The Don Lemon Show
LEMON DROP | A Former DHS Official on ICE’s Crisis & Lack of Humanity
16 Jan 2026
Chapter 1: What is the significance of the Bernie Goetz case?
Elliott Williams is a senior legal analyst and the author of the new book, Five Bullets, the story of Bernie Getz, New York's explosive 80s and the subway vigilante trial that divided the nation. I want to talk to him about that. And I want to talk to him about what's happening in this world of ICE and Minnesota and all of that. And how did he decide to write a book on Bernie Getz?
You're showing your age by doing that.
I'm showing my age by the fact that I look like a cadaver when I don't have TV makeup on. That's how I show my age, Don.
No TV makeup here, sir.
You know, there's an expression for that. It's independent journalists don't crack.
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Chapter 2: How has ICE evolved since its inception?
So that might be what people are saying.
Thank you. We'll talk about your book in just a moment, which I'm really thrilled to talk about. And congratulations on that. And it's good to see you. What is going on with ICE? And tell us, because you have, obviously, a history with ICE. Were you the former executive director?
Assistant director. So I was one of a bunch of folks helping to run the agency, yeah.
Yeah, and so what is happening with ICE? Is this the ICE that you work for?
Yeah, that's such a complicated question, Don, because ICE is always going to be radioactive. Just the very nature of immigration enforcement really is troubling to many people. And within the world of law enforcement, it's a particularly tough place, right? Now, even when I was there, ICE was controversial.
And I remember for the first two years that I was there, Democrats controlled both houses of Congress. And they were the biggest critics of ICE and even critics of Obama's ICE. You've heard about the term deporter in chief and going after meatpacking plants and so on, which changed over the years that I was there.
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Chapter 3: What are the current controversies surrounding ICE's actions?
So, yes, ICE has always been controversial and radioactive.
that said my friend this is not what i remember and it certainly is not the way it was carried out both in terms of the level of transparency that that ice has like a window into what exactly are they doing number one and number two just the math don just do the math the president was clear and god bless him for it he told america what he was going to do on immigration enforcement and said you know we want to have the most robust deportation effort in history
We, you know, we're going to remove a million people from the country. Okay, fine. If he wants to do that, that's a political choice that he's free to make and his supporters are free to make. But you can't take an entity that was doing 300,000 of a thing and and then move it up to a million of a thing and then expect that everything's going to be okay.
They necessarily were going to start violating civil rights or hiring people who were not fit for the job or acting in a way far exceeding their authority. Just do the math. And my question to everyone is, well, what did you expect? Like, what did you think when you had the president talking the way he was about immigration before on the campaign trail? What did anyone expect?
And I don't think anyone... should be shocked by what they're seeing right now.
Really? The cruelty of it? You don't think people should be shocked?
Only, again, I just think, I don't think people recognize what it truly meant
to and i've been saying it for a long time and you know you got a problem when someone who worked for ice under obama is saying whoa whoa slow down folks um no i just think when the president was that forthright about what what they were planning on doing when stephen miller was talking about 3 000 arrests a day i think were the numbers that is a staggering number in the history of american law enforcement and
you know, yes, the president has his critics, always has had his critics and his critics were saying, guys, red flag, this is going to be really bad.
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Chapter 4: What human rights issues are raised by ICE's enforcement methods?
But I actually think there were, Trump adjacent or Trump curious people who did not really stop to think about what the kind of immigration enforcement he was talking about really was going to mean.
And it was going to mean, like I said, the sort of lowering the hiring standards and then just literally sweeping people up because you just can't find that volume of people who are unlawfully present in the country without that kind of hiring.
hyper aggressive and in many instances just just impermissible and sloppy law enforcement so elliot when you look at what's happening just around the country just as a human being not as someone who worked for ice and not you know as a political analyst or any of that let me just show you some of it first um this is a baby who was tear gassed and then uh also a man whose rights were violated when they busted into his home with a battering ram and i just want to get what you think your thoughts on this
We're learning more about another dangerous incident involving ICE. A family says three of their children, including a six-month-old, were hospitalized after agents reportedly fired tear gas at their vehicle. Destiny Jackson says they were on their way home from a basketball game when gas grenades set off the airbags, trapping them inside as gas filled the car.
After people nearby helped open the doors, she says they realized their infant had stopped breathing. Destiny says she had to perform CPR to revive her own child.
I thought I was dying, honestly. And the way I felt, I could imagine how my kids felt, because I'm a full-blown grown adult. I just knew that it was even worse for them.
And late Thursday night, a federal judge in Minnesota ordered the release of a Liberian man four days after heavily armed agents were seen using a battering ram to enter his home. The judge said in his ruling that his Fourth Amendment rights against unlawful search and seizure were violated. Garrison Gibson was in his home with his wife and nine-year-old daughter when he was arrested.
He's being held at an immigration center, according to the Associated Press.
So, Elliot, when you see that and the trauma and the pain that that caused, this is a human being. What do you think?
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Chapter 5: How does media influence public perception of crime and justice?
I think the human cost, again, sort of as I was saying a little bit earlier, I just don't think people who maybe were swing voters who were skeptical of the president but still not happy with the direction the country was going under Joe Biden, I don't think people really thought about what was coming. So that's point one. Point two, it's the power of the cell phone image.
And this time, this generation, you know, if the administration is not being fully transparent about how they are carrying out any sorts of law enforcement, particularly immigration enforcement, we just live in a time of people documenting everything. And I think to some extent, that is what is highlighting a lot of some of what appear to be some pretty grave abuses by the administration.
With respect to immigration enforcement, that's one, two. And then finally, point three, you know, a lot of this comes down to accountability. Like how, when a presidential administration or when any entity, law enforcement entity, steps outside the bounds of what it's allowed to do, how do you hold them accountable? And really that way is Congress.
