With such a large contingent pulled from their duties, an expert says drug cartels and bad actors are watching.
FBI agents' reassignments to US immigration enforcement under Donald Trump may impact counterterrorism and corruption investigations.Nearly 25% of FBI agents are now working on immigration enforcement, according to numbers provided by the FBI to Sen.
Mark Warner's office. But those numbers get even higher when looking at some of the biggest field offices around the country: up to 45% of those FBI agents are working on President Donald Trump's immigration push. As operation "Midway Blitz" continues in Chicago, and more federal agents are deployed around the country to Democratic cities, prompting large public outcry, the ABC7 I-Team has learned 23% of FBI agents nationwide have been tasked with immigration enforcement. Traditionally, the FBI investigates foreign spies, terrorism, cyberattacks and transnational gangs."My concern is that if you're moving agents away from those vital responsibilities to engage in civil immigration enforcement, you're going to see a decrease in the number of FBI investigations in those areas and an increase in the threat to the country," former Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for Counterterrorism John Cohen told the I-Team. He says there is a finite number of law enforcement resources working on complex public safety investigations. "If FBI agents aren't working on Joint Terrorism Task Forces, then there are fewer terrorism investigations. If FBI agents are not working on drug gang task forces, then there are fewer investigations into violent street gangs and drug trafficking cartels," Cohen said. And with such a large contingent pulled from their duties, he says drug cartels and bad actors are watching.Chicago federal intervention: Tracking surge in immigration enforcement operations | Live updates "I am 100% certain that they are tracking, that federal agents are being moved out of drug task forces and seeking to determine ways to exploit the reduced resources on those task forces," said Cohen. Chicago FBI said in a statement to the I-Team, in part, as the fourth largest field office it has been assisting with immigration enforcement efforts since January of this year and does not comment on staffing allocations. They say they are committed to protecting the American people and upholding the constitution. "So, to say that they're allocated to do immigration, it's not like the rest of their other investigations, and the other job they could do is just automatically stopping," said ABC7 law enforcement expert and former Deputy Special Agent in Charge at the Secret Service in Chicago Derek Mayer. He says he's unconcerned with the reassignments. "I think it's very easy for the public to jump at this and say... you know, 40% of FBI agents are allocated to immigration, but agents are very good at multitasking, very good at doing many things simultaneously on a day to day basis," Mayer said. Sen. Dick Durbin said in a statement to the ABC 7 I-Team, the president is diverting critical resources from domestic terrorism threats and drug trafficking enforcement and this "shortsighted decision by FBI Director Kash Patel, in service of the President's agenda, only makes our country less safe."
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