This is an adapted excerpt from the October 14 episode of “The Rachel Maddow Show.”
Last weekend the Rod of Iron Ministries held their annual Freedom Festival in Pennsylvania. The group describes the event as the “largest open carry rally in America.” Carrying a gold AR-15 and wearing a crown made of bullets, the group’s leader welcomed attendees to the three-day event and called on God to save America by “using President Trump.”
Also in attendance was Tom Homan, who served as acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement during Donald Trump’s first term. He is largely considered the architect of Trump’s policy of ripping small children from their mothers and fathers at the border.
Homan was one of the main speakers at the event on Saturday. He bragged about his vision of running a deportation program under Trump. “I will lead the largest deportation operation this country has ever seen,” Homan said.
That’s not just wishful thinking on his part. Trump has publicly said that if elected to a second term, he would indeed bring Homan back on board to oversee his immigration policy, the centerpiece of which is ordering the U.S. military to build camps to house tens of millions of people and then to deport tens of millions of people. It’s one of them, if not thewho this time defined the Trump campaign’s policy position.
If you’re wondering how the Trump administration would handle this, how they would actually carry out the largest deportation operation this country has ever seen, whether it would be approached carefully and soberly, just consider that the man who reasonably could be in prison, The camp leadership, which was in charge of the deportations, headlined this weekend’s “Assault Rifles Are God’s Will” rally, where their leader wore a ball crown.
During his remarks, Homan promised the crowd: “I’ve said it a hundred times: Trump is coming back, I’m coming back.”
This article was originally published on MSNBC.com
