DHS wants you to think masked kidnap-squads are “NICE”
PWS weekly on ICE, Border Patrol, and the brave communities , organizations, and individuals resisting their fascist policies
The organization that has kidnapped tens of thousands of people, killed scores, lied publicly more times than we can count, and terrorized millions across the world, wants you to refer to them as “NICE.”
Trump apparently floated the renaming last week, but in the meantime, official Department of Homeland Security accounts have embraced the rebranding in a flurry of public statements and social media posts.
It’s the latest PR pivot to put a less fascist face on controversial policies that inspired uprisings across the nation after Minneapolis residents stymied a DHS crackdown in the city last year during protests in which DHS agents shot three people to death, including two US citizens.
The popular rebellion was too much even for some Trump allies who support his draconian migration policies, and led to the forced resignation of then-chief Gregory Bovino as acting head of operations for the department.
Secretary Markwayne Mullin. who has since taken over the masked US police force, pledged during his March confirmation hearing to lower the DHS’s public profile, stating that his goal was for the agency to no longer be “in the lead story every day” as it recalibrates its enforcement approach.
But though splashy public round-ups have largely ceased, ICE, which is under DHS control, has largely carried on business as usual — averaging 1,286 removals a day in March. Nearly 70,000 people are currently in DHS custody. The vast majority have no criminal record.
Crackdowns on migrants more broadly have continued, including on DACA recipients. More than 6,000 children have also been detained by DHS since Trump assumed office.
The agency has also continued stepping up its mass surveillance on US citizens and non-citizens alike.
The administration is reacting to recent polling, in which only 35% of people in the US say they support Trump’s migration policy, compared with more than 60% who “disapprove” or “strongly disapprove.”
The abysmal polling has worried many of Trump’s Republican allies as midterm elections approach. They have called for a softer public tone, worried that all the murder, racism, and kidnappings might affect their re-election chances among Latinos.
The PR charge, however, remains just that. Despite no longer conducting highly-publicized random sweeps in which they invite sympathetic journalists, as DHS did for all of 2025, Border Patrol and ICE operations have quietly continued without the fanfare.
The administration has also quietly continued tightening laws against migrants who entered the country “legally”, stacked migration courts with sympathetic judges, and stepped up other strategies for ICE to detain suspected migrants.
As the DHS “shutdown” fails to shut down anything, Trump allies move to fund the agency for 10 more years
As we have previously reported, DHS core operations are largely unaffected by a Democratic “shutdown” that has been ongoing for weeks (TSA being the one occasional exception.) Now Republicans are using an archaic funding procedure to push a measure that would fully fund the agency for ten years through both US legislative chambers.
The bill would authorize $70 billion dollars in funding for DHS as part of reconciliation processes in a simple up-down vote that could pass with a simple majority.
The Senate has already approved the bill. It now moves to the House, where Republicans hold a razor-thin majority.
The procedure is the latest in moves in which Republicans have simply side-stepped tepid Democratic efforts to offer token opposition to Trump’s migration policies.
The Round-Up
The ICE agent who fatally shot Renee Nicole Good after calling her a “dyke bitch” — Jonathan Ross —has been quietly relocated to a different state and allowed to resume work with DHS, according to internal documents from the organization.
DHS is increasingly sending migrants, including asylum seekers who entered the US formally, to third countries with which they have no relationship, including dozens of Colombians and Ecuadorians who have been deported to the Congo with no way to return home.
DHS is increasingly forcing local police to work with ICE. Louisiana now makes it a crime for police to refuse ICE cooperation. Florida created a board to punish officials who don’t comply with ICE. Texas forced nearly all sheriffs to become immigration enforcers. And the crackdown on resisting ICE is spreading.
California’s mask law, which lawmakers knew would not affect ICE using masks, has predictably been struck down by courts. The majority of Democratic lawmakers continue to engage in theatrics and symbolic actions rather than active opposition against DHS.
US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers were told verbally by superiors weeks ago to stop entering homes without judicial warrants, marking a shift away from some of the agency’s most aggressive enforcement tactics, according to a report from Bloomberg.
Florida may ban undocumented students from public colleges, according to reporting from the Miami Herald.
If you want to learn about all the different field agents that DHS employs, from ICE, to CPB, to HSI, the Guardian has a great visual breakdown that also describes DHS command structure.
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Hasta pronto, piratas!
