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    ‘Deterrence is boring’: the US troops at sharp end of Trump’s border crackdown

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    Inside an armored vehicle, an army scout uses a joystick to direct a long-range optical scope toward a man perched atop the US-Mexico border wall cutting across the hills of this Arizona frontier community.The man lowers himself toward US soil between coils of concertina wire. Shouts ring out, an alert is sounded and a US Customs and Border Protection SUV races toward the wall – warning enough to send the man scrambling back over it, disappearing into Mexico.The sighting on Tuesday was one of only two for the army infantry unit patrolling this sector of the southern border, where an emergency declaration by Donald Trump has thrust the military into a central role in deterring migrant crossings at US ports of entry.“Deterrence is actually boring,” said 24-year-old Sgt Ana Harker-Molina, giving voice to the tedium felt by some fellow soldiers over the sporadic sightings. Still, she said she takes pride in the work, knowing that troops discourage crossings by their mere presence.“Just if we’re sitting here watching the border, it’s helping our country,” said Harker-Molina, an immigrant herself who came from Panama at age 12 and became a US citizen two years ago while serving in the army.View image in fullscreenUS troop deployments at the border have tripled to 7,600 and include every branch of the military – even as the number of attempted illegal crossings has plummeted and Trump has authorized funding for an additional 3,000 border patrol agents, offering $10,000 signing and retention bonuses.The military mission is guided from a new command center at a remote army intelligence training base alongside southern Arizona’s Huachuca mountains. There, a community hall has been transformed into a bustling war room of battalion commanders and staff with digital maps pinpointing military camps and movements along the nearly 2,000-mile border.Until now, border enforcement had been the domain of civilian law enforcement, with the military only intermittently stepping in. But in April, large swaths of the border were designated militarized zones, empowering US troops to apprehend immigrants and others accused of trespassing on army, air force or navy bases, and authorizing additional criminal charges that can mean prison time.The two-star general leading the mission says troops are being untethered from maintenance and warehouse tasks to work closely with border patrol agents in high-traffic areas for illegal crossings – and to deploy rapidly to remote, unguarded terrain.View image in fullscreen“We don’t have a [labor] union, there’s no limit on how many hours we can work in a day, how many shifts we can man,” said Maj Gen Scott Naumann of the army. “I can put soldiers out whenever we need to in order to get after the problem and we can put them out for days at a time; we can fly people into incredibly remote areas now that we see the cartels shifting” course.At Nogales, army scouts patrolled the border in full battle gear – helmet, M5 service rifle, bullet-resistant vest – with the right to use deadly force if attacked under standing military rules integrated into the border mission. Underfoot, smugglers for decades routinely attempted to tunnel into stormwater drains to ferry contraband into the US.Naumann’s command post oversees an armada of 117 armored Stryker vehicles, more than 35 helicopters, and a half-dozen long-distance drones that can survey the border day and night with sensors to pinpoint people wandering the desert. Marine Corps engineers are adding concertina wire to slow crossings, as the Trump administration reboots border wall construction.Naumann said the focus is on stopping “got-aways” who evade authorities to disappear into the US in a race against the clock that can last seconds in urban areas as people vanish into smuggling vehicles, or several days in the dense wetland thickets of the Rio Grande or the vast desert and mountainous wilderness of Arizona.Meanwhile, the rate of apprehensions at the border has fallen to a 60-year low.View image in fullscreenNaumann says the falloff in illegal entries is the “elephant in the room” as the military increases pressure and resources aimed at starving smuggling cartels – including Latin American gangs recently designated as foreign terrorist organizations.He says it would be wrong to let up, though, and that crossings may rebound with the end of scorching summer weather.“We’ve got to keep going after it; we’re having some successes, we are trending positively,” he said of the mission with no fixed end date.The Trump administration is using the military broadly to boost its immigration operations.“It’s all part of the same strategy that is a very muscular, robust, intimidating, aggressive response to this – to show his base that he was serious about a campaign promise to fix immigration,” said Dan Maurer, a law professor at Ohio Northern University and a retired army judge advocate officer. “It’s both norm-breaking and unusual. It puts the military in a very awkward position.”View image in fullscreenThe militarized zones at the border sidestep the Posse Comitatus Act, an 1878 law that prohibits the military from conducting civilian law enforcement on US soil.“It’s in that gray area. It may be a violation – it may not be. The military’s always had the authority to arrest people and detain them on military bases,” said Joshua Kastenberg, a professor at the University of New Mexico School of Law and a former air force judge.Michael Fisher, a security consultant and former chief of the border patrol from 2010 to 2016, calls the military expansion at the border a “force multiplier” as border patrol agents increasingly turn up far from the border.“The military allows border patrol to be able to flex into other areas where they typically would not be able to do so,” he said.At daybreak on Wednesday in Arizona, Spc Luisangel Nito scanned a valley with an infrared scope that highlights body heat, spotting three people as they crossed illegally into the US, in preparation for the border patrol to apprehend them. Nito’s unit also has equipment that can ground small drones used by smugglers to plot entry routes.View image in fullscreenNito is the US-born son of Mexican immigrants who entered the country in the 1990s through the same valleys he now patrols.“They crossed right here,” he said. “They told me to just be careful because back when they crossed they said it was dangerous.”Nito’s parents returned to Mexico in 2008 amid the financial crisis, but the soldier saw brighter opportunities in the US, returned and enlisted. He expressed no reservations about his role in detaining undocumented immigrants.“Obviously it’s a job, right, and then I signed up for it and I’m going to do it,” he said. More

