CNN: DHS issues new guidance for lawmakers visiting ICE facilities after tense confrontations

After a spate of tense encounters involving lawmakers at Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities, the Department of Homeland Security is asking members of Congress to provide 72 hours of notice before visiting detention centers, according to new guidance.

Under the annual appropriations act, lawmakers are allowed to enter any DHS facilities “used to detain or otherwise house aliens” to inspect them as part of their oversight duties. The act outlines that they are not required “to provide prior notice of the intent to enter a facility.”

The agency’s new memo also seeks to differentiate ICE field offices from detention facilities, noting that “ICE Field Offices are not detention facilities” and therefore do not fall under the appropriations act provision.  

Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, the top Democrat on the Homeland Security Committee, called the move “unprecedented” and an “affront to the Constitution and Federal law.”

https://www.cnn.com/2025/06/19/politics/dhs-ice-visits-congress-lawmakers

The Hill: GOP senator criticizes Padilla being wrestled to floor

North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis (R) on Wednesday criticized the forceful removal of Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) from a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) press conference last week, while also critiquing his “inappropriate” behavior.

 Tillis said the incident, which followed a handful of escalations with Democratic lawmakers, was “disgusting” during a speech on the floor.

“There were clearly people in that building that knew he was a U.S. senator. So the minute he was removed from that situation in that briefing room, then they should have treated him with respect and allowed him to disperse,” Tillis said Wednesday.

“It was disgusting to me to see somebody wrestle to the floor, anybody, but particularly a U.S. senator that’s in a federal building,” he added.

https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/5357540-thom-tillis-alex-padilla-press-conference

Axios: Senate Democrats press Hegseth on domestic military deployment plan

Senate Democrats on Wednesday demanded the Trump administration to share its plans to deploy active duty military in cities across the U.S.

President Trump’s decision to send active duty Marines and National Guard to Los Angeles following pro-immigrants’ rights protests sparked more demonstrations nationwide.

  • Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem sparked additional backlash after she said the goal is to “liberate” Los Angeles from its elected Democratic leaders during a press conference where Sen. Alex Padilla was forcibly removed.
  • Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth suggested that the Trump administration would not respect district court orders to disband troops, but that it would abide by a Supreme Court ruling.

“I have been deeply disturbed and alarmed by the use of active-duty troops, Marines in Los Angeles,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) said.

  • “And President Trump has made clear his intentions to continue to use the military to suppress dissent and likely inflame tensions there and elsewhere all under the guise of enforcing the law. What he’s doing may well be illegal.”
  • Hegseth pushed back on the claim that the deployments have been illegal, but he did not confirm whether contingency plans were in place for using military in other cities.

“I take it from your answer that you do have contingency plans for the use of military in other cities,” Blumenthal said.

Hegseth did not address Blumenthal’s request.

Hegseth is a slimy, slippery snake who will never give an honest answer to a direct question.

https://www.axios.com/2025/06/18/hegseth-senate-testimony-blumenthal-military-domestic-protests

Associated Press: California senators demand Trump immigration officials stop using Medicaid data

California’s two U.S. senators demanded on Wednesday that the Trump administration stop using personal data of millions of Medicaid enrollees — including their immigration status — as part of its sweeping deportation campaign.

In a letter to top administration officials, Democratic Sens. Adam Schiff and Alex Padilla expressed alarm over an Associated Press report last week that detailed how deportation officials had obtained the sensitive data over the objections of career health officials. They wrote that health officials needed to stop sharing the information and that the Department of Homeland Security should “destroy any and all such data” it had obtained.

The AP reported that CMS transferred the data last week to DHS officials. Internal CMS records obtained by the AP showed the Medicaid agency fought the request, arguing that sharing the data would violate rules and federal law. Trump appointees overruled them, giving CMS a 54-minute deadline to share the information with DHS, according to emails obtained by AP.

“We are deeply troubled that this administration intends to use individuals’ private health information for the unrelated purpose of possible enforcement actions targeting lawful noncitizens and mixed status families,” the senators wrote.

https://apnews.com/article/immigration-medicaid-trump-deportation-padilla-schiff-california-a7a701026de1f954cfbdf545a7d91cb8

Mediaite: ‘Disgusting’: Republican Senator Rips Federal Agents Who ‘Wrestled’ U.S. Senator to the Floor, Urges Civility From Politicians

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) gave an impassioned speech on the Senate floor on Wednesday, denouncing federal agents detaining and wrestling Sen. Alex Padilla (D-CA) to the floor as “disgusting” – while also urging leaders to act with restraint and civility instead of trying to “trend on social media by getting in somebody’s face.”

