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U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has awarded a $16.7 million contract to purchase 6,000 pairs of gloves that can deliver painful electric shocks, saying officers would use them to control detainees and protesters who resist.
ICE moved forward with the purchase despite opposition from civil rights advocates and Democratic members of Congress, who said ICE officers cannot be trusted to use them appropriately.
A notice published in a federal database Thursday said ICE entered into a no-bid contract to purchase the gloves from Compliant Technologies LLC, a Kentucky-based firm that manufactures them. The deal includes acquiring 6,000 of the devices along with support equipment and services over the next six months.
Civil rights advocates have said ICE officers already face criticism for their use of force with little oversight or accountability while enforcing President Donald Trump's immigration crackdown.
ICE published the notice hours after a group of U.S. senators, led by Democrat Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada, urged the agency to cancel its plan to buy the gloves. In a letter to ICE's acting director Thursday, Cortez Masto and 15 of her colleagues in the Democratic caucus questioned ICE's need for the devices.
"The blatant and tragic misuse of force in Los Angeles, Chicago, Minneapolis, Houston, Maine, and other locations around the country raises significant skepticism about the agency's professional capability to safely deploy a new tool that could be used to harm Americans without cause," the letter said.
The senators were the latest to express opposition to the plan, which became public this month when ICE published a notice outlining its intent to purchase thousands of "conductive distraction and de-escalation devices" for officers and investigators.
The devices are normal patrol gloves until an officer presses a button to activate the electrical mode. They must be applied directly to someone's skin to produce a shock that causes pain, which is promoted as a way to gain compliance from people who are resisting. They have been used by some local jails and police departments in recent years.