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      Native American universities and colleges brace for crippling Trump cuts

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      While colleges and universities slow down during summer break, Ahniwake Rose is busy wondering what the fall semester will hold for the nation’s 37 tribal colleges and universities (TCUs) – and if they will be able to stay open much longer.As the president and CEO of the Indigenous non-profit American Indian Higher Education Consortium (AIHEC), Rose (Cherokee and Muscogee Creek) braces as the schools she represents face a potential nearly 90% reduction in funding starting in October. President Donald Trump’s fiscal year 2026 budget includes a proposal to slash operations funding from $183.3m to $22.1m for Bureau of Indian Education post-secondary programs – career and technical schools, community colleges, four-year colleges and universities. On 15 July, a House appropriations subcommittee approved legislation that allotted $1.5bn to the Bureau of Indian Education, though it did not specify how much would go toward post-secondary programs. Congress still needs to finish approving the budget for the Bureau of Indian Education, a subdivision of the Department of Interior.If approved, such cuts will further endanger a system that’s already undernourished. Congress currently underfunds the nation’s 37 tribal colleges and universities by $250m a year, according to a 2024 ProPublica report.TCUs are heavily reliant on federal funding, which accounts for about 75% of their revenue. Those monies cannot be replaced with endowments or alumni donations as other higher education institutions do due to low wealth in Indigenous communities, said Rose. “There is really no other option, if not to close,” she said, “than to severely reduce the way that our institutions are able to provide services to our students.” Rose added that “there is not one TCU that would be able to walk away unscathed”.While they are on summer recess, faculty and students have expressed concerns about their academic future as they fear that their schools will close next year.“The impact that this is having on the morale of our community and our students has been deeply troubling,” Rose said. Some students are reconsidering whether they will begin school or continue their coursework next year. “Would the staff want to sign a contract for an institution that might not be able to pay them next year or in a few months?”In anticipation of potential budget cuts, some schools have adjusted by canceling internships, fellowships and workforce study, said Rose. AIHEC is working with institutions to guarantee that the cancellations don’t affect students’ abilities to meet degree requirements and graduate. For students who relied on fellowships to support their education, the non-profit is partnering with the American Indian College Fund so that they can complete their education on time.When Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) student Breana Brave Heart (Oglala Lakota Sioux and Northern Cheyenne) learned that the Trump administration was seeking to eliminate her school’s funding, she saw it as a betrayal. “It felt like a direct attack on us as Native students – on our dreams, our cultures and our treaty rights,” Brave Heart said in a statement to the Guardian. “IAIA isn’t just a college; it’s a promise our ancestors secured for us through sacrifice and agreements with the US government.”Rose said that Brave Heart’s school was most vulnerable to a potential closure, since Trump’s 2026 discretionary budget request includes a plan to specifically eliminate funding for the school – without explanation. The four-year fine arts school that focuses on Alaska Native and Native American arts receives $13.5m in annual appropriations. That amount would be reduced to zero if the budget is approved by Congress.“If they were to defund us,” the IAIA president, Robert Martin, (Cherokee) said, “then what would happen to those 850 students? Where would they go at this point?” Native Americans make up 80% of the student population, with 92 federally recognized tribes represented at the school.View image in fullscreenFounded in 1962, IAIA has had an indelible influence on Indigenous arts, Martin said. Some of the most well-known alumni include the former US poet laureate Joy Harjo (Muscogee/Creek) and author Tommy Orange (Cheyenne and Arapaho of Oklahoma), a finalist for the Pulitzer prize for fiction.