ICE grew its Maine staff 44% over the past year

Cumberland County Sheriff Kevin Joyce lost two employees last summer to another agency. Both were lured away by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. As part of an effort to beef up its ranks to meet President Donald Trump's deportation goals, ICE offered $50,000 bonuses to new recruits. 'You kind of throw your hands in the air and go, 'I can't compete with that,'' Joyce said. While Maine law enforcement agencies have had a hard time staying staffed in recent years, ICE — flush with cash from Republicans in Congress — has expanded its roster in the state by 44%. When the hiring effort began a year ago, the Department of Homeland Security pitched it as an act of patriotism to remove 'the worst of the worst' from the U.S., but the agency has mostly arrested people without criminal convictions. On July 13, a newly recruited agent shot a father in Biddeford, Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, who didn't have a criminal history and wasn't the target of the enforcement that day. Advertisement The background of the agent who told people he was the shooter, David Brouillette, has brought intense scrutiny on ICE's rapid expansion and raised questions about the character of its new hires. Brouillette has a history of abuse accusations by and against his former romantic partners, impairment from a head injury and disputes over child support payments. He hasn't responded to requests for an interview and a phone number for him is not in service. Joyce said unlike what's been revealed about Brouillette, the staff hired away from his department in August and September last year were good employees and good candidates, though they were what he called 'short-term' employees. One of them was a corrections officer working in the jail who is now a deportation officer and has made several arrests this spring and summer, detention records show. Through public statistics, documents and more than a dozen interviews, the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram has learned more about how ICE has significantly grown its footprint in Maine. It's the first significant growth in the state in at least a decade, and it has led some residents to feel like immigration agents are ever-present in their communities. ICE had a steady level of 34 employees in the state each year on average in the past decade. In this fiscal year, which started in October, the agency's staff in Maine shot up to 52 people, according to statistics from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management that do not specify how many are officers, investigators or support staff. The office declined to answer questions about the data. Even members of Congress say they are unable to get answers to basic questions about ICE's staffing. Congresswoman Chellie Pingree, a Democrat, said she's been trying to get firm answers about how ICE is hiring, what vetting takes place, and what training is like. She said in prior years, and even during the first Trump administration, if she asked these questions, she would get answers. Advertisement 'It didn't used to be considered something that should be kept secret,' she said. U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree speaks during a July protest at Mechanics Park in Biddeford against the fatal shooting of Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero. (Daryn Slover/Staff Photographer) HISTORIC HIRING PUSH ICE and DHS did not respond to a list of questions about their hiring in Maine. The General Services Administration, which manages federal buildings, declined to answer questions about ICE's footprint in the state and deferred to DHS. To staff up in the past, DHS hosted large hiring events in various cities around the country, including in northern Virginia in 2024, which a department annual report said resulted in 185 accepted tentative job offers. It considered that 'a notable increase in ICE's hiring efforts' at the time. Since then, hiring has exploded. DHS onboarded about 5,500 new deportation officers nationwide from October to June, documents provided to Congress and reviewed by the Press Herald show. ICE's own statements say the total number of new hires is even higher. 'The accelerated hiring tempo has allowed ICE to place officers in the field faster than any previous recruitment effort in the agency's history,' DHS said in a statement. It said it was using 'data driven outreach' to 'recruit qualified patriotic Americans.' The push is possible because of $30 billion provided in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which passed Congress in summer 2025. Sen. Susan Collins of Maine voted to advance the bill and later voted against its passage. Maine's other representatives in Washington did not support it. Advertisement Pingree said as far as she knows, the ICE facility in Scarborough is the agency's only one in Maine. 