Following criticism, Suozzi and Gillen strike tougher stance on immigration enforcement

Long Island’s two Democratic House members are taking a tougher stance against U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement after federal agents killed two Americans in Minneapolis, following criticism that for months they were too quiet on ICE, walking a political tightrope ahead of the November midterm elections.

By voting with Republicans last week to pass a bill funding the Department of Homeland Security and several other agencies, Reps. Tom Suozzi (D-Glen Cove) and Laura Gillen (D-Rockville Centre) split from the majority of Democrats who voted "no" while demanding restrictions on ICE.

After an ICE agent shot and killed Renee Good, a Minneapolis mother of three, on Jan. 7, critics described Suozzi and Gillen's response as cautious. But after the Saturday fatal shooting of ICU nurse Alex Pretti by a Border Patrol officer in Minneapolis, they took a decidedly tougher position. Gillen called for Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to be impeached, while Suozzi asked President Donald Trump to end ICE's operation in Minneapolis, calling Pretti's death a "murder."

On Sunday, Gillen wrote on X: "Another U.S. citizen has been killed at the hands of ICE and there must be accountability, which is why Secretary Noem must be impeached immediately."

She continued, "Under her leadership, ICE has targeted U.S. citizens and children and killed Americans. She is not focused on safety or border security; she's focused on chaos and self-promotion, undermining local law enforcement and stoking violence as a result."

DHS did not immediately respond to an inquiry about Gillen's call for impeachment.

In a statement to Newsday on Sunday, Suozzi wrote, "I hear the anger from many of my constituents, and I take responsibility for that. I have long been critical of ICE’s unlawful behavior and I must do a better job demonstrating that."

He continued, "The senseless and tragic murder of Alex Pretti underscores what happens when untrained federal agents operate without accountability. President Trump must immediately end ... ICE's occupation of Minneapolis that has sown chaos, led to tragedy, and undermined experienced local law enforcement."

Bipartisan criticism

Before the DHS vote and Pretti's shooting, Gillen and Suozzi were criticized by the left and right for taking a tepid position on immigration enforcement. Being too quiet on ICE was a liability for them in a midterm election where their purple districts are among key swing areas for control of the U.S. House, experts said.

"Enough with the soft language," Sergio Argueta, an immigration advocate and assistant high school principal, said last week. "Democracy is on the line, but here they are still trying to play politics."

Former Long Island Rep. Peter King (R-Seaford) said as the nation's attention turned to ICE enforcement, Suozzi and Gillen's previous calls to secure the border were outdated.

"The border is pretty much sealed now. ... We’re not being, quote unquote, 'invaded'; there’s not a million people coming in," he said. "Democrats are under pressure to come hard line against ICE."

Republican strategist Mike Dawidziak said Gillen and Suozzi showing stronger opinions on immigration enforcement would resonate more with voters.

"Clearly, people felt that the immigration system was broken, that it was allowing too many criminals and gang members in. ... Now, the pendulum may very well have swung the other way," Dawidziak said. "People are feeling like the ICE tactics have gone too far."

Their prior stance would not be enough to secure voter turnout in November, according to veteran Democratic political consultant Hank Sheinkopf.

Gillen and Suozzi need to be "anti-Trumpian," he said, and tell constituents that ICE "shouldn’t be attacking people in their offices and in their homes. That there should be a more humane system of enforcing this."

A December poll from the Siena Research Institute, conducted before the Minneapolis shootings, found that 57% of suburban New York voters think deploying ICE agents, often in plainclothes, to round up immigrants has "gone too far." The poll found that 65% of registered New York voters overall agreed, while 21% said the actions were "just about right."

ICE tactics have spread fear across Long Island’s immigrant communities over the past year, as activists hold near-weekly protests and prayer vigils calling for federal agents to stop arresting people without a criminal record. Of the hundreds of immigrants detained across Nassau and Suffolk, most do not have a criminal record, according to data analyzed by Newsday.

'You’re not even talking our language'

Suozzi and Gillen made immigration reform major platforms on the campaign trail, but until recently had stopped short of joining other Democrats to condemn high-profile ICE enforcement tactics.

Their voting record shows they've taken a moderate stance on the issue. The two were among eight Democrats to vote for a bill that prohibited noncitizens from receiving small-business loans, and among 11 Democrats to help pass a bill increasing prison sentences for people who entered the United States illegally more than once. On Thursday, they crossed party lines to support a spending bill that kept Department of Homeland Security budget intact.

Both sponsored bipartisan bills that would create pathways to legal status for certain immigrants, like "Dreamers," who were brought to the United States as children.

Suozzi long has called for "order to the border" and extending work permits for long-term undocumented immigrants. He's made several trips to the Southern border with the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus, which he now co-chairs.

In an op-ed for The New York Times last fall, he described the main problem as cartels that smuggle people, drugs and weapons into the United States. The piece did not mention ICE or focus on agents' physically aggressive tactics towards people. 

Last year, Gillen co-sponsored a bill that would mandate ICE alert families when they arrest someone, and also make schools, churches, courts, hospitals and playgrounds off limits to federal agents.

Gillen defeated Republican incumbent Anthony D’Esposito by 2 points in 2024. Since then, her vulnerability has seesawed, a sign she faces an uphill battle getting voters to show up to the polls this November without a presidential candidate on the ballot, experts say.

Former Nassau County Executive Laura Curran, a Democrat, said she understood why some congressional Democrats were being "vanilla," telling Politico that Gillen and Suozzi were "going to have to be really careful how they talk about this."

There are 64,000 more registered Democrats than Republicans in Gillen's district and 147,000 unaffiliated voters, according to state data. The area’s Latino and immigrant population is growing, with nearly a quarter of Nassau residents born outside the country.

"The [party] enrollment is here, the people are here, but we’re not coming out to vote for you because you’re not even talking our language," Argueta said. "You can't disregard the nuances of a Latino community that is big and desperate for some type of political representation ... You start looking more like [Republicans] than you do caring for us."

In a statement to Newsday last week, Gillen called for "common sense and transparency" in immigration enforcement. She declined to answer specific questions about criticism of her stance.

"Our immigration system has been broken for decades and must be transformed immediately, and any associated violence stopped," Gillen wrote. "I believe we need a secure border and strict law enforcement for criminals, asylum reform and a pathway to legal status for law-abiding, tax-paying immigrants."

In a phone interview before Saturday's shooting, Suozzi said, "Fueling hostility is not going to be the answer. ... We have to take the temperature down and figure out how to actually solve the problems."

Suozzi, for his part, tried to intervene in the deportation of a Port Washington bagel store manager, Fernando Mejias. He's also visited local ICE detention sites in Nassau and Suffolk.

After an ICE agent in Minneapolis shot and killed 37-year-old Renee Good on Jan. 7, more than 1,000 protests nationwide were planned for that weekend. The next day, Democrats pushed House Homeland Security Committee Chair Andrew Garbarino (R-Bayport) to bring Noem to testify. Garbarino said he plans to hold hearings in the coming months.

Gillen told Long Island Patch the shooting should be investigated, calling it a "tragedy." One week later, Suozzi issued a letter to his constituents saying there should be an investigation, adding that ICE agents were not receiving enough training.

"From watching the video numerous times, it appears to me that Ms. Good should still be alive today," Suozzi wrote on Jan. 14.

Hours after Newsday published a version of this story online last week, Suozzi issued his strongest statement so far against ICE: "There is no question that ICE has overstepped its bounds," he wrote in a social media post after voting to pass the DHS bill. "We have seen masked agents aggressively and at times violently confront people, including American citizens and individuals who are lawfully present in this country, before even asking basic questions."

The DHS bill keeps ICE's budget roughly the same, and reduces Border Patrol funding by $1.8 billion. It passed 220-207, with Suozzi, Gillen and five other Democrats voting with Republicans. Many Democrats took to the House floor, calling to reduce ICE funding amid "the federal government's use of political violence against its own people."

In his statement on Thursday, Suozzi explained that he did not vote for the DHS bill to expand ICE crackdowns. He described ICE's presence in Minneapolis as a "confrontational enforcement posture" that was "escalatory and inappropriate," and said his vote was to fund other pieces of the bill, such as FEMA disaster response, TSA security, Customs and Border Protection and the Coast Guard, among other services. A small group of protesters rallied outside Suozzi's Queens office on Friday.

Gillen echoed the same sentiment, adding that she supported immigration enforcement and "common sense guardrails" in the bill.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer on Saturday called the situation in Minneapolis "appalling — and unacceptable in any American city." He said Senate Democrats would not provide the necessary votes to pass the DHS bill.

'They need to have more of a heart'

Little information has been made public about the death of 42-year-old Santos Banegas Reyes, an immigrant father of two who died in ICE custody last September at the Nassau County Correctional Center. He was pronounced dead less than 18 hours after arriving at the East Meadow jail.

At the time, Gillen, whose district includes the jail, voiced that she was "deeply concerned" and reached out to "relevant federal, state and local officials ... calling for a thorough, transparent investigation to understand how this occurred."

Asked last week about whether an investigation was underway, her office said they were waiting for more information.

ICE violated a congressionally mandated deadline to release details about the death, Newsday reported. Days after Newsday’s story was published, Suozzi wrote a letter to Noem asking about the report. He has not heard back, he said.

Claudia Borecky, president of the Bellmore Merrick Democratic Club, which endorsed Gillen in 2024, said she wants to see her federal representatives demand more information on local ICE incidents and call for the release of those without a criminal record.

"Our Congress members represent people no matter what their legal status is. ... They need to have more of a heart. ... Or stand up for them," she said.

"I think there’s a place for [ICE], but the brutality has to stop," Borecky added.

Argueta, the assistant high school principal and a lifelong Democrat, turned away from the party last fall, switching his registration to the Working Families Party.

"If they do get another term, it’s going to be a closer election than it needs to be," he said of Gillen and Suozzi.

Trump convinced Americans that the reason their quality of life is going down and they can't afford anything is because of immigrants, Argueta said.

"The Republicans have done a masterful job," he said.

Argueta added, "How is it that a blue-collar worker in Oceanside ... a sanitation worker, who didn’t have a silver spoon handed to him ... Why is it that this dude thinks he has more in common with the person in the White House than his neighbor of color in Baldwin?"

Newsday's Billy House contributed to this story.

Correction: Rep. Tom Suozzi left the House Homeland Security Committee in January 2025 and did not sign a letter calling for Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to appear at a hearing. An earlier version of this story misstated his status with the committee.