Washington — DHS to Test Pentagon's Heat-Ray Weapon at Border

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth signed a memo last month authorizing a seven-month loan of the Pentagon's Active Denial System to the Department of Homeland Security for testing at the US-Mexico border, according to The Guardian, which cited a memo first obtained by CNN.

What did Hegseth's memo actually authorize?

The memo permits a "temporary loan" of the Active Denial System to DHS beginning in September, running seven months, The Guardian reported. DHS can request an extension if it wants to keep using the system beyond that window. The document does not specify an exact deployment plan; The Guardian reported it remains unclear precisely how DHS intends to use the weapon, only that the loan covers "potential operations" at the southern border.

How does the Active Denial System work?

The weapon fires an invisible 95-gigahertz energy beam that penetrates roughly 1/64th of an inch into skin, according to the Guardian's reporting on the technology. A 2009 National Defense University case study, cited in that reporting, describes the effect as "a sensation of intense heat on the surface of the skin" severe enough to produce "an intolerable sensation and reflexive movement" — meaning a target ducks or runs rather than sustaining injury. The system is classified as non-lethal, distinguishing it from kinetic crowd-control tools like rubber bullets or tear gas, which work through physical impact or chemical irritation rather than a directed-energy beam.

Has the Active Denial System ever been used in the field?

No operational deployment has been documented in the nearly two decades since the system was built. The US military sent the Active Denial System to Afghanistan almost 20 years ago but returned it home without firing it, the Washington Post has reported, as cited by The Guardian. Domestically, CBP officials have previously floated using the system in high-traffic illegal-crossing areas or for crowd dispersal, but those plans never advanced to deployment, according to the same reporting. A 2017 test of the system took place in Wellton, Arizona, documented in a Marine Aviation Weapons and Tactics Squadron-1 photograph referenced by The Guardian — evidence the technology has been exercised in controlled settings even as it has sat unused operationally for roughly two decades.

What does DHS say about why it wants the weapon now?

A Customs and Border Protection spokesperson told The Guardian the agency is "continually evaluating new technology, especially technology that can save lives while simultaneously enhancing national security effectiveness." The statement does not name the Active Denial System specifically or confirm a border test date. When The Guardian sought comment from the Pentagon, the department referred questions to DHS, which supplied the same CBP statement — meaning the two agencies responsible for the loan and its intended use issued a single joint line rather than separate accounts of the plan.

Is this the first time the system has come up in a domestic policing context?

No. The Guardian's reporting references a separate episode in which US military police reportedly sought to use the Active Denial System to disperse protesters outside the White House, a request that did not result in deployment. That history means the current border authorization is at least the second documented instance of US officials examining the weapon for use against people on US soil, following the earlier Afghanistan deployment that also ended without the beam being fired.

What happens when the seven-month loan period ends?

Under the terms described by The Guardian, DHS's authorization to use the Pentagon-owned system runs through the seven-month window that began in September, putting the expiration around next spring. Whether testing produces an operational border deployment, a request for extension, or a repeat of the system's two-decade pattern of being loaned without use will depend on decisions neither agency's public statement has addressed. The joint CBP/DHS statement frames the move as technology evaluation rather than a confirmed rollout, leaving open whether the Active Denial System will see its first field use at the border after sitting dormant since its abandoned Afghanistan trial roughly 20 years ago.

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