Migrant Insider Podcast

WASHINGTON — On July 22, Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) stopped in the Capitol hallway and told me something Walmart executives should probably frame and hang in the break room—because sadly it’s as close to a senator telling them to go to hell as they’re going to get right now.

“These are just folks that are just living, man … and in this case, tased and taken down,” Luján said, shaking his head. “For companies to be saying to their c...

MOUNT PLEASANT, D.C. — The morning shift hadn’t even had its coffee when the government came rumbling down 16th Street NW. Out of nowhere, a caravan of masked federal troops stopped a work van — Z.M.H Heating & Air Conditioning, the kind of truck that keeps this city’s radiators clanking and its air conditioners wheezing through July.

Three men inside, still on their way to a job, were yanked out and lined up like they were smugglin...

WASHINGTON — A new viral video has surfaced of an unnamed resident of Mount Pleasant standing toe-to-toe with a pack of plain-clothed agents on a surveillance sting near the “Chinga La Migra” banner that ICE yanked down over the weekend. The clip has been moving fast online since I posted it to X an hour ago.

You might remember ICE’s victory lap from Sunday: a video of masked men tearing down a neighborhood banner and, for reasons s...

WASHINGTON — On Tuesday, the great Nick Valencia had me on his new live show to talk about covering mass deportations. I’m still pretty new to live streaming on my phone but as an old hand in the TV booking game, it was an honor to join a seriously talented broadcast journalist like Nick to talk about the beat that has consumed us both in 2025. Give it a watch and let me know what you think.

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WASHINGTON — On Sunday, federal agents made a big to-do on social media about removing a community banner that said ‘Chinga La Migra’ (translation: f*ck ICE) from a public plaza in the Mount Pleasant neighborhood of Washington, D.C.

A patrol of eight masked agents recorded a video of themselves acting brave as they triumphantly removed the banner which has hung in the plaza since January.

The video was posted to social media by Immi...

Alex Roberts is a union representative for flight attendants. His argument is concise: “Commercial flights are for consumers and cargo,” not ICE. His ask: “These commercial air carriers … should discontinue and disallow these deportations operations.” Kudos to Mika for last week’s best mass deportations segment on cable news. What do you think? Comments are open.

Subscribe or donate to keep Migrant Insider. Segment clipped with Snap...

WASHINGTON — On June 30, my knees shook with raw the adrenaline after I asked my first-ever question to the President of the United States. It was a question I’d asked Border Czar Tom Homan that morning in the blazing Potomac heat of the White House driveway.

Homan dodged, blaming Biden. Trump blamed Biden, too, but also told me that he understood my question and implied that 90% of the Afghan war allies that I was inquiring about w...

WASHINGTON — On Wednesday, *Migrant Insider* asked White House border czar Tom Homan why he deported more migrants as Barack Obama’s ICE director than he has during either Donald Trump administration.

Homan said Obama relied on accounting gimmicks, like counting Border Patrol removals as ICE removals, to drive up his presidency’s migrant removal statistics. As a result, Obama deported more migrants than any president in American his...

WASHINGTON — On Wednesday, we asked three Republican lawmakers if they care if ICE detains U.S. citizens. "No, I'm not concerned about that,” said Rep. Ralph Norman (R-SC):

Ditto Rep. Troy Nehls (R-TX):

Then there was Sen. Tommy Tubberville (R-AL):

In summary, no … Congressional Republicans don’t much care if U.S. citizens get swept up in ICE raids.

Video news like this takes a lot of legwork. Support our work by subscribing if you hav...

WASHINGTON — Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX) on the unprecedented funding increases for ICE tucked away in the sprawling Republican megabill currently advancing in the House. Follow us on X for realtime updates from the House of Representatives.

MEANWHILE, got an immigration question for Congress? We’d love to hear from you.

Comment below or DM us your question. We pick a few each week to ask at the Capitol.

Lastly, please subscribe to...

EDITOR’S NOTE: I forgot to include the video of our interview with Murphy in our last post. Apologies. The video is attached now.

WASHINGTON — Migrant Insider just interviewed Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) about the accounting gimmicks Republicans are using to jam Donald Trump’s megabill through the Senate via the obscure process of budget reconciliation.

We also asked Murphy to react to some of the concerns that Migrant Insider readers h...

WASHINGTON — Today, we tried something different at Migrant Insider: we hosted our first Substack Live with my longtime friend and colleague Nick Valencia who broadcast live from the streets of Los Angeles, California. Not gonna lie, I learned a ton watching Nick work through the Live experience, best practices that I’ll be using in the Beltway moving forward. So look for more alerts for when we go live.

Some of our broadcasts will...

WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans used tricky language to include a provision in the GOP megabill (Section 90003 Part B) being debated on the Senate floor tonight that would allow for the mass detention of migrant children, entirely at the discretion of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.

Watch the video to find out more, and please subscribe to support our work.

Federal agents launched a pre-dawn raid Friday on a Huntington Park home, detonating an explosive to force entry as a woman and her two young children huddled inside.

The target? Jenny Ramirez’s boyfriend, Jorge Sierra-Hernandez — who wasn't even there.

Surveillance footage shows agents securing an explosive device to the front door and window before detonating it, shattering glass and sending Ramirez scrambling to protect her 1-ye...

WASHINGTON — This afternoon I asked Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) what it means that Zohran Mamdani was able to win his New York City mayoral primary WITHOUT throwing immigrants under the bus.

Watch her response and remember: our work is made possible through the generous support of readers / viewers like you.

So please, subscribe to our newsletter and consider buying us a Gatorade so we can keep doing videos on the House st...

WASHINGTON — Yesterday, I interviewed Rep. Delia Ramirez (D-IL) on the House steps about holding ICE accountable for the nationwide avalanche of misconduct by agents.

Ramirez told me the buck ultimately stops with DHS secretary Kristi Noem who the congresswoman is confident will eventually be prosecuted for the many crimes committed during her tenure as secretary.

Watch the full interview and let me know in the comments if there ar...