Trump ICE Enforcement: “Worst of the Worst” Claims vs. Data Reality

Analysis reveals a rising percentage of immigrants arrested by ICE under the Trump administration had no criminal record, often for minor offenses, directly contradicting claims of targeting the worst of the worst criminals and highlighting data transparency issues.

The variation was even larger in cities and states that have been targeted for enhanced immigration enforcement. In the four areas analyzed– Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., Massachusetts and Illinois, the majority of those scooped by ICE had no criminal record (convictions or pending fees). Details on the operations in Minneapolis were not available.

It becomes part of the lack of transparency that has been an issue with the Trump administration, said Putzel-Kavanaugh of the Migration Plan Institute, including that whether the U.S. has the ability to obtain criminal records from an immigrant’s home country is very nation details. Some nations are just much more upcoming regarding sharing such data.

Discrepancy in Enforcement Data

David Bier, the director of immigration researches at the Cato Institute, analyzed nonpublic information from ICE dripped to Cato, and he discovered that amongst those with criminal sentences apprehended by ICE, 8% were founded guilty of violent or building crimes (about 5% were violent criminal sentences).

President Donald Trump has actually consistently urged– as he carried out in a Fact Social message on Jan. 25– that immigration enforcement initiatives are targeted at the “Tens of Millions of Illegal Alien Criminals [that] put into our Country, consisting of Thousands of Countless Convicted Killers, Rapists, Kidnappers, Medicine Dealers, and Terrorists.”

“A charge is not a sentence,” Lauren-Brooke Eisen, senior director for justice at the Brennan Center for Justice, informed us. “Just because someone is charged with a criminal activity. … People are innocent till tested guilty.”.

“They have actually eliminated the prioritization that remained in area under the Biden administration to go after those fierce criminals that they’re highlighting,” Bier said. “They removed that plan and replaced it on Day One with a plan of detaining people who are the most practical to jail.”.

In Trump’s first year, regarding 36.5% of those apprehended by ICE had prior criminal sentences. One more 29.8% faced pending criminal charges.

“We’re not knowledgeable about information that DHS holds, and definitely it’s not been offered in the information that they’ve shared with us about any kind of kind of foreign criminal links,” Blair of the Deportation Data Job stated. “I believe that that’s, honestly, a great deal of bluster.”.

“And that includes really minor attacks. I suggest, not like rape and murder,” Bier said in a radio meeting with KPFA on Jan. 22. “These are somebody had a run-in at a bar or things like that, not severe terrible offenders that committed murder and rape.”.

“We have no chance of understanding if the worst of the most awful are being targeted,” Colleen Putzel-Kavanaugh, an associate policy expert at the Movement Policy Institute, informed us. “The government is not providing us access to that sort of information.”.

Rising Arrests of Non-Criminal Immigrants

Our analysis of ICE arrest data gotten by the Expulsion Information Task found a doubling over time of the percentage without criminal records, implying neither costs neither convictions. In Trump’s first three months in office, 21.9% of those apprehended had no criminal record. The percentage climbed to 34.2% in Trump’s second three months, and afterwards to 40.5% in the three months finishing in mid-October.

The change towards jailing a higher percent of immigrants with no rap sheet appears to accompany the reported pressure from Noem and others in the Trump administration to dramatically boost the number of immigration arrests.

Cato’s findings were corroborated by a New York Times evaluation of ICE information acquired with the Deportation Data Job. Between the period of Jan. 20 and Oct. 15, the Times located that nationwide, 37% of those detained in ICE operations had any type of previous criminal sentence. Simply 7% had a violent sentence. Another 30% had pending criminal charges, and 33% had no criminal charges.

While the variety of apprehensions has actually not reached that objective, the variety of those in ICE detention has actually climbed by about 80% since Might, according to DHS data. (Those in ICE apprehension include arrests transformed an unidentified time period.).

While the number of month-to-month Immigration and Customs Enforcement apprehensions has increased progressively over the initial year of Trump’s second term, the percentage of those jailed that have no criminal sentences or pending fees has actually additionally increased.

“The Trump administration has actually particularly targeted the most awful of the worst,” Division of Homeland Security Assistant Kristi Noem said in an interview in July. “The people that we are going after are those that are fierce wrongdoers, those that are damaging our legislations and those that have last removal orders.”

Take into consideration, in February 2025, the initial full month of Trump’s second term, about 14.7% of those restrained by ICE had no criminal convictions or pending fees. By September, that percent had actually soared to 34.6%, and in January it was 42.7%.

The New York Times analysis kept in mind that while just a fraction of those arrested had been convicted of a terrible crime, “One of the most usual non-violent convictions were for driving drunk and other website traffic offenses.”.

