Tom Homan, President Donald Trump's executive associate director of enforcement and removal operations (Photo: Screen capture)
NBC News' Kristen Welker pressed Tom Homan on a $50,000 bribe he accepted in 2024 and what happened to the money he was given.
Homan, President Donald Trump's executive associate director of enforcement and removal operations, was involved in a contracts-for-cash scheme that was part of a sting operation
MSNBC reporters Carol Leonnig and Ken Dilanian reported in September that Homan was part of an investigation into a private-prison contracts scheme involving his former ICE colleague, Julian “Jace” Calderas.
"And in May 2023, he proposed a scheme, according to the FBI, whereby for $1 million, Homan could get them contracts and continued proposing that to the point that the FBI concluded they had to begin investigating Tom Homan for potential bribery," said Leonnig on MS NOW, while speaking about the report.
Leonnig noted then that at no point has Homan denied receiving the bribe. The White House, however, denied that he took the bribe in a press statement.
Speaking to Homan, Welker gave Homan an opportunity to answer ongoing questions about the money and where it went.
Homan said he didn't take $50,000 from anyone and that he did nothing wrong.
"I didn't have money to return," Homan claimed.
He also noted that the FBI has "cleared this."
Welker also asked to confirm whether the incident was recorded, whether there is a report on the matter and if it would ever be released.
Homan replied that those were all questions for the FBI.
She asked: "It might be a decision of the FBI, but would you be comfortable" with it being released?
"I'm not going to get ahead of the FBI in this investigation," Homan said, indicating that the matter was still an investigation.
He also complained that discussion on the matter keeps going "on, and on, and on, and on" despite his being cleared by the FBI.
"So I'm not going to answer any more of these questions," Homan said.