“With the pandemic and historical trauma to begin with, there’s always been mental health issues [for students], and this adds a little bit more stress to being a college student,” Martin said. “In terms of faculty and staff, they are stressed about their employment outlook in the future, and what that’s going to bring.”In the meantime, Martin is telling staff and students to expect to return to campus in the fall. School leadership has held town hall meetings for faculty and staff to allay their concerns, and they are preparing to increase their fundraising efforts.An obligation to educateMartin and Christopher Caldwell (Menominee), president at College of Menominee Nation in Wisconsin, hope that whenever a new budget passes, it will uphold the federal government’s promise to fund Indigenous education. The 1978 Tribally Controlled Colleges and Universities Assistance Act and about 150 treaties guaranteed federal funding to higher education, at a base amount of $8,000 per student adjusted for inflation.Since June, school leaders and their allies have lobbied congressional members to continue supporting TCUs so they remain open in the upcoming academic year. Continued funding of the schools, which provides economic vitality to the entire community also allows tribes to govern themselves, said Rose.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionView image in fullscreen“Our tribal colleges are a deep expression of self-determination and sovereignty. These education systems were created to support and build tribal leadership, to create education systems in which Native students can thrive and can build our economies,” Rose said. “Not only are the proposed cuts a direct attack against the trust and treaty responsibility that the federal government has to postsecondary institutions, it inhibits tribes’ ability to direct self-determination in our own education systems.” She added that her organization and the institutions were connecting with the current administration to underscore just how critical Department of Interior funding is to tribal colleges.The Institute of American Indian Arts has been in contact with New Mexico’s congressional delegation and members of the appropriations committee to ensure that they understand the significance of funding for TCUs. “We’ve had bipartisan support for our programs, and it’s all part of the trust responsibility of the federal government,” Martin said. “Our ancestors ceded millions of acres of land to the federal government in return for certain promises, and one of those was education.”Martin continued: “What we’re hearing from our donors and supporters is: ‘How can we help? And what can we do?’ We’re telling them to reach out to the congressional delegation immediately. But we also have to emphasize that we may have to experience some reduction in our funding, so we’re going to have to make that up in some way to continue to offer the quality of programs and really focus on student success.”Students are also part of the campaign to preserve tribal education. Brave Heart, the IAIA student, is working with her peers to reach out to Congress. “We deserve more than to see our futures reduced to a line item crossed out in a budget. We need our elected leaders to honor their commitments to Indigenous students and uphold these sacred obligations.”View image in fullscreenThe potential closures of schools will greatly affect tribal economies, particularly since TCUs are sometimes the largest employers in their locales, said Rose. The non-profit plans to release an analysis that looks at the overall economic impact of TCUs on the surrounding communities around the nation.Along with writing letters to congressional members, AIHEC is also helping the schools review their budgets and identify ways that they can cut costs. But for some institutions, the decreases are so steep it’s hard to plan.Caldwell, the College of Menominee Nation president, said that the school’s federal funding would be reduced from $1.5m to $181,000 if Congress passes the proposed budget.“How do you budget for the coming years when you see that kind of uncertainty?” Caldwell said. “We’re constantly weighing how much of these costs we are able to cover if the government suddenly stops paying their side of what they agreed to.”The school is refiguring their strategic plan for the upcoming academic year and examining whether their academic offerings align with workforce trends.In light of the financial hits that TCUs have faced since Trump entered office in January, including staff reductions at the Bureau of Indian Education, Caldwell said that the College of Menominee Nation had seen an increase in anonymous donations. “It demonstrated that there are people who support the work that we do in tribal nations and surrounding communities.” More

