Agents who go through training will be allowed to arrest people for immigration violations or other criminal charges, and will carry guns.
The move is significant because, until now, USCIS was explicitly kept separate from immigration enforcement, so that immigrants could feel comfortable submitting their personal information to the government and showing up for their interviews.
Having law-enforcement agents at interview sites who could potentially arrest immigrants may have a chilling effect on people’s willingness to apply for benefits they are eligible for, former agency officials and other critics say.
Joe Edlow, the agency’s newly installed director, said in an interview that he envisions the new law-enforcement body investigating patterns of fraud, like groups of immigrants from the same country who submit nearly identical immigration applications or citizenship applicants who fake disabilities to avoid taking the English proficiency exam. They will also make denaturalization of new citizens who lied on their applications a priority, he said.
The changes, he argued, shouldn’t impact most immigrants who make bona fide requests of the government.
“I’m not expecting this to have a chilling effect on applications,” Edlow said. “I’m expecting this to have a chilling effect on fraudulent applications, and that’s what I want.”
USCIS already has officers charged with tracking fraud or national security threats, led by a unit set up during the Obama administration called Fraud Detection and National Security. Cases detected by that unit are then referred to Immigration and Customs Enforcement for prosecution. Those officers are more akin to analysts; they can’t issue warrants or make arrests. And they don’t carry weapons.
Edlow said that forming his own law-enforcement team is necessary because, historically, ICE hasn’t had the capacity to pursue every lead his agency sends it.
Following the passage of President Trump’s so-called One Big Beautiful Bill, ICE has been given tens of billions of dollars to hire new agents and expand its detention capacity, making it the largest law-enforcement agency in the federal government.
“It’s totally unnecessary,” said Doug Rand, a former USCIS official in the Biden administration. “It’s a solution in search of a problem.”
Edlow said he plans to start with roughly 200 agents, who will be recruited and trained over the next few months. They will be embedded at immigration offices around the country.
The formation of a new police force is just the latest in a string of efforts to toughen vetting of immigrants. Under Edlow’s watch, the agency has instructed officers to strongly consider denying an applicant for a visa, green card or citizenship if that person holds “anti-American” views, a term the agency’s leadership didn’t define. The agency has also resumed sending officers to do “neighborhood checks” of citizenship applicants to speak with their neighbors. And, Edlow said, the agency is developing a tougher standard to assess applicants’ moral character.
Even before the formation of this new force, the Trump administration has increasingly been sending ICE agents to arrest immigrants at their interviews for citizenship, green cards or asylum. In several instances, the administration has argued in court — with mixed success — that involvement in anti-Israel protests should disqualify immigrants from remaining in the country.
