A Division of Fatherland Security spokeswoman acknowledged agents with Fatherland Security Investigations, a segment of ICE that focuses on transnational crime, would be inviting on helping to “vet and mitigate risks” on the Milan Cortina Games starting a week from Friday.
It’s no longer uncommon for the division, which takes the lead in world human trafficking eventualities, to work on marquee events in a foreign country. But its affiliation with ICE has sparked madden from some Italian politicians and media in mild of the U.S. immigration crackdown and two deadly shootings by federal officers in Minnesota this month.
Milan’s mayor described ICE as “a militia that kills,” pronouncing it used to be no longer welcome in the host city.
“Obviously, ICE does no longer behavior immigration enforcement operations in foreign worldwide locations,” DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin acknowledged in a assertion Tuesday. “At the Olympics, ICE’s Fatherland Security Investigations is supporting the U.S. Division of Divulge’s Diplomatic Security Carrier and host nation to vet and mitigate risks from transnational criminal organizations.”
She added, “All safety operations remain below Italian authority.”
Fatherland Security Investigations is an investigative arm of DHS, and though it technically falls below ICE, it makes a speciality of investigating transnational crime and factors with global exchange or financial programs.
Before the 2024 Paris Olympics, Fatherland Security Investigations acknowledged it used to be working with French officials “to fetch” the Games “through the sharing of finest practices.”
The U.S. Embassy in Italy acknowledged in a assertion: “The Divulge Division’s Diplomatic Security Carrier is leading the U.S. safety effort on the Milano–Cortina 2026 Chilly climate Olympics. As in old Olympic events, plenty of federal companies are supporting the Diplomatic Security Carrier, alongside with Fatherland Security Investigations, ICE’s investigative ingredient.”
Italian armed forces personnel stand guard in Piazza del Duomo in Milan on Monday ahead of the Chilly climate Olympics.Piero Cruciatti / AFP through Getty Photographs
Some Italian officials had already reacted with fury.
“This is a militia that kills. It is a militia that enters people’s homes by signing its own permission — it is clear that they are not welcome in Milan,” the city’s mayor, Giuseppe Sala, urged Italian radio RTL 102.5 on Tuesday.
“I wonder: Can we, for once, say no to Trump?” Sala acknowledged, relating to U.S. President Donald Trump. “ICE agents must not come to Italy because they are not aligned with our democratic way of ensuring security.”
Alessandro Zan, a lawmaker for Italy’s opposition Democratic Occasion, wrote Tuesday that it would be “paradoxical to entrust” Olympics safety “to of us which could perchance perchance well perchance be themselves criminals, working with violence and killing harmless of us in frigid blood,” relating to ICE.
“In Italy, we produce no longer need of us that trample on human rights and act outside of any democratic administration. It’s unacceptable to mediate that an agency of this form could per chance well perchance receive any role in any admire in our nation,” he wrote on X.
Senators from the occasion formally requested clarification from the government and assurances that Italian and European Union privateness and cybersecurity standards were complied with.
Later that day, Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi denied files of this however did no longer rule it out.
“Every country delegation decides to protect their own athletes and staff in the way they want. I spoke with local officials and this is not what we heard,” he urged the ANSA files agency.
On Monday, Attilio Fontana, the president of the Lombardy situation where the Games will be held, looked as if it would substantiate it.
“ICE will only be here to watch over U.S. Vice President Vance and Secretary of State Rubio,” he urged ANSA, relating to JD Vance and Marco Rubio. “So it will only be in a defensive measure. I am convinced that nothing will happen.”
But his place of enterprise then acknowledged he did no longer receive any particular files and used to be responding to a hypothetical request, basically based fully on Italian media.
The native governor’s place of enterprise did no longer at the moment acknowledge to requests for observation from NBC News.
