DHS Secretary Mullin Accuses Newsom and Other Democrats of Coaching Immigrants to Resist ICE; Offers Enforcement Trade to Cooperating States
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin says "Know Your Rights" campaigns run by Democratic officials teach immigrants to evade federal agents, while offering to pull ICE back from neighborhood arrests in states that hand over jail inmates.
The Number Both Sides Cite, and Why It Doesn't Mean the Same Thing Twice
Markwayne Mullin, the secretary of homeland security, says 70% of the people ICE arrests have a criminal background. Federal detention data shows 70.6% of people sitting in ICE detention have no criminal conviction at all[9]. Both numbers are real. They are just not measuring the same thing.
Mullin's figure counts arrest and charge histories — the flow of people ICE picks up on any given day. The detention figure, compiled by TRAC at Syracuse University, counts who is actually locked up on a given date: 46,436 of 65,765 people held as of July 11, 2026[9]. One is about who gets arrested. The other is about who ends up staying. That gap sits underneath almost everything else in this fight.
On Sunday, Mullin used his version of the number to make a public accusation. He said Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rep. Dan Goldman, and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass are circulating material that teaches immigrants how to resist ICE agents[1]. He pointed to a webinar, California's multilingual "Know Your Rights" guides, a video Goldman posted, and flyers handed out in Los Angeles[1]. A spokesperson for Newsom pushed back the same day, saying the guidance would not be needed if ICE agents were trained to respect people's constitutional rights[1].
What the Guides Actually Say, and Why That's the Real Argument
Nobody disputes that the webinars, guides, and flyers exist. California published its official "Know Your Rights" material through the governor's office in January 2026, in multiple languages[10]. The dispute is over what that material amounts to: basic legal education, or a tool for evading federal law.
The material mostly tells people to stay silent, not to open the door without a judge's warrant, not to run, and not to lie. Those instructions track real constitutional protections that already exist — the Fifth Amendment right to silence, and the Fourth Amendment rule that officers generally need a judge's warrant to force entry into a home. Newsom's office argues that explaining existing rights isn't obstruction; it's what a government owes the people living in it[1].
Mullin draws the line differently. He separates telling someone they may stay silent from telling them how to spot an approaching agent and block a door — in his framing, the second is operational help, not civics[1]. That distinction turns on a detail most guides are built around: the difference between an administrative warrant, signed by an ICE officer, and a judicial warrant, signed by a federal judge. Only the judicial kind allows agents to force entry into a home. An administrative warrant — the ICE Form I-200 or I-205 — authorizes an arrest, but not a forced entry. That's why the guides tell people to ask which kind of paper the officer is holding, and why DHS considers that instruction so damaging: for someone inside their own home, the honest legal answer is usually that ICE cannot come in without a judge's signature.
The Offer Underneath the Accusation
Alongside the accusation, Mullin repeated something he has floated before: he wants ICE to "become a transport more than the front line[2]." Under that plan, agents would pick people up at local jails instead of arresting them on the street or at work. In exchange, states and counties would hold people for ICE and hand them over, with DHS reimbursing the local cost[2][8].
The mechanism that makes this possible — or blocks it — is called 287(g). It's a formal agreement under which local police get trained and deputized to do specific immigration tasks, most often holding someone in jail on an ICE detainer until federal agents arrive. A detainer is a federal request, not a court order. Some sheriffs decline it outright; others who have honored it have been sued. That legal exposure is exactly the friction Mullin's reimbursement offer is aimed at closing[8].
There's a structural reason the federal government has to offer money rather than just issue an order. ICE is small compared to the country it covers, and depends on roughly 18,000 state and local agencies to hold people until agents show up. Under long-standing legal doctrine, Washington cannot force those local agencies to do its enforcement work — it can only pay them to cooperate. That's the same rule that has let states resist federal pressure on gun laws and marijuana policy. It's why the sanctuary fight and the price of cooperation are, legally, the same conversation.
And the sanctuary label is looser than either side's talking points suggest. Only Illinois, Oregon, and Vermont explicitly refuse to hand people over to ICE when they leave state prison. Transfers keep happening in plenty of states that call themselves sanctuaries, California included[8].
Two People Are Dead, and That's Reshaping the Tactics
In February 2026, DHS publicly demanded that California not release what it called 33,179 "criminal illegal aliens" from state and local jails[5]. Then, in July, ICE officers shot and killed two people — one in Maine, one in Texas — during vehicle stops[4][7]. President Trump directed ICE to keep using traffic stops after a brief pause[4][7]. Al Jazeera has tied at least nine deaths to the administration's immigration enforcement operations, alongside roughly 18 traffic-stop shootings[3][4].
