The Trump administration’s 2017 creation of the VOICE Office—an anti-immigrant smear campaign with historical roots in Nazi Germany—wasn’t just widely condemned, it was almost universally ridiculed. Reporter Robbie Gramer tweeted at the time that the office was flooded with prank callers reporting crimes committed by space aliens. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) was quick to deny the reports, claiming the propaganda office experienced “no disruption.” That, according to newly-obtained internal emails, was a lie.
Prank calls fully upended the system, leaving operators unable to answer more than 98 percent of incoming calls during the protest as the media relations team attempted to contain the narrative. In reports and emails produced in the first days of operation, ICE officials described an “overwhelming” amount of calls. The day after the launch, the office received more than 16,400. Of those, only a little more than 2,100 were placed into a queue, and only 260 answered. Callers in the queue waited as long as 79 minutes to reach an operator. An official noted that, should the rate of calls continue, they would need an additional 400 operators to field the hotline.
The Trump administration also claimed the office was a resource for crime victims, but this was also a lie. Reports show that, in the first days after launch, the number of callers actually seeking crime information was minuscule. In reality, the office was meant as a way to harass immigrants, people that racists and thugs perceived to be immigrants, or just anyone that pissed them off for one reason or another.
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