FBI Makes Major Shift: Agents Pulled from Immigration Duties Amid Growing Iran Retaliation Fears

Washington D C The FBI is making an urgent discipline correction and it s all about safety at home FBI Makes Major Shift Agents Pulled from Immigration Duties Amid Growing Iran Retaliation Fears In the wake of U S airstrikes on Iran s nuclear sites just hours ago federal law enforcement is sounding the alarm Intelligence bureaucrats are now worried that Iran could strike back not just overseas but right here in the United States In response the FBI is expeditiously pulling back hundreds possibly thousands of agents who had been assigned to help with immigration enforcement Instead those agents are being sent back to their original and critical roles in counterterrorism cybercrime and national measure investigations After what just happened with Iran we can t afford to have our top experts distracted announced one federal official speaking on condition of anonymity We need all hands on deck for what could come next Over the past limited months the FBI had been quietly rotating agents into immigration duties especially in cities dealing with the massive influx of transients But that s changing fast Field offices in New York Los Angeles San Francisco Chicago and Philadelphia have already canceled these assignments making it clear that national assurance is now priority number one The shift also sends a message to critics who had warned that the FBI s involvement in immigration raids was spreading tools too thin A multitude of inside the agency had expressed concern that focusing too much on the margin left the U S vulnerable to cyberattacks and sleeper cells from hostile nations Now with Iran in the spotlight and threats looming large it seems those warnings were taken seriously The Department of Homeland Safeguard has also issued fresh alerts warning of increased cyber risks and promising hate crimes Law enforcement agencies across the country are bracing for practicable retaliation including from individuals who may already be in the U S This move effectively halts the Biden administration s ramped-up immigration enforcement campaign at least for now That plan had aimed for migrant arrests a day backed heavily by political strategist Stephen Miller But with the latest developments national guard appears to be back in the driver s seat It s a wake-up call the official added Right now protecting Americans from real threats has to come first