Saturday, November 22, 2025

Corrections Officers Are Leaving in Droves for ICE

After years of struggling to find enough workers for some of the nation's toughest lockups, the Federal Bureau of Prisons is facing a new challenge: Corrections officers are jumping ship for more lucrative jobs at Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Posted by lamplighter at 09:30 PM | 9 COMMENTS | permalink

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NEW: The exodus of corrections officers from federal prisons to ICE comes amid shortages of critical supplies, from food to personal hygiene items, for both staff and inmates. It threatens to make the already grim conditions in these prisons even worse.

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-- ProPublica (@propublica.org) Nov 21, 2025 at 8:00 AM

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More from the article ...

... This is one of the unintended consequences of the Trump administration's focus on mass deportations. For months, ICE has been on a recruiting blitz, offering $50,000 starting bonuses and tuition reimbursement at an agency that has long offered better pay than the federal prison system. For many corrections officers, it's been an easy sell.

Workers at detention centers and maximum-security prisons from Florida to Minnesota to California counted off the number of co-workers who'd left for ICE or were in the process of doing so. Six at one lockup in Texas, eight at another. More than a dozen at one California facility, and over four dozen at a larger one. After retirements and other attrition, by the start of November the agency had lost at least 1,400 more staff this year than it had hired, according to internal prison data shared with ProPublica.

"We're broken and we're being poached by ICE," one official with the prison workers union told ProPublica. "It's unbelievable. People are leaving in droves." ...


#1 | Posted by LampLighter at 2025-11-22 12:50 AM

I guess my first observation about this trend might be along the lines of ...

OK, so now, the correction officers who worked in prisons, who seemed to be willing to work for low wages so that they could control inmates, are now being recruited by ICE to control citizens?

#2 | Posted by LampLighter at 2025-11-22 12:54 AM

Another good question, who is going to replace them? Or is the plan just to kill all the prisoners?

#3 | Posted by REDIAL at 2025-11-22 01:02 AM

@#3 ... Another good question, who is going to replace them? ...

Well, with conditions like this (from the article) ...

... And at some facilities, staff said the agency had even stopped providing basic hygiene items for officers, such as paper towels, soap and toilet paper.

"I have never seen it like this in all my 25 years," an officer in Texas told ProPublica. "You have to literally go around carrying your own roll of toilet paper. ...


OK, now it seems to be more understandable why Ms Maxwell apparently has asked for, and was granted, an unlimited supply of toilet paper in her quid pro quo.

A puppy and unlimited toilet paper? Legal experts say Ghislaine Maxwell's alleged prison life is uncommon
www.theguardian.com

#4 | Posted by LampLighter at 2025-11-22 01:10 AM

Great pay, poor adult supervision, anonymity, encouraged to ramp up violence through obnoxiousness and bullying ...

Only the best, especially the anonymity part (whoohol!), just the very best.
en.wikipedia.org

#5 | Posted by Doc_Sarvis at 2025-11-22 06:34 AM

These people are leaving a difficult job for a shameful job.

But, as the world learned generations ago, even ordinary people can be made into Nazis by a simple paycheck.

#6 | Posted by Zed at 2025-11-22 08:52 AM

Is it a surprise that the bottom of the law enforcement barrel would leave for a job where they have next to no risk while having near limitless power and immunity?

#7 | Posted by jpw at 2025-11-22 10:24 AM

A marriage made in hell.

#8 | Posted by fresno500 at 2025-11-23 11:11 AM

@#6 ... These people are leaving a difficult job for a shameful job. ...

I do not disagree.

Why might I agree to "shameful?"

Simple...

The masks and lack of identification.

For starters. ...


#9 | Posted by LampLighter at 2025-11-23 09:07 PM

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