Todd Lyons, the appearing head of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, is planning to depart the federal authorities later this spring, after main the company on the forefront of President Trump’s deportation crackdown for over a yr, two U.S. officers accustomed to his plan informed CBS Information.
Lyons, a two-decade ICE veteran, informed colleagues that he is planning to depart the company in June to spend extra time with household, together with his sons, in Massachusetts, the officers mentioned, requesting anonymity to debate a transfer that has not been publicly introduced. Lyons is anticipated to hitch the personal sector after leaving ICE.
The anticipated departure will create a management void on the helm of an company that has turn into a flashpoint over its central and extremely seen function in Mr. Trump’s nationwide operation to deport thousands and thousands of immigrants residing within the U.S. illegally.
It isn’t instantly clear who would substitute Lyons. For practically a decade, ICE has had a dozen appearing administrators, missing a Senate-confirmed head since early 2017, on the finish of the Obama administration. Lyons was named appearing ICE director in March 2025.
Discovering a successor for Lyons can even be one of many first main choices for Homeland Safety Secretary Markwayne Mullin, who was confirmed by the Senate final month after Mr. Trump ousted Kristi Noem amid issues about her management type and rising backlash to aggressive immigration enforcement operations in cities like Minneapolis.
In a press release to CBS Information Thursday, Mullin confirmed Lyons’ departure, saying Might 31 is ready to be his final official day. He wished Lyons “luck on his subsequent alternative within the personal sector.”
“Director Lyons has been an amazing chief of ICE and key participant in serving to the Trump administration take away murderers, rapists, pedophiles, terrorists, and gang members from American communities,” Mullin mentioned. “He jumpstarted an company that had not been allowed to do its job for 4 years. Because of his management, American communities are safer.”
An Air Drive veteran who was deployed abroad, Lyons joined ICE in 2007 as an agent in Dallas. He ultimately rose to the No. 2 spot in ICE’s Dallas area workplace, earlier than changing into the sector workplace director of the company’s Boston area, which covers all of New England. Lyons later assumed management roles at ICE headquarters, together with because the assistant director for area operations at ICE’s deportation department, Enforcement and Elimination Operations.
Lyons, who’s well-liked amongst profession ICE officers, publicly embraced Mr. Trump’s crackdown. However he additionally at instances disagreed internally with some administration choices, together with Noem’s effort to raise Border Patrol official Gregory Bovino and process him with main sweeping and controversial roundups in main U.S. cities.
After the deadly shootings of U.S. residents Renee Good and Alex Preti in Minneapolis — and the bipartisan backlash that ensued — Bovino was relieved of his command there. Border czar Tom Homan was despatched to Minneapolis to wind down the operation, and Bovino has since retired from authorities service.
Whereas he allowed ICE brokers to arrest anybody they decided was within the U.S. illegally, Lyons internally pushed for operations to focus on these with felony histories, a inhabitants the company has traditionally prioritized for arrest and deportation, sources accustomed to his efforts informed CBS Information.
Over the previous yr, ICE has confronted intense scrutiny from Democratic lawmakers, a few of whom have referred to as for its abolishment. A rising quantity of People have decried the company’s operations as inhumane and excessively harsh, and lots of have criticized the follow of brokers sporting masks. Democrats in Congress have refused to totally fund the company until the Trump administration agrees to make sure reforms, spurring the continued partial authorities shutdown.
Beneath Lyons’ management, ICE has mounted an enormous push to recruit and rent hundreds of extra deportation brokers, because of $75 billion in funds supplied by the One Large Lovely Invoice Act. He additionally signed a Might 2025 memo, disclosed earlier this yr by a whistleblower, that approved ICE brokers to forcibly enter houses with out judicial warrants throughout sure operations, a marked shift from longstanding company follow and coverage.
