The Marine Corps is sending about 200 service members to assist Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Florida, in the Trump administration’s latest use of the military to boost its immigration operations.
U.S. Northern Command announced the move Thursday, saying the 200 Marines — from the Marine Wing Support Squadron 272 based in North Carolina — mark the “first wave” of support for ICE. Last month, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth green-lit up to 700 military personnel to help ICE in Florida, Texas and Louisiana.
The military said the Marines “will perform strictly non-law enforcement duties within ICE facilities,” focusing primarily on “administrative and logistical tasks.” They are “prohibited from direct contact with individuals in ICE custody.”
Assistant Secretary of Homeland Security Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement to CBS News that the Marines “will be trained and ready to assist with immigration processing at locations across the state of Florida, consistent with the whole-of-government approach to deliver on President Trump’s mandate from the American people to remove public safety threats from American communities.”
As President Trump aims to crack down on unauthorized border crossings and boost immigration arrests in the interior of the United States, his administration has repeatedly used the military.
Thousands of service members have been deployed to the U.S.-Mexico border to assist with wall construction and border enforcement, and members of the military can temporarily detain migrants in some narrow zones of land along the border before transferring them to immigration officials. As a surge in ICE detentions stretches the agency’s capacity, officials have considered converting military bases such as Fort Bliss in Texas into temporary immigration holding facilities, though those plans have not fully materialized.
The administration also sent 700 Marines and approximately 4,000 California National Guard troops to Los Angeles last month, part of an operation to guard ICE agents and federal property after days of protests against the Trump administration’s immigration actions in the city.
In one case, Marines in Los Angeles temporarily detained someone who walked onto federal property last month, but released him without charges, The Associated Press reported. The military told The AP that Marines are authorized to briefly detain people in certain circumstances before transferring detainees to civilian police.
The deployment to Los Angeles was controversial. Gov. Gavin Newsom argued the federal government illegally sidestepped him by deploying Guard forces without his permission, and said the presence of the military might further inflame protests that state and local police could handle themselves. The Trump administration argued the deployment was necessary to deter alleged threats against immigration agents.
The state of California sued over the Guard deployment, but a federal appeals court sided with the Trump administration in an early ruling, saying Mr. Trump likely acted within his legal authority.
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