The Investigation into the Invisible Front – How ICE Built Its Own Security Realm in the Shadows

What investigations now reveal is a system that has expanded in secrecy over many years. Immigration and Customs Enforcement no longer acts merely as a deportation authority. Internal documents in our possession paint the picture of an organization that has declared itself a security power - with its own programs, its own levels of secrecy, and an operational reach that goes far beyond anything publicly discussed.

The names sound harmless, almost playful. Benchwarmer. Tidal Wave. Abracadabra. Dust Off. Fleur De Lis. But behind these code names lies not administrative action, but a sweeping enforcement apparatus. At least 21 so called large scale operations are listed in an internal document classified as law enforcement sensitive, 15 pages long. Since June, nearly seven thousand people are said to have been arrested in these operations. This is not a snapshot. It is a permanent deployment.

What stands out is not only the scale, but the purpose. It is not solely about immigration status. It is about information. People in custody are systematically approached, questioned, evaluated. One of the operations is explicitly designed to recruit informants in deportation detention. Not sporadically, but structurally. Another deploys around two thousand so called information resources nationwide - a term that says everything and nothing, but makes clear that people are being turned into tools.

This becomes particularly clear in Operation Abracadabra. It specifies that one hundred percent of all detained individuals must be questioned. Not to clarify their case, but to identify follow on targets. Apartments. Networks. Additional persons. The internal objective description goes even further. Every border crossing is to be linked, wherever possible, to terrorist organizations or transnational crime. Not because there is evidence, but because it is operationally useful.

In parallel, Operation Benchwarmer is underway. It shows how far the camouflage goes. Operatives appear in civilian clothing, blend in with others, sit in transport vehicles, in corridors, in detention areas. They listen, observe, collect information that would not be gathered in formal interrogations. This is not a marginal phenomenon. It is a nationwide program. None of this happens in isolation. ICE draws on an entire web. Border Patrol, investigative services, uniformed police, even the Secret Service are involved. The Department of Homeland Security has become the largest law enforcement agency in the country. Larger than the FBI. And that was before ICE’s budget was nearly tripled last year.

What makes this development so explosive is the lack of oversight. Many of these programs were previously unknown. Not because no one was looking, but because access is systematically sealed off. Even basic rules of engagement, for example regarding the use of lethal force, are almost completely redacted in internal guidelines. Public scrutiny is not intended. Within the agencies, resistance is growing. The flow of information comes not from activists, but from officers who no longer want to carry what they see. Anger is directed at the secrecy, but also at the political mandate. Increasingly, there is open talk of war. Not only against cartels, but against everything deemed left wing, critical, or un American. When even people like Renee Good are publicly labeled terrorists, it is hardly surprising that the agency sees itself in a state of emergency.

The consequences now reach into the Justice Department. In Minnesota, several senior federal prosecutors have resigned after pressure was applied not to examine the shooter, but the environment of the deceased. There are also fractures within the FBI. While one part of the agency follows political directives and investigates connections to activist groups, others warn internally that ICE’s conduct is destroying trust in law enforcement as a whole. An experienced FBI agent put it this way: Those who enforce the law must themselves abide by it. Masking, isolation, open hostility toward the public - all of this conveys the impression that one is placing oneself above the law. And that impression sticks.

What becomes visible here is not a single escalation, but a gradual shift in power. An agency assigning itself tasks that were once clearly separated. Deportation, intelligence gathering, policing, political monitoring. All in one hand. Without mandate. Without public debate. That is the larger context that is often missing. The images of raids, of shootings, of tear gas tell only part of the story. Behind them stands an apparatus that understands itself as a security state within the state. And that has learned to operate in the shadows.

That these documents are now surfacing is no coincidence. It is a sign that even within the structures, trust is eroding. Not outwardly, but inwardly. And that is precisely what makes the situation so dangerous. Because a system that no longer wants to explain itself and can no longer explain itself begins to seal itself off from everything - including its own society.