On March 23, President Donald Trump deployed Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents to U.S. airports following a government shutdown. The shutdown ensued following a refusal from Democrats to fund the Department of Homeland Security (which includes TSA) unless certain demands were met by the Republican Party—namely, requiring that ICE obtain warrants and unmask their faces while conducting immigration raids.
The shutdown left thousands of TSA workers unpaid, with estimates approximating that over 50,000 employees went unpaid for over a month. Collective wages missed by TSA agents exceeded over a billion dollars, leading over 500 employees to resign as of March, according to the New York Times.
The shutdown didn’t just have consequences for workers. Travelers experienced record high wait times as airports experienced staff shortages. Some security line wait times approached five hours, according to USA Today. As a result, several airlines advised their travelers to arrive hours ahead of their plane’s scheduled departure to avoid missing their flights.
Following the buildup of this issue, President Trump issued an announcement on March 22 that he would be deploying ICE agents to assist with long lines and crowd control. Tom Homan, often referred to by media outlets as the “Border Czar,” claimed that ICE agents would deal with more menial tasks, freeing up TSA workers to focus on screening and security.
Claire Hardy, a Junior at Skyline, took a trip to New York City this spring break. She flew into New York’s La Guardia airport, one of the fifteen airports where ICE was deployed. She saw one ICE agent completing Real ID checks at the airport as she went through security. “There weren’t a lot of them, and that was the only place I saw them,” she said. “They were a little discreet. The only way that you can really tell was, on [their] sleeve, it said ‘ICE.’”
People blame both sides for the government shutdown. However, Republicans are blamed more often than Democrats by a slim majority. According to YouGov, 36% of American adults blame Republicans more, while 29% blame Democrats more. Tate Flowers, who went on vacation to Hawaii during spring break, blames the Republicans. “I would blame President Trump, because I think ICE agents should have to follow the same laws as normal police or other military agents with body cameras—being accountable for what they have to do,” she said. Hardy believes both parties can be blamed, saying, “[Blame] can be shared by both sides, because the Democrats, they kept holding out [and] not giving people funds, which regardless of what people are doing for whatever, people do need to be paid; they do have to feed their families.”
Both Hardy and Flowers believe Trump made the wrong move when deploying ICE. “He probably should have figured out that funding issue before having to employ a […] military agency,” Flowers commented. Across the United States, public opinion on ICE’s deployment is low, with 40% approving of airport deployment and only 37% trusting ICE to act professionally in work settings.
In regards to the impact on travelers, Hardy points out that ICE’s deployment may cause heightened anxiety, especially for minorities. She stated, “I think especially people of minorities were more scared to travel and hesitant because of [the chance of being stopped].”