Problem is, our Grifter-in-Chief and his band of sycophants thrive on insulting and diminishing others. Unless Trump is impeached or kicks the bucket, these behaviors will be par for the course until 2029.

CNBC: NYC mayoral candidate Brad Lander arrested by ICE

New York City Comptroller and Democratic mayoral candidate Brad Lander was arrested Tuesday by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents while he was escorting a defendant out of immigration court.

“While escorting a defendant out of immigration court at 26 Federal Plaza, Brad was taken by masked agents and detained by ICE,” Lander’s wife, Meg Barnette, wrote on X.

Lander repeatedly asked the officers to show him a judicial warrant before he is handcuffed, per the video posted by Barnette.

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/06/17/brad-lander-ice-mayoral-comptroller.html

Newsweek: Did Senator ID himself when Kristi [Bimbo #2] Noem’s guards wrestled him?

Video footage posted to Padilla’s account on X, formerly Twitter, showed the senator identifying himself, but he appeared to do so after he began approaching the podium and was blocked by agents.

“I am Senator Alex Padilla. I have questions for the secretary,” Padilla said before agents pushed him into a hallway, where FBI agents forced him to the ground and placed him in handcuffs. The senator was released shortly after.

The customary lies and misrepresentations from Bimbo #2 Noem:

In an interview with Fox News, [Bimbo #2] Noem said Padilla “did not identify himself and was removed from the room.”

“This man burst into the room, started lunging toward the podium, interrupting me and elevating his voice and was stopped,” [Bimbo #2] Noem said. “Did not identify himself and was removed from the room. So as soon as he identified himself, you know, appropriate actions were taken.”

“I had a conversation with the senator after this,” she continued. “We sat down for 10 to 15 minutes and talked about the fact that nobody knew who he was. He didn’t say who he was until he already had been lunging forward, and people were trying to detain him for quite a period of time.”

[Bimbo #2] added, “He was never arrested. Nobody knew who he was when he came into the room creating a scene.”

But:

Padilla said in a video posted on his social media channels: “I introduced myself. ‘I’m Senator Alex Padilla, and I have a question.’ And it took all of a second for multiple agents to forcibly remove me from the room, to pin me on the ground and handcuff me.”

https://www.newsweek.com/did-senator-alex-padilla-id-himself-kristi-noem-guards-wrestled-2085009

Esquire: Somehow Republicans Are Defending Kristi Noem After the Forceful Removal of Senator Alex Padilla

I thought assaulting someone holding federal office was a crime. Not anymore, apparently.

So, apparently we’re bum-rushing US senators now. From The Guardian:

In video taken of the incident that has since gone viral on social media, Padilla is seen being restrained and removed from the room by Secret Service agents.“I’m Senator Alex Padilla. I have questions for the secretary,” Padilla shouts, as he struggles to move past the men removing him from the premises. “Hands off!” he says at one point.Emerging afterward, Padilla, who is the ranking member of the judiciary subcommittee on immigration, citizenship and border safety, said he and his colleagues had repeatedly asked DHS for more information on its “increasingly extreme immigration enforcement actions” but had not received a response to his inquiries.

This tinhorn governor of a state where nobody lives, this puppy-murdering hack whose political career outside of MAGA World was as dead as Custer, now gets to sic her black-shirted thugs on the senior senator of a state that she and her criminal boss and all their attendant lords have been lying about, and about which she had flown to Los Angeles to lie about some more.

Dumbass in a ballcap says what? She just admitted they’re blowing up the town to get rid of the mayor and governor. If the courts ever get their teeth back, this gaffe will figure prominently in many filings.

Meanwhile, Padilla is hauled into a backroom and driven to the floor and handcuffed.

And not for nothing, but threatening and/or assaulting the holder of any federal office is a felony and could draw you five to ten in the pokey. And these goons are pretty identifiable.

And, of course, the administration’s prevarication mill went into full operation almost instantly. From The New Republic via Yahoo:

In posts on X, the official DHS account and Assistant DHS Secretary Tricia McLaughlin released a statement attempting to justify wrestling Padilla to the ground and handcuffing him. “Senator Padilla chose disrespectful political theatre and interrupted a live press conference without identifying himself or having his Senate security pin on as he lunged toward Secretary Noem,” the statement read.