'Although it appears small, it is the center of ICE activities,' she said. Records have shown personnel came from outside Maine to make arrests during the surge of enforcement in January, but Pingree doesn't know if that's still happening. Brouillette is based in Maine, and so are the other new hires made in the last year that the Press Herald has identified. Most joined ICE in the first months of the recruitment effort. In addition to the people who left the Cumberland County Sheriff's Office, an officer left the Livermore Falls Police Department in the fall and joined ICE, Chief Ibrahim Haroon said. The officer had only worked for the police department for about a week before resigning. Two employees of the Bangor Police Department went to work for Homeland Security in the fall as well, though a police spokesman didn't know exactly what their new duties are with that agency. Joyce said he also knows someone who had formerly worked in federal law enforcement and was enticed to return because of the compensation ICE offered. Advertisement Sheriff Eric Samson in Androscoggin County has not had any employees leave to become deportation officers, he said, but said he knows someone ICE hired who had graduated from the University of Maine about eight months prior. The recruit attended the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Georgia this spring, Samson said. However, there is scant evidence that ICE has tried to do much formal recruiting in Maine's colleges and universities. Sheriff Joel Merry from Sagadahoc County said those would be logical places to start a recruitment search. 'You'd think as a federal agency, trying to hire career, top-notch people, that's the first place you'd go,' he said. Southern Maine Community College said it hasn't received any requests from ICE or DHS, spokesman Jeff Schools said. Local, state and federal law enforcement agencies regularly recruit from the University of Maine System through its career centers, spokeswoman Samantha Warren said, particularly students in homeland security and criminal justice programs. But ICE has not tried that avenue, she said. Last fall, ICE directly asked the criminal justice department at the University of Southern Maine about doing a recruitment event. The department didn't respond, said its chair, Brendan McQuade, who's been involved with the No ICE for ME campaign. He said it would be more typical for an agency that wants to hire to work with the career center. Advertisement Other common places to recruit, particularly for an employer looking to hire veterans, are the state's job fairs and Hire-A-Vet events. The alleged shooter in Biddeford, Brouillette, served in the U.S. Army as a human intelligence collector and deployed to Afghanistan. Previously he served in the Maine National Guard. U.S. military branches participate in the state's hiring events, and federal agencies use Maine's online job board. A state Labor Department spokeswoman said while they don't keep track of which employers have participated, staff do not recall ICE being involved anytime recently. Advertisements for ICE on social media spoke directly to people who worked in law enforcement. 'You took an oath to protect and serve,' one said. 'Join ICE, and help us catch the worst of the worst.' Another advertisement from August shows trucks with ICE logos as they park in front of monuments and memorials in Washington, D.C. A rap song plays under the video with the lyric, 'I bring guns to fights.' ICE targeted their online ads to people whose phones showed them near military bases, NASCAR races, college campuses, or gun and trade shows, the Washington Post reported, citing an internal document. The agency also targeted military veterans and people with conservative interests online. Advertisement Deborah Fleischaker served 14 years at DHS and was acting chief of staff at ICE under President Joe Biden. She said recruitment through social media is 'some of what they've always done,' and under Trump, 'they've done it in a more turbo-charged way, and they've done it with relaxed training requirements so it's easier to get people on faster.' Several law enforcement leaders said they understood why members of local departments might have been attracted to an opportunity with ICE last year, particularly if they had been working in corrections and wanted to be an officer, or if it gave them a leg up to advance to another federal agency like the FBI, but they would be surprised if people are still making that change. 'Why would anybody want to leave a respectable job at a county law enforcement agency and jump into that fray?' said Merry, who said he wasn't aware of anyone leaving his office to join a federal agency. Samson, the Androscoggin County sheriff, said given public opinion about ICE's conduct during the second Trump administration, 'I have concerns for recent college graduates who have gained employment with ICE for how that might affect their long-term career goals in law enforcement.' While ICE has hired staff away from local agencies, it has also detained several employees from local departments, since Maine doesn't require citizenship as a condition of employment in the field. Joyce has had three employees arrested by ICE, he said. They passed polygraphs and had legal work authorization, he said, adding that it's possible his office vetted more thoroughly than ICE has. Advertisement VETTING AND TRAINING QUESTIONED Under the frequently asked questions section on ICE's hiring site, it asks: 'What happens after I apply?' The answer: 'We will move fast.' Its critics say it has moved too fast. ICE started hiring last year at the same time its inspector general had just started an audit to see if it would be able to surge its hiring and training efforts. A year later, the office has not released any findings, Congressman Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, the top Democrat on the Homeland Security Committee, said in an interview this month. Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., talks to reporters on Capitol Hill in Washington in December 2022. (Jose Luis Magana/Associated Press) Todd Lyons, then acting director of ICE, told lawmakers in February that new officers get 47 days of training at the federal academy over eight weeks. The Atlantic reported that 47 days is a nod to Trump as the 47th president. That was a significant reduction from previous years, whistleblower Ryan Schwank told Congress. He said the length of training was cut by about 40%. Lyons said the training had been further reduced for people who had previously been certified federal law enforcement officers. 'We were told ICE would bring people in and provide additional training on a periodic basis,' Thompson said, adding the agency hasn't provided documentation to prove that additional training is happening. Advertisement In December, Thompson requested a Government Accountability Office investigation on the hiring surge. He said he expects the office is doing the review now and he won't hear back until it's complete, but he doesn't know for sure. New Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said that, as of July 1, training requirements would be 'back up to the regular standards.' Since the shooting in Biddeford, allegations against Brouillette led a senior Trump administration immigration enforcement official, Tom Homan, to say on CNN that if the allegations were true, the officer involved would've had 'an almost impossible time to pass vetting.' Homan said, 'This is kind of a rare instance.' But it's under review, he added. ICE's website says it uses contractors to do a 'thorough' background investigation of every new hire that includes 'the consideration of every piece of information concerning your personal and professional background.' NBC News reported in October that some recruits had shown up for training before they went through the full vetting process. Democrats in Washington have struggled to get clear answers. Thompson, whose Homeland Security Committee would normally watch over ICE, said Trump has intimidated Republicans into not conducting more oversight. Advertisement 'It's the Republicans in Congress who gave and continue to give ICE all this money,' Thompson said. 'And still there is no accountability that goes with the money.' He said the committee chairman, Andrew Garbarino of New York, has not called hearings since February, despite a number of incidents of public concern, like the Biddeford shooting. Instead, the committee gets briefings that Thompson said are not recorded and do not put the witnesses under oath. In one briefing in July, Thompson said he asked about ICE's vetting. 'And they said, 'You know, we generally vet all the people we employ,'' he said. 'I want to know what 'generally vet' means.' He said he asked if ICE officials were aware of any instance under the hiring surge where a new hire had not had a complete vetting. 'They said, 'I'm sure there are, but I'm not aware,'' the congressman recalled. In lieu of bipartisan hearings, Thompson and Pingree plan to hold what they call a 'shadow hearing' on Monday in Biddeford focused on accountability for ICE. Fleischaker, the former ICE acting chief of staff, said the agency has never before had the kind of money it needed to increase its workforce to such an extent, but U.S. Customs and Border Protection did, particularly after 9/11, and she believes it's a cautionary tale. Advertisement York County Sheriff Bill King was a special agent at the Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General at that time. He said he primarily investigated complaints against federal agents for murder, bribery, human trafficking and drug smuggling. He said the number of complaints rose drastically after Congress directed Border Patrol to hire a thousand new agents a year. Federal oversight investigators later said a disproportionately high number of the allegations were in the southwest border region, which may have been because CBP staff there were more likely to be newly hired, 'relatively less-experienced agents.' King said many agents were unprepared for the environment and kind of work they would be doing and he sees stark parallels to ICE's hiring today. He hoped DHS would have developed more internal controls over the past 20 years. 'To hear Tom Homan say, 'Yeah, we've got to look at our training process,' that pains me,' King said. 'Like, are you kidding me? We went through this. Didn't we learn anything? Apparently not.' Staff Writer Dylan Tusinski contributed to this report.