TAMPA, Fla. -- A rowdy crowd of 5,000 Gen Z Republican organizers rattled the Tampa Convention Center Saturday night with their support for President Donald Trump's deportation policies.
While the president's handling of the Jeffrey Epstein investigation split the event's lineup of MAGA media stars, the young adults gathered for Turning Point USA's Student Action Summit were united in their enthusiasm for their favorite Trump Cabinet celebrities.
Border czar Tom Homan and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem received what can only be called a hero's welcome, with fans from across the country pressing to take a selfie, straining to get a MAGA hat signed and screaming as the White House's top deportation authorities took the stage amid pyrotechnics and pounding music.
"We're on a mission to make this country safe again," Homan shouted over the applause. "President Trump was elected for this issue."
And this is the issue Trump must continue to deliver on for the political grassroots if he hopes to keep his team of advisers and his most fervent supporters on board, said Turning Point president Charlie Kirk in an interview with the Deseret News.
Over the course of Friday and Saturday, the America First influencers assembled by Kirk increasingly spoke to the audience of high school and university students about the infighting taking place within the Trump administration over the so-called Epstein Files.
Disagreements over transparency, Iran air strikes and immigration law enforcement represent serious "fault lines" among Trump's most vocal supporters, according to Kirk. But there is one agenda item the president has to get right to maintain credibility with the Turning Point camp.
"Of all the issues, if there would be even some flirtation with amnesty -- which the President has said no amnesty, he said those words, 'no amnesty' -- then the base would be quite upset," Kirk said. "I think that there would be a revolt on our hands. But I don't think that's going to happen."
After a decade of Trump preaching the need for a border wall, mass deportations of unprecedented scale and the value of U.S. citizenship, Kirk said that immigration has become "the connective tissue that keeps this movement together."
But in mid-June, Trump shocked immigration hawks with a series of statements implying that there could be carve outs for Immigration and Custom Enforcement actions that impacted farmers, hotels and other industries that rely on immigrant labor.
Trump went so far as to suggest in a Fox News appearance at the end of the month that he might allow agricultural employers to continue hiring unauthorized immigrants who had been in the country for a certain amount of time.
The change in tone reportedly followed admonitions from Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins who advocated for a halt on ICE raids at farms where fields would otherwise go unharvested because of the difficulty of finding American-born workers who are up to the task.
After a wave of immediate backlash, at least partially spearheaded by Kirk through his podcast, both Trump and Rollins reversed course this week, vowing that the administration would never green-light anything that looked like "amnesty" and would work to ensure a "100% American" workforce.
Foreign-born workers, including unauthorized immigrants, made up nearly 19% of the U.S. labor force in 2023, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. This includes around 1.5 million in construction, 1 million in restaurants and 320,000 in agriculture, the Center for Migration Studies reported.
But these numbers should in no way override a commitment to law and order, according to Kirk. Avoiding amnesty isn't just keeping campaign promises, Kirk said; it's making sure that businesses and unauthorized immigrants know that the United States enforces its law on the books.
"I get calls from people that own meat packing facilities," Kirk said. "They're like, 'This will really jeopardize stuff because I employ a bunch of illegals.' And I say, 'Well, you shouldn't be employing illegals. Sorry.'"
Since President Ronald Reagan signed amnesty legislation in 1986, the country has "grown addicted to illegal migrant labor," Kirk said. And now the administration is "looking to decouple that" which Kirk acknowledged "might be rough."
Kirk is skeptical about "alarmist rhetoric" that crops will rot and houses will go unbuilt if Trump carries through with the deportation of millions of unauthorized immigrants. But Kirk said he trusts the president to know how to help industries make the adjustment as he fulfills his mandate.
"If any leader, regardless if it's Trump or not, does something opposite to what they ran on, which I'm not saying Trump is doing, then you're gonna put your whole movement in jeopardy," Kirk said."No one is immune to that."
After making her way through the crowds on Saturday night, offering hugs, handshakes and "I love you"'s along the way, Noem, who oversees Citizenship and Immigration Services, repeated what had become the mantra of the event.
"I will be very firm in telling all of you there will never be amnesty under my agency," she said.
The night before, podcast host Tucker Carlson, visibly angry, responded to a question from a student, calling amnesty "the most grotesque thing I've ever heard" that should "burn on the tongue of anyone who utters it."
In addition to Carlson, the event featured remarks from internet personalities like Brett Cooper and Brandon Tatum, cable news commentators like Laura Ingraham and Riley Gaines, and Republican officials like Ohio Sen. Bernie Moreno and Arizona Rep. Andy Biggs.
Their messages, ranging from criticisms of the deep state to advice about marriage, built on Kirk's vision for Turning Point as both an infrastructure for political advocacy and an engine for cultural change.
Kirk started Turning Point USA, now based out of Phoenix, Arizona, in 2012 when he was 18 to bring conservative arguments to college campuses. The nonprofit has grown to include around 1,000 chapters at universities and another 1,000 at high schools.
When asked about the foreign and domestic controversies mentioned at the conference Charissa Solik, a 25-year-old from North Carolina, said her priority for the Trump administration is to get control of the immigration system.
"You definitely need mass deportations," Solik said. "And that, to me, is what's most important to America First."
Corban Skipper, the Turning Point chapter leader at Coastal Carolina University, said the Trump administration needs to "stay true to the people" by doing exactly what he campaigned on.
The highlight of the weekend, according to Skipper, was Homan, who railed against critics of ICE agents, including one protestor at the event who he challenged to a fight, and promised attendees that the work of ICE was just getting started.
The agency responsible for removing unauthorized immigrants from the country has already arrested and deported 150,000 individuals during Trump's second term in office, according to Homan.
Homan praised Trump's Saturday announcement that ICE is now authorized to immediately incarcerate, "using whatever means is necessary," anyone who assaults or stops the vehicles of ICE agents after an instance of Californians throwing rocks at the windows of ICE vehicles.
"If they think they're going to stop ICE from doing their job," Homan said,"they got another thing coming,because every time they double down,we'll triple down."
Attendees jumped to their feet as Homan finished his remarks, cheering louder than they had for any other of the well-known speakers,repeating the words,"USA,USA,USA."