Homeland Security asks for IRS agents to be deputized to root out illegal migrants
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has asked the Treasury Department to deputize some of its IRS agents and other law-enforcement personnel to root out illegal migrants.
Noem fired off the request to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Friday and argued that DHS needs more resources to investigate the finances of businesses suspected of employing illegal migrants, as well as the money behind human-trafficking rings.
“It is DHS’s understanding that the Department of the Treasury has qualified law enforcement personnel available to assist with immigration enforcement, especially in light of recent increases to the Internal Revenue Service’s work force and budget,” Noem wrote in her letter.
Noem did not specify how many IRS and other Treasury officials she hopes to have deputized but listed nine key areas of need: supporting existing task forces on immigration, targeting illegal hiring, investigating human trafficking, seizing assets, overseeing contracts, helping with apprehensions, monitoring certain migrants, aiding in detentions and helping with removals.
The DHS secretary said in her letter, which was first reported by the Wall Street Journal, that she would be deputizing any officials Bessent taps to carry out the “functions of an immigration officer.”
The newly deputized IRS agents could be tested before the month, when ICE plans to lead a “large scale,” multi-agency sting operation in Los Angeles, sources told the LA Times.
President Trump signed an executive order last month calling on DHS to take “all appropriate action to supplement available personnel to secure the southern border.”
That order took note of legal authority that empowers the DHS secretary and US attorney general to deputize other government employees for assistance.
The DHS has already deputized certain personnel in the Texas National Guard, several components of the Justice Department and officials in the Texas Attorney General’s Office for the task.
But as the Trump administration taps new resources to enforce the president’s immigration agenda, sanctuary cities are fighting back.
On Friday, San Francisco led a coalition of other jurisdictions across the country in a lawsuit seeking to overturn Trump’s “illegal and authoritarian” executive orders that cut off federal funding to “sanctuary cities” and prosecute local officials who refuse to cooperate with immigration agencies.
“The Trump Administration’s actions have nothing to do with public safety because we know that sanctuary laws improve public safety,” San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu said in a statement. “This is the federal government illegally asserting a right it does not have.”
Last month, Chiu and other California attorneys general filed a separate suit challenging another executive order that limits birthright citizenship.
That order, signed Jan. 20, Trump’s inauguration day, instructs federal agencies to refrain from issuing documents recognizing automatic citizenship for babies born in the US — and to not recognize such documents issued by state and local governments.
On Monday, US District Judge Joseph N. Laplante in New Hampshire became the latest of three federal judges to block that order.
In Los Angeles, residents have taken to the streets by the hundreds to protest Trump’s immigration actions.
On Friday, a teenager was stabbed and went to the hospital in critical condition during a brawl that broke out at one such protest, ABC 7 reported.
