotics seized.
“This is what having a secure border looks like,” he said.
But Scott also took issue with what he called “an unprecedented level of aggressive interference and intimidation” against federal officers in the course of doing their jobs. He said these “attacks” on federal officers have been “coordinated and well funded.”
From left, Rodney Scott, commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Joseph Edlow, director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and Todd Lyons, acting director of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, are sworn in during a House Committee on Homeland Security oversight hearing of the Department of Homeland Security: ICE CBP and USCIS, on Capitol Hill, Tuesday, Feb. 10, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Tom Brenner)
From left, Rodney Scott, commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Joseph Edlow, director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and Todd Lyons, acting director of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, are sworn in during a House Committee on Homeland Security oversight hearing of the Department of Homeland Security: ICE CBP and USCIS, on Capitol Hill, Tuesday, Feb. 10, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Tom Brenner)
From left, Rodney Scott, commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Joseph Edlow, director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and Todd Lyons, acting director of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, are sworn in during a House Committee on Homeland Security oversight hearing of the Department of Homeland Security: ICE CBP and USCIS, on Capitol Hill, Tuesday, Feb. 10, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Tom Brenner)
People gather during a protest against immigration enforcement operations after Kristi Noem, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, spoke at the border Wednesday, Feb. 4, 2026, in Nogales, Ariz. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)
Kristi Noem, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, speaks at the border with Mexico Wednesday, Feb. 4, 2026, in Nogales, Ariz. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)
People gather for a memorial honoring Renee Good, who was fatally shot by a federal agent, in Minneapolis, Saturday, Feb. 7, 2026, . (AP Photo/Ryan Murphy)
FILE - Federal agents walk down a street while conducting immigration enforcement operations, Thursday, Feb. 5, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Ryan Murphy, File)
