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A Democrat running for the Senate in ruby-red Arkansas once called to defund immigration enforcement, but has since changed her tune.
Arkansas Senate Democratic nominee Hallie Shoffner, a farmer and political newcomer whose first time in the political arena is this midterm cycle, is running to unseat Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., in November.
As Election Day creeps closer, Cotton has gone on the offensive against her, attacking an apparent flip-flop in her position on Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the immigration enforcement agency under the Department of Homeland Security that became a political lightning rod in Congress earlier this year.
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Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents walk a detainee out of the Ventura County Government Center in Ventura, Calif., on July 27, 2026. (AFP via Getty Images)
Shoffner, during an appearance in June at the Immigrant Heritage Month Business Expo in Springdale, Ark., was asked whether she would defund ICE — a position several Democrats running for office have taken this cycle, including progressives Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan and Peggy Flanagan in Minnesota.
“I would vote to defund ICE as it exists right now,” Shoffner said. “Immigration and Customs Enforcement was created not that long ago, and it no longer serves the purpose it was originally created for.”
“I would not spend one more dime on ICE, because — not just because of the human dignity issue — but also the fact that it is now the largest law enforcement agency in the country,” she continued. “It has 10 times the budget of the organization that fights child sex trafficking.”
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ICE became a political third rail earlier this year after fatal shootings in Minnesota and was at the center of the longest government shutdown in history, when Senate Democrats refused to fund the agency absent stringent reforms.
That prompted Senate Republicans to front-load $70 billion in funding for ICE and Border Patrol earlier this year.
Cotton’s campaign cut Shoffner’s comments into attack ads and accused her of donating to former Vice President Kamala Harris 25 times, which prompted Shoffner to further define her position.
In a Facebook post from Tuesday in which Cotton was asked by a voter about Shoffner’s ICE position, she jumped into the comment section to argue, “I don’t want to defund ICE, I want to reform it.”
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Sens. John Barrasso of Wyoming, Tom Cotton of Arkansas, Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia and James Lankford of Oklahoma attend a news conference following Senate Republican policy luncheons at the U.S. Capitol on June 23, 2026. (Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“My opponent wants to defund ICE, just like Democrat socialists Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez and Abdul El-Sayed,” Cotton told Fox News Digital. “Doing so would protect criminals from deportation, like the illegal alien gang member who was arrested in Carroll County just days ago. Defunding ICE would make Arkansas more dangerous.”
Shoffner’s bid to unseat Cotton, who is running for a third term in the upper chamber, is one of the tougher battles during this midterm cycle for Democrats.
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Arkansas hasn’t sent a Democrat to the Senate since former Sen. Mark Pryor, who Cotton defeated in 2014. Shoffner also doesn’t have the backing of the Democratic establishment, including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., in Washington, D.C.
Shoffner has put distance between herself and Schumer, too, telling Politico in March that while Democrats had found the issue of affordability to be a “magic bullet” at the national level, Arkansans were going to give Schumer “the side eye, because what does he know about affordability?”