ICE Director Mocked After Declaring 'Criminals Tend to Hang Out With Criminals': 'Sounds Like Trump and Epstein'

Madison Sheahan, the 28-year-old deputy director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), was mocked online after claiming that "criminals tend to hang out with criminals" in defense of the agency's practice of targeting undocumented immigrants and their networks.

During a Fox News interview on Monday, Sheahan asserted that ICE officers receive "some of the best training of any law enforcement officers" in the nation. She also emphasized that immigration agents frequently work with local law enforcement to build cases, except in states like California, where cooperation is prohibited.

So far in fiscal year 2025, however, 13 people have died while in ICE custody, which is one more than the total number of deaths in all of 2024. The most recent case involved a 75-year-old Cuban man.

As of June 29, ICE detained 57,861 people, 72% of whom, or 41,495, had no criminal record. Despite growing criticism directed at the agency, Sheahan, who lacks prior law enforcement experience, continued to defend its approach.

"I think we all know that criminals tend to hang out with criminals," Sheahan said. "And so, as we start to build a case, we're gonna be going after everyone that's around them because these criminals tend to hang out with like-minded people who also happen to be criminals," she added during a Fox News interview

The Trump official's remarks drew comparisons between the president and his decades-long friendship with the disgraced late financier Jeffrey Epstein.

"Criminals hanging out with criminals," one X user wrote in a post accompanied by a photo of Donald and Melania Trump alongside Epstein and his accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell, who was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison after she was found guilty of child sex trafficking and other offenses in 2021.

"Sounds like she is connecting the dots on the Epstein files," another added.

"Criminals hang with criminals? Then why is half of Trump's circle under indictment?" a third user wrote. "If this logic applied to MAGA, Mar-a-Lago would be a prison yard."

Trump told New York magazine he had "known Jeff for 15 years," calling him a "terrific guy," in a 2002 interview, according to The Telegraph.

"He's a lot of fun to be with," Trump said at the time. "It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side," he added.

Despite Epstein referring to Trump as one of his "closest friends" in resurfaced 2017 recordings, Trump has repeatedly attempted to distance himself from the late financier. When asked about calling Epstein a "terrific guy," Trump said he knew Epstein only in the way others in Palm Beach did at the time.

"Well, I knew him like everybody in Palm Beach knew him. I mean, people in Palm Beach knew him. He was a fixture in Palm Beach," Trump said in a 2019 interview, according to NPR.

That same year, Epstein was arrested again on federal charges of sex trafficking minors. However, before the trial started, Epstein died in a Manhattan jail cell in August 2019. His death was ruled a suicide. The charges were later dismissed due to his death.