ICE Deports 483,200 People in Fiscal 2026
Homeland Security reports the highest removal total in the agency's 23-year history, a figure that falls short of the administration's annual target of one million.
By Sanjay Caldwell ·
Immigration and Customs Enforcement removed 483,200 people from the United States during the fiscal year that ended on September 30, 2026.
The Department of Homeland Security announced the figures on Wednesday, marking the highest deportation total in the agency's 23-year existence. This count surpasses the previous peak of 405,090 recorded in 2014 under President Barack Obama. The 2026 total also represents a 9% increase over the prior year's high of 442,640 and a 78% jump from the 271,480 removals recorded in 2024, the final year of the Biden administration.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin attributed the increase to the agency's expanded operational capacity. "Thanks to President Trump’s leadership, ICE has been unleashed to target and remove illegal aliens so that we can save American lives," Mullin said in a statement. The release, however, omitted detailed breakdowns regarding the criminal histories of the deportees, a data point that experts say is essential for context.
Marc R. Rosenblum, a visiting fellow at the Migration Policy Institute and former DHS statistics official, noted that the agency has doubled its staffing and received support from other law enforcement bodies. "It is accurate that ICE is making record numbers of arrests," Rosenblum said. He added that the sparse data in the announcement prevents a detailed view of the operational reality.
The reported total falls significantly below the White House goal of one million deportations per year, a target set when Congress provided billions in additional funding to the immigration bureaucracy. Previous data from the Deportation Data Project indicated that in July, only about one-quarter of removed individuals had criminal convictions, while more than half faced no formal charges. This contrasts with President Trump's campaign pledge to target the "worst of the worst."
The enforcement strategy has faced political challenges following high-profile operations in Minneapolis earlier this year. More than 2,000 federal officers were deployed to the city, leading to confrontations with protesters. Two U.S. citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, both 37, were killed during the clashes. The administration subsequently reduced the visibility of its operations, though arrest numbers quickly returned to record levels in quieter sweeps.
By the midterm elections last week, the immigration stance had influenced voting patterns, with some Republican rural districts voting Democratic. The historical context for removal rates remains distinct; the highest recorded number of deportations occurred in the early 1950s under President Dwight D. Eisenhower, when the total crested at 1.1 million in 1954.
