Federal immigration officials were at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport on Monday, March 23, 2026, to assist with airport security as the partial closure continues. The airport told travelers to prepare for at least four-hour waits to get through security on Monday. (Photo by Ross Williams/Georgia Recorder)
Airport security guards failed Monday at the highest rate since a partial government shutdown began in mid-February, the Department of Homeland Security said, and the Trump administration sent immigration agents to some airports to keep lines moving.
Travelers reported hours-long security lines at major airports in Atlanta and Houston, while waits of 30 minutes or more were reported at several other hubs on Monday.
Nearly 3,500 Transportation Security Administration officers, about 11.8% of the national planned workforce, were recalled from work Monday. TSA officers have been working without pay since the department that oversees the TSA initiated a funding freeze on Feb. 14 amid a dispute in Congress over immigration enforcement.
According to DHS, call-out rates at a few major airports exceeded 20%. They were:
- 42.3% in New Orleans
- 41.5% in Atlanta
- 39.1% in Houston
- 38.1% in Baltimore
- 37.4% at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport
- 24.7% in Pittsburgh
- 24.2% in Philadelphia
- 21.7% at New York’s Laguardia Airport
- 20.3% in Phoenix
ICE to airports
More than 400 TSA employees have resigned since the “senseless and reckless closure” began, DHS spokeswoman Lauren Bis said in an emailed statement.
Bis blamed congressional Democrats for the shutdown and related aviation security staffing problems and confirmed that DHS would deploy officers from Immigration and Customs Enforcement, another DHS agency, to assist the TSA at airports.
TSA officers “are unable to afford gas, child care, food or rent,” she said.
“As Democrats continue to threaten the safety, reliability and ease of our air travel, President Trump is taking action to deploy hundreds of ICE officers, currently funded by Congress, to airports that are being impacted. This will help strengthen TSA’s efforts to protect our skies and minimize disruptions to air travel.”
President Donald Trump praised ICE in comments to reporters Monday morning and suggested he could also bring in National Guard troops to support at airports.
“They intervened so, so strongly,” he said of ICE officers. “You’ll do great. And if that’s not enough, I’ll deploy the National Guard.”
Tom Homan, the White House border czar who is coordinating much of Trump’s immigration enforcement agenda, said in a Sunday interview on CNN’s “State of the Union” that ICE officers would primarily perform tasks that do not require extensive training, such as ensuring no one passes through exits into secure areas.
“We’re simply there to help the TSA do their job in areas where their specific expertise is not required,” he told CNN’s Dana Bash, rather than scanning the X-ray machines. “But there are roles we can take on to free up TSA officers from their insignificant role, such as guarding an exit, so they can get back to the scanning machines and move people more quickly.”
DHS declined to provide a list of airports where ICE would be deployed, citing concerns about “operational security.”
ICE officers were spotted at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, the busiest in the country, where waits of four hours were reported in security lines on Monday.
The shutdown remains in place
Federal law requires TSA officers to work during a shutdown, although they will not be paid until funding is restored.
Although ICE has been at the center of the shutdown debate, it has not been affected by DHS’s funding gap because Republicans gave the agency significant funding as part of the tax cuts and spending bill they passed along party lines last year.
Democrats have refused to fund a fiscal 2026 budget proposal for the department without fundamental changes to the administration’s immigration policies, which reached a tipping point after the deaths of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis in January.
“Due to the Democratic shutdown, President Trump is using every tool available to help American travelers who are facing hour-long lines at airports across the country – especially during this spring break and holiday season, which is very important to many American families,” Bis said.
In a infrequent weekend session, the U.S. Senate again failed to advance a funding measure for DHS on Saturday.
Fatal LaGuardia crash
The pilot and co-pilot of an Air Canada plane died and more than 40 people were injured after the plane collided with a fire truck at LaGuardia Airport tardy Sunday.
The incident was unrelated to problems with the TSA, which is not responsible for security on runways or elsewhere outside airport terminals, but it did delay and further complicate travel in the New York City area.
Ashley Murray contributed to this report.
