Buffalo Congressman Tim Kennedy is defending his bill to hire thousands more Customs and Border Protection officers amid criticism that the bill could help enable President Donald Trump’s deportation campaign.
The bill, dubbed the “Securing America’s Ports of Entry Act of 2025,” requires CBP to hire at least 1,000 new border officers every year, plus a new officer for every agent that leaves the force. If passed, those hirings would continue until CBP meets the staffing requirements laid out in its annual Workload Staffing Model.
CBP’s model from 2024 showed that the agency was short-staffed by about 5,850 officers, according to the National Treasury Employees Union, which represents CBP employees.
Kennedy says the legislation is necessary to prevent hours-long delays at the Canadian border that stifle trade and tourism — especially as the NTEU expects that the number of retiring officers will triple in 2028 due to how retirement benefits are structured.
“We’ve got to fix that, and the only way you fix it is by hiring more staff. So that bill does just that,” Kennedy told reporters on Saturday. “It resolves an issue that is not only lingering, but it’s important to the economy of our community, and with a retirement cliff that is pending in the very near future, you’re going to see that problem at our border exacerbated if we don’t deal with it right now.”
Some local immigration advocates have criticized Kennedy, arguing that the bill would give the Trump Administration more manpower to carry out its deportation campaign. Jennifer Connor, the executive director of the group Justice for Migrant Families, told the Investigative Post that Kennedy’s introduction of the bill was “very sad.”
Data from the Cato Institute, a Libertarian think tank, found that around 3,100 CBP employees were reassigned from their normal duties to civil immigration enforcement operations in August.
Since Trump took office, CBP has detained unauthorized migrants, including families, for days or sometimes weeks at northern border crossings. NPR reported that between January and April, 293 people (including a dozen families, some with children who were U.S. citizens) were detained at the Ambassador Bridge between Detroit, Michigan and Windsor, Ontario. About 90% of those detained had made a wrong turn onto the bridge, and some were held for days without access to legal counsel.
“What the Trump administration is doing is deplorable, and we are against it,” Kennedy said. “We’ve been fighting back against what the Trump administration has been doing with these ridiculous un American deportations, and it needs to end.”
Kennedy said he would consider amending the bill to make sure newly hired CBP officers stay at border crossings instead of being diverted to assist U.S. Immigration Customs and Enforcement, but he stopped short of making any firm promises.
“We would certainly look at something like that,” Kennedy said. “But this is all about making sure that the border is staffed to the level that is necessary.”
Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill provides ICE with funding to hire 10,000 officers over the next five years, according to a statement from Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. ICE currently has 20,000 total employees, including support staff.
Kennedy’s bill was referred to the Committee on Homeland Security and the Ways and Means Committee in July, according to Congress’ website. It’s been cosponsored by one other member of Congress, Mississippi Democrat Rep. Bennie Thompson.