On Wednesday's All In show on MS NOW, fill-in host let Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT) downplay the importance of fighting crime by illegal aliens by suggesting that having more immigrants makes Americans safer.
MSNOW's All In
September 2, 2026
8:19 p.m. Eastern
JACOB SOBOROFF: After ICE wound down its deadly reign of terror in Minneapolis, the Trump administration tried to convince us that cleaning house would fix the problem. How about border czar Tom Homan in a suit and tie? He effectively took over for Greg Bovino and his military-style costume. That is the guy who had that made-up title of commander at large of the border patrol. He seems to have retired to hang out with white nationalists -- white nationalists much of the time.
And Homeland Security secretary Kristi Noem was ousted and replaced with Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin. But to nobody's surprise, Stephen Miller did not want the reign of terror to end. It's just that those negative headlines were getting in the way of his mass deportation scheme exactly like when they deliberately separated 5,500 parents from their kids in the first term in what the American Academy of Pediatrics called "government-sanctioned child abuse."
Mark my words, though, what ICE is doing throughout this country is just as depraved as it was before. Earlier this month, a group of Cuban migrants in Florida were deported to Equatorial Guinea in West Africa, a country that they had never, ever lived in, but which take millions of dollars from the United States to accept our deportees. This week, a Haitian student, a young Haitian student in Springfield, Ohio, a city that has been the target of racist attacks from Trump and JD Vance, publicly died by suicide, according to his family, after being forced to wear an ankle monitor by ICE.
And, in the state of Connecticut in the city of Danbury and surrounding communities, ICE has been snatching dozens of people off of the streets there. We're talking about people going to work or waiting at bus stops, Connecticut Senator Richard Blumenthal says. Many of the people targeted by ICE there are likely in the country legally. The overwhelming majority of them face no criminal charges. And today, over 60 local Danbury businesses are closed in protest of ICE's presence in their communities, with neighbors standing up for neighbors and telling Donald Trump's agents that they are not welcome. Senator Chris Murphy is a Democrat from Connecticut. He attended those protests today on his annual walk across the state of Connecticut to speak with voters, and he joins me now. Senator, thank you for being here. You were at the protest tonight. Tell me about what's happening in Connecticut.
SENATOR CHRIS MURPHY (D-CT): ... There were thousands of people from all over Connecticut in Danbury tonight to say that if ICE is going to be in Danbury to purposely traumatize our children, then they need to get out. What's happening in Danbury is extraordinary. It's kind of a new tactic. What we know is that on the first and second day of school, ICE was at the school bus stops. They let the kids board the school buses, and then they arrested the parents. Now why did they do that? They did that to purposely traumatize the kids because the kids don't know their parents are gone. And when they get off the school bus, at the end of the day, they're alone, abandoned. They can't find their parents. Just imagine what those kids are going through. And as far as we understand, that practice is still continuing in Connecticut. ...
SOBOROFF: ... Let me play you a little bit of what some of my colleagues from MS NOW heard at today's protests.
UNIDENTIFIED MAN #1: They're terrorizing communities. They're picking up people, following school buses around, picking up mothers, people who have no criminal history, just picking them up. And it really needs to stop.
UNIDENTIFIED MAN #2: Danbury is a city of immigrants, okay. The United States is a nation of immigrants. The actions of this administration over the past two years are counter to everything in American history in terms of who we are as a nation. The idea, I think, was that we were supposed to be a country that welcomes people who are looking for an opportunity. We've done that for generations over many, many hundreds of years. And what we are seeing right now is violence, hatred and division. We want to be very clear that organized labor in Connecticut, at least our union and many, many others stand against that type of fear, hatred and division.
SOBOROFF: Senator, does that sound about right about what you've been hearing from your constituents out there?
(Murphy claims that, under DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin, ICE is arresting more immigrants who are in the country legally)
SOBOROFF: I think the word you used was "deliberately" about this strategy to, you know, let the kids get on the school bus and then apprehend the parents. Have you been able to get any answers from ICE at all about what the hell they're doing, and whether this is really an official strategy?
(MURPHY)
SOBOROFF: I'm told -- I'm told, Senator, that the Department of Homeland Security is disputing your account of family members detained at a bus stop after their kids were were boarding. What is your response to DHS?
SENATOR MURPHY: Well, that's been widely reported, but it's actually not true. Tom Homan got asked about this tactic, and he did not deny it. In fact, he said, "I haven't heard of that tactic being used, but we are not going to give safe harbor to illegal immigrants wherever they are." He effectively seemed to confirm that they are going to target bus stops. So, yeah, there's -- there's no denial from the Department of Homeland Security. And, of course, it's it's in keeping with their entire practice of trying to terrorize communities in this country.
The reality is, and I know that Trump and his supporters don't want to hear this, is that immigrants to this country and undocumented immigrants commit crimes at lower rates --
SOBOROFF: That's right.
SENATOR MURPHY: -- than people who are born here in the United States. And so if you want to live in a safe community, live in a community like Danbury, Connecticut, that's full of immigrants. You are not keeping Danbury safe. You're not keeping communities safe by specifically targeting immigrants because they do not commit crimes at a higher rate than anybody else in the community.
SOBOROFF: If you all -- the Democrats -- retake control of the Senate come November, would you seek the impeachment of Markwayne Mullin?
SENATOR MURPHY: Well, I mean, listen, we're going to have to have a full-scale investigation of the illegality at that department. And if a secretary is willfully violating the law, as Markwayne Mullin is, then our remedy has to be impeachment. That's a question for the House of Representatives, not the United States Senate. We would try a secretary in an impeachment proceeding, but I don't know what other remedy you have if you have these departments that are totally and completely out of control.
Now, the only reason that ICE is still operating is because Republicans have used this process in the United States Senate to keep their budget funded with only Republican votes. If Democrats take control of the House and the Senate, then we have the power to say to ICE, "We're not giving you any money -- we control congress, now, -- unless you stop this widespread illegality." So we will have new levers at our disposal to compel ICE to start behaving legally if we do well in November, as I think we will.
SOBOROFF: Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut, thank you so much for your report from the front lines and what you're seeing there today, and good luck on the rest of your walk.
