The Department of Homeland Security said more than 141,000 people have applied to work for Immigration and Customs Enforcement since a recruitment push at the end of July, and that the agency has extended more than 18,000 tentative job offers.
The recruitment effort, launched by the Trump administration, includes expanded pay and benefits aimed at boosting ICE’s ranks, including sign-on bonuses of up to $50,000, student loan forgiveness and changes to retirement benefits. The administration also removed longstanding age caps for ICE law enforcement positions, a move officials said was intended to broaden the pool of qualified applicants.
"ICE has received more than 141,000 applications from patriotic Americans who want to defend the homeland by removing the worst of the worst criminal illegal aliens from the U.S.," U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said in a statement. "We have already given more than 18,000 tentative job offers. Americans are answering their country's call to serve and help remove murderers, pedophiles, rapists, terrorists, and gang members from our country."
Agency officials have said the campaign began at the end of July and that the effort reached about 100,000 applicants by mid-August. The administration has framed the hiring push as necessary to carry out expanded immigration enforcement, including large-scale operations in major cities.
ICE has carried out operations with names such as "Operation Midway Blitz" in Chicago and "Operation Patriot 2.0," which officials describe as targeting individuals with criminal records. The agency has also reopened and expanded detention capacity, including facilities in Florida that have been used to hold people pending deportation.
Congressional and executive action has provided funding to expand ICE’s workforce. The spending measure signed by President Donald Trump in July, titled the "One Big Beautiful Bill," included provisions that back funding to hire up to 10,000 ICE agents, according to administration officials. Department leaders said changing the age restriction — previously set in many cases at 37 or 40 — removed a barrier for retired law enforcement officers who expressed interest.
State-level cooperation has varied. Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders announced that the state’s National Guard would provide administrative and logistical support to ICE, with roughly 40 Guardsmen mobilized to assist federal agents. Brig. Gen. Chad Bridges, Arkansas’ adjutant general, said the Guard would enable federal agents to focus on core operations.
At the same time, some local officials have declined to cooperate with federal immigration enforcement, saying they will not participate in certain operations. The Department of Homeland Security has encouraged people in the country without authorization to leave voluntarily through an updated CBP Home app that the administration says replaces the prior app used to claim asylum at the southern border.
DHS officials described the recruitment figures as an early indicator of broader workforce growth, but they stressed that applicants still must pass hiring screens and background checks before final offers are made. The administration’s enforcement push, coupled with increased detention capacity and state partnerships in some jurisdictions, signals a significant expansion of federal immigration enforcement operations in the months ahead.