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      Judge dismisses trespassing charges against immigrants crossing US-Mexico border

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      A federal judge in New Mexico on Thursday dismissed trespassing charges against dozens of immigrants caught in a new military zone on the US-Mexico border, marking a setback for Trump administration efforts to raise penalties for unlawful crossings into the US.Chief US magistrate judge Gregory Wormuth began filing the dismissals late on Wednesday, ruling that immigrants did not know they were entering the military zone in New Mexico and therefore could not be charged, according to court documents and a defense attorney.Assistant federal public defender Amanda Skinner said Wormuth dismissed trespassing charges against all immigrants who made initial court appearances on Thursday. The immigrants still face charges accusing them of crossing the border illegally.“Judge Wormuth found no probable cause,” Skinner said in an email.New Mexico US attorney Ryan Ellison, who filed the first trespassing charges against migrants on 28 April, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.The so-called New Mexico national defense area was established in April along 180 miles (290km) of the border, and US army troops were authorized to detain immigrants entering the area from Mexico.A second buffer zone was set up in Texas this month. Defense secretary Pete Hegseth said in a social media post the military would continue to expand the zones to gain “100% operational control” of the border.US attorneys charged over 100 immigrants with crossing the border illegally and trespassing in the military zones in New Mexico and Texas. Potential combined penalties were up to 10 years imprisonment, according to Hegseth.But Wormuth pushed back against the charges for the immigrants in New Mexico, ordering Ellison on 1 May to show proof they were aware they entered the military zone unlawfully.Defense attorneys argued warning signs in the area were inadequate to inform immigrants they were committing a crime, a position Wormuth agreed with.“The criminal complaint fails to establish probable cause to believe the defendant knew he/she was entering” the military zone, Wormuth wrote in his orders dismissing charges.The Department of Defense did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for comment. More

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      12 States Sue Trump Over His Tariffs

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      A dozen states, most of them led by Democrats, sued President Trump over his tariffs on Wednesday, arguing that he has no power to “arbitrarily impose tariffs as he has done here.”Contending that only Congress has the power to legislate tariffs, the states are asking the court to block the Trump administration from enforcing what they said were unlawful tariffs.“These edicts reflect a national trade policy that now hinges on the president’s whims rather than the sound exercise of his lawful authority,” said the lawsuit, filed by the states’ attorneys general in the U.S. Court of International Trade.The states, including New York, Illinois and Oregon, are the latest parties to take the Trump administration to court over the tariffs. Their case comes after California filed its own lawsuit last week, in which Gov. Gavin Newsom and the state attorney general accused the administration of escalating a trade war that has caused “immediate and irreparable harm” to that state’s economy.Officials and businesses from Oregon, the lead plaintiff in the suit filed Wednesday, have also expressed concerns about the vulnerability of the state’s trade-dependent economy, as well as its sportswear industry, as a result of the tariffs.“When a president pushes an unlawful policy that drives up prices at the grocery store and spikes utility bills, we don’t have the luxury of standing by,” said Dan Rayfield, Oregon’s attorney general, in a statement. “These tariffs hit every corner of our lives — from the checkout line to the doctor’s office — and we have a responsibility to push back.”Asked about the latest lawsuit, Kush Desai, a White House spokesman, called it a “witch hunt” by Democrats against Mr. Trump. “The Trump administration remains committed to using its full legal authority to confront the distinct national emergencies our country is currently facing,” he said, “both the scourge of illegal migration and fentanyl flows across our border and the exploding annual U.S. goods trade deficit.”The other states in the suit are Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico and Vermont. All of the states have Democratic attorneys general, though Nevada and Vermont have Republican governors.Mr. Trump’s tariffs have shocked and upended the global trade industry. He set a 145 percent tariff on goods from China, 25 percent on Canada, and 10 percent on almost all imports from most other countries.The moves have drawn legal challenges from other entities as well, including two members of the Blackfeet Nation, who filed a federal lawsuit in Montana over the tariffs on Canada, saying they violated tribal treaty rights. Legal groups like the Liberty Justice Center and the New Civil Liberties Alliance have also sued. “I’m happy that Oregon and the other states are joining us in this fight,” said Ilya Somin, a law professor at George Mason University, who is working on the Liberty Justice Center’s lawsuit. More

