As ICE launches recruitment efforts to hire another 10,000 officers, existing staff will fight long hours and expand public anger.
Ted Hesson, Tim Reed, Nicole Janine Johnson
|Reuters
“Highly Desired Career”: Ice Job Fair attracts prospects and protesters
The Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE) Recruitment Fair (ICE) attracted applicants to Arlington, Texas, saying it hopes to hire 1,000 new executives over two days.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Under President Donald Trump, immigration and customs enforcement has been the driving force behind his drastic crackdown on immigrants, strengthened by record funds and record funds to make raids and new latitudes, but staff are fighting for the public’s rage over the long hours and arrests.
These internal pressures are at the expense of them.
The two current former ICE officials told Reuters that agents are tackling burnout and frustration as agents struggle to respond to the administration’s aggressive enforcement agenda.
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The agency has launched recruitment drives to relieve stress by hiring thousands of new executives as quickly as possible, but it can probably take months.
All those interviewed by Reuters supported immigration enforcement in principle. But they criticized the Trump administration’s push for high daily arrest allocations, with thousands of people with no criminal history, long-term green cardholders, others with legal visas, and even US citizens being detained.
Most current and former ICE officials requested anonymity due to concerns about retaliation against themselves or former colleagues.
Americans are flooding social media images of masked agents in tactical gear handcuffing people in neighbourhood streets, workplaces, schools, churches, courts and driveways. Several videos of arrests have become viruses and promoted public outrage over tactics.
Under Trump, average daily arrests by 21,000 powerful agencies have skyrocketed, up over 250% in June compared to June, but daily arrest rates fell in July.
Trump says he wants to deport “the worst, the worst, the worst,” but ice figures show that non-criminals are being picked up.
Immigration emergency justifies long hours
Agency data obtained from the University of California, Berkeley, the deportation data project at the School of Law shows that Trump’s first six months of inauguration have reached 221 people a day, up from 80 people a day under President Joe Biden.
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69% of immigrant arrests under Trump belonged to those who were subject to criminal convictions or pending charges, numbers show. Some ICE agents are frustrated that hundreds of specialized ice research agents, usually focusing on serious crimes such as human trafficking and cross-border gangs, are reassigned to everyday immigration enforcement.
In an interview with Reuters, Trump border emperor Tom Homan admitted that the long hours and reallocation of experts wanted ice personnel, but said the January 20 declaration of a national emergency on illegal immigration justified that.
“We have staff who want to do other types of investigations, but the president has declared a national emergency,” Homan said.
Homan, who spent 30 years in immigration enforcement and joined ICE at the start of 2003, said that the lengthy hours should be reduced as new ICE staff hire speeds up.
“I think morale is good. I think morale will improve as we bring more resources,” he said.
Another stressor for more senior officials is the lasting threat of being ruled out for failing arrests highlighted by multiple leadership changes at ICE since Trump took office in January, five ICE officials said.
In response to a request for comment, the ICE parent agency, a senior U.S. Department of Homeland Security official, downplayed concerns about morale and said officers were targeted by attacks and were most plagued by targeting criticism from Democrats.
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The senior official said he was “excited to be able to work again” after ICE officials were restricted under Biden.
Agents under intense pressure
Current and former ICE officials said they are at the heart of the complaints. He said this is the White House’s request for ICE to increase the number of immigrant arrests, which are 10 times the daily arrest rate last year to around 3,000 a day under Trump’s Democratic predecessor.
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In some cases, raid officials have moved on to the wrong address following leads relying on artificial intelligence, increasing the likelihood of picking up the wrong person or putting officers at risk, according to current and two former staff members.
“The demands they placed on us were unrealistic. It was not done in a safe way to make us most successful,” the current official said.
During recent attacks in several US cities, masked ice agents have faced angry residents demanding they identify themselves and kick them out of their neighborhoods.
“In many communities, they don’t look like the work they do, so I’m sure it’s stressful for them and their families,” said Kelly Doyle, former top legal counsel at ICE.
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ICE faced backlash between Trump’s 2017 and 2021 presidency when activists and some Democrats cried out “to abolish the ice,” but the agency’s more aggressive enforcement in recent months has even fallen into the spotlight.
A Reuters/Ipsos poll in August showed Trump’s public recognition rate fell to 43% as Americans saw the administration’s forceful tactics dimly from 50% in March.
That view is partly shaped by news reports that students have been arrested on campus or on their way to sports practice, being detained while dropping off children at school, smashing windows and pulling people out of their cars, surrounded and bound people while waiting at bus stops or at their home warehouse.
A former ICE official said at the beginning of the administration that several former colleagues told him they were happy with the “cuffs off.”
But a few months later, he said he was “overwhelmed” by the number of arrests the administration is demanding.
“They’ll prefer to go back to intensive targeting,” he said. “They were once able to say, ‘We’re arresting criminals.’ ”
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10,000 Employment Disabilities
The Republican spending package passed in Congress in July gave more money than almost every other federal law enforcement agency.
The Trump administration has launched a fierce recruitment drive behind the new funds to achieve its goal of hiring 10,000 ICE officers over the next four years.
Using wartime-style posters and slogans such as “America Needs You,” Ice has launched a media blitz, which is very unusual for government agencies running ads on social media platforms such as Instagram and YouTube.
Homeland Security said more than 115,000 “patriotic Americans” applied for ice jobs, but for any period it didn’t say that.
Recruitment is similar to a similar surge in signing on to Border Patrol agents in the mid-2000s, with opposition saying the rise in corruption and fraud in that rank.
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Asked about the risk of rushing fewer qualified people to staff, Homan said ice should choose “quality over quantity.”
“Officers still need to do background investigations. They still need to be vetted. They still need to make sure they are going to the academy,” Homan said.
Additional Reports by Marisa Taylor, MB Pell, Benjamin Kellerman and Christina Cook
