Booker and Padilla Demand Answers About Hiring Standards for Immigration Agents

Democratic Sens. Cory Booker and Alex Padilla lambasted the training standards for newly hired immigration agents in a scathing letter to the Trump administration on Thursday.

The senators are pushing for information from the Department of Homeland Security and its subagencies — Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection — about the vetting, training and supervision protocols for new hires and personnel who have been reassigned to street enforcement.

“In only months, DHS’s failure to meet its obligations has tarnished the reputation of federal law enforcement, endangered and victimized the public, and eroded public trust in the rule of law,” Booker and Padilla write in the letter addressed to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and the heads of ICE and CBP, first reported by NOTUS.

“This is unacceptable, and DHS must act swiftly to correct these failures, uphold the rule of law, and respect the Constitutional rights of all people in America,” they continue.

The bulk of 50,000 employees the federal government has hired since the beginning of President Donald Trump’s second term are working at ICE, Reuters reported. This hiring surge of immigration agents is being fueled by hundreds of millions of dollars from the tax cut and spending package Trump signed in July, which set a goal of hiring at least 10,000 officers.

Booker and Padilla cite Noem’s lowering of the minimum age for ICE agents from 21 to 18 and incidents of immigration officers using aggressive tactics.

“The authority to detain and use force, including, in extreme circumstances, deadly force, is not a game, and it is not a performance,” Booker and Padilla wrote.

Amid the influx of immigration agents carrying out raids in Democratic cities, NBC reported ICE dismissed more than 200 new hires during training for failing to meet physical or academic standards. Ten were let go because of criminal charges, safety concerns or because they failed drug tests.

DHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment about criticism of its hiring standards.

The agency has been advertising openings on social media. A pinned post on the DHS X account uses an Uncle Sam image with the caption: “America has been invaded by criminals and predators. We need YOU to get them out.”

Other Democrats’ attempts to get answers from DHS often have been unsuccessful so far. Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut and Rep. Robert Garcia of California — the top Democrats on each chamber’s oversight committee — asked on Oct. 20 for DHS to turn over information on the number of U.S. citizens detained by ICE and CBP. They set a deadline for Nov. 3, which was not met.

“Your failure to provide any response whatsoever by the stated deadline is troubling and appears to indicate that DHS does not know how many U.S. citizens are being swept up in its reckless immigration enforcement,” Blumenthal and Garcia wrote in a Nov. 17 letter to Noem.