Mathew Silverman is the National President of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association and a board member for Law Enforcement Today.
Maryland lawmakers and local officials have every right to debate immigration policy, the role of federal agencies, and the appropriate boundaries between local law enforcement and federal immigration enforcement. Those are legitimate policy questions.
But Maryland is moving beyond a debate over policy. A growing series of proposals now seeks to deny employment opportunities to people based solely on their prior service with specific federal agencies, particularly U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
That approach is divisive, discriminatory, and fundamentally inconsistent with the principle that public servants should be judged on their individual character, qualifications, record, and ability to serve their community.
The newest example is Montgomery County’s proposed Community Trust in County Employees Act, Expedited Bill 29-26. Introduced by Councilmembers Kristin Mink and Will Jawando, the proposal would prohibit Montgomery County from hiring certain former ICE or CBP employees into public-facing or resource-allocation positions if they worked for those agencies after October 2025.
It would also reach employees of other federal agencies who spent more than six months enforcing federal immigration laws.
The bill is scheduled for a public hearing on July 14.
Supporters argue that the proposal is necessary to build trust with immigrant communities. Trust between government and the people it serves is essential.
Every resident—regardless of immigration status, nationality, race, religion, or background—should be able to report a crime, seek emergency assistance, use public services, and interact with government without fear.
But trust cannot be built by creating a new class of people who are presumed unworthy of public employment because of where they previously worked.
A former ICE officer, CBP officer, deportation officer, special agent, intelligence analyst, attorney, victim-witness coordinator, or support employee is not defined solely by an agency patch. These individuals have different assignments, different experiences, different records, and different reasons for entering public service.
Many have spent years protecting victims of human trafficking, investigating transnational gangs, combating narcotics trafficking, identifying child exploitation, stopping weapons smuggling, and enforcing laws enacted by Congress.
To declare that an individual is unsuitable for a county position simply because he or she worked for ICE, CBP, or another federal agency after an arbitrary date is not an individualized hiring assessment. It is a political litmus test.
That is particularly troubling because this Montgomery County proposal does not exist in isolation.
Earlier this year, Maryland enacted legislation prohibiting state and local jurisdictions from entering into or renewing formal 287(g) agreements—arrangements through which local law-enforcement agencies can perform certain federal immigration-enforcement functions. Governor Wes Moore signed SB 245/HB 444 in February, and the law took effect immediately.
The policy debate surrounding 287(g) agreements is substantial and ongoing, with supporters emphasizing community trust and opponents emphasizing public-safety coordination and local control.
But the next step now being proposed is far more sweeping: excluding individual federal employees from future employment opportunities because of their past affiliation with an agency.
The so-called ICE Breaker Act, House Bill 361, would prohibit Maryland state law-enforcement agencies from hiring individuals who were hired as sworn ICE officers after January 20, 2025. The bill would apply to a broad range of state law-enforcement agencies and would take effect prospectively if enacted.
The message being sent is unmistakable: certain people are unwelcome in Maryland public service—not because they committed misconduct, failed a background investigation, lacked qualifications, or violated public trust, but because they served in a federal agency during a politically disfavored period.
That is not how professional hiring should work.
Every law-enforcement applicant should undergo a rigorous background investigation. Agencies should evaluate integrity, judgment, disciplinary history, training, community engagement, fitness for duty, and the ability to comply with Maryland law and agency policy.
A former federal officer who applies to a Maryland agency would still have to meet that agency’s standards, complete any required training, learn Maryland law, and earn the trust of the community and the organization.
No one should receive a job automatically because of prior federal service. But no one should be automatically disqualified because of it either.
The practical consequences also deserve serious attention. Maryland law-enforcement agencies, like agencies across the country, continue to face recruitment and retention challenges.
At a time when departments need experienced investigators, officers, analysts, and public-safety professionals, lawmakers should be expanding the pool of qualified applicants—not narrowing it based on political affiliation or federal employment history.
Former ICE and CBP personnel often bring valuable experience in investigations, intelligence, human trafficking, narcotics interdiction, organized crime, victim services, border-security operations, and interagency coordination.
Whether a particular applicant should be hired should depend on that person’s record—not a blanket assumption about an entire workforce.
This is also about fairness.
If Maryland permits government employers to exclude people because they served at ICE or CBP, what comes next? Could a future administration bar applicants who previously worked for another federal agency, a state police department, a prosecutor’s office, a military unit, or a public-safety organization whose mission it opposes?
Once government begins sorting applicants into acceptable and unacceptable categories based on political disagreement with their former employer, the principle of equal opportunity in public employment begins to erode.
The country is already deeply divided. Americans disagree sharply about immigration, enforcement priorities, federal authority, and public safety. Those disagreements should be resolved through democratic debate, legislation, oversight, and lawful policy reform.
They should not be resolved by treating individual public servants as untouchable because they wore the uniform of a federal agency that some elected officials oppose.
Maryland should be a place where people are evaluated as individuals. It should be a place where government hiring is based on merit, integrity, qualifications, and service—not ideological retaliation.
The Community Trust in County Employees Act and the ICE Breaker Act should prompt a broader question for every Maryland resident: Do we want government to judge people by their personal conduct and professional record, or by the political controversy surrounding the agency where they once worked?
A state and county government committed to fairness should choose the former.
Federal law-enforcement officers are not the enemy. They are public servants who took an oath to uphold the law. Maryland can debate immigration policy without discriminating against the men and women who have devoted their careers to enforcing laws passed by Congress.
The path forward should be accountability for misconduct, transparency in government, meaningful community engagement, and fair hiring practices—not blanket exclusion, political retaliation, and a deeper divide among Americans.
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