If you think ICE is bad now, brace yourself, its going to get worse as standards are lowered

NBC

Asian Americans joined in demonstrations against ICE including these Sacramento protestors.

The fatal shootings in Minnesota, the unwarranted home invasions in Maine, the children detained without their parents, US citizens dragged from their cars and workplaces, the harassment and beatings of onlookers and ignorance of the Constitution and the feeling of impunity by federeal agents looks like something from a dystopian movie.

Except, its not a movie. It is the United States in 2026.

Already the largest law enforcement arm of the federal government, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) wants to become even bigger. The agency's problem is hiring enough people to join what has essentially become Donald Trump's private army.

However, the shooting in Minneapolis Wednesday (Jan. 7) where an a Border Patrol  agent quickly fatally shot a mother of three, three times and the unwarranted shooting of an ICU nurse again raises the question about the adequacy of the training of federal agents.  

We already saw the fallout from this earlier this month with the tragic shootings of Renee Nicole Good  and Alex Pritti in Minneapolis. When you trade quality for speed, people get hurt. DHS Secretary Kristi Noem is out there saying the training of her ICE troops is "streamlined," but the boots on the ground are telling a very different story.

 

Critics say the violent confrontations were inevitable as federal agents aggressively carry out the Trump regime's political strategy of stirring up Americans against the "others."

Congressional Democrats and immigrant rights groups have criticized ICE, arguing that agents have regularly violated migrants’ due process protections and characterizing recent raids as intimidation tactics.

Criticisms of ICE's relaxed age requirements center on concerns that lowered standards and insufficient training lead to the hiring of unqualified, immature, and potentially corrupt agents who may violate civil and constitutional rights; criticisms already leveled at current agents. 

DHS Secretary Kristi Noem recently said on Fox News that there’s “no longer a cap on how old you can be” and that 18-year-olds could sign up.

Previously, an applicant had to be 21-years old or under 40 to get hired.
To sweeten the pot for potential recruits, the $29 billion courtesy of the so-called "One Big Beautiful Bill" allows the agency to offer a generous package of  incentives, including: 

A maximum $50,000 signing bonus

Student loan repayment and forgiveness options

25% Law Enforcement Availability Pay (LEAP) for HSI Special Agents

Administratively Uncontrollable Overtime (AUI) for Enforcement Removal Operations (ERO) Deportation Officers

Enhanced retirement benefits

In this time of high unemployment, those are attractive inducements. The US  unemployment rate was 4.4% in December 2025, marked by slow hiring and massive layoffs.

DHS reports that more than 80,000 individuals had applied to join ICE since the start of the campaign. The Trump regime reports that as of this month, ICE has surpassed its goal of 10,000 new immigration officers. Currently, ICE has more than 20,000 law enforcement and support personnel. 

The annual budget for ICE alone now exceeds the combined budgets of all other non-immigration federal law enforcement agencies. 

This isn't just a policy shift; it's a total overhaul of how federal law enforcement operates. We’re going to keep a close eye on the DHS Inspector General’s investigation into these new "accelerated" standards.

The "47-Day" fast track

Get this: DHS officially gutted training for ICE agents. We went from a five-month professional academy down to just eight weeks. That is 47 days of training, down from 5 months. And yeah, you guessed it—the duration was reportedly picked specifically to honor the 47th President. In comparison, police officers in California undergo six-months of formal training.

Earlier this month (January 2026), it was revealed that an artificial intelligence tool used for hiring mistakenly categorized thousands of applicants as "experienced law enforcement," allowing them to bypass full academy training and instead take a four-week online course. For the mathematically challenged, that's only 28 days!

Under the new shortened course, ICE trainers are basically churning thes rest of the recruits through a 24/7 meat grinder. We’re talking six-day work weeks just to cram everything in. But you can't compress five months of law, tactics, and ethics into 47 days without cutting corners.

Unfortunately, with the shorter training period, DHS had to cut out some training. For example: 

No More Spanish: They cut the entire five-week language program. New agents are literally being told to just "use a translation app" in the field. Imagine trying to navigate a high-tension raid with Google Translate.

Tactical Training Halved: Reports are surfacing that firearms and de-escalation training have been slashed in half just to get boots on the ground faster.

Hmong Americans and thousands of Minnesotans enddure freezing weather to protest ICE.

Vetting Failures: Because they’re trying to hire 12,000 new people in a single year, the background checks are failing. The "breakneck speed" of the current hiring blitz has reportedly allowed some recruits to reach training without complete fingerprinting, drug tests, or background checks. This may be the most dangerous aspect of ICE's reduced training.

And ... if you've been watching the videos -- from the slayings of Renee Good and Alex Pritti to the mistaken detention of Hmong elder ChongLy Thao --- taken by ordinary citizens of how ICE is abusing and ignoring the basic civil rights of people, including US citizens, it appears that the class on what's legal and what's not legal under the Constitution, needs to be extended and hammered into some of the yahoos abusing their authority instead of the cursing and name calling of the already dead victims.

Veteran law enforcement leaders, like Sheriff Kevin Joyce of Cumberland County, Maine, haven’t minced words, labeling recent operations as "bush-league policing." This sentiment stems from incidents where ICE agents have bypassed local coordination, in one case even detaining an authorized local corrections officer on a roadside. The consensus among old-school sheriffs is that while the mission is to remove serious criminals, the agency has "moved the goalposts" to prioritize optics over professional procedure.

