President Donald Trump announced a plan to deploy ICE agents at unnamed airports on Monday, claiming it would help ease long security lines amid the ongoing partial government shutdown.
Congress has held up funding for the Department of Homeland Security in response to the Trump administration’s unpopular deployment of ICE agents throughout the country. That department includes the Transportation Security Administration, the agency tasked with handling security at United States airports. The funding freeze has left TSA agents working short-staffed and without pay. Hours-long lines have been a regular sight at major airports.
Trump announced his plan in a post to Truth Social on Saturday.
“ICE will be going to airports to help our wonderful TSA Agents who have stayed on the job despite the fact that the Radical Left Democrats … are endangering the USA by holding back the money,” he wrote.”THEY WILL DO A FANTASTIC JOB.”
Trump followed that up with a post that blamed Democrats and “their vicious and uncaring ways” for the shutdown. He said that ICE would be deployed beginning tomorrow.
“Get ready,” he wrote. “No more games.”
BASH: Are ICE agents going to move into American airports starting tomorrow?
HOMAN: Yes. I'm currently working on the plan. We'll execute tomorrow.
BASH: Are ICE agents even remotely trained to handle security at airports?
HOMAN: ICE agents receive high-level training. pic.twitter.com/Z7ZNzJth6a
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) March 22, 2026
Trump border czar Tom Homan confirmed the plan in interviews on Sunday morning.
“We’ll put together a plan today and we’ll execute tomorrow,” he told CNN’s Dana Bash.
When Bash asked if ICE agents were “even remotely trained” to handle airport security, Homan countered that they would be tasked with guarding entry points people might use to skip the security screening. When Bash asked Homan to confirm that ICE wouldn’t be involved in screening, Homan balked.
“I’m not an expert,” he said. “We’ll have a plan by the end of the day.”
Also on CNN, top Democrats chafed at the idea of deploying ICE agents to do a job they aren’t trained to do. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries pointed to ICE’s conduct over the course of Trump’s second term as clear proof that they should not be pressed into action.
“The last thing the American people need is for untrained ICE agents to be deployed at airports all across the country, potentially to brutalize or in some instances kill them,” he said. We’ve already seen how ICE conducts itself. These are untrained individuals when it comes to doing the current job that they have.”
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Jeffries admitted that he’s open to a funding bill to provide the money to pay TSA agents and fund other agencies under the umbrella of DHS. When Bash pointed out that this would give up the leverage that Democrats had in pushing for reform at ICE, Jeffries chafed.
“We never approach these things that are in front of us…in the context of leverage,” he said. “Our approach is ‘What is the appropriate use of taxpayer dollars?'”
