AI Tool Misclassifies ICE Applicants, Sends Untrained Recruits to Field
An artificial intelligence error caused significant problems for US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). The agency was rushing to hire 10,000 new officers. According to two law enforcement officials who know about the mistake, the AI tool sent many new recruits to field offices without proper training.
How the AI System Was Supposed to Work
ICE used an AI tool to scan resumes. Its job was simple. It needed to identify applicants with real law enforcement experience. Those qualified candidates would enter the LEO program. LEO stands for law enforcement officer.
This program was designed for recruits who were already officers elsewhere. They only required a shorter, four-week online training course. Applicants without any law enforcement background faced a different path. They had to complete a much longer, eight-week in-person course.
This intensive training happened at ICE's academy. The location is the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Georgia. The curriculum included critical subjects. Recruits studied immigration law. They learned how to handle firearms. They also underwent rigorous physical fitness tests.
The Critical Flaw in the AI's Logic
The system failed spectacularly. "They were using AI to scan résumés and found out a bunch of the people who were LEOs weren't LEOs," one official explained. The AI tool made a basic error. It flagged any resume containing the word "officer."
This meant people with titles like "compliance officer" were misidentified. Even applicants who simply wrote they aspired to be ICE officers were caught in the net. The majority of new applicants were incorrectly labeled as experienced law enforcement officers. In reality, many had zero experience with any police or federal force.
Officials stressed that field offices provided additional training. This extra instruction happened after the academy or online course. It occurred before officers were deployed on the street. The recruits singled out by the AI most likely received this follow-up training. However, the core foundational training was missing.
Discovery and Fallout of the Error
The mistake was discovered in mid-fall. This was more than a month into the massive recruitment surge. ICE took immediate action to fix the problem. The agency started manually reviewing the resumes of new hires.
"They now have to bring them back to FLETC," one official stated, referring to the training center in Georgia. This means a costly and time-consuming retraining process. The officials could not confirm exactly how many officers were improperly trained. It is also unclear how many may have already begun making immigration arrests.
Broader Context and Agency Pressure
This error highlights a major challenge. ICE is under immense pressure to rapidly expand its force. The agency has a mandate to hire 10,000 new officers by the end of 2025. Congress allocated funds through the One Big Beautiful Bill to support this. The funding included attractive incentives like $50,000 signing bonuses for new recruits.
One official noted that while ICE may have met the hiring goal on paper, the training blunder had real consequences. Bringing misidentified people back for proper training meant the agency did not successfully put 10,000 fully qualified officers on the street in 2025.
The recruitment push happened amid increased scrutiny of ICE's tactics. As the agency surged agents into American cities, its methods were questioned by local police, community groups, and lawmakers. This followed the shooting death of Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis by an ICE officer. That officer had over a decade of experience and was not part of the new AI-screened recruit group.
In a related issue, NBC News reported that ICE placed some new recruits into training before they even completed the agency's full vetting process. This adds another layer of concern over the rapid expansion.
The scale of the operation is vast. In Minneapolis alone, more than 2,000 ICE officers were deployed to boost arrests. Since late November, they apprehended over 2,400 people, according to a DHS spokesperson. The situation led Minnesota to sue in an attempt to remove DHS authority.
The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, did not respond to requests for comment on the AI error. The two law enforcement officials who provided this information were not authorized to speak publicly. They spoke to NBC News on the condition of anonymity.
