Campaign will target rightwing ideologues to fill ranks to meet Trump deportation goals in 2026
US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has reportedly planned a $100m, one-year media blitz for what it’s calling “wartime recruitment”, targeting conservative radio show listeners, gun rights aficionados, military affairs followers and men’s interests enthusiasts – among others in the MAGA-verse – for jobs in the Trump administration’s next phase of its mass deportation campaign.
As ICE looks to hire for thousands of new positions, flush with cash after an unprecedented influx from Congress last summer, it’s relying on geofencing to ensure people near military bases, Nascar races, gun and trade shows, and college campuses receive its recruitment ads, according to an internal document reported by the Washington Post.
Officials also intend to spend $8m or more on deals with fitness, military and tactical/lifestyle online influencers, who would use their sway to push the administration’s immigration agenda through livestreams, events, and other content meant for their gen Z and millennial audiences.
It wouldn’t matter. There will be no trials and no one will be held to account. American fascism won’t end with some external power or rebel group bringing justice, but by the movement losing momentum and all the war criminals going home. The people who commit unspeakable acts will just be another dad at their kid’s little league game. They’ll just be average workers who have a bit more wealth than those who didn’t kidnap innocent people. The only justice will be them needing to live in a dystopia they did their part in maintaining.