Those deaths are doing real work on the policy itself. Street arrests and traffic stops are the most dangerous way to take someone into custody, for the officer and the person being arrested. Mullin's jail-based pickup plan would let ICE take custody at a controlled location instead — a shift NPR has described as ICE moving toward a "quieter" approach[6]. The administration is still committed to high arrest numbers. Jail transfers let it keep those numbers while cutting the footage of officers on residential streets that has driven public backlash[2][6].
Mullin also faces pressure from a different direction. Some on the right have accused him of going around President Trump to soften ICE tactics, treating any restraint as a retreat from the enforcement agenda he was appointed to run[13]. The White House has publicly insisted the underlying agenda hasn't changed[2].
The Fight Both Sides Have an Interest in Continuing
Nearly everyone in this dispute is also thinking about 2028. Newsom, Ocasio-Cortez, and the other Democrats Mullin named are widely discussed as future presidential contenders, and being singled out by a Trump cabinet secretary carries real standing with primary voters, not just political cost. Opposing ICE's tactics is close to a defining issue for the Democratic base right now.
For Mullin, the calculation runs differently but points the same way. He owns every ICE shooting politically, and he has faced hostile questioning in Congress over the deaths and over a detention-contracting plan he has admitted was mishandled[11]. A cooperation deal with even one large Democratic state would be a signature win. Coverage of the story split along predictable lines: Fox News framed the officials as helping migrants "evade" ICE[1], Al Jazeera filed it under human rights and migration with a running count of deaths[3][4], and NPR and the Boston Globe covered the same period mainly through the lens of the ICE shootings themselves[6][7]. What's harder to find in any of that coverage is the quieter overlap: ICE would rather make these arrests at the jail door than on the street, and sanctuary states already hand over more people than their label implies. The public argument over rights and lawbreaking is real. But the negotiation over what cooperation actually costs appears to be further along than the rhetoric admits.
Summary
On Sunday, August 2, 2026, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin accused a group of Democratic officials of teaching immigrants how to resist federal agents. He named California Gov. Gavin Newsom, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rep. Dan Goldman, and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass. Mullin pointed to specific items: a webinar, multilingual state guides, a video posted online, and flyers handed out in Los Angeles[1]. He said these materials show people how to spot ICE officers, block entry to a home, and refuse to answer questions.
Newsom's office rejected the charge. A spokesperson, Diana Crofts-Pelayo, said the guides would not be needed if the administration trained ICE officers on the public's constitutional rights[1]. "There is nothing more American than making sure everyone is aware of their rights," she said. California published its "Know Your Rights" material through the governor's office in January 2026[10].
Alongside the accusation, Mullin repeated an offer he has made before. He has said he would like ICE to "become a transport more than the front line" — meaning agents would pick people up at jails instead of arresting them in neighborhoods and at workplaces[2]. In exchange, states and counties would have to hold people for ICE and hand them over. DHS would reimburse local agencies for the cost.
The genuine dispute is not really about whether the guides exist. Both sides agree they do. The dispute is whether telling someone their legal rights counts as helping them break the law — and whether ICE's current tactics are lawful enough that resisting them is itself unlawful. A second, factual dispute runs underneath it: how many people ICE actually arrests are criminals. Mullin has said 70% of ICE arrestees have a criminal background. Federal detention data compiled by TRAC at Syracuse University shows 70.6% of the 65,765 people in ICE detention as of July 11, 2026 had no criminal conviction[9].
The Event
On Sunday, August 2, 2026, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin publicly accused Gov. Gavin Newsom, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rep. Dan Goldman, and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass of promoting material that teaches immigrants to defy ICE[1]. He cited a webinar, California's multilingual guides and sanctuary laws, a posted video, and flyers distributed in Los Angeles[1]. Mullin paired the accusation with a standing offer to shift ICE toward jail-based pickups in jurisdictions that cooperate, with federal reimbursement for local costs[2]. A spokesperson for Newsom, Diana Crofts-Pelayo, responded that the guidance would be unnecessary if ICE officers were trained to respect constitutional rights[1].
Undisputed Facts
- Markwayne Mullin was confirmed as Secretary of Homeland Security by a 54-45 Senate vote in March 2026, after serving as a Republican senator from Oklahoma[11].
- The California governor's office published "Know Your Rights" guidance for immigrants, released in January 2026 and available in multiple languages[10].
