The White House border czar, Thomas Homan, defended the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Service’s desire to equip its agents with gloves that can deliver painful electric shocks upon contact with the skin. He justifies their use by asserting that they could allow officials to avoid resorting to lethal force in migrant detention operations.
The gloves would be added to the Taser devices, which are already a tool available to ICE agents.
“It’s another resource to help someone comply with orders when they are not doing so,” Homan said in an interview on the Fox and Friends program on the Fox News television network. “You can’t just go from zero to one hundred and go straight to the use of lethal force.”
The gloves — for which the government will pay up to 20 million dollars, according to the contract — will not be used by agents immediately. Homan assured that the training protocol is still being written and reviewed.
The contract for the purchase of these gloves was made with the company Compliant Technologies, based in Kentucky and dedicated to the production of “non-lethal” technology, they say on their page, to empower law enforcement officers, correctional officers, security personnel, and health professionals “to handle dangerous situations with confidence and control.”
In the user manual for these gloves published on their website, Compliant Technologies explains that “they must be treated seriously, like any other weapon” and that their use can cause harm to the person and even death if instructions are not followed. They state that the certification to use them is valid for two years; after that time, recertification is required.
“If the biennial training is not completed, you will be disqualified from using the device until you finish it,” they note.
The G.L.O.V.E gloves — whose acronym stands for Low Voltage Discharge Generation Emitters — are activated with a button on the back of the hand. In their user manual, the company states that no more than two gloves should be used at the same time on a person and that exposure to the electric shock should not exceed 15 seconds.
Upon contact with the skin, the gloves — which appear harmless — inhibit muscle mobility. The company recommends in its manual that they not be used on the elderly, children, pregnant women, or people with disabilities.
They also explain that their use can amplify effects that lead to sudden death, such as increased blood pressure, changes in blood composition, increased heart rate, and adrenaline. “The greater the exposure (…) the greater the potential risk,” the guide reads.
Criticism
ICE’s plan to use these gloves has generated strong criticism from civil rights organizations and congress members, especially due to the aggressive tactics agents already employ in their operations, which have been documented in hundreds of videos from ordinary citizens.
Since President Donald Trump assumed his second term, about six people have died after being shot by ICE agents. One of the most controversial cases was that of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo in Houston.
According to the version of witnesses traveling in Salgado’s van, after a pursuit lasting several minutes, an ICE agent quickly got out of his car, ran to the passenger window. From there he shouted “stop” and almost immediately, without further words and without resistance from the four passengers, fired the bullet that killed the Mexican migrant. None of the agents in the operation — whose names are unknown — wore body cameras, so no footage was recorded to help understand why the official fired.
“The last thing ICE needs is a new tool to inflict more cruelty and pain on our communities,” wrote the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the largest civil rights defense organization in the United States, on its Facebook account.
Democratic Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal also condemned the plan: “Let’s be clear about what is happening,” she wrote. “This is an agency accused of acting with racial discrimination, preventing congress members from conducting oversight visits (to detention centers), and terrorizing communities under the pretext of law enforcement. Now they intend to have new tools to harm people, tools designed to nullify individuals’ ability to respond.”
The gloves have already been used by guards in federal prisons in the United States to control inmates.
A guard at a county jail in Kentucky told the AP agency that his department has used them for four years. He said he has suffered shocks from the gloves more than 10 times during training, causing intense pain. He explained that they have used them moderately and that they have served as an initial deterrent when de-escalation techniques do not work.
However, AP cites a lawsuit in Kentucky regarding a 43-year-old inmate who died in 2024 after receiving 27 shocks with the gloves and another 13 with a Taser gun. An internal investigation determined that two of the shocks lasted 45 seconds and 99 seconds, much longer than the time recommended by the device manufacturer.
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