DHS After Dallas ICE Shooting: 'Far-Left Rhetoric Has Consequences'

The Department of Homeland Security said Wednesday that the fatal shooting at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Dallas should "serve as a wake-up call to the far-left that their rhetoric has consequences."

Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin made the statement after a gunman opened fire at the field office, killing one detainee and critically wounding two others before dying from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. No ICE officers were harmed. Officials identified the suspect as 29-year-old Joshua Jahn of Collin County, Texas.

Investigators said bullets recovered at the scene were inscribed with the phrase "ANTI-ICE," which they described as evidence of an ideological motive. McLaughlin linked the attack to months of political criticism of the agency in a statement shared with The Hill:

"For months, we've been warning politicians and the media to tone down their rhetoric about ICE law enforcement before someone was killed. This shooting must serve as a wake-up call to the far-left that their rhetoric about ICE has consequences. Comparing ICE Day-in and day-out to the Nazi Gestapo, the Secret Police, and slave patrols has consequences"

McLaughlin also said ICE officers have faced a surge of violence since January, citing a more than 1,000 percent increase in assaults, along with incidents involving bomb threats, Molotov cocktails, and the doxing of officers' families. DHS announced it will immediately increase security at ICE facilities across the country.

President Donald Trump echoed McLaughlin's comments in a post on Truth Social, writing that the attack was "the result of the Radical Left Democrats constantly demonizing law enforcement." Trump said his administration would sign an executive order to "dismantle these domestic terrorism networks."

Vice President JD Vance, speaking in North Carolina, also tied the shooting to Democratic leaders and specifically named California Governor Gavin Newsom. "It is time to stop the rhetorical assault on law enforcement," Vance said, adding that Newsom and others did not have to agree with the Trump administration's immigration policies — "but if your political rhetoric, encourages violence against our law enforcement, you can go straight to hell and you have no place in the political conversation of the United States of America."

Newsom responed to Vance's comments through a post on X: