Trump's border czar Tom Homan challenges heckler to a fight during unhinged rant: 'I deserve your respect'
Homan was just about five minutes into his prepared remarks at the Turning Point USA Student Action Summit in Tampa, Florida on Saturday night when he was interrupted by a heckler.
'Are you an MS-13 member?' the unidentified protester could be heard shouting out, referring to a notorious Salvadoran gang that has been targeted in the Trump administration's deportation efforts.
Homan quickly turned his attention to the man, as he was being led out of the Tampa Convention Center.
'You know what? I'm sick of these a**holes. You want some? Come get some,' the 63-year-old taunted in an unhinged rant. 'I'm tired of it.'
'For the men and women of ICE, I deserve your respect. They're the finest one percent this country has,' he continued, before referring to himself in third-person.
'And Tom Homan isn't going anywhere. Tom Homan isn't shutting up.'
At that point, Homan turned his attention back to the audience - as he hit out at the nationwide protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.
'This guy wouldn't know what it's like to serve this nation,' the border czar claimed.
'This guy ain't got the balls to be an ICE officer. He hasn't got the balls to be a border patrol agent,' he continued, as the conservative crowd cheered.
'This guy lives in his mother's basement. The only thing that surprised me is [he] doesn't have purple hair and a nose ring.
'Get out of here, you loser,' he told the protester one more time as he was being escorted out of the auditorium. 'And if you're such a bad***, meet me offstage in 13 minutes and 50 seconds.'
But Homan didn't stop there, telling the audience: 'I guarantee you, he sits down to pee.'
Much of the rest of his speech also focused on the growing protests against ICE officers across the country, which he said are targeting federal immigration officials on almost a daily basis.
He also said he has never before seen 'such hate against the men and women of ICE and in the Border Patrol,' but vowed that agents will not be intimidated because 'we're going to do the job that President Trump gave us to do.'
'If these protesters, these people with purple hair, with a nose ring who live in their parents' basement, who don't work and want to go protest us, or get paid by people if they're going to stop ICE or stop Border Patrol doing their job, they got another thing coming,' Homan claimed.
'Because every time they double down, we're going to triple down.'
He then concluded his remarks by vowing: 'Tom Homan is going to run the biggest deportation operation this country has ever seen.
'Take it to the bank.'
The comments came just one day after President Trump directed federal law enforcement officials to use 'whatever means necessary' to arrest anyone who throws rocks or other projectiles at ICE agents during immigration raids.
The president appeared to be referring to footage of protestors violently clashing with ICE agents during the Thursday raid of a cannabis farm in Camarillo, a city in Southern California.
The raid, despite the chaos, resulted in 200 migrant workers being detained. This included some juveniles who authorities say were illegally working on the farm.
One Mexican farm worker, Jaime Alanís, died in the hospital Friday after he fell 30 feet off a building and broke his neck and skull.
The raid was on Glass House Farms, which employs hundreds of people and bills itself as the largest cannabis operation in the world.
CBP said it served a warrant on the farm, accusing it of employing illegal migrant workers. ICE and the National Guard reportedly executed that warrant on Thursday.
Protestors then showed up to impede federal agents, some of whom threw smoke canisters and flash bangs to control the growing crowd.
Once the smoke and tear gas was deployed, most of the protestors ran in the opposite direction, though some were seen throwing rocks at the agents.
The demonstration lasted past 11pm on Thursday, with federal agents remaining on the scene as well.
Video and photos from the scene showed ICE agents clashing with a crowd of more than 100 people - many of them farmworkers or their family members - who had initially formed a human blockade along the road.
It was a scene of absolute chaos, with protesters, farmworkers, and family members scattering throughout the fields.
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