Trump praises Fetterman for saying calls to abolish ICE are “inappropriate and outrageous”

Evgenia Anastasakos, The Philadelphia Inquirer on Jul 10, 2025

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U.S. Sen. John Fetterman, D.-Pa., is still tweeting about ICE after earning President Donald Trump’s praise Wednesday for slamming calls to abolish Immigrations and Customs Enforcement.

Fetterman said “ICE performs an important job for our country” in the first of a pair of posts uploaded to X on Thursday.

“Any calls to abolish ICE are inappropriate and outrageous,” he wrote.

Fetterman also shared a screenshot of an Axios article about the Trump administration considering amnesty for some migrant workers.

“Absolutely support amnesty for the hardworking, otherwise law-abiding migrant workers. Round up and deport the criminals. We must acknowledge the critical contribution migrants make to our nation’s economy,” he wrote in the caption.

Fetterman’s comments reflect the growing rift between him and his fellow Democrats. In recent months, he has broken with his party to vote for several of President Donald Trump’s cabinet nominees and, in June, he accused Democrats of failing to condemn anti-ICE protests in Los Angeles. Fetterman was also the first sitting Democratic to meet with then-president elect Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago this January.

Fetterman first made headlines this week when he told Fox News Wednesday that “ICE agents are just doing their job and I fully support that.”

“For me... (that) people in my party might want to abolish it or treat them as criminals or anything, that’s inappropriate and outrageous. ICE performs an important role for our nation,” he added.

When asked about Fetterman’s comments on Fox by a reporter, Trump said “The new John Fetterman is exactly what you said. He’s right, he’s right. And we have to protect our police officers, and we will, and we have been.”

Fetterman told The Daily Mail Thursday that Trump’s praise probably “made my parents proud.”

“They’re big Fox News viewers,” he said. “My whole family is Republican.”

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