Three top Department of Homeland Security officials testified in front of the House Committee on Homeland Security today, largely deflecting critical questions about the violence federal agents are inflicting on communities—and justifying their actions through claims of ensuring public safety, as well as their own.
In a hearing that ran more than three hours, the DHS officials made weak commitments to transparency in federal enforcement to ensure public trust. But we have seen in states like Minnesota that this is far from the case, as the Trump administration doubles down on its cruelty. Local officials in Minneapolis have said that there hasn’t been a change in federal tactics, with people still being targeted without cause.
Listening to the officials speak, I was reminded that the brutality is the point. The Trump administration’s promise of transparency within DHS, which is resisting calls to meaningfully change blatantly unconstitutional practices, rings false—it's unlikely to result in accountability, especially when Congress has already funded what was already a largely unaccountable agency for twenty years.
Change has to happen.
—Alex Nguyen
|
