$30,000,000,000 to The American Gestapo

On the eve of Independence Day, many Americans feel they’ve lost their independence as we barrel rapidly towards fascism.

Today, the Trump regime took another leaping step toward fascism. While many Americans grilled burgers and watched fireworks, the federal government quietly finalized a plan to fund the most dangerous expansion of immigration policing in modern U.S. history. This is not just about immigration. It is about building a domestic control machine with no off switch.

I said it before they introduced this bill, and I will say it again now:
ICE, CBP… any immigration enforcement agency? The American Gestapo. Full stop.

And now, with the One Big Beautiful Bill Act headed to Trumps desk, the government has handed ICE its largest budget in history while slashing the most they’ve even taken from the poor. This is like Reagan on steroids.

This is not just a budget. It is a strategic plan for surveillance, fear, detention, and mass deportation. ICE will receive thirty billion dollars per year. Combined with Border Patrol (CBP), the total reaches one hundred sixty-eight billion dollars over five years.

To put that in perspective, if you make ~$50,000/dollars a year, you would have to work for about three MILLION years to earn what ICE gets in ONE.

• It is more than thirty times what the IRS gets to go after tax fraud.

• It is twenty-one times what the ATF gets to stop gun trafficking.

• Thirteen times more than what the DEA gets to fight drug cartels.

• Eight times the entire FBI budget.

• This is more money than all the federal agencies get in a year combined.

Of course, the MAGA loyalists say this is about border security. National security. But the numbers don’t lie. This is about building a national apparatus of control, one that targets immigrants now but sets a precedent for broader domestic repression later. And here’s the uncomfortable truth: there are only so many immigrants.

The federal government knows this. ICE knows this. They are not preparing to police immigration.. they appear to be preparing to police everyone.

This isn’t about border crossings. It’s about building a police state infrastructure with your money. Just look at Palantir. That’s going to be their tool.

This isn’t just speculation. It’s already happening. American citizens have already been illegally detained by ICE. There are multiple documented cases.

In one, an officer reportedly told a Latino man on camera that his U.S. citizenship didn’t matter. In another, a teenage U.S. citizen was held for nearly a month in a detention center because agents assumed he was undocumented.

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Where the money is going:

The bill allows ICE to hire aggressively.

Section 70103 gives new ICE officers bonuses of up to twenty-five thousand dollars.

Section 70104 lets the agency bypass traditional federal hiring standards to fast-track new hires. These hires include surveillance analysts, transport officers, and detention contractors. This is not about responding to border crossings. It is about building a large-scale system of human tracking and incarceration.

The bill also imposes a long list of new fees that punish people for seeking protection:

• Section 70002 adds a fee of fifty to one hundred fifty dollars just to apply for asylum.

• Section 70004 imposes a fee of four hundred to eight hundred dollars for parole requests.

• Section 70011 charges one thousand dollars for a continuance in immigration court.

• Section 70013 adds a fee to renew employment authorization for asylum applicants.

• Section 70020 creates a penalty fee for sponsors of unaccompanied minors who miss court.

• Section 70016 increases EOIR court fees.

• Section 70022 adds a CBP apprehension fee for those deemed inadmissible.

• Section 70008 imposes a visa integrity fee.

Even requesting your own immigration file under the Freedom of Information Act now comes with a cost. These charges are not administrative. They are barriers, deliberately placed to make access to safety and due process harder for anyone without money.

The detention system is also growing fast:

Section 70101 expands adult detention capacity. Section 70115 increases the number of beds for detained children. Section 70110 pours money into expanding the 287(g) program, which allows local police to act as federal immigration agents. Section 70106 funds surveillance technology upgrades including facial recognition, biometric databases, and automated license plate readers. Section 70107 funds the expansion and renovation of detention facilities. ICE is told to enter new contracts with private prison companies in at least ten states. This is not a side effect. It is the goal.

The bill fuels deeper coordination between federal and local enforcement. Section 70114 pays sheriffs and police departments to work with ICE. Sections 60001 and 60003 authorize the use of National Guard units for so-called border security missions, including immigration raids and interior checkpoints. Immigration policing is now aligned with military-style tactics.

ICE officers are becoming more anonymous and less accountable. Section 70112 expands funding for ICE's legal office, which helps defend the agency against lawsuits and shields it from scrutiny.

ICE agents now regularly operate with face masks and no name tags. They do not want to be recognized because they know what they are doing. They know it is brutal. And they want to get away with it.

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This is not just about immigration. The same tools that ICE is using now… mass surveillance, biometric databases thanks to Peter Thiel’s company Palantir, with a “bigger” one coming out in the next year, ImmigrationOS.

Not to mention the military-style raids, financial tracking.. these are tools that can be turned against anyone. Protesters. Journalists. Whistleblowers. The poor. The politically inconvenient. ICE is the test lab. The rest of us are next in line.

The One Big Beautiful Bill is not just about funding. It is about power. It builds a stronger, harsher ICE with more legal cover, more prisons, and fewer rules. It is an investment in authoritarianism. While starving and taking away healthcare from the rest of us to pay for it.

ICE is the American Gestapo. And this bill gives them the green light.

We either stop this now, or wait for the knock at our own door.

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— Dissent ♥