The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is ramping up its police dog presence at the U.S.-Mexico border, amid growing concerns about border security.
A Newsweek analysis of federal procurement data has revealed the department more than doubled its spending on dog providers in the first six weeks of the year compared with the amount it spent in a similar period in 2023, and a government spokesperson confirmed it was increasing the number of canines it will use this year. One charity called the spending wasteful.
From January 3 to February 5, DHS spent $264,000 on three new contracts to dog providers. In a comparable period in 2023, from February 15 to February 27, the department spent $119,686 on two new contracts. DHS did not procure new contracts in January 2023.
The contracts, given to Police Service Dogs Inc., Carolina Canine Academy LLC, and Deborgem Enterprises Incorporated, were awarded by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) sub-agency. A CBP spokesperson told Newsweek the dogs will be trained at the U.S. Border Patrol Canine Academy in El Paso, Texas, which is projected to produce 33 percent more new dog teams in the fiscal year 2024 than in the same period in 2023, before being deployed nationwide.
Photo by Jeff T. Green/Getty Images)
The spokesperson added that the number of canines procured reflects the number of canines needed to maintain USBP’s nearly 900 teams stationed across the country.
“The Border Patrol Canine Program is committed to upholding the highest standards of discipline and training,” the spokesperson said. “The use of canines is directly related to CBP’s humanitarian efforts of preserving life by combatting human smuggling and preventing the smuggling of controlled substances across U.S. borders.”
Kelly Overton, the executive director of Border Kindness—a charity that provides support to migrants—raised concerns about the use of the dogs. Speaking to Newsweek, he criticized the increased expenditure on the animals and accused CBP agents of using them to intimidate asylum seekers, a claim Newsweek then put to CBP for comment.
“As through US history (slavery, civil rights, public protest), local, state and federal government(s) in USA use dogs to control, intimidate and terrorize individuals and communities. Border Kindness has witnessed individual CBP agents do this—use dogs as weapons of intimidation against asylum-seeking individuals and families,” he said.
Overton continued: “There is a role for well-trained working dogs to assist in seizing drugs, firearms, and other dangerous items. In regards to immigration, increasing budgetary spending on dogs—one example of continued militarization of the border—is wasteful and continues to ignore the regional and global crises fueling migration across the globe.”
With border encounters surging in recent years, border security has captured public attention in recent weeks. CBP data showed federal border agents encountered around 2.5 million migrants in 2023, a record high. However, encounters halved in January in comparison with December’s numbers.
A bipartisan bill intended to bolster border security by providing tougher immigration enforcement and allowing DHS to temporarily shut down the border during surges of crossing attempts recently failed in Congress because it lacked the support of former president Donald Trump, who called on Republicans to kill it.
Meanwhile, in January, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of Biden’s decision to remove razor wire and other barriers that had been constructed along to border to curb immigration, sparking a backlash in which Texas Governor Greg Abbott vowed to continue using the deterrents, flouting the Biden administration’s orders.
According to CBP’s website, police dogs have been used since 1970 to detect and apprehend terrorists, seize contraband substances including drugs, and assist local law enforcement agencies. They also detect human remains.
In January, a CBP dog found mummified monkeys in a bag belonging to a passenger returning to the U.S. from a trip to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, according to a CBP press release.
“The CBP Canine Program is critical to the mission of the Department of Homeland Security: ‘to protect the homeland,'” the website says.
It adds that it trains dogs “based upon numerous federal and internationally recognized standards” in two training sites.
Uncommon Knowledge
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.