Tricia learned to lie like this at the AEI’s Leadership Institute.

But in a video of the altercation from Padilla’s office, the senator could be heard clearly identifying himself. “Hands off! I’m Senator Alex Padilla, and I have questions for the secretary,” said the California Democrat as a security guard pushed him out of the room.

It’s clear that the goons looked at him and just saw another angry brown face. And by their reactions, Tricia and her boss are similarly afflicted.

This is also all my bollocks. Noem knows who Padilla is and, if she doesn’t, she should, and he did identify himself. Third-rate hack with a fourth-rate alibi.

And what about Speaker Moses? What did you expect?

That sanctimonious sumbitch wants Padilla censured. And he spent the afternoon hiding. If he’s a Christian, I’m an Ostrogoth.

The day was not without its burlesque, however. In a House Oversight Committee hearing, Rep. Maxwell Frost asked Chairman James (Jughead) Comer to issue a subpoena for Noem regarding the events of the day. Comer, of course, refused, probably because Padilla was not carrying Hunter Biden’s laptop at the time. And then we were off.

https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a65058840/senator-padilla-kristi-noem-james-comer-marjorie-taylor-greene

Mediaite: CNN’s Erin Burnett Asks Padilla If Trump DHS Chief’s Agents Jacked Him Up ‘Because of How You Look?’

On Thursday night’s edition of CNN’s OutFront, Burnett picked up on a comment from CNN commentator Xochitl Hinojosa, and asked Padilla if his race had anything to do with the heavy-handed response:

BURNETT: I don’t know if you just heard what Xochitl was saying. She was saying that what she finds so unsettling as a Hispanic woman is that she feels that this happened to you because of how you look. And that as one of two sitting senators from California, those — those Secret Service agents would have known exactly who you were. And in fact, after you started talking, you said, “I’m Senator Alex Padilla”, and you said it multiple times.

Do you think that it was because of how you look?

SEN. ALEX PADILLA (D-CA): Look, I don’t know what the motives are. I think the point is this, Erin, and as I said, when I — when I came out of the building a little while after the incident, if this can happen to me, a United States senator representing the state of California, if this is how the Department of Homeland Security and the people around the secretary will treat a United States senator for having the audacity to ask a question, then imagine what they can do — imagine what they are doing to people in communities, not just throughout Los Angeles, but throughout the country.

Raw Story: Kristi [Bimbo #2] Noem called out over her ‘disturbing’ comments as Padilla was cuffed

The day after Sen. Alex Padilla (D-CA) was manhandled by homeland security secretary Kristi Noem’s security team before being forced to the ground and being handcuffed, MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin called out the Donald Trump appointee for her actions and comments as the lawmaker was dragged out.

Speaking with host Ana Cabrera, Rubin expressed her own disgust at the men who grabbed the lawmaker before taking aim at [Bimbo #2] Noem for continuing on as if nothing happened.

After watching footage of the incident, Rubin said she focused on what Noem complained about as the altercation took place.

Pointing out that Padilla “was escorted into that room DHS and an FBI agent flanking him, so clearly, somebody in the Department of Homeland Security was well aware that Alex Padilla was not only in the building, but in the room.”

“The idea that Alex Padilla was an attacker and was not recognized by people affiliated with Kristi [Bimbo #2] Noem, or that Kristi [Bimbo #2] Noem herself didn’t recognize Alex Padilla and stop herself to say, ‘Well, wait a second, that’s California’s senior senator, Alex Padilla, but instead continues on her way as he’s being escorted from the room and then pushed to the ground and handcuffed – that is an incredibly disturbing moment.”

“I don’t know if you could hear this,” she told Cabrera, “But as Kristi [Bimbo #2] Noem is continuing at her press conference, she’s talking about the danger of DHS agents being doxxed. I imagine that she was talking about the reasons for their wearing masks on the streets of Los Angeles and other places.”

“The idea that her concern was, in that moment, more about DHS agents being doxed while a sitting U.S. senator is being forcibly removed for nothing disruptive is chilling to the bone,” she remarked. “I saw that yesterday. I thought that I was incapable of more hyperbole, and I just don’t know where to muster it from anymore.”

What do you expect from a psychotic liar who shot her own family’s puppy and goat? All she cares about are herself and her Rollex. U.S. Senators being abused and brown people being disappeared are of no consequence to her.

https://www.rawstory.com/noem-2672365076