The Trump administration is reportedly sending elite federal tactical units from the southern border to sanctuary cities across the United States in an effort to boost Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) ability to enforce federal immigration laws.

The New York Times reports that the units will be deployed to the Democrat-controlled cities of Chicago, New York City, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Houston, Boston, New Orleans, Detroit, and Newark.

“The move reflects President Trump’s persistence in cracking down on sanctuary cities, localities that have refused to cooperate in handing over immigrants targeted for deportation to federal authorities,” the Times added. “It comes soon after the Justice Department and Department of Homeland Security announced a series of measures that will affect both American citizens and immigrants living in those places.”

Acting ICE Director Matthew Albence told the Times in a statement that the deployment is coming in response to Democrat policies that make it difficult for federal agents to enforce the law.

“As we have noted for years, in jurisdictions where we are not allowed to assume custody of aliens from jails, our officers are forced to make at-large arrests of criminal aliens who have been released into communities,” Albence said. “When sanctuary cities release these criminals back to the street, it increases the occurrence of preventable crimes, and more importantly, preventable victims.”

The Times noted that the officials indicated that the goal of the deployments was to increase immigration-related arrests by 35%. The officials stressed that the units that were being deployed would not be “busting down doors or engaging in shootouts” and that their role was to simply support local ICE agents that the Democrat-controlled cities were not providing support to.

ICE officials have had an even harder time carrying out their mission as far-left politicians like socialist Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) have encouraged people to tip off illegal aliens to impending immigration enforcement actions by federal authorities.

At a recent rally in Iowa, Ocasio-Cortez said, “Organizing is about tipping people off if you start to see that ICE and CBP are in communities to try and keep people safe. I’m not here to reform some of these systems when we talk about immigration. I’m here because Senator Sanders has actually committed to breaking up ICE and CBP. That’s why I’m here.”

Sources told Vanity Fair this week that the campaign of Democrat presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, who is also a socialist, was not happy with Ocasio-Cortez’s remarks because even they thought she was going to far.

Former Acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Director Tom Homan slammed Ocasio-Cortez immediately following her remarks, saying that she was engaged in criminal activity by encouraging people to commit obstruction.

“ICE is keeping the community safe,” Homan continued. “It’s an incredibly stupid statement she made, which doesn’t surprise me because she’s about as far from smart as anybody could possibly be, but what she said is dangerous. These men and women put their lives on the line every day to arrest criminals off the streets, especially in New York.”

“My last year as ICE director, we took 5,000 criminals off the streets of New York,” Homan continued. “These ICE agents have done more to protect the residents of New York than she ever has done or ever will do.”

“It’s a dangerous statement, it’s idiotic, and I just can’t believe that she can stand up on stage and make a statement like that and not have any repercussions from the House Ethics Committee,” Homan continued. “They are trying to remove the president of the United States, a sitting president, and at the same time she’s saying ICE shouldn’t remove criminal aliens. They say the president is obstructing them, there’s no one that’s been obstructing more than Congress. They’ve been obstructing this president from day 1.”

“She’s standing on stage and telling people to give a heads up that the good guys are going to be arresting the bad guys in your neighborhood… that’s obstruction, that’s a crime,” Homan continued. “She’s disgusting, something needs to be done about it.”

"She's about as far from smart as anybody can possibly be!" Retired ICE director Tom Homan absolutely eviscerates AOC for her "dangerous" & "idiotic" attacks. She encouraged folks to tip each other off during ICE raids, which ends up protecting, in many cases, violent criminals. pic.twitter.com/IlNOK4isI8 — (((Jason Rantz))) on KTTH Radio (@jasonrantz) January 28, 2020

This report has been updated to include additional information.