UK tourists could face ICE agents under Trump plans | UK | News
Trump says he will direct ICE officials to arrest anyone entering the country illegally (Image: Getty Images)
Donald Trump announced Sunday that ICE personnel would be deployed to airports to help clear horrific screening lines for the TSA, which ran out of funding more than a month ago due to a partial government shutdown.
The measure is designed to speed up security queues that have stretched up to three hours at some airports because TSA agents have called in sick or resigned because they haven’t been paid in weeks. This comes after US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy warned that another wave of resignations could occur on Thursday or Friday and that the situation in TSA queues “will get much worse.”
“On Monday, ICE will be heading to airports to assist our wonderful TSA Agents who remain on duty even though Radical Left Democrats, focused solely on protecting hardened criminals entering our country illegally, are endangering the United States by withholding money agreed to long ago in signed and sealed contracts,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
The president said the other day that he would direct ICE officials to arrest anyone entering the country illegally, including from the UK, especially those from Somalia, which he has repeatedly condemned. Trump’s Border Czar Tom Homan confirmed the plans in an appearance on CNN on Sunday, saying, “I’m working on the plan right now. We’ll implement it tomorrow.” When asked if ICE agents were equipped to handle airport security, Homan responded vaguely, “ICE agents receive high-level training.”
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It remains unclear whether ICE officers’ remit will include immigration enforcement at airports to process UK or other travelers, or whether they will simply assist TSA officials with their designated duties during Monday’s deployment.
“More than 50,000 TSA employees worked without pay for more than five weeks. Hundreds have resigned. And Washington’s answer is not to pay them. It’s to send ICE agents to do their jobs,” said Everett Kelley, National President of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), the exclusive union representative for TSA officers. he said.
“ICE agents are not trained or certified in aviation security.
“TSA officers spend months learning to detect specially designed explosives, weapons, and threats to avoid detection at checkpoints—skills that require specialized training, hands-on practice, and constant recertification. You can’t improvise that.”
Travelers wait in line at the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) checkpoint at San Francisco International Airport (Image: Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Airport immigration control is predominantly overseen by Customs and Border Protection officers.
Nearly 50,000 TSA airport security personnel were forced to work without pay last month due to the ongoing government shutdown.
The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees both TSA and ICE, was forced to shut down after Democrats refused to approve funding until DHS changes its immigration enforcement methods following the deadly raid in Minnesota.
Masked federal agents wearing police ICE jackets stand in the New York Federal Plaza Immigration Court corridor inside the Jacob K. Javitz Federal Building in New York. (Image: AFP via Getty Images)
Republican lawmakers rejected Democratic proposals to greenlight funds only for DHS’s non-immigration enforcement departments, such as the TSA.
Queue times at Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey ranged from five minutes to 30 minutes in certain terminals.
By 6 a.m. at Philadelphia International Airport, the line stretched past the security checkpoints to the Marriott hotel. “I’ve never seen a line this long in Philly,” Reuters reporter Jarrett Renshaw wrote on X.
