Different agencies, different tasks

The Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement both operate under the umbrella of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which contains a confusing array of agencies.

ICE is the largest investigative branch of Homeland Security. Agents are in plain clothes.

The Border Patrol is the largest enforcement arm of the federal Department of Homeland Security, spokesman Michael Bermudez said.

Agents wear green uniforms.

“Our primary mission is to secure our nation’s borders,” he said.

ICE, created in March 2003, combines the law enforcement arms of the former Immigration and Naturalization Service and the former U.S. Customs Service.

According to the ICE Web site, www.ice.gov/, it targets “illegal immigrants: the people, money and materials that support terrorism and other criminal activities.”

The Border Patrol is one of three arms of uniformed agents under U.S. Customs and Border Protection, a separate division of Homeland Security from ICE.

The other two arms of Customs and Border Protection are:

Field Operations, which deal with ports of entry. Agents wear blue uniforms.

Air and Marine, with agents in brown uniforms.

Air and Marine agents use “integrated air and marine forces to detect, interdict and prevent acts of terrorism and the unlawful movement of people, illegal drugs and other contraband toward or across the borders of the United States,” according to the Customs and Border Protection Web site, www.cbp.gov/.

Border Patrol agents, who operate checkpoints, are not tasked with going into businesses, although if they discover that a person is illegal, they can detain the person, Bermudez said.

“ICE will be doing employer sanctions or investigations,” he added.

“Either agency can arrest individuals. If we encounter someone who has broken the law on the street, we can take that person into custody.”

He said that the Border Patrol has five objectives:

To apprehend terrorists and those illegally entering the United States.

To deter illegal entries through improved enforcement of the law.

To detect, apprehend and deter smugglers of humans, drugs and other contraband.

To use smart border technology such as global positioning devices, expanded communications, underground sensors and remote video surveillance systems.

To reduce crime in border communities, and improve the quality of life.

Border Patrol agents operate throughout the United States, but the checkpoints can be only within 100 miles of an international border.

ICE has several functions.

In addition to the National Fugitive Operations Program, ICE investigates employers for illegal workers, gang organizations, human smuggling and illegal export of U.S. munitions and sensitive technology.