When Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) asked Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison (D) during a Senate hearing on Wednesday if we should enforce laws against illegal aliens, he answered, "It depends." In other words, Ellison doesn't believe in law and order; he believes in his omnipotent authority to pick and choose which laws he agrees with before enforcing them.
The Minnesota attorney general, already up to his eyeballs in the Somali daycare fraud scandal, is equally embarrassing on immigration enforcement. He followed up his ridiculous answer about deporting illegal aliens by saying that entering America illegally or overstaying a visa in violation of the law is not remotely similar to invading someone's home.
Moreno sarcastically said that a "big shot lawyer like" Ellison ought to be able to define illegal presence in our country very clearly. "Sir, [if] somebody breaks into your home, should they be arrested for breaking and entering, or does it depend?" Moreno questioned.
"It's an entirely different scenario," Ellison blustered, "because, uh, immigration is essentially civil, and the breaking into my home is a criminal matter."
Moreno: "If you enter the country illegally or overstay a visa, should you be deported?"
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) February 12, 2026
Ellison: "It depends."
Moreno: "If someone breaks into your home, should they be arrested, or does it depend?" pic.twitter.com/4yzhk7C2XO
But Ellison is ignoring two obvious facts here, one of which Moreno pointed out to him: He is making the argument that some laws should be enforced and some should not, a ridiculous, arbitrary, and dangerous proposition. "There's laws that should be enforced, so we shouldn't enforce civil violations?" Moreno challenged.
Ellison answered without seeming to remember he'd just argued the contrary: "We absolutely should enforce them."
Moreno dryly pointed out, "But you just said that it's a civil matter, so it's different.… So if somebody commits a civil infraction, it shouldn't be enforced?"
Ellison said, "It should be," but when Moreno clarified that means illegal aliens "should be deported," Ellison backtracked. "No, they should have due process that is associated with their petition." That, of course, is not based on constitutional law. An illegal alien can and should be arrested and deported at any time, regardless of lengthy "proceedings" or not, because constitutional rights apply to citizens, not foreign nationals. Moreno argued "it's pretty obvious" that, if illegal aliens have committed a crime worthy of deportation, then merely establishing their illegal entry is enough to enforce the law.
"I mean, it would depend on the facts of the situation," Ellison sputtered lamely.
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The second fact Ellison ignored, however, is that there truly is a very real parallel between breaking and entering a home and illegally entering a country. Put simply, we might say that just because the space or area in question is bigger in the case of illegal entry into a country does not make it any less a violation of property. The American people are sovereign over this country, as a man owns his house. In fact, property rights were one of the main incentives for the Founding Fathers to launch the Revolution, and they believed no less in national sovereignty than in private property.
It is unfortunate that, on the very day the Senate was grilling Gov. Tim Walz and Ellison on their dangerous and illegal actions in Minnesota (e.g., 18 U.S. Code § 111 and 8 U.S. Code § 1324), the Trump administration decided to announce it was ending its immigration enforcement surge operation in Minnesota. If there's anything we learned from Ellison's answers today, it's that he does not believe in the enforcement of federal laws, and he also evidently thinks he should not be held accountable for that.
