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  • DHS has transitioned from a defensive posture, established in the wake of the September 11 attacks to protect the homeland from external threats, to an offensive domestic enforcement apparatus.

DHS has transitioned from a defensive posture, established in the wake of the September 11 attacks to protect the homeland from external threats, to an offensive domestic enforcement apparatus.

The domestic armamentarium is no longer just a set of tools; it is a fundamental reordering of the American state toward automated, high-powered internal containment.

Author

Pascal Hetzscholdt
February 28, 2026

The Domestic Armamentarium: An Analysis of DHS Paramilitarization and the Strategic Evolution of Internal Enforcement

by Gemini 3.0, Deep Research. Warning, LLMs may hallucinate!

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), through its primary enforcement components—U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP)—has undergone a transformative expansion that fundamentally alters its role in the American constitutional framework. As of 2026, the department has transitioned from a defensive posture, established in the wake of the September 11 attacks to protect the homeland from external threats, to an offensive domestic enforcement apparatus equipped with military-grade weaponry and pervasive surveillance capabilities.1 This evolution is fueled by an unprecedented influx of capital via the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” (OBBBA), which has bypassed traditional congressional oversight to provide the executive branch with a virtually autonomous paramilitary force.4 This report examines the technical specifications of recent acquisitions, the historical trajectory of agency growth, the ideological drivers behind current recruitment strategies, and the convergence of political and corporate interests that sustain this “immigration-industrial complex”.5

The Surge in Lethal and Less-Lethal Acquisitions

The first year of the second Trump administration has been marked by a staggering escalation in the procurement of weapons and tactical gear. According to an oversight report released by Senator Adam Schiff in early 2026, DHS committed more than $144 million to weapons, ammunition, and related accessories between January 20, 2025, and January 20, 2026.2 This surge represents a quadrupling of ICE’s weapons spending and a doubling of CBP’s procurement compared to the final year of the previous administration.2

Small Arms and High-Powered Lethal Weaponry

The shift toward a more militarized footprint is most evident in the types of small arms being distributed to federal agents. The procurement of thousands of AR-style rifles indicates that the agency is preparing for high-intensity confrontations within domestic environments. In September 2025, ICE finalized a $9.1 million contract with Geissele Automatics for “precision long guns and accessories” to support the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Bureau of Firearms and Tactical Programs.2 These rifles, characterized as “Border Patrol rifles,” are variants of the AR-15 platform designed for enhanced accuracy and reliability in varied operational theaters.1

Concurrently, CBP has bolstered its sidearm inventory through significant contracts with Glock Inc. In September 2025, the agency placed a $3.25 million order for 9mm service pistols, followed by an additional $644,544 order in early 2026.2 Beyond standard pistols, CBP has also invested in 9mm submachine guns, a category of weapon typically reserved for specialized military or counter-terror units, signaling a departure from traditional law enforcement equipment.7

The procurement of over $30 million in ammunition during the same period ensures that this expanded arsenal remains operational for years to come, effectively insulating the agency from potential future supply constraints.1

Less-Lethal Weapons and Crowd Control Technologies

The acquisition of “less-lethal” weaponry provides insight into the administration’s strategies for managing domestic unrest and protests. Contracts for Tasers, pepper spray, and tear gas canisters exceeded $25 million in 2025.1 These tools are frequently deployed in urban centers where ICE operations have sparked significant public backlash, such as Minneapolis and Los Angeles.3

Axon Enterprise, a major contractor, received approximately $11.81 million for the provision of Tasers and related tactical technology.1 The integration of these tools into standard patrol kits is paired with the acquisition of specialized canisters and launchers for chemical agents.8 Critics argue that the frequent “brandishing and use” of such weapons against peaceful observers and protesters heightens the risk of fatal encounters, a concern underscored by the shooting deaths of Alex Pretti and Renee Good in early 2026.3

Surveillance Infrastructure and Software Integration

The physical armament of DHS is matched by an increasingly sophisticated digital panopticon. The transition from targeted border security to population-wide surveillance is facilitated by deep integration with private software firms providing artificial intelligence (AI), facial recognition, and intrusive data-mining capabilities.12

