PHILADELPHIA — With ICE agents placed at Philadelphia International Airport, Philadelphia’s district attorney warned them to keep it peaceful.
Agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) were seen at the Philadelphia Airport on Tuesday — after the Trump administration placed them at major air-travel hubs during the TSA staffing shortage.
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Several passengers and witnesses — including one who put out a local ICE watch alert — said they observed ICE agents standing around while performing no clear duties at Philadelphia’s airport.
Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner said he witnessed the same. But he re-iterated his vow to prosecute ICE agents who break the law in Philadelphia.
“I will put you in handcuffs, I will put you in a courtroom and, if necessary I will put you in a jail cell if you decide to make the terrazzo floor of this airport anything like what you did in the streets of Minneapolis, which involved the criminal homicide of unarmed, innocent people,” Krasner said during a news conference at the airport.
In late January, Krasner said that any federal agent who violates Constitutional rights or breaks state law in Philadelphia will be held accountable. His statement came days after Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers shot and killed Alex Pretti during protests in Minneapolis.
The shootings of Pretti and Renée Good in Minneapolis — both at the hands of federal immigration authorities — led to the partial federal-government shutdown. The shutdown stems from disputes in Congress about reforms to federal immigration enforcement.
The conflict relates to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which includes TSA and ICE. TSA personnel have been working unpaid since the shutdown started Feb. 14, prompting a sizable portion of the agency’s workforce to quit or call out of work.
On Sunday, President Donald Trump announced that ICE agents would be placed in airports, pending the end of the shutdown. They were seen in about a dozen airports the next day.
Krasner blasted the Trump administration, saying ICE agents lack the specialized training to perform TSA duties.
“I think the Trump administration likes to break things,” he said. “They like to break norms. One of the norms that they like to break is that Americans don’t have the military in our face everywhere we go. We need our military. We respect our military. My dad was in the military. But we do not expect, as a democratic society, to have the military in our face everywhere we go. He’s trying to change that.”
Spokespeople for ICE and the Department of Homeland Security haven’t responded to Patch’s inquiry as of this writing.
“I cannot blame an ICE agent who has come here, is following orders and is standing in the corner basically doing nothing,” Krasner said. “They have simply followed orders on something that is lawful — stupid, but lawful. It’s not their fault, because the stupidity isn’t coming from them. It’s coming from above.”
Watch Krasner’s full remarks below: