Ben Burgis writes:

A typical social media post from the official DHS account last year called for Americans to join ICE to “defend your culture.” Note: Not “enforce the law,” not even “defend our safety” against some imagined horde of violent drug-running narcoterrorists streaming across the border. But defend American culture against the grave threat of too many people living here who supposedly have the wrong ethnic background. This is just one among many recruitment posts that explicitly evoke white nationalism and historical fascism.

As for vetting the people who heed this call, recruitment standards are so low that anti-ICE commentator Laura Jedeed, who applied to the agency as a test, was offered a job without having to sign any paperwork or pass a background check. In December, one DHS official expressed concern that the rushed hiring of unqualified ICE agents had resulted in onboarding many recruits who “can barely read or write.”

Put all this together, and you get an agency full of people who increasingly haven’t even gone through cursory background checks, who have been recruited on the basis of flagrant appeals to racism, and have gotten a taste for being able to push around and physically brutalize citizens with the blessings of the administration.

ICE has evolved into a rogue, thuggish paramilitary force. In the greater scheme of things, it’s a brand-new addition to the American state, and it’s highly volatile. Even if a new president with better intentions inherits this state-sanctioned gang, it’s far from clear that it would ever be reformable. It’s really not crazy to suggest it shouldn’t exist. [Continue reading…]