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      US citizen wrongfully arrested by border patrol in Arizona held for nearly 10 days

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      Immigration officials detained a US citizen for nearly 10 days in Arizona, according to court records and press reports.As the NPR affiliate Arizona Public Media, first reported, 19-year-old Jose Hermosillo, a New Mexico resident visiting Arizona, was detained by border patrol agents in Nogales, a city along the Mexico border about an hour south of Tucson.According to a border patrol criminal complaint, on 8 April, a border patrol official found Hermosillo “without the proper immigration documents” and claimed that the young American had admitted entering the US illegally from Mexico. Two days later, the federal court document notes that Hermosillo continued to claim he was a US citizen. On 17 April, a federal judge dismissed his case.Hermosillo’s wrongful arrest and prolonged detention comes amid escalating attacks by the Trump administration on immigrants in the US. Since Donald Trump took office, the administration has emboldened immigration officers to arrest and deport undocumented people, including foreign students whose visas have been revoked, leading to a series of errors.“Under the Trump administration’s theory of the law, the government could have banished this U.S. citizen to a Salvadoran prison then refused to do anything to bring him back,” Mark Joseph Stern, a legal analyst for Slate, wrote on Bluesky. “This is why the Constitution guarantees due process to all. Could it be more obvious?”During his campaign for the presidency, the US president promised to carry out “mass deportations”. In the three months since he took office, several foreign tourists have been wrongfully detained, federal agents from other agencies have been deputized to engage in immigration enforcement and Trump has invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, declaring that Venezuelan gang members are a leading foreign invasion of the United States to give himself the power to expel immigrants to a notorious Salvadorian prison.According to AZPM’s report, Hermosillo was visiting the Tucson area from Albuquerque, got lost without identification and was arrested by border patrol officials near its headquarters in Nogales. Hermosillo’s girlfriend’s family made numerous calls looking for him before they discovered he was being held at the Florence Correctional Center, a privately run Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) facility. After his arrest, the court docket shows, he was temporarily detained in the custody of the US marshals.After the family tracked him done, they provided officials with his birth certificate and social security card.“He did say he was a US citizen, but they didn’t believe him,” Hermosillo’s girlfriend’s aunt told AZPM. “I think they would have kept him. I think they would have, if they would have not got that information yesterday in the court, and gave that to Ice and the border patrol. He probably would have been deported already to Mexico.”Ice, Customs and Border Protection, the Department of Homeland Security and Hermosillo’s attorney did not respond to requests for comment.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionFederal magistrate judge Maria S Aguilera dismissed the case on 17 April. Hermosillo was released later that evening.Since Trump stepped into office, there have been a rising number of US citizens detained by immigration officials around the country. But immigration officials’ detention of citizens is not new, and it has taken place across presidential administrations. In 2021, the Government Accountability Office found that from 2015 through 2020, Ice arrested 674 US citizens and deported 70 of them. And from 2007 through 2015, 818 US citizens were held in immigration detention, according to a 2016 analysis from NPR.In recent months, the Trump administration has revoked the visas of hundreds of foreign students, many for taking part in Gaza solidarity protests the administration call antisemitic . Among those swept up in that crackdown is Aditya Wahyu Harsono, an Indonesian student in Minnesota, who is married to a US citizen, arrested at his hospital workplace this month after his visa was secretly revoked. More

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      Suspect Arrested in Arson Attacks on New Mexico G.O.P. Office and a Tesla Dealer