- Mullin has publicly said he would like to see "ICE become a transport more than the front line," with agents collecting people from local jails rather than arresting them in communities[2].
- Mullin has offered federal reimbursement to local police agencies that join the 287(g) task force program, covering salaries and benefits[8].
- In February 2026, DHS publicly called on California not to release what it described as 33,179 criminal illegal aliens from state and local jails[5].
- Two people were shot and killed by ICE officers in July 2026, in Maine and in Texas, prompting a brief pause in vehicle stops that President Trump then directed ICE to end[4][7].
- As of July 11, 2026, 46,436 of the 65,765 people held in ICE detention — 70.6% — had no criminal conviction, according to federal data compiled by TRAC at Syracuse University[9].
- Mullin has said the administration is considering halting international customs processing at airports in sanctuary cities, calling the plan "under active consideration"[12].
The Pressure
Strip away the moralizing and blame. What structural realities persist regardless of which narrative wins?
- Numbers versus optics
- The administration is committed to a high deportation count. Street arrests produce volume but also produce shootings, viral video, and lawsuits. Jail-based enforcement produces the same arrests with far less footage. Mullin's offer is best read as an attempt to keep the number and lose the picture[2][6].
- Washington cannot draft state police
- Federal law enforcement is small relative to the country. ICE depends on roughly 18,000 state and local agencies to hold people until agents arrive. Under longstanding anti-commandeering doctrine, the federal government cannot order them to do it — so it must buy the cooperation, which is exactly what reimbursement and 287(g) contracts do[8].
- The 2028 primary is already running
- Newsom, Ocasio-Cortez, and other named officials are all discussed as 2028 contenders. Being singled out by name by a Trump cabinet secretary is not purely a cost to them; it is national standing with Democratic primary voters. Both sides get something out of this exchange.
- Officer safety is a real constraint, not only a talking point
- Two ICE officers shot and killed people in July 2026, and there have been roughly 18 traffic-stop shootings during the crackdown[3][4]. Every such event triggers investigations, congressional hearings, and internal pressure. That risk pushes DHS toward jails regardless of who wins the rhetorical fight.
Material realityTwo mechanisms do most of the real work here, and both are worth understanding. The first is the difference between an administrative warrant and a judicial one. An administrative warrant — ICE Form I-200 or I-205 — is signed by an ICE officer, not a judge. It authorizes an arrest for an immigration violation, but it does not authorize forcing entry into a home. Only a warrant signed by a federal judge does that. This is why every "Know Your Rights" guide tells people to ask which kind of paper the officer has, and why DHS considers that instruction so damaging: for people inside a home, the correct legal answer is usually that ICE cannot come in. Mullin has committed to seeking judicial warrants for home and business entries, which narrows this gap[11]. The second mechanism is 287(g) — a written agreement under which local officers are trained and deputized to do specific immigration work, most often holding someone in jail on an ICE detainer until agents collect them. A detainer is a federal request, not a court order, which is why some sheriffs decline it and why some who honored it have been sued. Mullin's reimbursement offer targets exactly that friction[8]. Underneath the argument sit numbers both sides use. Mullin has said 70% of ICE arrestees have a criminal background — that counts arrest and charge histories, not convictions, and it measures the flow of new arrests. TRAC's count measures a different thing: who is sitting in detention on a given day. On July 11, 2026, that was 46,436 of 65,765 people, or 70.6%, with no criminal conviction[9]. The mirror-image 70% figures are not the same statistic, and neither one is false. Detention itself passed 70,000 people in January 2026[14]. And the sanctuary label is looser than either side admits: only Illinois, Oregon, and Vermont flatly refuse prison-to-ICE transfers, and transfers keep happening elsewhere[8].
Narrative as a weaponThree actors are actively shaping how you read this. DHS wants you to see a chain of causation: Democratic officials publish resistance material, immigrants resist, officers get hurt, and therefore the deaths belong to the officials — which conveniently makes the offer of jail-based enforcement look like the reasonable exit. Newsom and the officials he was grouped with want you to see the opposite chain: untrained agents violate rights, states inform residents of rights they already hold, and the accusation is an attempt to make basic legal information sound criminal. Both want the fight itself, because each side's base rewards it. A fourth party — the right flank of the president's own coalition — wants you to see Mullin as the story's weak link, softening enforcement behind Trump's back; that reading pressures Mullin against exactly the deal he is offering[13]. What almost no one on any side is advertising is the point of quiet agreement: ICE would prefer to do this at jail doors, sanctuary states already hand over more people than their label implies, and the negotiation over the price of that cooperation is further along than the public argument suggests.