One of the loudest complaints from local police is the lack of "professional courtesy" shown to fellow officers. In Brooklyn Park, local police reported ICE agents boxing in and holding off-duty officers of color at gunpoint. These veterans argue that such "reckless" behavior forces local cops to treat federal agents as a potential threat rather than partners.

This isn't just a policy shift; it's a total overhaul of how federal law enforcement operates. We’re going to keep a close eye on the DHS Inspector General’s investigation into these new "accelerated" standards.

ICE will take anybody

There is no evidence to suggest that the ICE screening process for white supremacists is effective; on the contrary, reports from civil rights organizations, media outlets and government sources indicate that extremism is an ongoing concern within law enforcement agencies, including ICE.

As a matter of fact, the ICE recruitment propaganda appears to be aimed at individuals who admire the racist teachings of Hitler.

Key findings and concerns:

Infiltration of Law Enforcement: The FBI has long acknowledged the threat of white supremacists infiltrating law enforcement agencies, a concern echoed by the Brennan Center for Justice and other watchdog groups. Reports have identified "active links" between domestic terrorism investigations and law enforcement officials.

Specific Incidents and Propaganda: Recent news articles from 2025 have highlighted instances of explicit white supremacist references in official ICE recruitment materials and social media posts by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). An ICE prosecutor in Dallas was also found to be running a white supremacist account on social media.

Lack of Oversight: Critics, including the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) and Asian Americans Advancing Justice - AAJC, have raised alarms about the failure of ICE and DHS to adequately address and remove white supremacist content and extremism in their ranks.

Insufficient Screening: There are concerns that current hiring practices and background checks, particularly during periods of rapid expansion, have been inadequate, with one Government Accountability Office report identifying flaws in US Customs and Border Protection's (CBP) processes.

Calls for Action: Lawmakers and civil rights organizations have urged the Department of Justice (DOJ), FBI, and DHS to improve screening processes for all candidates and current staff for promoting white supremacy and other forms of bias.

Overall, the available information suggests a significant problem with white supremacist ideology within ICE and related agencies, and a lack of effective screening measures to prevent the racists out of ICE and other law enforcement agencies.

The annual budget for ICE alone now exceeds the combined budgets of all other non-immigration federal law enforcement agencies. The total funding for immigration and border enforcement agencies (including ICE and CBP) in FY 2025 accounts for approximately two-thirds of all federal law enforcement spending.

$75 billion for ICE

The recent budget bill provided a total of $170.7 billion to be allocated to immigration enforcement over several years, with $75 billion directed specifically to ICE. And if that wasn't enough, the House passed and the Senate is considering an additional $10 billion to fund ICE the rest of this year.

And what do we get? Masked men and women who are reluctant to presesnt an ID and who might have gone to the local military surplus supply store to get camo garb with a bullet-proof vest imprinted with "ICE" or "Border Patrol." Sometimes, if they didn't have time to fully outfit themselves, the "so-called" agents are wearing blue jeans or khaki pants.

Some local law enforcement members have been heard describing their unidentified federal counterparts as "wannabe cops" with the ability to chase suspects, push, abuse them, and in some cases, employ torture; all in the name of Trump.

In the case of Minneapolis, local police are handicapped. With only 600 cops on the police force, already busy with local crime and traffic, they are no match for the 2,000 ro 3,000 federal agents who feel free to harass and detain anyone hampering their ability to go after anybody they suspect of being an undocumented immigrant.

The mayor and Minnesota Gov. Walz are urging local residents and local law enforcement to not resort to violence against ICE despite the rising anger against the agency. Violent confrontations could give the Trump regime to declare martial law under the Insurection Act and allow the regime to send in the military. But that han't prevented the Trump regime from  giving them sopoenas.

As Chair of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus (CAPAC),Grace Meng, D-NY, has repeatedly demanded answers from DHS regarding the treatment of Asian immigrants and lawful permanent residents. Earlier this month she announced her opposition to funding bills that fail to hold ICE accountable for what she described as "trampling on" the rights of law-abiding immigrants.

Thousands of Minnesotans are tallying in support of immigrants.

The View from the Edge

In 2026, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations will continue to have a profound impact on the Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) community and other communities of color, characterized by a sharp rise in arrests, mental health crises, and economic disruption. 

Any lingering belief among AAPI voters that the Trump regime's immigration enforcement doesn't affect Asian Americans , even those with the proper documentation and are in the US legally, should have dissipated by now as federal agents have shown they have no knowledge of  or respect for the Constitution.

A recent poll by the Associated Press and the University of Chicago (AP-NORC) found that the economy is the top concern for Asian Americans. 

Asian communities in the US, particularly in the Twin Cities and California, are actively protesting increased ICE operations in 2026, which have tripled arrests of Asian immigrants

A coalition of Asian groups and vendors from Saint Paul spoke about the impact ICE operations are having on their communities.

"This is the most active and united I have ever seen in the Asian community in Saint Paul. Because we've seen our elders be terrorized, we have seen foot traffic decrease in our shops, and we have seen ICE agents lurk out of our stores and community spaces trying to target us," said Cam Yang who joined the Twin Cities' protests. 

In Minnesota, federal agents are reportedly "hunting" for Asians. Residents of Minneapolis and St. Paul are afraid to leave their house or send their kids to school, the elderly won't go to their medical appointments.

The actions of the federal agents, ICE and the Border Patrol, suggests that the rule of law, the Constitution, our civil rights, are on the line.

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, news, views and chismis from an AANHPI perspective, follow me on Threads, on X, BlueSky or at the blog Views From the Edge.