WASHINGTON (TNND) — In the wake of last week’s deadly shooting of two D.C. National Guardsmen and mounting data showing rising attacks on law enforcement, the House Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday examined what officials say is a sharp increase in threats and violence against officers across the country.

The hearing came amid growing concern that anger over President Donald Trump’s crime-crackdown and immigration policies is increasingly being directed at rank-and-file officers and agents tasked with carrying them out. (TNND)

“What we are seeing today is unprecedented in scope and intensity,” one witness testified.

The hearing came amid growing concern that anger over President Donald Trump’s crime-crackdown and immigration policies is increasingly being directed at rank-and-file officers and agents tasked with carrying them out. Authorities say the shooting of two National Guardsmen in Washington last week is one recent example.

“Those who wear the badge are human beings, whose dedication to safeguarding our country should never make them targets,” Committee Chairman Rep. Andrew Garbarino, R-N.Y., said.

According to the Fraternal Order of Police, 352 law enforcement officers were shot nationwide in 2024, 50 of them fatally. Data from the Department of Homeland Security shows a 1,150 percent increase in assaults and acts of violence against Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.

Jonathan Thompson, executive director and CEO of the National Sheriffs’ Association, sharply criticized rhetoric he said is contributing to the rise in hostility toward law enforcement.

“Calling officers Nazis and Gestapo — it better stop right now,” Thompson said. “You are inflaming dangerous circumstances.”

Lawmakers highlighted several recent comments from elected officials that critics say contribute to the climate. On MSNBC in September, Rep. Jasmine Crockett, D-Texas, likened ICE to “slave patrols.”

Rep. Delia Ramirez, D-Ill., has accused Department of Homeland Security agents of using “anonymity to terrorize our communities” and claimed they “lie” and “reject accountability.”

Other examples included Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., calling ICE a “terrorist force”; Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz comparing federal law enforcement actions to “Donald Trump’s modern-day Gestapo”; and Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker saying he viewed current events with “foreboding dread,” invoking “the specter of Nazis.”

“There are no Nazis acting in the law enforcement of this country,” Thompson said. “We are certainly not living in 1939 Germany. Dehumanizing rhetoric breeds violence.”

Democrats on the committee pushed back, arguing Republicans were ignoring politically motivated violence from within their own ranks, including the attack on police during the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol.

“Until Republicans are willing to acknowledge the problem on their side of the political spectrum and do something about it, their statements about protecting police officers are hypocritical,” said Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss.

Law enforcement experts at the hearing warned that rising hostility toward officers is deepening existing recruitment and retention challenges, which they say pose broader national security concerns.