The Senate Must Not Fund ICE

The money fueling ICE’s abuses comes directly out of the pockets of working Americans who are already struggling.

By Sonali Kolhatkar, OtherWords

More Americans now support abolishing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) than keeping it.

A January 13, 2026 Economist/YouGov poll found that 46 percent want to eliminate ICE, compared to 43 percent who support preserving it. It’s a trend that’s been growing since ICE agents have been running rampant in U.S. cities during Donald Trump’s second term.

A majority of Americans in 2024 backed strict immigration enforcement, so this surge in anti-ICE sentiment likely stems from the agency’s draconian crackdown on immigrants, protesters, citizens, and even children. Most recently, federal agents shot and killed an ICU nurse named Alex Pretti in Minneapolis when he came to the defense of other protesters.

Pretti was only the latest casualty. On New Year’s eve, a Black man named Keith Porter was killed in Los Angeles, allegedly at the hands of an off-duty ICE officer with a documented history of abusing children and being racist and homophobic.

A week later in Minneapolis, ICE officer Jonathan Ross shot and killed a white woman named Renee Good in an incident that galvanized the nation.

During the same crackdown, ICE agents dragged an elderly Hmong American man into the street in his underwear in frigid temperatures after invading his home and terrorizing his family. Other agents tear-gassed a family of eight trying to get home from their son’s sporting event, causing their infant child to lose consciousness.

These are just the documented incidents involving U.S. citizens. Meanwhile, immigrant children as young as 5 years old are being targeted and detained, and dozens of non-citizens have died in ICE custody.

Senators who believe in compassion and human rights have a unique opportunity to pull back the agency’s powers by refusing to back an appropriations bill passed by the House of Representatives. That bill, according to the ACLU, “would renew ICE’s excessive budget, with no strings attached, adding to the over $170 billion in taxpayer funds already allocated for immigration enforcement in July 2025.”

Although seven House Democrats voted for the bill alongside Republicans, a majority of Democrats voted against it and there are even rumblings within the party to support the idea of eliminating the agency altogether. Rep. Delia Ramirez (D-IL) recently introduced legislation to that effect.

Abolishing ICE is not only good for human rights in the nation — it would also free up funding for such critical needs as healthcare. “My position has always been clear that ICE funding should be cut,” explained Rep.  Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) after Good was shot, adding: “the cuts to your healthcare are what’s paying for this.”

She’s right. Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” deeply slashed Medicaid funding and allowed subsidies that lowered healthcare costs for Affordable Care Act plans to expire at the same time it hiked ICE funding to historic levels.

ICE funding comes out of the pockets of all working Americans — who are currently, absurdly, funding an agency with striking similarities to Hitler’s Brown Shirts. This comes at a time of continued economic insecurity for a majority of Americans.

For a microcosm of what it would look like to reverse the equation, look at New York City. In just a few weeks the city’s popular new mayor, Zohran Mamdani, who has clearly stated his desire to abolish ICE, has taken actionable steps toward affordable housing, universal childcare, and other bread-and-butter issues.

Imagine living in a nation where, instead of pouring our collective resources into hurting and killing our fellow human beings, we pay to house, feed, clothe, educate, and care for one another.

The Senate now faces such a choice. It was only after Pretti was killed that Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer signaled his party would take a stand and block the vote.

This can and should be the first step toward eliminating ICE altogether.