'Examine All Passengers and Crew Members'; New Details About Puerto Rico CBP Airport Operation
The total expenses for "Operation Cupid's Nest" were $59,487.
Last year, I reported on “Operation Cupid’s Nest,” a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) operation that involved “asking all travelers in the TSA checkpoint line their flight destination and their country of citizenship.” At the time, there were very few available details other than what was available in public court records. However, I recently received a response to a records request that contains new details about the operation and I am sharing them here for the first time.
“The primary objective was to examine all passengers and crew members departing for CONUS [contiguous United States] to determine alienage and immigration status,” reads the heavily redacted after action report.
The operation was meant to target undocumented immigrants who entered without inspection, overstayed their visa or entered after being deported who might believe they won't be inspected because they’re traveling inside the United States. Per the documents, CBP agents were assigned to travel document checker stations at Transportation Security Administration (TSA) checkpoints to help verify documents and identify undocumented migrants.
While the original estimated overtime cost for the operation was $20,800, expenses related to the operation climbed to $59,487, nearly triple the original amount. The vast majority of these expenses went to “case processing of [REDACTED] encountered,” according to the documents.
The location and duration of the operation are redacted, but the chain of command lists Roberto Vaquero, director of CBP field operations in San Juan, Puerto Rico at the top. While the names of the other agents listed are redacted, their location also appears to be San Juan. Per my previous reporting, an arrest related to Operation Cupid’s Nest took place on Feb. 16, 2025 at Luis Muñoz Marín International Airport in Carolina, Puerto Rico.
One of the documents received is an email thread concerning the aforementioned arrest. There’s not much information there, other than the undocumented immigrant who was arrested at the TSA checkpoint said “don’t do this to me” when he was being instructed to move for further examination by CBP agents.
While the FBI told me that they could not confirm or deny the existence of the operation when I asked last year, one of the documents says that the migrant arrested at LMM had been turned over to the FBI on Feb. 17, 2025.
Iliana Pacheco, a Mexican-American nurse who's a U.S. citizen was questioned about her immigration status at LMM Airport when coming back from a Valentine's Day getaway on Feb. 16, 2025. Last year, she told me that a federal immigration agent told her she "fit the description" when she asked why she had been stopped.
Several undocumented immigrants have been detained at LMM Airport since January 2025. Some where attempting to travel to the the contiguous United States and others were traveling to the Dominican Republic, according to court records. A USA Today investigation found that five women in "ongoing legal immigration process[es]" were detained at airport checkpoints in Puerto Rico and the U.S Virgin Islands in mid-February 2025. One of the women was detained at LMM Airport while returning from her honeymoon.
Approximately 15.4 million travelers were screened by a TSA checkpoint during the week of Valentine’s Day in 2025, according to TSA data. The mixture of surveillance and databases that immigration officials have access to at airport checkpoints has led to multiple people being arrested, deported, and in one case, allegedly tortured, according to The Verge.
The documents referenced in this article can be found here, here, and here.
