Trump team drops accelerated training program for new ICE agents in rare climbdown: report

Donald Trump’s administration is reportedly ditching a fast-tracked training program for Immigration and Customs Enforcement recruits after a blitz of federal agents into cities across the country sparked chaos on the ground and bipartisan outrage in Congress.

The shakeup reported by Politico follows bipartisan scrutiny and growing outrage across the country over violent ICE arrests, in-custody deaths and fatal shootings of two demonstrators

A deal to revisit ICE training standards reportedly followed behind-the-scenes demands from members of Congress who hold the agency’s purse strings, resulting in what one official told Politico was a “handshake deal” that avoided a bitter debate to firm up training language in the funding bill that ended a 76-day partial government shutdown.

ICE is now preparing to certify and dispatch veteran officers to support recruits who advanced under the accelerated training program and bolstering training protocols for ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations agents, according to Politico, citing administration officials speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the plans.

The tentative plans appear to be the latest modifications to an agency that has grown into a massive and violent liability for the president, with newly appointed Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin hoping to keep the agency out of the headlines while keeping up with Trump’s demands to deport 1 million people a year.

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Asked to confirm the plans, a spokesperson for DHS told The Independent that “ICE training does not end when recruits graduate from the academy” and officers continue to receive instruction from “senior officials who mentor, coach, and train agents and officers every step of the way.”

“ICE officers go through a rigorous on-the-job training and mentorship,” the spokesperson said. “This additional training is tracked online and monitored closely. New hires take what they learn at [the training center] and apply it to real-life scenarios while on duty, preserving ICE’s reputation as one of the most elite law enforcement agencies not only in the U.S., but the entire world.”

Flush with billions of dollars in new funding, the agency launched an aggressive recruiting campaign last year with plans to add 10,000 agents to swiftly arrest and deport tens of thousands of people.

While ICE sent out inexperienced new agents in militarized gear into volatile scenes across the country, dozens of would-be recruits were dismissed for allegedly failing open-book exams, fitness tests and background checks.

DHS offered a maximum $50,000 signing bonus and student loan forgiveness while rolling back age requirements, allowing people as young as 18 years old to apply and opening ICE to recruits older than 40 years old.

A training period at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Georgia also shrank from 13 weeks to eight — and then six.

Acting ICE Director Todd Lyons and Trump’s border czar Tom Homan “promised some people on the Hill that they would take a look at it,” another official told Politico.

Recently hired officers will now get the “extra 30 days of training they didn’t get before they started on the job,” the person said.

“It was something Homan wanted to fix anyways that seemed like an easy thing everyone could get behind,” a second official told Politico.

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According to internal DHS documents released by Democratic lawmakers, recruits were previously receiving 584 hours of training over 72 days — compared to a February 2026 training syllabus showing approximately 336 hours of training over 42 days.

DHS has repeatedly denied cutting down on hiring standards, despite acknowledging the truncated timeline as recently as February of this year. In a press release, DHS said recruits receive 56 days of training and an average of 28 days of on-the-job training, adding that “no training requirements have been removed.” Training increased from eight hours a day, five days a week to 12 hours a day, six days a week, according to the agency.

“The meat of the training was never removed,” Lyons testified during a congressional hearing in February.

A former ICE instructor-turned-whistleblower disputed those claims.

Ryan Schwank, who served as a top lawyer for the agency, testified that DHS “has told the public that new cadets are receiving all the critical classes they need to perform their duties, that no critical material or standards have been cut. This is a lie.”

“ICE made the program shorter, and they removed so many essential parts that what remains is a dangerous husk,” he said in February. “No reasonable person would believe a training program suddenly cut nearly in half could meet the minimum legal requirements.”

Over several months, he watched ICE “dismantle” the training program, he said.

Schwank also said he received “secretive orders” to teach recruits to “violate the Constitution,” including entering homes without a warrant signed by a judge.

Before he received that May 2025 memo, his supervisor told him that “no previous ICE instructors had been dismissed because they questioned senior ICE management over the legality of the memo,” Schwank said.

The agency cut “240 hours of vital classes from a 584-hour program,” according to Schwank, who said the agency cut “classes that teach the Constitution, our legal system, firearms training, the use of force, lawful arrests, proper detention and the limits of officers’ authority.”

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ICE’s summer hiring surge followed congressional approval of $178 billion to expand the agency into one of the most expensive police agencies in the world, but ICE later dismissed more than 200 new recruits while they were in training for falling short of requirements, according to agency data reviewed by NBC.

Most did not meet physical and academic standards while several were dismissed for their criminal backgrounds or over safety concerns that were flagged in background checks.

Homeland Security’s then-deputy secretary Tricia McLaughlin claimed that a majority of new recruits are former law enforcement officers who go through a different hiring process; per ICE policy, applicants are required to pass drug tests and undergo a security check before they enter training. McLaughlin said the figures in NBC’s report were “not accurate” and “reflect a subset of candidates in initial basic academy classes.”

Critics have warned that hitting that 10,000 target — more than doubling its pre-Trump footprint — could expose ICE to intense legal scrutiny over allegations of abuse and illegal use of force without adequate guardrails and training.

“The loosening of hiring standards and training requirements is unacceptable and will likely result in increased officer misconduct — similar to or worse than what occurred during a small surge in hiring U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers in the early 2000s,” Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin wrote to then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in October.

“Exacerbating our concerns, DHS has gutted offices responsible for overseeing ICE officers and ensuring accountability for use-of-force incidents,” he added. “Given these developments, greater congressional oversight of ICE’s hiring is essential.”

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