The way our country has been set up since its founding is that, you know, when Congress An administration's either abusing a power, exceeding power, or even using its power lawfully, but in a way that Congress doesn't want. Congress ought to be the one having hearings. Congress ought to be the one asking the questions. And they're just not doing it. I use the example from my time back in ICE.
I was an appointee under a Democratic administration working for ICE. But it was Democrats in Congress for those first two years that were the most aggressive in about raising concerns and even threatening to suspend the funding of the agency until some of these questions they had were answered. You're really not seeing that right now.
I mean, there was a little bit, a moment with respect to Jeffrey Epstein in which Congress sort of in a bipartisan manner raised some questions to the administration about how to proceed.
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Chapter 6: What parallels can be drawn between past and present vigilante actions?
There was a moment around Venezuela where some Senate Republicans seemed to break with the president. But for the most part, Congress, which ought to be, if not a co-equal branch of government, the first among equals, they just haven't been playing that role.
And it will be truly fascinating, I think, on a historic level, on a human level, whatever level, to see should Democrats take a House of Congress in 2026, in the midterms, how this dynamic changes, if at all.
But if there is a 2026, considering what you see here, let's talk about The training of those of those alleged agents, we call them goons here on The Don Lemon Show. Let's talk about the training of the lack of training, because reportedly they got forty seven days of training and they're supposed to get five months of training.
And it appears that just they're just hiring people off the streets without qualifications. That is I would hope that is new and and that is reversible. But did that happen during the Obama administration?
No, no, no, no, no. I mean, now, certainly the qualifications for immigration officers were in some ways lower than the qualifications for customs officers, the other side of the ice house, which I'll be perfectly candid.
For the time I was there and just since the founding of the agency, the customs folks don't want to be a part of this agency, or at least for some time didn't, because they never wanted to be smushed with this immigration work that they regard as really radioactive.
And in fact, a few years ago in 2018, the customs side of the house, many of the leaders wrote a letter to the secretary asking to be broken off into a separate agency. They just think the immigration stuff is so toxic and so radioactive and bad for them as law enforcement officers.
Now, the folks who, when I say they were lower standards, they didn't have the same educational standards as customs officers and were officers, not agents, and it gets a little bit complicated. Now, when... This administration has tried to surge hiring. They've certainly had to bend the standards even for the deportation officers and raising age limits and so on.
And I think it comes at a profound cost.
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Chapter 7: How do historical events shape current immigration policies?
It really does. This work is difficult. You want people to be in shape for it at a minimum. And I just think you're just not finding that.
So let me ask you, look, obviously, you know, you need to pay the bills, but why do people take these jobs? Like this, with this type of, when this is their mission. Well, let me ask you. These are the marching orders they're getting.
Define these jobs. When you say these jobs, what do you mean?
I mean, the people who are rounding people up off the street without due process and dragging them through the snow and pulling them out of cars and cutting their seatbelts and bashing their, breaking their windows and battering rams into their homes, tear gassing babies. Like, Who wants that job?
Yeah, that's an interesting question. And I think an interesting segment of the Don Lemon Show would be to talk to an actual deportation officer. You know, I think, you know, look, let's put it this way. I worked for years with Tom Homan, who's now the White House border czar. And, you know, a lot of law enforcement folks just see themselves as standing, holding the line between
freedom and tyranny, right? That's their ethos and worldview.
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Chapter 8: What insights does Elliott Williams provide about the future of immigration enforcement?
And you might be seeing some of that. I think a lot of folks in law enforcement come from the military. And in the military, the thing that is paramount is following orders. And the order that has come quite clearly from the top, if not the president and certainly the folks around him, is this is what your job is.
And I think it has led to some of the abuses, the kinds of things that you're talking about and seeing the But at its core, and I want to be clear, Don, at its core, law enforcement is a good thing at its core. You know, no nation in the world exists without some sort of immigration or border enforcement apparatus. The way we've done it here in this country has completely run amok.
And you're seeing now in these images what the dark side of that is. And More than anything else, I'll get back to the point I made. Congress let this happen. They didn't, you know, the laws have been vague, they need to be updated, and they haven't held this administration accountable in the way that just you have one fucking job, do your job.
Yeah, you can't say that word on the CNN, can you? So look, that's not going to help the approval rating of Congress, especially if, you know, if I guess people realize now that this is lawmakers' fault. That's how they feel. But look, there's a very similar thing.
There is a direct connection to your book because much like this, there are people who are hailing these, you know, immigration agents or officers who are, you know, wreaking havoc on the people of Minnesota and elsewhere. And others who are saying, you know, obviously the majority of Americans are saying this is awful. This is tyrannical. They shouldn't be doing it. Same thing with Bernie Getz.
People were wondering, should he get a medal or should he spend the rest of his life in solitary confinement, so to speak? So there's a direct connection between here and the 19th, I mean, since the 1980s.
Yeah. Nothing is more of a Rorschach test than law enforcement, but also vigilantes and what we as a country think about people who step outside the law because they feel that law enforcement isn't doing its job. And there's a long tradition.
In the book, Five Bullets, I talk about not just Bernie Goetz, but Daniel Penny, who was the ex-Marine college student who choked Jordan Neely, the Michael Jackson person who died. Kyle Rittenhouse, and believe it or not, Luigi Mangione, who also felt that the systems in the country were not acting in an appropriate manner. Therefore, he had to take the law into his own hands.
And all of these folks were heralded by a major if not majority portion of the public. What is that about? And what I say, a thread running through five bullets is two of the most motivating influences in American history have been fear. And we as humans are united in our fear, but also a fear fixation or fetish or fantasy or whatever else about vigilantes.
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