President Donald Trump granted deportation powers to a variety of federal law enforcement agencies as he gears up for a promised mass deportation plan.
In a memo from acting Homeland Security Secretary Benjamine Huffman, obtained by the Wall Street Journal, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, and the U.S. Marshals Service are among the agencies being granted deportation powers. According to a person familiar with the matter, Trump administration officials are planning on borrowing agents from the Justice Department to carry out deportation plans.
The memo also stressed that the FBI already has deportation powers, though their use is rare.
The work of the DEA, ATF, U.S. Marshals Service, and other agencies mentioned in the memo occasionally overlaps with the immigration issue but not on a significant scale.
One of Trump’s signature campaign promises was the largest deportation operation in U.S. history. To carry this out, he would likely need to use more than just Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel.
The memo is the latest of a flurry of immigration moves that Trump has made in a stark reversal from his predecessor. He signed an executive order declaring a national emergency over the border crisis, directing the military to assist at the southern border.
Acting Defense Secretary Robert Salesses announced the deployment of roughly 1,500 troops to the southern border, with plans to boost this total to 10,000 eventually.
“DOD will begin augmenting its forces at the southwest border with an additional [approximately] 1,500 ground personnel, as well as helicopters with associated crews, and intelligence analysts to support increased detection and monitoring efforts,” Salesses said in a statement from the Pentagon. The initial tranche of 1,500 additional troops will bring the total at the border to 4,000, a 60% increase in active-duty ground forces, according to the Pentagon.
Border czar Tom Homan boasted on Wednesday that he has already seen a major difference on the border since Trump took office.
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“The greatest president in my lifetime, he’s back. Because in two days, the last 24 hours, total apprehensions on the southwest border, 766. Compare that to the 10 to 12,000 Biden had at one time,” Homan said on Fox News’s Fox & Friends on Wednesday. “Just yesterday, in the last 24 hours, ICE arrested over 308 — 308 — serious criminals. Some of them were murderers. Some of them were rapists. Some raped a child. Some were sexual assault of a child. So ICE is doing their job and prioritizing just as the president said they would.”
On Tuesday, acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove ordered federal prosecutors to investigate and possibly charge state and local officials in sanctuary cities.