Biometric Identification and Facial Recognition

The use of facial recognition technology (FRT) has expanded from a niche tool for identifying suspects to a baseline mechanism for identifying individuals in public spaces. ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) entered into a $9.2 million contract with Clearview AI in September 2025 for a database containing over 50 billion images scraped from open-source internet platforms.14 This contract is ICE’s largest ever for facial recognition technology.13

This technology is utilized through mobile applications like “Mobile Fortify,” which allows agents in the field to snap a photo of a person and instantly search over 200 million images across government databases, returning names, birthdates, and nationality.13 As of January 2026, DHS agents had utilized Mobile Fortify more than 100,000 times in the field.15 The lack of a comprehensive biometric privacy law allows these tools to be used without warrants or individualized suspicion, a phenomenon analysts call “mission creep”.13

Data Aggregation and ImmigrationOS

A central pillar of the modern enforcement strategy is the consolidation of data into actionable platforms. Palantir Technologies has developed “ImmigrationOS,” a platform that integrates ID scanning, device analytics, and social media monitoring to assist ICE in identifying and tracking individuals for deportation.10 In early 2025, ICE signed a $30 million deal with Palantir to enhance its mass surveillance of immigrants, including those who have overstayed visas.17

These systems facilitate “always-on” surveillance pipelines that are difficult to audit.14 Furthermore, DHS has updated its AI Use Case Inventory to consolidate functions into large vendor-platforms like those of Palantir, Clearview AI, and Paragon, a foreign spyware company whose software can reportedly gain full access to information on a mobile device without the owner’s knowledge.14

Autonomous Surveillance and Domain Awareness

The physical border is increasingly defined by “virtual” barriers. Anduril Industries, founded by Palmer Luckey, was awarded a $363 million contract by CBP in December 2025 for “Autonomous Surveillance Towers” (ASTs).19 These towers utilize the “Lattice” software platform to automatically detect, classify, and track threats in real-time.19 Unlike traditional cameras, these systems use AI to task and control other autonomous assets, such as drones and sensors, to create a persistent security mesh across the northern and southern borders.19

Historical Patterns of Growth and the Strategy of Metastasization

The current expansion of DHS must be viewed within the context of a two-decade-long trend of growth that has consistently outpaced the growth of the broader federal government. Since its creation in 2003, the federal government has spent an estimated $409 billion on the agencies responsible for immigration enforcement.6

Decades of Bipartisan Expansion

The trajectory of ICE and CBP has been a project shared across multiple administrations. The number of U.S. Border Patrol agents nearly doubled from 10,717 in 2003 to 19,357 in 2022.6 Similarly, the personnel at ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) nearly tripled during the same period.6

*Note: The 2025 ICE budget reflects the multi-year infusion from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA).4

Historical “benchmarks” for border security, such as those specified in the bipartisan 2006 Secure Fence Act and subsequent reform packages in 2007 and 2010, have been largely met and surpassed.6 By 2014, CBP had completed over 650 miles of border fencing.23 However, despite meeting these security targets, funding has continued to reach record highs, reaching $19.6 billion for CBP in FY 2024.6

The Enforcement-Adjudication Mismatch

A defining feature of this historical growth is the extreme imbalance between enforcement and legal adjudication. For every $24 spent on ICE and Border Patrol since 2003, only $1 has been allocated to the immigration court system.6 In FY 2024, Congress provided $3.43 billion to detention centers alone, compared to just $840 million for the entire immigration court system.6 This mismatch has fueled a backlog of 3.7 million cases—an increase of 2,000 percent since 2007—which in turn is used to justify the need for expanded detention capacity and expedited removal programs.6

The Legislative Engine: The One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA)

The OBBBA, signed into law on July 4, 2025, represents a fundamental shift in how immigration enforcement is funded. By utilizing the budget reconciliation process to bypass the Senate filibuster, the Republican-led Congress provided DHS with $170 billion in new budget authority.4

Fiscal Autonomy and Shutdown Immunity

The most significant aspect of the OBBBA is its move from discretionary appropriations to a “mandatory-style” budget authority that remains available through September 2029.4 This makes ICE and CBP effectively “shutdown-proof”.4 When much of the DHS budget expired in early 2026, the enforcement components remained operational because they possessed billions in separate funding that did not require annual congressional approval.4

