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FIRST ON FOX: A decision on whom President-elect Trump will nominate to lead Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is expected within the coming days, sources familiar with proceedings tell Fox News Digital – ahead of what could be significant opposition to mass deportations from some Democratic states next year.
Discussions have been held at Mar-a-Lago this week, and a decision could be made as early as Friday. Whoever is nominated will require Senate confirmation.
Who is in the running is unclear. One source said on Thursday that there are still multiple candidates being discussed and that the Trump team has yet to whittle the list down.
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Sources had previously suggested that John Fabbricatore, a former ICE field officer, and Todd Lyons, currently leading the agency’s Enforcement and Removal Operation (ERO) unit in Boston, were among the top contenders. The transition team is understood to be looking for someone with a deep law enforcement background to lead the agency.
But Fabbricatore is now understood to be out of the running to lead the agency. Lyons is believed to be held in high regard within the agency and by a number of people on the transition team, given his leadership of the Boston unit and his teams’ work in chasing down criminal illegal immigrants who had been released from custody in the sanctuary city.
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Whoever leads the agency will be in the media and political spotlight in the next year as they spearhead what President-elect Trump has promised will be a historic mass deportation operation.
Trump has appointed former ICE Director Thomas Homan as “border czar,” and he is expected to take a leadership role in the efforts to secure the border and launch the mass deportation operation. He has also announced that South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem will be his nominee to lead the Department of Homeland Security.
The transition team has already been eyeing a significant expansion of detention in order to facilitate the operation, with an increase in beds and expanded detention capacity near major metropolitan areas.
Those efforts are already drawing significant opposition from Democratic officials in some states. The governors of Illinois, Arizona and Massachusetts have said they won’t assist the administration in the operation. But some Republican states have offered support, with Texas offering more than 1,400 acres of land to stage mass deportations near the border.