One Big Beautiful Bill ICE Funding
🔴 Abuse of Power ·
Jul 4, 2025
Summary
Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act allocated $75 billion to ICE as a lump sum available through September 2029, a 185% increase over prior ICE budgets. Combined with the FY2026 base budget, ICE’s total available funds exceeded $77 billion, surpassing the U.S. Marine Corps (proposed at $57.26 billion). ICE, unlike the Marines, operates under direct presidential executive control with few independent oversight mechanisms. The Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 generally bars the regular armed forces, and National Guard troops once federalized, from civilian law enforcement such as arrests, searches, and patrols on U.S. soil, while ICE, as a civilian agency, is not subject to that limit. The administration surged thousands of ICE and Customs and Border Protection agents into cities where agents used masks, unmarked vehicles, and military-style tactics in neighborhoods, near schools, and outside courthouses. The funding therefore expanded a civilian force the president can direct into American cities to perform the very policing the armed forces are legally forbidden to carry out.
Key Figures
Institutions Involved
ICE, U.S. House of Representatives, U.S. Senate
Sources
- Unpacking claims Trump admin budgeted more money for ICE than US Marine Corps
- What’s in the Big Beautiful Bill Immigration and Border Security Unpacked
- In July 4 ceremony - Trump signs tax and spending bill into law