This fiscal independence has allowed the agencies to accelerate a massive hiring spree. ICE’s personnel more than doubled in a single year, growing from 10,000 agents to over 22,000 as of early 2026.3 This rapid expansion has raised alarms about “staffing erosion” and the dilution of training standards, as the traditional 13-week training window was adjusted to just 47 days to meet force-generation targets.26

The Detention Reengineering Initiative

A massive portion of the OBBBA funding—approximately $45 billion—is earmarked for building new detention centers.6 This includes the “Detention Reengineering Initiative,” a $38 billion plan to increase ICE detention capacity by 92,600 beds through a series of giant warehouses around the country.25 These facilities are designed to hold 7,000 to 10,000 people each for periods averaging less than 60 days, transitioning the system toward a high-volume, industrialized deportation model.13

The Ideological Framework and Recruitment Strategy

The current expansion is accompanied by an ideological shift that explicitly aligns the agency with white nationalist and Christian nationalist movements. This is visible in the agency’s public messaging, recruitment tactics, and institutional culture.

Recruitment Imagery and Extremist Slogans

DHS social media campaigns in 2025 and 2026 have increasingly utilized imagery and language associated with the far-right. A Hatewatch review found that DHS recruitment ads feature white individuals almost exclusively, while social media posts celebrating arrests disproportionately feature Black and Brown people.29

One notable recruitment ad featured the caption “Which Way, American Man?”, a direct reference to the white nationalist text Which Way Western Man?.29 Another post featured a doctored illustration of Uncle Sam with the text “REPORT ALL FOREIGN INVADERS,” which reportedly originated from a white nationalist X account.29 Experts note that captions on some posts contain exactly 14 words—a symbolic number in white supremacist circles referring to the “14 Words” slogan by David Lane.27

The Influence of Project 2025

The Heritage Foundation’s “Project 2025” has provided the personnel and policy roadmap for this transformation. The project’s Mandate for Leadership calls for the consolidation of executive power and the replacement of civil service workers with “people loyal to the next conservative president”.33 Key architects of the project, such as Russell Vought (OMB) and John Ratcliffe, have been placed in high-level administration roles to lead the implementation of these policies.33

Project 2025 recommendations include ending birthright citizenship, targeting immigrant communities through mass raids, and dismantling the asylum system.33 By establishing a personnel database and “Presidential Administration Academy,” the project ensures that appointees are trained to “seize the gears of power effectively” and bypass the resistance of career federal employees.34

The Drivers: PACs, Tech Oligarchs, and the Industrial Complex

The sustaining force behind this domestic buildup is a coalition of political action committees and private industry leaders who profit from the expansion of the “immigration/industrial complex”.5

AIPAC and the Intersection of Defense and Border Security

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) has become a primary driver of the legislative frameworks that fund these technologies. In early 2025, AIPAC lobbied for the “United States-Israel Defense Partnership Act,” which authorizes $150 million annually for countering unmanned systems and $50 million for emerging technologies like AI and cybersecurity.36

These technologies are often “recycled” from the international battlefield to the domestic border. AIPAC dished out a record $126.9 million in campaign cash during the 2023-2024 cycle, largely supporting candidates who approved military aid packages and expanded surveillance budgets.38 This lobbying creates a feedback loop where military-grade tech is developed for foreign theaters and then sold to DHS for domestic enforcement.38

The Tech Oligarchy and Solutionist Solutions

A new generation of tech investors, including Peter Thiel, Palmer Luckey, and Elon Musk, has influenced the administration’s approach to border security. These “tech oligarchs” advocate for a world where private fantasies of “network states” and “pay-per-view police forces” become reality.41 Peter Thiel, a co-founder of Palantir, has been a central figure, with his company securing $30 million in ICE contracts as it expands its mass surveillance capacity.17

Similarly, Anduril Industries, led by Luckey, has become a multi-billion-dollar contractor for the Pentagon and DHS, providing the “Lattice” software that powers autonomous surveillance.20 These firms have ramped up their lobbying efforts, with Palantir spending over $1.6 million in a single quarter to maintain its influence over the DHS procurement process.43

