DNC Passes Resolution to Abolish ICE, Alongside a Second One to Just Reform It

The Democratic National Committee couldn't decide whether it wants to abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement or just fix it. So at its summer meeting in Austin, Texas, it passed both.

Resolution 27, sponsored by Louisiana DNC committeewoman Michele Johnson, urges congressional Democrats to write legislation dissolving ICE entirely and winding down the immigration detention system, according to Newsweek and the Associated Press. A separate resolution, backed by DNC Chairman Ken Martin, calls only for "concrete reforms." Both got bundled into a larger policy package and passed the full membership by unanimous voice vote, per the Washington Times, after the abolition measure cleared the Resolutions Committee 25-12 with one abstention on Thursday.

None of it is binding. The DNC's actual platform gets set at the 2028 convention, not at a summer committee meeting, and Martin said as much directly. "Our official party positions are determined at the convention every four years in our platform," Martin told Newsweek. He argued the through-line for Democrats isn't abolish-versus-reform, it's that "what ICE is doing right now — and CBP and the federal government — should stop."

What the abolition resolution actually does

Beyond dissolving ICE, the measure calls for cutting off Department of Homeland Security funding unless the agency ends workplace raids, mass roundups, courthouse arrests, arrests at ICE check-ins, and operations near schools and churches, according to both Newsweek and the Epoch Times. It also calls for ending contracts with private detention companies and pursuing "civil and criminal accountability" for any federal official who "lied under oath, misrepresented evidence, or gave false testimony regarding DHS conduct," plus stripping qualified immunity from DHS and ICE personnel involved in deaths in custody or shootings at moving vehicles, per the Epoch Times.

Johnson framed the push as overdue. "I think one of the reasons why people are not trusting the party is because we sound so academic," she told the AP. "We sound focus group tested, we sound poll tested because we're worried about saying the wrong thing or doing the wrong thing and not just like, just stand on business, like take a position." She also pointed to the dissolution of ICE's predecessor agency, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, as precedent, per the AP.

Not everyone on the committee agreed. Yvonne Reeves-Chong voted no, telling the AP the measure would energize part of the base while alienating another. "I would strongly suggest we get to the business of winning races so we can make the policies that make a difference," she said.

An amendment from Idaho's Terri Pickens that would have swapped "abolishing" for "completely restructuring" was floated in committee days earlier but withdrawn, according to the Epoch Times.

The political backdrop

The vote lands as ICE ramps up enforcement under the Trump administration. Border czar Tom Homan said in July the agency was on pace to set arrest records for a second straight month, calling the push "deportation-maxxing," a phrase cited by Newsweek, the Daily Wire, and the Epoch Times.

It also follows two fatal ICE shootings in July, including the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Martin's home state of Minnesota, which the AP notes Martin referenced directly in explaining the party's anger. Separately, House Homeland Security Committee Democrats, including ranking member Bennie Thompson, Luis Correa, and Shri Thanedar, sent DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin a letter this week urging him to halt a planned $20 million procurement of electric-shock gloves for ICE and Homeland Security Investigations agents, warning the devices could be "incorrectly used or abused by officers resulting in injury or death," according to FedScoop. DHS responded that it is "constantly assessing the needs of our officers in the field" and that any technology it adopts is reviewed against law enforcement standards.

The White House response to the DNC vote was blunt. Spokeswoman Lauren Bis told Newsweek: "Extreme radical Democrats want to abolish ICE and defund the police. President Trump's efforts to remove criminal illegal aliens from American communities is already delivering results including the lowest murder rate in 125 years."

That framing skips the fact that a reform resolution, not the abolition one, drew the broader base of support in committee. A distinction the AP's Mike Catalini captured but that the White House statement flattens into a single "Democrats want to abolish ICE" line.

Polling adds context Republicans and Democrats will both want to cite selectively. An AP-NORC survey released this month found only 39% of U.S. adults approve of Trump's handling of immigration, down from 49% at the start of his second term, even as the same survey found immigration remains a stronger issue for Trump than the economy or Iran.

None of this changes what ICE does tomorrow. The resolution has no legislative force, Congress isn't voting on abolishing ICE, and the $20 million shock-glove contract is still expected to be awarded later this year unless Mullin acts on the House Democrats' letter. In 2028, when Democrats set their binding platform, they will have to decide which of these two positions actually makes it in.