ICE arrests plunge after pullout from Minnesota; criminal arrests rise

ICE is now booking in fewer than 1,000 migrants a day as the agency has seen its workload plummet after pulling out of Minnesota.

Deportations have also dipped, though not as much.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s latest data, posted this week, shows an average of nearly 1,300 removals a day, down from more than 1,400 during the peak of the Minnesota operation but still well above Biden-era levels.

Even ICE’s detention space is down, with the agency reporting 60,311 beds used as of April 4. In late January, amid Operation Metro Surge, that figure was more than 70,000.

The drops also coincide with the partial shutdown at Homeland Security, which has seen some ICE support staff furloughed, though deportation officers and detention operations are still funded through last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill budget law.

Book-ins are a proxy for arrests, and at the current pace, ICE would be on track for roughly 350,000 a year — well shy of the million mark the White House had set. Deportations are on pace for about 470,000 a year, also below the White House target.

In a February planning document, ICE said it wanted to have 92,600 detention beds available by Nov. 30, which makes the current drop in use surprising.

Rosemary Jenks, policy director at the Immigration Accountability Project, said it’s not clear why the numbers should be dropping, but she said it’s worrisome for a president who ran on mass deportations.

“They obviously need to get back on track and go beyond what they were doing because those numbers are not going to get us where President Trump promised,” she said.

Her group is part of the Mass Deportation Coalition, comprised of a host of groups calling for the administration to find new ways to boost their numbers.

Among the answers the coalition wants is worksite enforcement, where ICE would investigate employers themselves and arrest illegal immigrants working there.

That’s a different approach than the high-profile, street-level enforcement surges during Mr. Trump’s first year, which sparked riots and clashes in the streets of Los Angeles, Chicago and Minneapolis.

The deaths of two Americans in Minneapolis at the hands of DHS officers appear to have changed that.

“I don’t know if an actual decision was made to back off, but it seems pretty clear that they’ve backed off. I think the change in leadership at DHS has contributed,” Ms. Jenks said, referring to Markwayne Mullin succeeding Kristi Noem. “I’m not sure there is clear messaging to ICE at the moment,” Ms. Jenks said.

The Washington Times has sought comment from ICE and Homeland Security for this story.

The data released this week covers from Oct. 1 through April 4, which roughly matches the first six months of the fiscal year.

ICE reported 234,236 removals during that time.

It reported 207,035 book-ins.

Even as overall arrests drop, the ratio of arrestees with criminal records has risen.

Roughly 65% of book-ins in the past two months had criminal convictions or pending charges on their records. That’s up from about 56% earlier this year, amid Operation Metro Surge.

It’s still substantially lower than the Biden years, however, when ICE almost exclusively targeted those with criminal records. In late 2024, for example, 94% of ICE book-ins had convictions or pending charges.

The remainder have immigration violations, which are civil affairs punishable by deportation but are not criminal cases.