Viral interview captures what traveler really thought about ICE agents helping TSA at airports

A Brooklyn man went viral for his take on the deployment of ICE agents to airports nationwide to assist TSA agents as the DHS shutdown consequences played out over the last several weeks.

Chris Scali briefly spoke with News 12 at Newark Liberty International Airport, saying ICE agents were "good" and not bothering anyone — comments that quickly gained widespread attention online.

Fox News Digital spoke with Scali on Thursday while he was vacationing in the Bahamas; he said he'd arrived with a friend at the airport four hours early.

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"I walked into the airport, I saw a very small line and all I thought was, Now I gotta be here for three hours," said Scali. "I started seeing the ICE agents walk, and I was like, They just look like they're here to help."

He added, "I mean, the last I knew, people were scared to go to airports years ago. The more safety [and] security, the better. That's just the way I feel. I don't really care who was there to help."

"As long as everything goes smooth in the airport and everyone gets on their planes — God bless," he said.

Scali said he felt their presence was just "common sense," noting that every time he goes to an international airport, he sees customs agents and border patrol present.

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"I wasn't too sure what the fuss was [about]. Am I crazy? I don't know," he added.

The sports betting influencer of "Sports By Scal" on YouTube said a friend texted him the interview, telling him it was all over X, which Scali does not have. He said many people were sending him the clip.

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"I was so surprised because I didn't really say much. I just said the obvious, like if they're here to help, they're here to help. I just wanted to get to the beach," he added.

Scali said it was the best flight he's ever been on — and that the plane was half empty.

"The winter in New York was rough, so I needed to get away. I needed to sit on a beach. I haven't got away in a long time," he said.

"Me and my girl, we just wanted to sit down, relax on the beach, have a couple of drinks, enjoy ourselves — you know," said Scali. "The last time I went on vacation was probably six months ago, so this was well deserved."

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"I'm glad it went smooth. That's all I cared about," he added. 

"Because that's the thing, right? It's like, you know, all the anxiety leading up to going to the airport," said Scali. 

"I haven't traveled in so long, but I don't want to deal with a headache. It makes you not want to travel. Then you get there and everything's smooth — easy peasy."

While Scali expressed a favorable view of ICE agents at airports, Democratic lawmakers criticized the decision by the Trump administration.

New York City Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani posted to X on Tuesday, writing, "ICE doesn’t belong at our airports."

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U.S. House of Representatives Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries shared a similar sentiment earlier this week.

"The last thing that the American people need are for untrained ICE agents to be deployed at airports, all across the country, potentially to brutalize or in some instances kill them," said Jeffries.

President Donald Trump late Thursday said he would sign an executive order to "immediately pay our TSA Agents in order to address this Emergency Situation" and "quickly stop the Democrat Chaos at the Airports." 

In the wee hours of Friday morning, the Senate advanced a new, last-minute deal to reopen most of the DHS, 42 days into the shutdown that was spurred by the Trump administration’s immigration operations in Minnesota.

It was an agreement that largely gave Senate Democrats what they wanted — no funding for ICE and parts of Customs and Border Protection (CBP). But it lacked the stringent reforms they desired, such as requiring judicial warrants or requiring agents to unmask, as Fox News Digital has previously reported.

While the deal mirrors previous attempts by Democrats to pass similar legislation that carved out immigration funding, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., argued Democrats are still walking away empty-handed in the policy fight over immigration enforcement. 

"We've been trying for weeks to fund the whole thing," Thune said. "And, I mean, in the end, this is what they were willing to agree to. But again, it's different [in] that it has zero reforms in it. I mean, they got no reforms on DHS, which they could have had if they had been willing to work with us a little bit on that."

Fox News Digital's Alex Miller contributed reporting.