Yuma mayor expects border security improvements under Trump

Yuma Mayor Douglas Nicholls, whose city often bears the brunt of illegal border crossings, expects to see significant changes in border security policies under the incoming Trump administration. 

The big picture: Increasing border security and cracking down on illegal immigration were among the pillars of Trump's campaign platform.  

• Tom Homan, who served as Trump's Immigration and Customs Enforcement director in his first term and will be the president-elect's border czar in the new administration, visited the U.S.-Mexico border in Cochise County on Wednesday. 
• He pledged that the Trump administration will "develop plans today to help these sheriffs make their communities safer and secure the border once again." 

Zoom in: While many details of Trump's border security plans remain unknown, Nicholls has some ideas about what he wants and expects to see.

• Speaking to Axios shortly after the election, the mayor said he anticipated Trump would reinstate the "Remain in Mexico" policy implemented during his first term. It would require migrants attempting to enter the U.S. to wait in Mexico until their immigration hearings.
• Nicholls said he also expected to see the completion of segments of Trump's border wall that weren't finished from 2017 to 2020, as well as increased funding for ICE's Enforcement and Removal Operations division. 

The intrigue: Trump has vowed to hire 10,000 new Border Patrol agents and provide them with pay raises and retention and signing bonuses. 

• He attempted to increase the number of agents in his first term, though Border Patrol shrank on his watch.

What they're saying: Nicholls said he expects to see "a lot more local engagement, a lot more issue-addressing" on border security from Trump than he has under President Biden's administration. 

• Asked what he thinks Trump understands about border security that Biden doesn't, Nicholls said the incoming president gets that cartels view the movement of people across the border the same way as anything else. 
• "As a business, they're looking to maximize profits. And if they can exploit the genuine empathy for wanting to take everybody, however they come, they're going to do that. But he understands that when you make business difficult — however that materializes — that reduces your profits and forces more control," he said.