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‘100% Pro Police’ And Running For Congress To Abolish ICE

The “havoc and terror” inflicted on America by Trump, his yes men and the administration’s supporters in Congress is a dynamic all too familiar to former U.S. Capitol Police Officer Harry Dunn.

“I have been on the front lines,” he said.

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Five years ago, Dunn was one of the Capitol police officers defending the members of Congress from Trump’s mob on Jan. 6, 2021, enduring a torrent of violent attacks and racial slurs. He held the line amid chaos — and in a moment of perhaps some irony now — he rushed to give a woman CPR on the floor inside the office of Democrat Rep. Steny Hoyer.

This year, it was just a few hours after Alex Pretti was killed by federal agents in Minneapolis that, hundreds of miles away in Maryland, Dunn decided to run for Congress.

“I said, ‘We’ve got to do this. We have to do this. People are dying and we have to push back and get in there,’” he recalled in an interview with HuffPost this week.

Dunn is running for the seat that Hoyer will vacate for Maryland’s Fifth Congressional District. Hoyer has held it since 1981 but announced his retirement on Jan. 8, just a day after Renee Good was gunned down by ICE in Minneapolis. Dunn announced his campaign on Feb. 4.

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It’s his second bid for Congress after a narrow primary loss in Maryland’s third district in 2023. When he ran the first time, Dunn said he focused on the threats Trump posed to democracy and what would happen if he returned to the White House with a Congress willing to enable him. This time — those threats have come to be.

“It’s not even an administration anymore. We’re in regime territory, and we need as many people [as possible] that are going to stand up to him, especially when the Democrats take back the House in these midterms coming up, we’re going to need people,” Dunn said.

If he’s sent to Congress, he won’t cut any “blank checks” for agencies or officials who refuse to answer questions, he said, because Congress holds the purse and he intends to keep it that way. Using his subpoena powers as a lawmaker, Dunn said he would force answers from administration officials about ICE’s brute force tactics, shrouded membership and overall operations. High-ranking agency officials would come under intense scrutiny and be up for removal, he said.

“I see the same aggression in these ICE agents that I saw from rioters on Jan. 6,” Dunn said. “Maybe they are wearing their masks because they will be identified as people who were at the Capitol on Jan. 6.”

“I believe we need to abolish ICE,” he added. “In the way that it exists right now, I don’t see a way of functionality.”

Trump supporters clash with police and security forces as people try to storm the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6, 2021. Demonstrators breached security and entered the Capitol as Congress debated the Electoral Vote Certification for the 2020 presidential election.

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As a 15-year veteran of the Capitol Police force, Dunn underwent training in de-escalation and negotiation tactics. Training — and adhering to that training — is the difference between life and death for members of the public as well as officers on the beat. What Dunn sees happening wherever Trump’s ICE agents go doesn’t give him confidence in ICE.

The ICE and CBP agents involved in the shooting deaths of Good and Pretti were trained and had years of experience, he noted.

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“These weren’t just some rookies who just made a training error,” he said. “We are beyond the point of being able to train our way out of this.”

Dunn considers himself “100% pro police” and is “absolutely, full stop” in support of immigration enforcement to remove criminal offenders like rapists, murderers and drug traffickers. What he won’t do is support blanket immunity for police or paint immigrants with one broad brush or ignore the urgent need to improve paths to citizenship.

“There could be a way to do this, but they have shown over and over again that they don’t want to. The blatant disregard for humanity, for human safety. They’re hitting people with their cars. They’re throwing tear gas at reporters, at peaceful protesters. They’re shooting people. It’s insane,” he said.

Holding the line for democracy may be his speciality, but it is far from his only interest. Dunn believes that for Democrats duking it out in the Maryland primary, this election won’t really be about huge disputes in policy since they largely align on issues like health care, education, and — particularly — affordability.

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“The point is: Who is going to be able to be the most forceful? Who is going to press every button, pull every lever available to them, take every chance and use the full weight of the constitutional authority granted to a member of Congress?” he said.

In another life, before Jan. 6, Dunn said he would have been happy to just “donate a couple dollars and go knock on doors” for his favorite candidate. But he forsook the “luxury” of standing back and hoping someone else would figure it out long ago.

“Respect to all career politicians, because some are good, but I don’t think this is the time for a career politician. We need somebody that’s going to restore order, restore the faith, restore the trust in Congress, in the government, and we only do that with accountability,” he said.

Dunn said he believes the Trump administration’s abuses of power are inextricably linked to every “kitchen table issue” in America. He highlights the impacts on the district he is running in: The cuts by DOGE in early 2025 hit Maryland, as well as nearby Washington, D.C., and Virginia, hard, leaving laid-off workers reeling as they dealt with an abruptly inundated job market and high costs of living.

U.S. Capitol Police officer Sgt. Harry Dunn testifies before the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol on July 27, 2021, at the Cannon House Office Building in Washington, D.C. Members of law enforcement testified about the attack by supporters of former President Donald Trump on the U.S. Capitol. According to authorities, about 140 police officers were injured when they were trampled, had objects thrown at them, and sprayed with chemical irritants during the insurrection.

There are close to 150,000 federal workers in Maryland and 75,000 of them live in Maryland’s Fifth. According to Hoyer’s office, nearly 20% of all workers in MD-5 are federal employees, the highest percentage of any district nationwide. There are also 48,236 active duty and reserve military personnel serving in Maryland.

“My friends and my loved ones are being affected by this. People across the country, in the community,” he said. “That’s what this is all about… all roads lead back to Donald Trump and his billionaire buddies getting these tax breaks, and Donald Trump growing his net worth because of the presidency,” he said before noting Trump just sued the Treasury and IRS for a $10 billion payout, out of taxpayers’ pockets.

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“He don’t give a **** about nobody but himself,” he said.

“My goal is to make sure the people are being heard in those halls, the people are being represented in those halls,” Dunn said. “I want to stand in the void where they are being attacked, and stand up for them.”