PHILADELPHIA — Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have arrived at Philadelphia International Airport, one day after they were deployed at other airports across the country.

At the Terminal D security checkpoint Tuesday morning, at least a dozen ICE agents wearing tactical vests with “POLICE ICE” emblazoned on the back stood in place observing. Agents from Enforcement and Removal Operations and the Department of Homeland Security were also present.

ICE agents stationed themselves at regular and PreCheck security lanes while others patrolled the airport terminals.

Some travelers walked by without giving the agents much attention, while others stopped to shake hands with immigration enforcement officers.

LaShanda Palmer, president of AFGE Local 333, which represents Transportation Security Administration employees at the Philadelphia and Wilmington airports, said she saw ICE agents at Terminal B while she was working the checkpoint there Tuesday. The agents, she said, are supposed to be there for “line control.”

They did “nothing” and stood near steps or a window, not speaking, she said. Some smiled and some didn’t.

It is unclear how many agents are being deployed to Philadelphia. DHS did not respond to a request for comment. The airport was aware ICE was “assisting” TSA as that agency’s staffing levels have been affected by the partial government shutdown, a PHL spokesperson said, referring further questions to the federal agencies.

The move to send ICE agents to Philadelphia has drawn a sharp rebuke from some lawmakers, though Mayor Cherelle L. Parker has not commented publicly.

City Council member Rue Landau, a Democrat who co-authored pending city legislation aimed at curtailing ICE operations in the city, said the federal government should “work with Congress to properly end the shutdown and let TSA workers return to their jobs.”

”ICE already makes many Philadelphians feel unsafe to leave their homes or engage with public resources," Landau said. “Adding ICE agents into the mix at the airport, a place where many immigrant residents already feel at risk, only adds to that fear.”

City Council member Nicolas O’Rourke and District Attorney Larry Krasner held a news conference at the airport Tuesday afternoon. By the time the duo began walking through Terminal D around 3 p.m., ICE agents had disappeared from the area.

Krasner echoed his previous comments, invoking the names of the two U.S. citizens who were shot and killed in Minneapolis by ICE in January: Continue to film agents and other law enforcement officers.

“We need to keep filming law enforcement. That is the only way we really know the details of what happened to Alex Pretti and Renee Good,” Krasner said.

Steve Papelian, 73, drove more than an hour from Nazareth to Philadelphia to protest ICE’s presence at the airport. Equipped with signs equating immigration enforcement to the paramilitary forces of Nazi Germany, Papelian, a former schoolteacher, displayed his message to travelers walking by who ignored him, applauded his sign, or shared appreciation for ICE. “God Bless ICE,” one passerby said to Papelian. Another said, “Thank you for your work.”

Inside the Terminal D bathrooms, someone also placed anti-President Donald Trump and anti-ICE flyers in stalls, with depictions of a middle finger and disparaging remarks about the president and immigration enforcement.

The agents’ controversial presence has worsened morale, Palmer said.

“The chaos that is attached to them, we don’t need that in any airport,” she said.

As TSA staff continued to work without pay, national AFGE president Everett Kelley said: “We’ve been hearing about progress and optimism for weeks. Our members cannot eat optimism. They cannot pay rent with progress. They need a paycheck.”

The Trump administration is deploying ICE agents to 14 airports nationwide as security wait times balloon because of the partial government shutdown that began Jan. 31.

Despite reports of lengthy security checkpoint waits in places like Houston, PHL was operating with minimal delays.

Helping to keep lines moving was the fact that Philadelphia had some of the lowest TSA staff call-outs nationally on Monday, the Department of Homeland Security said. Of the roughly 900 TSA workers at Philadelphia’s airport, 19.7% called out. In Houston, where checkpoints have reportedly taken three hours to get through, 40.3% of the TSA workforce called out.

Nearly 11% of the national TSA workforce, or 3,200 employees, called out Monday, and at least 458 have quit altogether since the shutdown began, according to DHS. TSA workers could miss another paycheck Friday if Congress can’t agree on a deal.

Three security checkpoints in Philadelphia are temporarily closed because of the staffing challenges. But even at some of the busiest times of the day, waits to get through security were just 10 to 15 minutes.

Hearing of delays throughout the country, friends Sydney Keninitc and Victoria Jordan drove from Maryland to arrive five hours before their 3:30 p.m. flight.

“We came here so early today thinking it was going to be a long wait for security checkpoints,” Jordan said. “We saw photos of the lines at other airports, but there is almost no delay here.”

_____

©2026 The Philadelphia Inquirer. Visit inquirer.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.