Trump’s ICE has a fitness test agents are failing. I took it. Yikes.

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On Monday, the Atlantic’s Nick Miroff reported that Immigration and Customs Enforcement is facing a problem: More than a third of its recruits who have tried to sign up as part of President Donald Trump’s recent recruitment push cannot pass the fitness test, which apparently consists of pushups, situps, and a one-and-a-half-mile run. In a quoted email from ICE HQ, a leader described the recent candidates as “athletically allergic.” The timed run, two of the officials Miroff interviewed said, was a particular sticking point.

This article resulted in a wave of laughter among culture warriors primed to savor any evidence that MAGA’s masculine swagger is all hat, no cattle. This test seems easy! But it’s simple to say so from behind a keyboard. So a number of us at Slate—where athletic abilities are variable, one might say—decided to try the test, exactly as Miroff described it: “Recruits must do 15 push-ups and 32 sit-ups, and run 1.5 miles in 14 minutes.”

There are things we don’t know about the rules. Are ICE applicants allowed to wear earbuds and put on, say, Rage Against the Machine’s “Killing in the Name Of,” as one of our testers did during the running portion? Can they rest a bit between the run and the pushups and situps, or even do them on different days? An ICE website describing the physical fitness test for HSI Special Agents—a slightly more difficult process—showed one applicant holding another’s feet during the situps. Would this be allowed?

Still, my colleagues and I went ahead anyway, and of six Slatesters who tried the test, all fitness enthusiasts in their 30s and 40s, five passed. One colleague’s 10-year-old joined the challenge on a whim, and passed as well, though this colleague added, “I’m pretty sure he cheated at the situps.” (ICE recruits must be 18, but there’s no upper age limit, so everyone but the 10-year-old would have been eligible.)

One theory emerged from these results: City living helps with cardio. Two Slatesters mentioned that cycling was an everyday cardio practice, and each of these people killed it at the run, despite running not being something they do often. “I was uncomfortable, but I knew it was a level of exertion I could maintain,” said a 33-year-old, one of the bikers. Another, a 45-year-old, added that although it was probably done “in bad form,” he was able to run the mile and a half in 12:17.

The test revealed other things to us: “Just being outside of my normal routine, I felt really awake,” said a 41-year-old podcast producer who is a four-time-a-week CrossFitter and an occasional marathon runner, and who murdered this challenge, finishing the run in 11:54. Another colleague, 35, who is training for the New York City Marathon right now, said that the situps were surprisingly hard: “They used to be much easier for me!”

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I asked the group whether the test makes sense as a gatekeeping method for applicants looking to sign up to wear a face mask while chasing down delivery drivers or restraining parents struggling to be allowed to stay with their children. One said: “I am in pretty good shape, but I feel like this test should probably be more vigorous considering what it’s for?” Another added: “I would say this was not hard for me, but it definitely requires an actual level of fitness and would be hard if I wasn’t a maniac about biking all the time.” A 49-year-old female colleague said, “I dare ICE agents to take ONE Barre class. THAT is a test of fitness and strength.”

Here is where I have to make an embarrassing confession. I, a 48-year-old who lifts weights three times a week and is five weeks into a couch-to-10K program, was Slate’s only failure. It took me 20 (!) minutes to do the run—I hadn’t run that fast since I quit CrossFit in 2021. I went straight into the calisthenics afterward, and ended up breaking the situps into strings of 10 after I got a stomach charley horse. (No, I didn’t know that was possible.) I knew the pushups were a no-go—in the gym, I always use an incline for these—so I did them on my knees, an automatic no-rep.

But I’m not mad, at least about this fitness test. I’m an “always shows up, but gives about 50 percent effort” workout person, and I forgot how good it feels to breathe really hard. It’s also good, sometimes, to see where you stand in relationship to your much fitter colleagues. And for that, and that alone, I must thank United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement for its service.

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