Let’s get this out of the way: Immigration and Customs Enforcement is nothing like the Sturmabteilung, aka Hitler’s Brownshirts. Your main clue is right there in the name. The Brownshirts wore brown shirts. And pants, coats, hats, insignia, etc. They had an actual uniform that they wore like brand ambassadors for authoritarian paramilitary violence.
ICE? Not so much. No official uniform, no clear identification, nothing that says, “I am a recognized member of a government agency and what I am doing is legal.” Instead, they go for that “Target clearance rack meets SWAT cosplay” vibe: a tactical vest you can buy on Amazon, maybe an old baseball cap, and a facemask they want you to know isn’t there for any health-related reasons. That’s not a uniform. You can tell because people have easily copied the look to impersonate ICE numerous times in the past to brutalize or rob immigrants, knowing that it’s virtually impossible to tell apart government agents and straight-up criminals in wraparound glasses.
Say what you want about the Brownshirts (no, really, they were Nazis, say whatever you want about them), at least their kind of government-approved brutality was hard to pirate by someone with an extra $50 and overnight shipping. So stop saying that ICE is like the Brownshirts. The Brownshirts wanted everyone to see them beat people in the streets. They did public terror. ICE does plausible terror so they can go out and get tacos on the weekend.
And when ICE agents aren’t wearing their vest-and-hat starter kit, they dress up as civilians. They’ve been known to pretend to be utility workers (electric company, gas, even delivery drivers) to trick people into letting them into their houses. Do you think the Brownshirts ever bothered with ruses? Hell no. They were proud of being fascists. ICE is still shy about labels because, again, tacos exist.
But this actually gets to the fundamental difference between the two groups. The Brownshirts operated out in public, in easily identifiable uniforms, so that everyone would be afraid of them. ICE has erased the line between the government and civilians. Anyone could be a secret fascist working for the government. Your neighbor. The guy fixing your car. The person asking you for directions.
The Sturmabteilung’s violence was meant to send a clear message: “We are here, and we will hurt you.” ICE’s operations, on the other hand, say: “We could be anywhere, at any time, and you’ll never know until it’s too late.” That way, everyone will be afraid of each other. Totally different strategy than what the Brownshirts were doing. So, let’s just cool it with the historically inaccurate name-calling, please and thank you.
Let’s say it again: ICE is nothing like the Brownshirts. One was an open paramilitary wing of an openly fascist political party, the other is an unaccountable government force operating without clear uniforms, identification, or transparency… for an openly fascist political party. There are SOME similarities between them, that’s true, but ICE is more like… well, we don’t really have a word for it in English. They are like… a government-sanctioned organization that operates without uniforms, masks its identity, infiltrates civilian spaces, and detains people without oversight, like some sort of… secretive… police-like thing.
But just because there isn’t a name for something like that does not give you the right to call ICE agents Brownshirts. That’d be like calling asbestos a “toxin.” Yeah, both will kill you, but THEY ARE NOT THE SAME THING.
