Gordon to deploy Wyoming National Guard to support ICE in Trump’s mass deportation effort

Wyoming National Guard members may soon assist U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the detention and deportation of undocumented people, a spokesperson for Gov. Mark Gordon confirmed Monday to WyoFile.

Gordon is among 20 Republican governors who have agreed to enlist guard troops in President Donald Trump’s rapidly escalating detention operation. Key details about the deployment remain undecided — including the number of participating troops, the nature of their duties and, critically, the question of whether they would be working in Wyoming or deploying to another state. 

“We are still determining exactly what that participation involves and are waiting for some more information from our federal partners,” Gordon’s spokesperson Michael Pearlman told WyoFile in an emailed statement Monday.

Last week, The New York Times reported on a memo from ICE officials that described using guard troops to process detention paperwork and do other administrative tasks. Department of Homeland Security officials hope that in doing so, the troops can free up ICE agents to find and detain undocumented immigrants. In June, however, National Public Radio reported that DHS was also considering National Guard troops as detention guards, transporting detained immigrants and pursuing “fugitives.” 

The New York Times reported troops “would be deployed in 20 states with Republican governors,” but it did not list the states involved. The deployment could start this month, the Times reported. 

Wyoming does not have a federal immigration detention facility, though ICE holds undocumented immigrants in some county jails. 

Guard officials and the governor are still coordinating details of the deployment with federal officials in the region, including where members will serve, Wyoming National Guard Director of Strategic Communications Joseph Coslett told WyoFile. They’re “basically trying to work out what all the (federal officials) need and where,” Coslett said, adding that ultimately the decision about the numbers of personnel deployed, and what they do, will fall to Gordon. 

“This one is a little different obviously,” Coslett said, “so we have to work with our national partners and there’s still a lot of questions.” 

The second-term governor’s decision to deploy the Wyoming National Guard further enmeshes the Equality State in Trump’s sprawling and aggressive effort to detain and deport people. News of the deployment comes closely on the heels of Gordon’s announcement that some Wyoming Highway Patrol troopers also will help enforce federal immigration laws. 

Unlawful presence in the country, on its own, is a civil offense, not a criminal one. In Wyoming and Colorado, ICE has increasingly been detaining people who do not have criminal convictions, according to reporting by WyoFile and The Colorado Sun. 

Trump continues to involve the military in the domestic immigration enforcement effort, including by sending National Guard troops and U.S. Marines into Los Angeles when residents of that city protested ICE activity. Department of Homeland Security Officials in May requested that the Department of Defense consider the deployment of 20,000 National Guard members for immigration enforcement, according to The New York Times. DHS has also enlisted other federal law enforcement agencies in its detention effort, such as the U.S. Marshals Service and the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Times reported.  

In July, the Republican-controlled U.S. Congress passed legislation to funnel billions of taxpayer dollars to ICE — tripling the agency’s budget and bringing it up to $28 billion. That money is going to hiring more personnel and increasing available detention space, both by building new facilities and contracting with county jails, among other uses. 

Still, Trump may seek to draw the military even further into immigration enforcement and into deployments to other American cities. Homeland security officials have asked the Department of Defense to find ways to better support their efforts, including “during the next instance of L.A.-type operations,” according to a separate leaked memo, which was reported on by The New Republic. 

For this new deployment involving the Wyoming National Guard, Trump is using a different legal justification than the one he used to order the California National Guard into Los Angeles. In that case, Trump federalized the guard troops. For this new deployment, state governors must approve the use of their National Guard members for the federal mission, according to the Brennan Center for Justice. The federal government will pay for the deployment, however.

Pearlman last week said the state was not pursuing federal funding that recently became available for state governments to build migrant detention centers. He reiterated Monday that the state was not pursuing an immigration detention center, though that wouldn’t preclude the federal government from seeking to build one or contracting a for-profit prison company for the job.  

Five Wyoming sheriffs have agreements with ICE to hold people arrested on local crimes if the agency wants to detain them because of their immigration status. ICE is also using jails in Natrona and Sweetwater counties to hold increasing numbers of immigrants from a privately run detention center in Aurora, Colorado. ICE officials have said they’re using the jails when the Aurora facility has capacity issues. 

CORRECTION: This story has been updated to indicate that unlawful presence in the country, on its own, is a civil offense, not a criminal one. -Ed.