How Each Side Sees It
Each major actor’s view — how it frames things, its underlying incentive, and how it’s materially affected. Tap a side to read it.
Frames it asMullin's core argument is about the rule of law and officer safety, not about speech. Federal immigration law is federal law, he argues, and a state cannot nullify it by teaching people to obstruct the officers enforcing it. He draws a line between telling someone they may remain silent and telling them how to identify an approaching officer and shut a door on him — the second, in his view, is operational help, not civics. His second argument is practical and is the strongest one he has: the most dangerous way to arrest someone is on a street or in a moving car. Jail pickups are safer for everyone. Two people were shot dead by ICE officers in July, and Mullin's answer is that sanctuary laws forced ICE into the streets in the first place[2][7]. Hand people over at the jail door, he argues, and ICE never needs to make the traffic stop. He also cites his own reforms as proof of good faith — he committed to judicial warrants before home and business entries and to consulting local officials before opening detention sites[11].
WhyMullin needs enforcement numbers to stay high while the political cost of violent incidents falls. Jail-based enforcement delivers both. He is also under pressure from the right flank, which has accused him of going soft after the traffic-stop pause[13], and from the White House, which has insisted the enforcement agenda is unchanged[2].
Impact on themMullin owns every ICE shooting politically. He has faced hostile congressional questioning over the deaths and over an ICE warehouse contracting plan he has conceded was mishandled[11]. A cooperation deal with even one large Democratic state would be his signature achievement; failure leaves him running the tactics that generate the headlines.
Frames it asTheir strongest claim is constitutional, and it is narrow: the rights described in the guides are rights that already exist. The Fifth Amendment right to stay silent and the Fourth Amendment rule that officers need a judge's warrant to force entry into a home are not California inventions. Telling people what the Constitution says is not obstruction — it is what a government owes its residents. Newsom's spokesperson put it directly: the guidance "wouldn't be necessary if the Trump Administration actually trained ICE officers on the public's Constitutional rights"[1]. Their second argument is federalism, and it is the same argument conservatives have long made about guns and marijuana: Washington may enforce its own laws, but it cannot conscript state and local officers to do the work. Their third is factual. They argue the administration's own detention numbers refute its public story about who is being arrested — most people in ICE detention have no criminal conviction at all[9].
WhyNewsom is widely treated as a 2028 presidential contender, and opposing federal immigration raids is a defining issue with the Democratic base. There is also a governing incentive: California's economy and public safety depend on immigrant residents calling 911 and appearing as witnesses, which they stop doing when local police are seen as an arm of ICE.
Impact on themCalifornia faces direct federal pressure — DHS has floated cutting customs processing at its international airports, which would hit San Francisco and Los Angeles trade and travel[12]. The state also spends public money on immigrant legal aid and on a portal for residents to report federal agents' conduct[10].
Frames it asSheriffs and police chiefs are split, and both halves have real arguments. Cooperating sheriffs say a jail transfer is the safest possible handoff: the person is already in custody, already searched, and no one is chasing a car. Refusing sheriffs say the moment their deputies are seen as immigration agents, crime victims in immigrant neighborhoods stop reporting — and a witness who will not testify is a case they cannot close. Both camps agree on one thing: unfunded federal mandates are the real grievance, which is why Mullin's reimbursement offer got their attention[8].
WhyMoney, liability, and local politics. Holding someone past their release date on an ICE detainer has drawn lawsuits; federal reimbursement plus training changes that math.
Impact on themPractice already varies far more than the sanctuary label suggests. Only Illinois, Oregon, and Vermont explicitly refuse to hand over people leaving state prison on an immigration detainer, and transfers continue in states that call themselves sanctuaries[8].
Frames it asTheir argument is that rights you do not know about are not rights. Most people facing an ICE encounter have seconds to decide, no lawyer, and often limited English — which is why the material is multilingual and short. They stress that mainstream guidance tells people not to run, not to lie, and not to physically interfere, precisely because those acts are crimes. They also point to the deaths: at least nine people have died in immigration operations under this administration, with roughly 18 traffic-stop shootings[3][4]. From that vantage, the guides are safety instructions, not evasion instructions.
WhyReducing arrests and deportations of long-settled residents, and building a record of federal conduct usable in court and in Congress.
Impact on themImmigration detention passed 70,000 people in January 2026[14]. Most people in detention have no criminal conviction, so the population most affected by street-level enforcement is largely people whose only violation is immigration status[9].
