U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is spending millions of dollars on television advertising in select metro areas around the country, an Associated Press tally found, aimed at recruiting local officers frustrated with their cities’ restrictions on immigration enforcement into President Donald Trump’s mass deportation efforts.
“You took an oath to protect and serve, to keep your family, your city, safe,” the narrator says, as images of the cities targeted and ICE agents arresting people move across the screen. “But in sanctuary cities, you’re ordered to stand down while dangerous illegals walk free.”
The campaign — airing in more than a dozen cities, including Chicago, Seattle and Atlanta — is part of ICE’s $30 billion initiative to hire 10,000 more deportation officers by the end of the year to supercharge deportations. The money is part of the $76.5 billion sought by Trump’s Republican administration for ICE — a 10-fold increase in its current budget — as part of the sweeping, multitrillion-dollar tax breaks and spending cuts bill enacted in July.
ICE is already offering bonuses of up to $50,000 for new recruits and other benefits such as tuition reimbursement as it seeks to fast-track hiring.
And while some parts of the federal government are shut down as the result of Congress’ failure to pass a spending measure last week, the ICE ads reflect that the push for mass deportations, the Trump administration’s top priority, is still flush with cash.
Millions spent on the 30-second ads
The ads open with video of each metro’s familiar skyline and the narrator’s voice announcing, for example, “Attention, Miami law enforcement.” Beyond that, the spots are identical, inviting officers to “join ICE and help us catch the worst of the worst. Drug traffickers. Gang members. Predators,” according to a review of the ads on the ad-tracking service AdImpact.
The 30-second spots began running in mid-September in Albuquerque, New Mexico; Boston; Chicago; Denver; New York; Philadelphia; Sacramento, California; Seattle; and Washington, D.C. Adding to the list a week ago: Atlanta; Dallas; El Paso, Texas; Houston; Miami; Salt Lake City; and San Antonio.
As of Monday, total spending on the ads had topped $6.5 million, with the most spent since mid-September being $853,745 in the Seattle area. However, Atlanta saw the most in the past week, more than $947,000, according to AdImpact.
It was unclear why ICE targeted those locations and not others. There is no standard definition of what is a sanctuary jurisdiction although it generally refers to cities or states that limit their cooperation with ICE. Some but not all of the cities appear on a Justice Department list of cities that “that impede enforcement of federal immigration laws.”
Asked in an AP email to explain why specific areas were chosen as advertising targets, Department of Homeland Security officials declined to provide an explanation. Instead, they replied with a Sept. 16 press release, near the beginning of the ad campaign, reporting that it had received more than 150,000 applications and had extended 18,000 tentative job offers.
Some cities where the ads have been playing, particularly Boston and Chicago, have been repeatedly criticized by the Trump administration for their policies that limit how much they can work with federal immigration enforcement. ICE has launched immigration crackdowns in both of those cities. Local officials in Chicago have been particularly outspoken against the stepped-up enforcement.
Albuquerque is among the smallest metropolitan areas where the ads are airing, though the city’s mayor, Tim Keller, has been a vocal opponent of the Trump administration’s immigration policy. In July, Keller signed an executive order barring city employees from assisting federal authorities with civil immigration enforcement “unless legally required.”
Local police can’t compete with ICE promises
The AP reached out to police departments in areas where the ads were running. Most departments either did not respond or said they did not comment on actions of outside agencies. A few, including Sacramento and Miami, said they had not noticed any of their officers leaving for positions at ICE or DHS.
Four of the markets where the ads are playing are in Texas, including San Antonio.
Danny Diaz, the president of the city’s Police Officers Association, said he’d seen the ads and was concerned about prospective recruits who might be thinking of joining the city’s police department joining ICE instead.
“We can’t compete with a $50,000 signing bonus,” Diaz said. “I do think that the younger generation will jump on that.”
The government shutdown could dampen ICE’s recruitment hopes, he said.
“They’re furloughing federal employees, and I don’t think individuals want to leave one department to go work for a federal agency when they don’t know if they’re going to receive a check or not,” he said, referring to the lapse in funding that has led to federal law enforcement officers going without pay.
Philadelphia police Capt. John Walker said it’s too early to tell whether the ad campaign has had an impact on the city’s recruiting. Instead, he suggested, the ads appeared more geared toward reassuring viewers that the Trump administration was addressing illegal immigration.
“It’s the psychological feel. You want to know that there are cops out there because it makes you feel good,” said Walker, who’s in charge of Philadelphia police recruiting. “That’s all this is, strengthening the belief that they’re doing something.”
The ad blitz comes as law enforcement departments around the country are struggling to meet staffing demands.
Beaumont reported from Des Moines, Iowa.
