CNN’s Abby Phillip Schools Trump Ally Joe Borelli: ‘That’s Not How Government Funding Works’

CNN’s Abby Phillip reminded a former elected official “how government funding works” in a debate over a fatal ICE encounter in Texas.

Speaking on CNN NewsNight Friday, Philip and former New York City Councilman Joe Borelli got into a discussion over the fatal shooting of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Houston.

ICE has claimed Salgado Araujo attempted to ram its agents.

Phillip, whose panel included Borelli and journalist Charles Blow among others, questioned why there was no photographic evidence for the claim:

ABBY PHILLIP: I mean, they’ve said that the vehicle rammed the ICE vehicle. They should be able to provide photographic evidence of that. They should be able to tell us who, what direction the officer shot into the vehicle. What happened in that lead up? Why all the silence around this?

JOE BORELLI: I think it takes time to conduct a proper investigation. Police shootings unfortunately happen from time to time. More often than not, the shootings are justified. Occasionally they’re not and that’s why there does need to be and I fully support what you’re saying.

There should be transparency. There should be accountability. But to dissect a little bit what Charles said, he’s right. It was the Trump administration, not the Biden administration in February of 2025 that put a directive out that said all ICE officers should have body cams.

And as Charles pointed out, it was thanks to constant Democratic shutdowns that delayed that process. Now you finally have in April, and finally you have in April of 2026, the government actually funds $20 million.

CHARLES BLOW: Are you suggesting?

PHILLIP: Well no the funding for body cameras that $20 million came in the big beautiful bill. That was last year. So they had almost a full year to roll this out. They did not do it.

I don’t know why you would blame the government shutdown when ICE was operating as normal during the government shutdown, the Trump administration told us that. They have been operating. They were a fully funded agency.

ICE was not impacted by the government shutdown. So why would that stop them from providing body cams?

BORELLI: As I understand it and as they say, this funding was tied to portions of the bill that were shut down by the government.

PHILLIP: That’s fine. No, no, no, that’s not how government that’s not how government funding works.

Watch above via CNN.

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