“ICE is Lying to Congress and the American People”
Ryan Schwank — an ICE academy instructor for new recruits resigned earlier this month. On Monday, he testified before a Congressional forum that the agency is “lying to Congress and the American people” about its training of new recruits. He stated the agency’s training program “is now deficient, defective, and broken..”
“Without reform, ICE will graduate thousands of new officers who do not know their constitutional duty, do not know the limits of their authority, and do not have the training to recognize an unlawful order,” he said.
ICE whistleblower Ryan Schwank, a former ICE instructor and attorney, testifies that agents were trained to disregard constitutional rights.
— Molly Ploofkins (@mollyploofkins.bsky.social) February 23, 2026 at 2:22 PM
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Former ICE lawyer Ryan Schwank: “I received secretive orders to teach new cadets to violate the Constitution.”
— The Bulwark (@thebulwark.com) February 23, 2026 at 3:12 PM
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Schwank’s testimony at the forum, co-hosted by Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., and Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Calif., comes on the heels of mounting public criticism of ICE as its officers have aggressively worked to carry out President Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda. An ICE officer killed Renee Good, a 37-year-old U.S. citizen, in Minneapolis last month, using tactics that law enforcement experts broadly criticized. (Agents from the Border Patrol, a separate agency, killed Alex Pretti, also a 37-year-old U.S. citizen, in Minneapolis shortly after.)
New documents provided by Blumenthal’s office by an unidentified whistleblower provide more insight into how, exactly, the training protocol has changed. (Blumenthal’s staff could not confirm whether it was Schwank or another anonymous whistleblower who reached out to their office last month that provided the images of the syllabus.)