Rep. Jacobs Questions General Guillot on Military's Role at the Border

Military Involvement in Migrant Handling

• ❓ Rep. Sara Jacobs questioned General Gregory M. Guillot regarding the military's role in handling migrants at the southern border.
• 🚫 General Guillot stated that DoD is not currently conducting any detention of migrants and has no orders to do so.
• 🚫 Military personnel are not allowed to physically transport migrants or facilitate their transfer into DHS custody.

Operational Limitations and Surveillance

• 🚫 Troops will not be operating checkpoints, conducting crowd control, or performing traffic control.
• 🔍 Military forces do conduct detection and monitoring of the border region to notify Border Patrol of potential illegal crossings.
• 🚫 Personnel do not have access to DHS surveillance tools, databases, or intelligence systems that collect information on U.S. citizens or lawful residents.

Processes When Border Patrol is Unavailable

• ⚠️ If Border Patrol is not immediately available, military personnel will continue to surveil migrants and provide updated locations to agents.
• 🚫 Military personnel will not stop or impede illegal migrants, as this is considered a law enforcement action.

Legal Compliance and Training

• ✅ General Guillot assured the committee that Northcom's activities fully comply with the Posse Comitatus Act.
• 🎓 Service members receive extensive training on legal constraints, including the Posse Comitatus Act and standards on the use of force, before and during deployment.

Rules of Engagement and Use of Force

• 🔫 Service members deployed at the border are armed with their trained weapons.
• ✈️ The only proposed change to the rules of engagement is to allow troops to bring down drones surveilling over deployed military personnel.