Sheriff Rochelle Bilal has garnered national headlines and condemnation for calling U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement “fake, wannabe law enforcement” and sending a blunt warning to immigration officers who commit crimes in Philadelphia.

“If any [ICE agents] want to come in this city and commit a crime, you will not be able to hide, nobody will whisk you off,” Bilal said. “You don’t want this smoke, cause we will bring it to you. … The criminal in the White House would not be able to keep you from going to jail.”

Bilal made the now-viral remarks at a news conference Thursday alongside Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner, who vowed to prosecute law enforcement officers who commit crimes. The news conference was held in response to the killing of Renee Nicole Good by ICE officer Jonathan Ross in Minneapolis.

» READ MORE: DA Krasner condemns fatal ICE shooting in Minneapolis, says officers who commit crimes in Philly will ‘be convicted’

Since then, clips of Bilal have circled social media — with one post on X amassing 1.6 million views and more than 91,000 likes as of Saturday afternoon — and the sheriff’s name has been invoked in Fox News, Newsweek, and HuffPost headlines, among others. Philadelphia Police Commissioner Kevin Bethel said his department has been inundated with calls and emails, leading him to put out a statement Friday affirming that the sheriff’s office is a separate entity from the Philadelphia Police Department. One Florida politician said Bilal should be arrested.

The sheriff’s office and a spokesperson for Bilal did not immediately respond to requests for comment Saturday. In an interview with CNN’s Erin Burnett, Bilal said “enough is enough.”

“People are tired of these people coming into the city, masked up — basically all masked up — and pulling people out and causing havoc,” Bilal told the network. “This was supposed to be helping cities out, this was supposed to be eliminating crime, but yet, you are committing them here, you are putting people in fear, you are breaking up families.”

Bilal spoke for less than four minutes at the Thursday news conference. She upbraided ICE agents for wearing masks that obscure their faces and said their actions violate “not only legal law but the moral law.”

“Law enforcement professionals around the country do their job, and we have been fighting for years to build that bridge between us and our communities,” Bilal said. “You had one negative nutcase that causes this problem and now we all have to fight again to let people know law enforcement works with communities.”

» READ MORE: Hundreds protest in Philadelphia against Minneapolis ICE shooting

Some praised Bilal on social media. Ben Crump, a prominent civil rights attorney, wrote on Facebook, “Sheriff Rochelle Bilal didn’t hold back. … Tragedies like this happen when agents operate in our communities with little to no oversight.”

Meanwhile, the Pennsylvania GOP posted on X, “When local law enforcement stands with criminals rather than people keeping our communities safe, you know there’s a problem. … Rhetoric like this only makes this situation more dangerous for federal law enforcement and the city of Philadelphia.”

A video of Bilal’s statement was also posted by LibsofTikTok, a controversial far-right social media account. That post had more than 746,800 views and 8,500 likes as of Saturday afternoon.

U.S. Rep. Randy Fine, a Republican from Florida, responded to LibsofTikTok’s post, writing, “She should be arrested.”

The Philadelphia Sheriff’s Office does not police the city; instead, the office’s core functions are deploying deputies to the county’s courtrooms and transporting in-custody defendants to court.

In his statement, Police Commissioner Bethel distinguished the roles of the sheriff’s office and the police department, noting that the sheriff’s office does not “conduct criminal investigations, nor does it in any way direct municipal policing.” The sheriff is an elected official, while police commissioners are appointed by the mayor.

“The Philadelphia Police Department will continue to work professionally with all of our enforcement partners,” Bethel said. “But clear lines of authority — and accurate public representation of those roles — are essential to maintaining public trust and effective public safety operations.”

Under Bilal — who took office in 2020 — there’s been a series of breakdowns in the sheriff’s office, The Inquirer has reported, including misappropriated funds, lax courthouse security, mishandled domestic-abuse cases, and allegations of missing guns. The issues have renewed calls to reform or abolish the embattled office.

» READ MORE: Philly’s financial watchdog calls for abolition of Sheriff’s Office and Register of Wills