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      Jamison Wagner, 40, of Albuquerque, faces up to 40 years in prison if convicted, the authorities said.An Albuquerque man was arrested on Monday in connection with the fire bombings of the Republican Party of New Mexico’s headquarters in March and a Tesla dealership in February, attacks that the federal authorities have designated as “domestic terrorism.”The suspect, Jamison Wagner, 40, had parked his white Hyundai sedan at both locations before the arson attacks and then drove away, according to security and traffic camera images released by the Justice Department.Federal prosecutors said that surveillance footage from the Tesla showroom near Albuquerque on Feb. 9 showed him carrying a box of supplies that he used to spray-paint graffiti on the building and several vehicles. Investigators said that he had scrawled the phrases “Die Elon,” “Tesla Nazi Inc” and “Die Tesla Nazi,” references to the company’s billionaire founder, Elon Musk, who is leading the Trump administration’s cost-cutting program. Mr. Wagner was then observed breaking some car windows and throwing an incendiary device inside one of them, destroying it, a criminal complaint said.Several weeks after that arson attack, the authorities said, Mr. Wagner struck again, torching the lobby of the Republican Party of New Mexico’s headquarters during the early morning hours of March 30.Damage from a fire at the Republican Party of New Mexico’s headquarters in Albuquerque in March.New Mexico G.O.P.Investigators say that he left behind critical evidence each time, connecting him to both crimes: lids from a jar of Smucker’s jelly and a container of olives that they said he had filled with gasoline. Both lids had the letter “H” or “I” written on them with what appeared to be a marker, photographs showed.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump Directive Calls to Turn Border Land Into ‘Military Installation’

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      President Trump announced a plan on Friday to turn a narrow strip along the Mexican border in California, Arizona and New Mexico into a military installation as part of his effort to curtail illegal crossings.The plan, set out in a White House memorandum, calls for transferring authority over the 60-foot-wide strip of federal border land known as the Roosevelt Reservation from other cabinet agencies to the Defense Department. Military forces patrolling that area could then temporarily detain migrants passing through for trespassing on a military reservation, said a U.S. military official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss operational matters.The directive expands a military presence that has increased steadily along the southern border, even as crossings have already dropped precipitously during the Trump administration. The ordering of troops to the border has already put the military in politically charged territory, and, depending on the details of the effort, the plan could run afoul of laws that limit the use of regular federal troops for domestic law enforcement.The directive says that the border strip will become a “military installation under the jurisdiction of” the Pentagon. Military members would be able to stop anyone crossing into the “military installation” but would not have the power to make immigration arrests, according to the military official. Border Patrol agents could then be summoned to arrest the migrants.The memorandum formalizes a plan that the administration had been considering for weeks. The Washington Post had reported on the plan earlier.A White House spokesman did not respond to questions seeking clarity as to what U.S. forces operating in the strip of border land would be able to do. A Defense Department spokesman also did not respond to questions seeking clarity.Military officials are still working out how to execute the plan, including how long troops could detain migrants before turning them over to Border Patrol agents, and what type of “no trespassing” signs needed to be installed along the border, warning migrants they were about to enter a U.S. military reservation.Then there are other logistics that would have to be hammered out, such as the languages the signs are written in, and how far apart they are posted. There is also the question of where to position military patrols along hundreds of miles of rugged land along the border, and what additional training those troops might need.Adam Isacson, who focuses on border security and human rights at the Washington Office on Latin America, said the memorandum appeared to create a path for using quasi-military personnel to detain migrants.A section of the memorandum calls for the authorization of state National Guard members to work on the military-controlled strip. If those working at the installation hold migrants until Customs and Border Protection officials pick them up, their use “comes very close to military personnel detaining migrants,” Mr. Isacson said.Zolan Kanno-Youngs More

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      Fire at New Mexico Republican Party Headquarters Being Investigated as Arson

