Inside the ICE Forum Where Agents Complain About Their Jobs

On a forum with implicit 5,000 members claiming to beryllium existent and erstwhile Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers, users vent their frustrations and concerns astir the bureau arsenic it has go the halfway of nationalist ire.

“I'm each for removing illegals, but snatching dudes disconnected tract mowers successful Cali and leaving the motortruck and instrumentality conscionable sitting there? Definitely not moving smarter,” wrote 1 user.

The forum contains posts dating backmost implicit a decennary and describes itself arsenic an “unofficial forum for existent Deportation Officers, prospective applicants and retired Deportation Officers to person a level for discussion.” In posts viewed by WIRED, users kick of agelong moving hours, constricted overtime pay, incompetent leadership, and poorly trained caller recruits.

Forum users bash not request to amusement impervious of their employment to join, and the level does not look to beryllium heavy moderated. WIRED has not confirmed the idiosyncratic identities of these posters, though the forum is 1 of respective related forums wherever radical moving successful antithetic parts of DHS stock experiences and sermon circumstantial details of deportation serviceman enactment that would apt lone beryllium known to those successful the job, including discussions astir the interior workings of the job, the hiring and grooming process, and swapping work placements. Some forum members are newcomers, and others person been members for implicit a decade.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and ICE did not respond to requests for comment.

As scrutiny and nationalist outrage person followed the convulsive migration raids successful Minneapolis for DHS’s Operation Metro Surge, peculiarly successful the aftermath of national agents shooting and sidesplitting Renee Good and Alex Pretti, users successful the forum haven’t shied distant from posting.

On January 19, 5 days earlier Pretti was killed, a idiosyncratic started a thread titled, “Ready to resign, had capable stress.”

“I person 2.3 years near for afloat peculiar class status … but don't cognize if I'll marque it. Tired of this Agency. Employees being abused badly. Mandated TDY's with little than 24 hours notice,” the archetypal station reads from a idiosyncratic who has been a subordinate of the forum since September 2015. TDY is the shorthand for “temporary duty,” which involves pulling officers from crossed the state to cities similar Minneapolis for large-scale operations.

“No much weekends off, much enactment than ever earlier successful 18 years. No much union. No much down time,” the station continues. “This is not what immoderate of america envisioned for our past years of vocation erstwhile we are successful our 50's.” (In 2022, thousands of ICE unit mislaid national practice that galore different authorities workers possess, including protections astir overtime pay. The president of the assembly that represented ICE officers wrong the American Federation of Government Employees alleged that the national had go “far left.”)

Other forum users joined successful to echo the archetypal poster’s complaints and dependable their concerns astir the absorption of the agency. “Led by immoderate of the worst enactment I’ve ever witnessed, from the section level each the mode up to the nationalist stage, this bureau has managed to crook a righteous ngo into a implicit clown show,” added different idiosyncratic who joined the forum successful October 2015.

Several users person besides complained astir the representation occupation created for ICE arsenic CBP has taken a greater relation successful migration enforcement successful US cities. “There was perfectly zero forethought and our Management conscionable rolled implicit to fto BP instrumentality over. HUGE mistake, erstwhile the nuance of existent targeted enforcement is needed,” a antithetic idiosyncratic who has been a forum subordinate since May 2017 added.