Where Are the Proud Boys? Are They Working for ICE?

What we know — and can’t know — about January 6 pardons and ICE hiring

Scroll through social media long enough, and you’ll see the same question pop up again and again, often as a meme:

Where did the Proud Boys go? Why don’t we hear from them anymore? Are they working for ICE now?

It’s a fair question. And based on what’s publicly available, it’s also one that can’t be answered — and that may be by design.

What we actually know

As of January 2026, there is no public database, audit, or official report showing how many January 6 defendants — including members of the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, or Three Percenters — are now employed by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. There’s also no public confirmation that none of them are. That absence of information is the core issue.

The January 6 pardons changed the landscape

On January 20, 2025, President Donald Trump issued blanket clemency to roughly fifteen hundred people charged or convicted for their roles in the January 6 Capitol attack.

Most received full pardons, which legally erase the conviction. A smaller group — including senior figures from the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers — received commutations instead. They were released from prison, but their convictions technically remain on the books.

That distinction matters for federal hiring, but not in any way the public can track. Federal law enforcement hiring doesn’t hinge only on criminal records. It relies on “suitability” reviews handled by the Office of Personnel Management. Those reviews are confidential. Their outcomes aren’t published. There’s no public accounting of who passes, who fails, or why. Once someone is pardoned, the record largely disappears.

What’s been confirmed — and what hasn’t

Watchdog groups like Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington and The 19th News have tracked what some pardoned January 6 defendants did after clemency. Their focus has been on rearrests and new criminal behavior, not employment.

By late 2025, at least 33 pardoned individuals had been rearrested for new offenses. That number is public. What isn’t public is how many applied for federal jobs, how many were hired, or where they were placed.

The Department of Justice has confirmed that at least one former January 6 defendant was hired into a DOJ role. Department of Homeland Security and ICE have released no comparable employment data.

ICE’s hiring push

In 2025, DHS launched an aggressive recruitment campaign for ICE. Age limits were waived. Physical and intellectual standards were lowered. Hiring was accelerated. The messaging emphasized urgency, enforcement, and patriotism — patriotism as defined by the Trump administration, which effectively means loyalty to Trump.

At the same time, the administration moved to loosen long-standing federal hiring constraints and background screening rules. None of this proves that former extremist group members were hired into ICE, but it does explain why the question keeps coming up — and why there’s no public way to resolve it.

Sloppy work, untrained officers

Videos circulating online show ICE agents who, to many viewers, appear poorly trained, inexperienced, or unfamiliar with basic law enforcement conduct. Agents are repeatedly seen making threats, issuing contradictory commands, failing to clearly identify themselves, escalating routine encounters, giving incorrect legal instructions, and assaulting people who are filming them.

Some of them outright act like thugs, exhibiting behavior that many viewers associate with January 6 itself.

If municipal police officers behaved the same way on camera, most of them would be suspended or fired. There would be internal investigations and public accountability. ICE operates under different rules, with far less transparency and weaker civilian oversight.

Filming ICE is legal

ICE agents frequently tell bystanders to stop recording. But bystanders have a legal right to film — at least for now. It is legal to record federal agents performing their duties in public spaces so long as filming doesn’t physically interfere with their work. Courts have been clear on this point. Recording isn’t obstruction, no matter how much agents dislike it.

Why the question persists

To many observers, ICE operations don’t just look sloppy — they look provocative. Agents appear angry, hostile, and combative, almost like how they accuse protesters of acting. They show up heavily armed, minimally communicative, and quick to escalate. When encounters don’t turn violent, critics say agents sometimes push them there anyway.

That perception fuels the speculation. Not because there’s proof of a pipeline from January 6 groups into ICE, but because the government won’t release hiring data, vetting outcomes are secret, enforcement tactics look increasingly confrontational, and the people once most visible on the far-right street scene have largely vanished from view.

What we don’t know — and can’t know

There is no public mechanism to answer whether Proud Boys or other January 6 defendants are now working for ICE. That information isn’t disclosed. It can’t be obtained through routine records requests. It would require congressional oversight, inspector general audits, or court-ordered discovery.

Until then, the question isn’t reckless or conspiratorial. It’s a reasonable response to a system that operates with force, secrecy, and no obligation to show its work.