Together, those with criminal convictions or pending costs represented 66% of arrests, which the management has rounded up to 70%. There’s even more context: the pattern over time of higher portions of arrests of individuals with neither a sentence neither pending fee.

At the same time, the percentage of those apprehended by ICE that have criminal convictions– not merely pending fees– fell from 44.7% in Trump’s initial 3 months to 31.8% in the three months finishing in mid-October.

Challenging “Worst of the Worst” Rhetoric

Later that very same program, Autonomous Sen. Chris Murphy disputed those figures. “I heard him [Homan] state that they are carrying out targeted enforcement actions versus wrongdoers. Just not real. The large bulk of individuals they are assembling are serene immigrants.”

While the management has long said it is targeting the “worst of the worst” bad guys, just a smallfraction of those restrained by ICE have been convicted of the type of terrible felony offenses often mentioned by the administration, according to an analysis of leaked ICE data by the libertarian Cato Institute.

Pressing back against records of greater portions of ICE arrests of immigrants without criminal records, management officials have actually declared that those individuals usually have convictions or pending charges in their home countries.

“I assume when you listen to elderly leaders in the Trump administration, what they’re stating is that they’re detaining what they’re calling the, quote, worst of the worst. They’re detaining people that they’re referring to as killers and rapists,” Graeme Blair, associate teacher of political science at UCLA and co-director of the Expulsion Data Job, informed KTLA 5 Information in July. “And I assume that simply really doesn’t inform the story of what they’re doing.”

In very early December, DHS launched what it calls its “Worst of the Worst” site. The purpose, DHS Aide Secretary for Public Matters Tricia McLaughlin claimed, was “so every American can see on their own the criminal prohibited aliens that we are arresting, what criminal activities they dedicated, and which areas we eliminated them from.” The site is loaded with instances of immigrants detained by ICE during the Trump management who have convictions for major terrible felonies, according to DHS.

As we stated, in the very first three months of Trump’s presidency, concerning 22% of those apprehended by ICE had no criminal record. By the three months ending in mid-October, that had leapt to around 40.5%.

In Trump’s very first three months in office, 21.9% of those jailed had no criminal record. In Trump’s very first year, concerning 36.5% of those detained by ICE had prior criminal convictions. 64% of those detained by ICE had criminal sentences. Between the duration of Jan. 20 and Oct. 15, the Times located that nationwide, 37% of those detained in ICE procedures had any type of previous criminal sentence. Another 30% had pending criminal costs, and 33% had no criminal costs.

A: No checks are being released. Head of state Donald Trump said he wishes to make use of toll earnings to provide “dividend” payments of “at least $2,000” to “lower-income people and middle-income individuals.” But no formal plan has actually been completed and accepted by Congress.Fiscal policy professionals say there’s inadequate toll profits for that.

“Under Head of state Trump’s management, we are looking to establish an objective of a minimum of 3,000 apprehensions for ICE daily and President Trump is going to maintain pressing to get that number up higher every single day,” senior White Home adviser Stephen Miller said on Fox Information on May 29.

“A person with a pending charge that is not founded guilty is not generally called a ‘criminal’ in our criminal system,” David Hausman, an assistant teacher at the University of California, Berkeley Institution of Law who guides the Expulsion Data Job, told us.

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“And let’s bear in mind truth data, real information, 70%, around, it goes anywhere from 60% to 70%, of people that are detained are bad guys, bottom line,” White House boundary czar Tom Homan stated on NBC’s “Satisfy journalism” on Jan. 11.

Data Transparency Issues in DHS Reports

DHS’ public data does not give a breakdown of the types of criminal offenses devoted by those with criminal convictions, nor of the kinds of criminal offenses encountered by those with pending costs, that would permit the general public to examine Noem’s case regarding the percent apprehended that have actually devoted fierce crimes. (In a similar way, the information can’t answer whether the “vast bulk” are “relaxed,” as Murphy declared– though it is exact that the large bulk have not been convicted of a crime in the united state).

DHS did not respond to our queries for this tale, DHS’ McLaughlin has claimed, “Many of the people that are counted as ‘non-criminals’ are actually terrorists, human rights abusers, mobsters and more; they just do not have a rap sheet in the U.S.”.

While the Trump management firmly insists that it is targeting the “worst of the worst” in its migration enforcement, it has not provided information to validate that, and the information that is readily available recommends the claim has actually become less exact over time.

Comparative, just 869 of those apprehended by ICE in December 2024 (Biden’s last complete month) had no sentences or pending costs. 64% of those detained by ICE had criminal convictions. In January, 2026, it was approximately 29%, according to ICE data.

“Every private [arrested or apprehended] has actually devoted a crime, however 70% of them have committed or have fees against them on violent crimes and crimes that they are charged with or have actually been founded guilty of that have actually originated from various other nations,” Noem stated on CBS’ “Face the Nation” on Jan. 18.