International Intelligence Collaboration

The DHS surveillance dragnet is part of a broader international effort involving the “Five Eyes” and “Migration Five” (M5) nations.44 New border security agreements are being negotiated in 2026 that would provide the U.S. with large-scale access to the biometric databases of allies like New Zealand and the European Union.45

The “Enhanced Border Security Partnership” (EBSP) being negotiated with the EU would compel European countries to transfer “special categories” of personal data, including political opinions and trade union memberships, to U.S. border authorities.47 These international agreements allow DHS to “trawl” for data across global systems, ensuring that travelers can be vetted against a massive, interlinked database that extends far beyond U.S. territory.45

Operational Reality: The Paramilitary on American Streets

The theoretical expansion of DHS is made real through operations like “Metro Surge” and “Swamp Sweep,” which have militarized American cities and resulted in tragic civilian casualties.3

The Siege of Cities

In early 2026, Operation Metro Surge deployed 2,000 agents to the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, leading to roughly 3,000 arrests in the first month.3 Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey characterized the operation as an “ICE siege,” noting that federal agents had been used to silence dissent and intimidate the local population.50 Similar operations have occurred in Los Angeles, Charlotte, and New Orleans, with 2,000 National Guard troops deployed to Los Angeles without the authorization of the state’s governor.49

Use of Excessive Force and Fatal Shootings

The militarization of the agency has correlated with a sharp rise in reported excessive force. In the first two months of 2025, there was a 353 percent increase in reported use of force by ICE agents.10 This culture of aggression culminated in the January 2026 shootings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis.3 Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse, was fatally shot ten times by ICE agents while participating in a demonstration against federal enforcement.3

Documents obtained via FOIA requests indicate that ICE agents have routinely ignored de-escalation training.10 Instead, recruitment materials target individuals through “warrior” ideology, encouraging a mindset that holds violence as the most effective method to resolve problems.26 Agents are reportedly using facial recognition to identify legal observers and peaceful protesters, whom they then verbally threaten with being placed on “domestic terrorist watchlists”.15

Synthesis: The Strategy of Domestic Containment

The convergence of massive weapons acquisitions, pervasive surveillance software, and extremist ideological framing suggests a strategy that extends beyond traditional border security. The overall goal is a system of internal containment and the creation of a loyal paramilitary force capable of suppressing domestic dissent.

Is This About Keeping People Out or In?

The strategy is increasingly focused on the “internal” rather than the “external.” While the border wall receives significant funding ($37 billion from the OBBBA), the most innovative investments are in neighborhood surveillance and urban raids.3 Tools built for the border, like autonomous towers and facial recognition apps, are being flipped to scan entire populations.13

This suggests a strategy of population-wide monitoring, where the immigration system is a testing ground for broader domestic surveillance.13 The “ImmigrationOS” platform and the use of voter registration data by ICE agents indicate that the infrastructure can easily be used to identify and target political opposition.10

A Multi-Purpose Army for the Administration

ICE has evolved into a “private army accountable only to President Trump,” willing to use force against American citizens and ignore the constraints of local and state governments.3 By lowering hiring standards and recruiting from white nationalist circles, the administration has created a force that identifies culturally with the military rather than civilian law enforcement.26

This paramilitary force is “shutdown-proof” and fiscally autonomous, meaning it can continue to operate and expand regardless of congressional approval or changes in the political climate.4 The explicit linkage between enforcement operations and political strategy—such as the discipline of sanctuary jurisdictions and the monitoring of protest networks—reveals a force designed for domestic political signaling and institutional pressure.3

The Role of Corporate and PAC Interests

The strategy is sustained by a bipartisan “immigration/industrial complex” where profit motives and political ideology align. AIPAC and tech investors provide the capital and technology, while the OBBBA provides the legal and fiscal authority. This coalition ensures that the expansion of the security state remains a permanent fixture of the American government.5

The transformation of DHS from an entity meant to protect the homeland to one meant to police American society represents the “metastasization” of the national security bureaucracy.1 The result is an environment where technology normalizes suspicion, automates targeting, and erodes constitutional protections for citizens and non-citizens alike.13 The domestic armamentarium is no longer just a set of tools; it is a fundamental reordering of the American state toward automated, high-powered internal containment.

Works cited

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