Agreement won’t impact day-to-day policework, Sheriff Dodson says  

At the end of January, the Brewster County Sheriff’s Office (BCSO) signed on to join Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) warrant service officer program. “The warrant service officer program allows ICE to train, certify and authorize state and local law enforcement officers to serve and execute administrative warrants on [undocumented people] in their agency’s jail,” the official ICE.gov webpage explains. 

The agreement is part of ICE’s 287(g) program, which partners with local law enforcement agencies to carry out immigration enforcement. The program was launched in January 2025, when President Trump issued a laundry list of border security-related executive orders, and was designed in a political climate where “sanctuary cities”—cities typically run by Democrats that welcome migrants and asylum seekers—became a huge talking point on both sides of the aisle. 

In Texas, individual law enforcement agencies don’t have much of a choice. June of last year, the Texas Legislature passed SB 8, which opens the door legally for the state attorney general to sue sheriffs’ offices that don’t comply by December 1, 2026. (The Texas Immigration Law Council called SB 8 “one of the state’s most significant immigration enforcement laws”—an impressive achievement in a state with a national reputation for its shock-and-awe approach to border security.)

Sheriff Dodson said that the program would not change the way he or his officers approach their policework and is simply a formal ink-and-paper expression of how the BCSO has worked with agencies like the Border Patrol for decades. “Basically what we’re doing is, if we catch somebody that’s illegal, we notify ICE,” he explained. “We’re just doing it because the governor wants us to do it—we don’t call them that often.”

Dodson says that the agreement could have a positive impact on a persistent problem at the jail: the county makes money off of federal inmates, but sees no financial benefit from housing state inmates. As a result of President Trump’s immigration enforcement crackdown, numbers in the Big Bend are so low that profit from the jail has slowed to a trickle. “Financially, what I call our ‘extra money’ is gone,” Dodson explained. 

In January, Dodson and Sheriff Danny Dominguez of Presidio County met with Gov. Greg Abbott to discuss these issues and their personal experiences working in law enforcement on the border. Abbott advised them that there might be grant opportunities at the state level. SB 8 also provides grant-funding opportunities proportional to the size of each county. (Dominguez has not yet signed a similar agreement for Presidio County.)

Dodson knew that any kind of cooperation with ICE could be tricky in today’s political climate, but he stressed that the program his county signed on for was more about paperwork than dramatic raids in the street. “They’re more administrative, not discipline,” he said. “It’s not what you see on TV.”