At an ICE career expo, thousands line up to ‘defend the homeland’

ARLINGTON, Texas – Christian Osborne has been itching to serve his country since he was discharged from the Marines after refusing the coronavirus vaccine. He thinks Americans have a naive view of illegal immigration and wants to be part of President Donald Trump’s mass deportation campaign.

“Every country for its entire existence has always had borders. We’re the only country who says, ‘Come on in,’” said Osborne, 24. “There needs to be a control on who can come in, to make sure you’re not some psycho.”

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So last week he shuffled into a Texas arena typically reserved for Counter-Strike and “League of Legends” video game competitions to attend a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement career expo and make the case for why he should become one of 10,000 new officers the agency intends to hire this year.

So far, the Department of Homeland Security said it has received more than 130,000 applications, and if the hiring fair in this community wedged between Dallas and Fort Worth offers any indication, plenty of people are eager to sign up. Despite polls showing that growing numbers of Americans disapprove of Trump’s aggressive tactics and images of masked ICE agents whisking immigrants off the streets, 3,000 applicants showed up to submit résumés at last week’s career expo, drawn in part by the president’s call to serve and the promise of a signing bonus of up to $50,000 for top recruits.

Overhead, a video about ICE’s history and mission played on a large screen while smaller TV monitors touted ICE’s hiring mantra: “Defend the homeland.” Recruiting agents sat at tables parked in front of an ICE-branded Ford Mustang, resplendent in black, gold and red. In a lobby, applicants lined up to submit fingerprints for background checks and urine for drug screening.

Competing alongside Osborne for one of the spots was a great-grandson of Mexican immigrants, a former professional MMA fighter and a lanky community college student from Tennessee who drove 12 hours to make his case to ICE recruiters.

Kole Wunschel, 18, passed a dozen protesters who taunted him and his father as they made their way into Esports Stadium. “America was built by immigrants,” read one woman’s sign. Another yelled, “Why are you signing up for the Gestapo?”

But that’s not how Wunschel saw it. The agency was promising to make tentative job offers on the spot, and Wunschel was so set on getting hired that he was prepared to drop out of college.

“I want to do anything that betters our country,” Wunschel said before his father, Kim, cut him off.

“Letting 15 million people in the country illegally should never have happened, and the people that allowed it to happen should be arrested,” Kim Wunschel said. “If your first act coming to America is breaking the law, then you don’t have the right to be here.”

The recruiting push has come with militaristic branding that evokes World War II-era U.S. propaganda posters featuring Uncle Sam, casting immigration enforcement as a defense against an “invasion.” At the hiring expo, a video played on a large screen in a dimly lit room touting ICE’s role investigating human trafficking and drug-smuggling, and showing agents in fatigues and bulletproof vests.

That message appealed to Arturo Sanchez, 29, who sported an Air Force cap as he made his pitch. He’d been a hydraulics specialist working on E-C130s at posts including Kuwait, Afghanistan and Qatar. Since he left the service, he’s been selling manufactured homes. He said he once applied to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, but was turned down. He said he believes that working against illegal immigration will help prevent human trafficking and drug smuggling.

Sanchez, whose great-grandparents emigrated from Mexico, said he was undeterred by the harsh and inaccurate statements some recruits at the expo shared about immigrants. He said he sometimes had to deal with uncomfortable situations in the Air Force, including racism, which he was always able to handle on his own.

“I think that it would be beautiful if we could all live together in peace and happiness, but Satan doesn’t allow that to happen, unfortunately,” Sanchez said. “There are evil deeds that do go unpunished, so that’s where people like me want to see if I can help contribute to bringing justice.”

Many Americans have become angry at the sight of ICE agents showing up at Home Depots and car washes, and arresting immigrants going about their daily lives. Arrest and deportation data from ICE shows the agency is increasingly deporting people with no criminal convictions. DHS says ICE officers are facing an 830 percent increase in assaults.

None of that daunted Kevin Tucker, 54, of North Dallas, who said he retired from a local police department 19 years ago but felt called to help with the immigration enforcement blitz because, in his view, undocumented immigrants “are not paying taxes into the system” and taking jobs from Americans.

Tucker is newly eligible for ICE service: The agency has lifted age caps for applicants and encouraged retired law enforcement officers to rejoin the ranks. The age cap for deportation officers – the role ICE was primarily recruiting for in Texas – used to be 40.

Tucker has seen news stories and images on social media showing masked ICE officers aggressively taking immigrants into custody – and heard the concerns that the agency is violating people’s constitutional rights – but he said those reports don’t move him.

“Things are posted for certain reasons,” Tucker said. “You can see the same story on different channels, and there are different narratives. On social media you’re going to get the stories that fit what you want to believe, based on the algorithm. You never get the true story.”

Reports of rough tactics don’t bother Aaron Ely, either. A former bantamweight MMA fighter who went by the ring name “The Cyborg,” Ely settled on an IT career after his hip gave out. He limped into the hiring expo last week hoping ICE could use his computer expertise. He said he felt he was no longer able to advance in the private sector because the market is crowded with candidates from India willing to do the work for less.

“I keep seeing these memes where Indians are bragging about taking our tech jobs,” said Ely, 36. “So I said, ‘Oh yeah? Well I’m going to work with these guys that are going to arrest you, slam your face on the pavement and send you home.’”

Some candidates said they do have reservations about what the job might entail. Osborne, the former Marine, said there might be orders he doesn’t feel entirely comfortable with, like being told to arrest the parent of a young child whose only crime was crossing the border illegally.

“That would weigh on my heart,” Osborne said. “It’s a tough moral question, for sure.”

Still, he said, “To call ICE the Gestapo – that’s ridiculous.”

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