Trump Directive Calls to Turn Border Land Into 'Military Installation'

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Trump Directive Calls to Turn Border Land Into ‘Military Installation’

The plan would put a strip along the southern border under Pentagon control, allowing the military to detain migrants for trespassing on a military base until Border Patrol agents could arrest them.


President Trump speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One on Friday. Tom Brenner for The New York Times

By Maggie Haberman, Eric Schmitt and Hamed Aleaziz
April 11, 2025

President Trump announced a plan on Friday to turn a narrow strip along the Mexican border in California, Arizona and New Mexico into a military installation as part of his effort to curtail illegal crossings. … The plan, set out in a White House memorandum, calls for transferring authority over the 60-foot-wide strip of federal border land known as the Roosevelt Reservation from other cabinet agencies to the Defense Department. Military forces patrolling that area could then temporarily detain migrants passing through for trespassing on a military reservation, said a U.S. military official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss operational matters.

The directive expands a military presence that has increased steadily along the southern border, even as crossings have already dropped precipitously during the Trump administration. The ordering of troops to the border has already put the military in politically charged territory, and, depending on the details of the effort, the plan could run afoul of laws that limit the use of regular federal troops for domestic law enforcement.

The directive says that the border strip will become a “military installation under the jurisdiction of” the Pentagon. Military members would be able to stop anyone crossing into the “military installation” but would not have the power to make immigration arrests, according to the military official. Border Patrol agents could then be summoned to arrest the migrants.

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Adam Isacson, who focuses on border security and human rights at the Washington Office on Latin America, said the memorandum appeared to create a path for using quasi-military personnel to detain migrants. … A section of the memorandum calls for the authorization of state National Guard members to work on the military-controlled strip. If those working at the installation hold migrants until Customs and Border Protection officials pick them up, their use “comes very close to military personnel detaining migrants,” Mr. Isacson said.

Zolan Kanno-Youngs contributed reporting.

Maggie Haberman is a White House correspondent for The Times, reporting on the second, nonconsecutive term of Donald J. Trump.

Eric Schmitt is a national security correspondent for The Times, focusing on U.S. military affairs and counterterrorism issues overseas, topics he has reported on for more than three decades.

Hamed Aleaziz covers the Department of Homeland Security and immigration policy.

Military Mission for Sealing the Southern Border of the United States and Repelling Invasions
Presidential Memoranda
April 11, 2025