The Briefing
- Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth signed a memo in September 2026 authorizing a seven-month temporary loan of one Active Denial System to DHS, giving CBP the right to test and develop tactics for a weapon that fires an invisible millimeter-wave beam capable of reaching more than half a mile.
- The memo explicitly removes all personnel from the newly renamed Department of War from any operational role, placing full legal and tactical responsibility on DHS — with no public protocol specifying where or how the weapon will be tested or eventually deployed.
- Some current and former Border Patrol agents have questioned whether the weapon fills any real operational gap amid lower crossing numbers and a larger enforcement workforce, while safety experts warn the system could push migrants into dangerous river terrain with no mechanism to control their retreat.
What the Active Denial System Actually Does
The Active Denial System is a nonlethal directed-energy weapon developed under U.S. military programs for area denial, crowd control, and perimeter security, using focused millimeter-wave electromagnetic radiation to trigger an intense but temporary heating sensation on the skin. Informally called the "heat ray" or "pain ray," it fires millimeter waves at a frequency of 95 GHz — a band sitting between microwave and infrared on the electromagnetic spectrum. At that frequency, the beam agitates water molecules in the skin's outermost layer without penetrating further, producing a burning response powerful enough to force an involuntary retreat.
The system includes an automatic mechanism that limits beam duration to reduce the risk of lasting injury. Raytheon built ADS units under U.S. Air Force contracts and also developed a reduced-range commercial variant called the Silent Guardian, though the weapon itself was conceived and directed by the Air Force Research Laboratory and the Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate. The ADS was briefly sent to Afghanistan in 2010 but was pulled back without ever being fired in a combat or law enforcement setting.
The Hegseth Memo: What It Authorizes — and What It Doesn't
The Pentagon has given the Department of Homeland Security permission to test a military-grade heat ray and develop tactics to potentially use it in operations at the southern U.S. border, according to a memo signed by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth last month and obtained by CNN. The document authorizes a temporary seven-month loan of one ADS unit beginning in September and states the system "shall not be operated by DoW (Department of War) personnel" — a reference to the Pentagon, which Trump renamed from the Department of Defense by executive order in September 2025.
That provision strips the military of any operational role, leaving CBP to absorb complete legal responsibility for how a weapon originally designed for battlefield use might ultimately be deployed along a civilian border. The memo further states that DHS is solely accountable for "system employment, use and development of tactics, techniques and procedures." Once the loan period concludes, DHS can file an additional request for continued access, a defense official told CNN. The Pentagon declined to comment, directing all questions to DHS.
Notably, the DHS request did not specify where the weapon would be tested or how it might eventually be used — leaving CBP operating in uncharted legal territory with a directed-energy system that has never been deployed in any American domestic enforcement context.
The Crowd-Dispersal Debate Inside CBP
Internal discussions about using the ADS at the border are not new. Current and former CBP officials confirmed to CNN that these conversations have circulated inside the agency for years without resulting in deployment. El Centro Sector, covering roughly 70 miles of the California-Mexico boundary, conducted an evaluation of the weapon some years ago when Rodney Scott — now the confirmed CBP commissioner — was running that unit. At the time, officials considered whether the system might discourage crossings in river-adjacent areas or help move people out of the water, though the evaluation concluded without a deployment decision.
In 2018, ahead of the midterm elections, CBP officials revisited the proposal, but then-Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen rejected it. The concern was foundational: as one former DHS official told CNN, the central objection was "treating immigrants and citizens like enemy combatants." U.S. officials also weighed deploying it during the 2020 demonstrations that followed the murder of George Floyd, according to a former official familiar with those discussions — a move that ultimately was not taken. Officials also flagged questions over sovereignty: because the ADS's beam can reach more than half a mile, it could affect people still on Mexican soil who have not yet entered U.S. territory, complicating the legal picture further.
Now, even with formal authorization in hand, enthusiasm inside the agency is not uniform. Some Border Patrol agents have privately expressed doubt over whether the tool addresses any actual gap, given declining crossing numbers and a larger enforcement workforce than in previous years.
The Drowning Risk No One Has Solved
The most immediate operational concern isn't the weapon itself — it's the terrain where it would be used. High-traffic crossing areas along the U.S.-Mexico border routinely sit beside the Rio Grande and other swift-moving waterways. An involuntary retreat triggered by a directed-energy beam cannot be aimed or steered, meaning a person driven back from a border agent could run into the river just as easily as away from it.
"Even if they're chasing people back to the river, you don't want them to go in and drown," a former CBP official told CNN. Legal experts have separately raised questions about whether domestic use-of-force standards — which differ substantially from the military rules of engagement under which the ADS was originally built — would even permit deploying the system against civilians approaching a checkpoint. Officials have also previously noted concern that the weapon might incapacitate migrants in the water rather than simply discourage them from crossing.
An Unprecedented Escalation in Border Technology
Deploying the heat ray at the U.S. border would represent an unprecedented move, even for a Trump administration that has made border security a defining priority. The transfer fits a larger pattern of military hardware crossing into civilian enforcement. Earlier this year, CBP used a military anti-drone laser along the El Paso border corridor without properly coordinating with the FAA, triggering the closure of El Paso's airspace. The objects targeted were not independently confirmed to be cartel drones; NBC News later reported they were identified as party balloons. A second incident ended with the U.S. military accidentally shooting down a CBP surveillance drone with the same type of laser system, prompting additional FAA airspace restrictions near Fort Hancock, Texas.
"CBP is continually evaluating new technologies, especially those that enhance operational effectiveness and strengthen mission capabilities," a Customs and Border Protection spokesperson said in a statement.
That framing positions the Active Denial System as an incremental innovation. Critics see it as something more consequential: a pain-compliance weapon placed in civilian hands without a rulebook, in terrain where a retreat triggered by an invisible beam can send a person directly into a river.
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