Even if this is true, you have to look at the intent of action between 2016 and now. Trump uses ice in the exact same way Hitler used the Gastapo. What ice is doing currently is illegal, but presidentially supported. Which is why ice is being denounced because they’re removing innocent people and treating them like garbage.
It’s not about democratic intent. It’s about the intent of the administration using ice like it’s a branch of the military to force people out of the country for no good reason except they crossed this fictional line that only exists on paper. If we were as concerned about other domestic issues as we are immigration, we’d have a lot less issues at home.
The difference is they’ve been weaponized to a point they’re untouchable. They now operate on an anything goes basis. They’re illegally kidnapping American citizens under the pretense of them being illegal. The trump administration doesn’t understand the law they’re trying to enforce because they’re all illiterate (proven fact for the president), too stupid to read it thoroughly, or in the middle of a substance abuse issue.
Yes the anything goes and absolute lack of any checks and balances is new but the rest is still the same, they have always existed to kidnap people under the pretense of them being illegal and it’s also not new for them to target American citizens from racial profiling especially of indigenous people but again the degree and lack of checks is a complete new level of disgusting