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      The headquarters of the Republican Party of New Mexico in Albuquerque was damaged early Sunday morning in what the party described as a “deliberate act of arson.”Albuquerque Fire Rescue confirmed that it had been dispatched to the party’s headquarters just before 6 a.m. for a report of a structure fire, which was brought under control within five minutes. No injuries to civilians or firefighters were reported.The fire burned the entryway of the headquarters and left smoke damage throughout the building, Lt. Jason Fejer, a spokesman for the fire department, said on Sunday.He confirmed that the department, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and Explosives were investigating the fire as an act of arson.A spokeswoman for the F.B.I. confirmed that it was investigating but said she could not provide further details because the investigation was ongoing. The A.T.F. did not immediately respond to requests for information on Sunday.The Albuquerque Police Department confirmed that the federal authorities were investigating but did not provide any further information, including whether arrests had been made.In a statement, the Republican Party of New Mexico said the fire was “not an isolated incident” and was accompanied by the spray-painted letters “ICE=KKK.”In recent months, ICE, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, has deployed agents across the country to carry out what the Trump administration has characterized as a new and more aggressive effort to target illegal immigration and deliver on a key campaign pledge to carry out mass deportations.The Democratic Party of New Mexico said on Sunday that it condemned “any vandalism at the Republican Party of New Mexico headquarters as strongly as possible.”The Republican Party of New Mexico said the fire was accompanied by the spray-painted letters “ICE=KKK.”Republican Party of New Mexico“We firmly maintain that this sort of act has absolutely no place in our democracy, and that peaceful discourse and organization are the only ways to approach political differences in our country,” the state Democratic Party added. “We hope whoever is responsible is found and held accountable.”Amy Barela, the chairwoman of the Republican Party of New Mexico, said on Sunday that the alarm system at the party’s headquarters had gone off around 1 a.m., about four hours before the fire started.There had been a separate bomb threat and other acts of vandalism at the headquarters in recent years, she said.A former Republican candidate for the New Mexico House of Representatives this month was found guilty of hiring people to shoot at the homes of Democratic officials in Albuquerque in 2022 and 2023.“We completely condemn violence,” Ms. Barela said. “It doesn’t matter where it’s coming from.”The party was “deeply relieved that no one was harmed in what could have been a tragic and deadly attack,” she said. More

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      Trump administration plans for militarized border in New Mexico – report

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      The Trump administration is working on a plan to create what conservatives have long demanded: a militarized buffer zone along the southern border in New Mexico that would be occupied by active-duty US troops, empowered to detain migrants who cross into the United States unlawfully, the Washington Post reports.According to the Post, recent internal discussions have centered on deploying troops to a section of the border in New Mexico that would be turned into a kind of military installation, which would give the soldiers a legal right to detain migrants who “trespass” on the elongated base. Unauthorized migrants would then be held until they can be turned over to immigration officers.The planning appears to focus on creating a vast military installation as a way around the Posse Comitatus Act, a federal law that bars soldiers from participating in most civilian law enforcement missions.Calls to militarize the southern border are not new, but so far they have existed more in the realm of political rhetoric than reality.In 2022, Blake Masters, an Arizona Senate candidate enthusiastically backed by Peter Thiel, the same tech billionaire who bankrolled JD Vance’s campaign that year, ran a campaign ad promising to do just that.In 2018, Trump abruptly announced during a White House meeting with then defense secretary Jim Mattis: “We are going to be guarding our border with our military. That’s a big step.”Although the US president’s announcement sparked a flurry of reports, in the Washington Post and elsewhere, that he was serious about the proposal, it was never enacted at scale.Seven months later, as Trump focused on the supposed threat of a migrant “caravan” on the eve of the 2018 midterm elections, Mattis defended the limited presence of troops at the southern border by saying: “We don’t do stunts in this department”.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionMattis’s successor, Mark Esper, revealed in his memoir that Trump had apparently asked him to violate the Posse Comitatus Act in 2020. According to Esper, Trump asked him, a week after the murder of George Floyd, to deploy 10,000 active-duty troops to the streets of the nation’s capital and have them open fire on protesters. “Can’t you just shoot them?” Trump asked, in an Oval Office meeting. “Just shoot them in the legs or something?” Esper declined to do so.One big difference between 2018, 2020 and 2025, however, is that Trump will not have to convince a sober, former general like Mattis or a West Point graduate like Esper to carry out his plan to divert military resources to domestic law enforcement, since his current defense secretary is a former weekend TV host who is far less likely to object. More