Represented by WhistleblowerAid.org — former ICE lawyer and instructor alarmed that more people may die as poorly prepared agents are rushed through training to meet mass deportation quotas
WASHINGTON, DC, Feb. 23, 2026—A U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) lawyer turned whistleblower, speaking publicly for the first time, said the agency is graduating thousands of new recruits after dangerously stripped-down training and teaching them they can legally enter private homes without consent or a warrant signed by a judge–in violation of the U.S. Constitution.
Surging the number of ICE agents from about 10,000 to more than 22,000 to meet the Trump Administration’s aggressive deportation quotas has prompted drastic and dangerous cuts in training of new agents, WhistleblowerAid.org client and former ICE lawyer and legal instructor Ryan Schwank told a public forum chaired by Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-Connecticut) and Representative Robert Garcia (D-California).
“ICE is lying to Congress and the American people about the steps it is taking to ensure its 12,000 new officers faithfully uphold the Constitution and perform their jobs,” Schwank said in a prepared statement. “Deficient training can and will get people killed,” he added. “It can and will lead to unlawful arrests, violations of constitutional rights, and a fundamental loss of public trust in law enforcement.”
‘ICE is teaching cadets to violate the Constitution’
On his first day at the Georgia-based Federal Law Enforcement Training Center, Schwank, an experienced immigration lawyer, said he “received secretive orders to teach new cadets to violate the Constitution by entering homes without a judicial warrant. I was instructed to read and return a memo in my supervisor’s presence which claimed ICE officers could enter homes without a judicial warrant.” That memo, dated May 12, 2025, lacked any of the typical markings or handling associated with internal policy guidance. “Before I was shown this memo, my supervisor warned me that two previous ICE instructors had been dismissed because they questioned senior ICE management over the legality of the memo,” he said.
“The Acting ICE Director authorized the very conduct that DHS [Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE] in 2025 legal training materials has called ‘the chief evil against which the wording of the Fourth Amendment is directed’—that is, ‘physical entry of the home’ without consent or a proper warrant,” Schwank said.
Schwank was one of two anonymous WhistleblowerAid.org clients who came forward to the U.S. Senate in January of 2026 with evidence that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has authorized–and even trained–ICE agents to forcibly enter homes without consent or a warrant issued by a judge. The whistleblowers assert that this is a flagrant violation of the Fourth Amendment.
“No court has ever found that any law enforcement has this type of authority to enter homes without a judicial warrant under such circumstances,” WhistleblowerAid.org Senior Vice President and Special Counsel David Kligerman said. He noted that, after whistleblower disclosures, six former DHS General Counsels signed an op-ed in The New York Times calling for the government to end forcible entries without judicial warrants.
“Never in my career had I ever received such a blatantly unlawful order—nor one conveyed in such a troubling manner,” Schwank said. “I was being shown this memo in secret by a supervisor who made sure that I understood that disobedience could cost me my job. ICE is teaching cadets to violate the Constitution, and they were attempting to cloak it in secrecy.”
Massive hiring surge
ICE cadets, recruited in a massive surge since 2025 to enforce President Trump’s promised crackdown on undocumented immigrants, are also receiving highly compressed instruction that leaves them poorly trained and ignorant of U.S. law, including when and how to lawfully conduct searches, detain suspects, or use deadly force, Schwank said.
DHS “has told the public that new cadets are receiving all the critical classes they need to perform their duties, that no critical material or standards have been cut.This is a lie,” he said. “ICE made the program shorter, and they removed so many essential parts that what remains is a dangerous husk. No reasonable person would believe a training program suddenly cut nearly in half could meet the minimum legal requirements.”
In 2021, Schwank was hired as an Assistant Chief Counsel for the ICE Office of the Principal Legal Advisor, where he represented ICE in proceedings before the Executive Office of Immigration Review. He previously served as on-site legal adviser to the ICE South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, Texas, before becoming an instructor for the incoming surge of recruits at the ICE Academy in Glynco, Georgia.
Third congressional forum
Today’s public forum, “Our Values at Stake, Part III: Terrorizing Communities Without Warrants and No Restraint,” is the third Senator Blumenthal and Representative Garcia have hosted to highlight abuses by DHS and ICE. Blumenthal and Garcia are, respectively, Ranking Member of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations and Ranking Member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
Schwank is one of two WhistleblowerAid.org clients to come forward anonymously in January to report abuses at DHS and ICE. The second whistleblower remains anonymous. The identity of the whistleblower who provided the Congress with the relevant documentation has also not been disclosed.
In an opening statement, Blumenthal thanked Schwank, who resigned from ICE earlier this month, and other whistleblowers for coming forward to expose abuses.
“We know about the Trump Administration’s decimation of training for immigration officers and its secret policy to shred your Constitutional rights because of the brave Americans who are speaking out today. They are coming to Congress because we have the responsibility to not only bear witness to these crimes, but to do something to make sure they don’t happen again,” Blumenthal said.
“Our door is open,” he said, inviting other potential whistleblowers to speak up. “We are here for you when you are ready, and we will do everything within our power to protect your rights.”
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WhistleblowerAid.org provides pro bono legal, advocacy, and communications support to government and private sector whistleblowers acting in the public interest. The organization’s lawyers have represented some of the most consequential national security and Big Tech whistleblowers in history, including Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen, the anonymous intelligence community whistleblower whose disclosures led to the first impeachment of President Trump, and others.
“ICE is teaching cadets to violate the Constitution, and they were attempting to cloak it in secrecy.” – ICE Whistleblower Ryan Schwank
“Law enforcement is a deadly serious business. Deficient training can and will get people killed. It can and will lead to unlawful arrests, violations of constitutional rights, and a fundamental loss of public trust in law enforcement. ICE is lying to Congress and the American people about the steps it is taking to ensure its 10,000 new officers faithfully uphold the Constitution and can perform their jobs.” – ICE Whistleblower Ryan Schwank
“We know about the Trump Administration’s decimation of training for immigration officers and its secret policy to shred your Constitutional rights because of the brave Americans who are speaking out today.” – Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-Connecticut)
