US President Donald Trump threatened to send agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to provide security at airports, unless a deal is reached to fund the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
“I will move our brilliant and patriotic ICE Agents to the Airports where they will do Security like no one has ever seen before,” Trump posted on Truth Social on Saturday.
The DHS has gone without funding since mid-February, after Congress failed to reach a funding agreement – leaving normal airport security without pay.
A bill that would fund DHS and provide payments for Transportation Security Administration (TSA) agents at airports failed to advance in the Senate on Friday.
The Trump administration has blamed the delay on Democrats, who have declined to pass funding without reforms to ICE, which operates under DHS.
The hold-up has meant thousands of staff for the TSA – which also operates under DHS – have been working without pay for more than a month.
More than 300 TSA employees have reportedly quit in that time, while US media reported unscheduled absences had more than doubled.
Long lines have formed at airports, and union officials have reported some officers are taking on second jobs. Some airports are collecting gift cards and food parcels for TSA staff.
“Numerous employees have reported to me that their bank accounts are at zero or negative,” Johnny Jones, a Dallas-based official in the government workers’ union AFGE, told USA Today.
“No funds for daycare, no funds for food. They just want to know why the hell they can’t get paid when we have money to shoot missiles into other countries,” he said.
ICE has played a key role in the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, making thousands of arrests since Trump returned to the White House in January 2025. Its tactics have drawn heavy criticism from many Democrats, civil liberties groups and NGOs.
Trump wrote that the deployment of ICE agents would begin on Monday “if the Democrats do not allow for Just and Proper Security at our Airports, and elsewhere throughout our Country.”
ICE agents are not specifically trained for airport security.
Though it operates under DHS, ICE has not been significantly affected by the partial government shutdown because Congress already separately provided that agency funding.
Democrats have been demanding reforms to ICE after federal agents killed two Minneapolis residents, Alex Pretti and Renee Good, who were protesting against the Trump administration’s immigration raids in Minnesota in January.
The Democrats have asked that the DHS bar immigration agents from wearing face masks, provide better identification for officers and tighten rules for obtaining warrants.
By BBC News
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