ICE mandates additional training for new hires after backlash
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement this week extended training for new officers and mandated additional instruction for those onboarded under a shortened Trump administration academy process that has now been scrapped, according to an internal agency memo obtained by CBS News.
The moves follow months of concerns raised by Democratic lawmakers, advocates and former ICE officials about the length and quality of the training undergone by the federal immigration agents at the forefront of President Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigration.
Those concerns intensified after federal immigration agents fatally shot two U.S. citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, during a controversial crackdown in Minneapolis earlier this year that the Trump administration scaled back after bipartisan backlash.
In February, Ryan Schwank, a former ICE instructor, delivered a scathing whistleblower complaint to Congress, denouncing the agency’s training process as “deficient, defective, and broken.” He warned that the administration was at risk of onboarding thousands of ICE officers who would not be able to carry out immigration enforcement in a lawful way.
In an internal memo this week, an ICE official said the agency would be extending its core training program for immigration enforcement officers from 42 days to roughly 71 days. That extended training period is set to start in July for new academy classes at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center, or FLETC, in Georgia, where ICE recruits are trained.
ICE officers who underwent the prior 42-day training process will now be required to participate in an additional “follow-on” training, dubbed the Advanced Field Officer Training Program, according to the memo. It’s unclear how long or intensive that supplemental training will be.
The ICE official said the training changes were designed to promote officer safety, operational efficiency and compliance with laws and policies.
The revamp of ICE’s officer training scheme was previewed by Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin during testimony before Congress last week.
“The training policy is going to change a little bit, because we’re going to be doing crowd control and fit today’s needs. But all training always is willing to change, back and forth,” Mullin told lawmakers on the Senate Appropriations Committee on June 2.
In a statement to CBS News, the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, confirmed the training changes.
“As our officers continue to face coordinated campaigns of violence against them including riots outside ICE facilities, sniper attacks, and more than a 1,300% increase in assaults against them, ICE is instituting additional training including, crowd control measures, additional training for high-risk vehicle stops, a live-fire cover course for officer safety, and medical training,” DHS said.
The added training, DHS said, will be “tracked online and monitored closely.”
“New hires take what they learn at FLETC and apply it to real-life scenarios while on duty, preserving ICE’s reputation as one of the most elite law enforcement agencies not only in the U.S., but the entire world,” DHS said.
The shortened ICE training course was adopted during the tenure of now-ousted Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, as the Trump administration moved quickly to hire and onboard 10,000 new deportation agents. ICE began that massive hiring blitz after receiving an unprecedented $75 billion infusion of funds through the so-called “One Big Beautiful Bill” last summer.
For months this year, congressional Democrats refused to fully fund ICE and Border Patrol unless the administration agreed to make certain reforms, such as prohibiting agents from masking up during operations.
Republicans eventually moved forward with funding the agencies through the end of President Trump’s term using the reconciliation process, which did not require making a deal with Democrats. Both chambers passed the $70 billion legislation over the past week, and the president signed it into law Wednesday morning.
