Greg Abbott says ICE needs to 'recalibrate' mission after deadly Minnesota shooting

San Antonio Express News ^ | 01/26/2026 | By Benjamin Wermund, Staff Writer

[Responsibility2nd]

Gov. Greg Abbott on Monday said the White House needs to “recalibrate” Immigration and Customs Enforcement's mission to rebuild public trust after immigration agents shot and killed a second protester in Minnesota over the weekend.

Abbott said immigration officials should “get back to what they wanted to do to begin with — and that is to remove people from the country who are here illegally.”

“In general, we need to have respect for law enforcement officers in the country. ICE, they are law enforcement officers,” the Texas Republican said on conservative radio host Mark Davis’ show Monday morning. “So they, being the White House, need to recalibrate on what needs to be done to make sure that that respect is going to be reinstilled. And that's not an easy task, especially under the current circumstances.”

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TOPICS: Culture/Society; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: arrestwalz; gregabbott; ice; minnesota; prettigood; prettiretarded; texas

[Responsibility2nd]

This is unfortunate.

Abbott should have just kept his mouth shut.

The overall context of what Abbott said may be been screwed over by the press, but that's what happens, so this is a bad look for a guy that is usually conservatively correct.

[BigFreakinToad]

and there we have the real Abbott.

[ConservativeMind]

Abbott seems like he has a pretty slow mental problem.

[TheDon]

Siding with the Democrats on immigration law enforcement, sanctuary cities and illegal alien criminals is....not a good look.

[Sarah Barracuda]

and how are they supposed to do that, ask criminal aliens PRETTY PLEASE let us arrest you

[Kleon]

Abbott said immigration officials should “get back to what they wanted to do to begin with — and that is to remove people from the country who are here illegally.”

Yes! Well said.

[MarDav]

I thought Costello was the foolish one?

[brownsfan]

The “moderates” are beginning to come out of the woodwork. I say ride this deportation operation as hard as we can, because come November, there likely will be a new reality. Yes, Americans are stupid.

[toddausauras]

Keep up the arrests and deportations
...that’s the best plan.

[stanne]

There is no squishy RINO like a Texas RINO

Of course Abbott is doing this

[ek_hornbeck]

Scratch a rank and file Republican, and you'll find lukewarm liberal.

Why is it that it's always conservative Republicans who go soft when there's a controversy involving law enforcement, even when they are in the right, whereas leftists always stick to their guns, no matter what?

[mikelets456]

To be clear this is not an ICE problem this is a sanctuary city/open border problem.

[Yogafist]

You don’t see a single democrat politician calling for Walz or Frey to call off their insurrection, but republicans a lining up to criticize Trump and ICE. What do they think will happen when Trump caves to the violent mob? I guarantee every blue city will burn.

[stanne]

Oh geeze. Here I am insulting Abbott and he’s the only one making sense

It is the San Antonio propaganda express leftist rag

I should have read the article before commenting. But I didnt

“Gov. Greg Abbott on Monday said the White House needs to “recalibrate” Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s mission to rebuild public trust after immigration agents shot and killed a second protester in Minnesota over the weekend.

Abbott said immigration officials should “get back to what they wanted to do to begin with — and that is to remove people from the country who are here illegally.”

“In general, we need to have respect for law enforcement officers in the country. ICE, they are law enforcement officers,” the

[Jan_Sobieski]

Yes Governor Abbott, ICE will get back to its job once it has defeated the enemy combatants trying to stop it and kill them

[cowboyusa]

Keep the new n- violent Illegals and deport insane white leftists instead.

[Presbyterian Reporter]

Yup. Gov Abbott has joined the surrender crowd to the anarchists.

Abbott joins OK Gov Stitt and 3 RINO Senators who started the surrender to the anarchist movement yesterday.

[stanne]

“ Scratch a rank and file Republican, and you’ll find lukewarm liberal.”

Nope

This is one where you have to read the article

[ek_hornbeck]

There is no squishy RINO like a Texas RINO

In my experience Texas Republicans are often solidly conservative on most issues except for immigration. Too many businesses in Texas are addicted to cheap immigrant (very much including illegal immigrant) labor and actually don't want to see illegals blocked from entry or deported. They can't come out and say this because it alienates their rank and file voters, but it's what their big donors and Chambers of Commerce want. Not unique to Texas of course, but it explains why Abbott and Co are saying this now - the truth is coming out.

[Sicon]

Gov. Greg Abbott on Monday said the White House needs to “recalibrate” Immigration and Customs Enforcement's mission to rebuild public trust after immigration agents shot and killed a second protester in Minnesota over the weekend

First of all, Pretti and Good were not "protestors", they were criminal obstructionists. Second, most of the public trusts that the ICE agents are doing their job, enforcing federal law, and that it is the leftists and their pals in the democrat party that cannot be trusted.