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The Bias Ledger average rating 5.3
The same story, as framed by outlets across the spectrum, ordered least to most biased. The bias score (1 = straight, 10 = heavily spun) is an AI assessment of that framing — click an outlet to see its track record. The tell is the word choice or omission that reveals the angle.
| Outlet | Vantage | Bias | How they frame it | The tell |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Hill | U.S. center | 2 | Procedural: Mullin defends ICE enforcement after Trump urges continuation of traffic stops. | Neutral verbs and sourcing, but it covers the institutional clash and skips the substance of whether the guides are lawful. Access-driven framing — the story is what officials said, not what is true. |
| NPR | U.S. center-left, partly federally funded | 4 | After the Minnesota surge, ICE is moving to a quieter enforcement approach. | "Quieter" frames the jail-pickup shift as a lowering of visibility rather than a policy the administration argues is safer. It treats the change as reactive damage control, which is a read, not a fact. |
| The Marshall Project | U.S. nonprofit criminal-justice newsroom, foundation-funded, reform-oriented | 4 | Immigrants Behind Bars Often Find ICE Waiting After Their Prison Sentences. | Frames prison-to-ICE transfers as a story of unfair 'double punishment.' But the reporting cuts against the left's own talking point by showing sanctuary states transfer people anyway — a fact that complicates both sides. |
| Al Jazeera | Qatari state-funded | 6 | Files the enforcement story under Human Rights and Migration: "ICE kills 26-year-old in Maine: What happened, and who else has ICE killed?" | The section label does the argument. Running body counts and "who else has ICE killed" set the frame as state violence; the American federalism dispute over sanctuary law barely appears. |
| Fox News | U.S. right | 7 | Frames it as 2028 Democratic hopefuls being "torched" over webinars teaching illegal immigrants how to "defy" ICE, and as Ocasio-Cortez and Newsom "helping migrants evade ICE." | "Defy" and "evade" are put in the frame before any description of what the guides actually instruct. The piece does include Newsom's spokesperson's full quote, which is real balance — but the headline verb has already decided the question. |
| The Gateway Pundit | U.S. right, strongly pro-Trump | 9 | Says Mullin is doing "damage control" after reports he went around Trump to suspend ICE traffic stops. | Attacks Mullin from the right, treating any restraint as betrayal. Asserts motive as fact and sources it to "reports" — the internal-enemy frame, not a reporting frame. |
References
- Mullin accuses Ocasio-Cortez and Newsom of helping migrants evade ICE — Fox News · U.S. right, owned by Fox Corporation
- Mullin talks immigration changes at DHS but White House insists agenda stays — AOL · U.S. aggregator carrying wire and syndicated reporting
- Nine deaths tied to Trump's immigration enforcement operations in US — Al Jazeera · Qatari state-funded
- Trump urges ICE to keep using traffic stops after deadly incidents — Al Jazeera · Qatari state-funded
- SANCTUARY CALAMITY: DHS and ICE Urgently Call on Gavin Newsom and Sanctuary California... — U.S. Department of Homeland Security · U.S. federal agency; party to the dispute
- After the Minnesota surge, ICE is moving to a quieter enforcement approach — NPR · U.S. center-left; member-station and partly federally funded
- DHS finds itself back in the headlines after ICE shot and killed two people, in a test for Secretary Mullin — The Boston Globe · U.S. center-left metro daily, privately owned
- Immigrants Behind Bars Often Find ICE Waiting After Their Prison Sentences — The Marshall Project · U.S. nonprofit criminal-justice newsroom, foundation-funded, reform-oriented
- Immigration Detention Quick Facts — TRAC (Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse), Syracuse University · University data clearinghouse built on FOIA-obtained federal records; findings often cited by immigration-restriction critics
- Know your rights, California — Office of the Governor of California · California state government; party to the dispute
- Markwayne Mullin Confirmed as Homeland Security Secretary — Time · U.S. center to center-left newsmagazine
- DHS Secretary Mullin could target 'sanctuary' international flights — NewsNation · U.S. center, Nexstar-owned, positions itself as non-partisan cable news
- Markwayne Mullin Attempts Damage Control After Reports He Went Around President Trump to Suspend ICE Traffic Stops — The Gateway Pundit · U.S. right, strongly pro-Trump, repeatedly found to publish unverified claims
- Immigration detention passed 70,000 in January — Stateline · U.S. nonprofit state-policy newsroom, part of States Newsroom, funded largely by progressive-leaning donors