The border czar couldn’t be bothered to show sympathy over the death of an elderly man in ICE custody
Published
July 1, 2025 7:50PM (EDT)
Former Acting Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Thomas Homan speaks at the 2024 Republican National Convention at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on July 17, 2024. (ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS/AFP via Getty Images)
Trump administration border czar Tom Homan brushed off reports of an elderly Cuban man dying in Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody.
Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Homan said he was “unaware” of the death of Isidro Perez, a 75-year-old man who suffered a heart attack after being detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement for more than two weeks.
“I’m unaware of that. I’m not aware of that. I mean, people die in ICE custody. People die in county jails. People die in state prisons,” Homan said. “What the question should be is how many lives does ICE save because, when they go into detention, we find many with diseases and stuff that we deal with right away to prevent death.”
Perez was taken into ICE custody following a raid in Key Largo on June 5, per an agency press release. He had lived in the United States since 1966. He was admitted into a Miami-area hospital on June 17 and released on June 25, a day before his death. Homan moved past the question on Tuesday, saying that ICE’s detention standards were “the highest…in the industry.”
“I’ll compare an ICE detention facility against any state prison, against any federal facility. I’ll go head-to-head with any of them. You go to ICE.gov and look at our detention standards. It’s the highest detention standards in the industry, at a very expensive cost to the taxpayers,” he said, the same date that Florida opened a tent-based detention facility in the middle of the Everglades. “Go look for yourself, then come back and talk to me.”
Q: “A 75 year old Cuban national died in ICE custody. He had lived in the U.S. for 60 years…Is there anything you can tell us about that?”
Border Czar Tom Homan: “People die in ICE custody. People die in county jails. People die in state prisons.” pic.twitter.com/sLtVKrWpxQ
— The Bulwark (@BulwarkOnline) June 30, 2025
By
Alex Galbraith
Alex Galbraith is a writer and editor based in New Orleans.
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