The US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrested nearly 50,000 people in July, recording the agency’s highest monthly arrest total since President Donald Trump returned to office, according to newly released government data.
ICE made 49,571 arrests during the month, representing a 15 per cent increase from the 43,021 arrests recorded in June and a 70 per cent rise from the 29,241 arrests made in February.
The figures, provided by ICE to the University of California, Berkeley’s Deportation Data Project and analysed by The Associated Press, highlight the continued expansion of the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement campaign.
The increase comes despite an apparent change in strategy earlier this year, when the administration moved away from highly publicised immigration operations in major cities following widespread protests and criticism.
Instead, enforcement has increasingly focused on arrests that have attracted less public attention but have continued to affect immigrant communities across the country.
Before Trump took office in January, monthly ICE arrests stood at just over 8,000. The figure largely consisted of immigrants transferred to federal custody after being held in local or state jails and prisons.
Arrests began rising after the Trump administration eased restrictions on the people and locations targeted by ICE while providing the agency with additional funding.
By December, ICE arrests had exceeded 40,000, according to government data obtained through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.
The number later dropped to about 29,000 in February following an enforcement operation in Minnesota that sparked protests and criticism from Democratic lawmakers.
However, arrests began climbing again in June, when more than 43,000 people were detained, before reaching nearly 50,000 in July.
Texas and Florida accounted for almost 20,000 of the July arrests, underscoring the growing importance of both states to the administration’s deportation campaign.
The two states have expanded cooperation with ICE through 287(g) agreements, which allow participating state and local law enforcement agencies to assist federal authorities with immigration enforcement.
The surge also comes after Congress provided ICE with billions of dollars in additional funding. The agency has since moved to expand its workforce, including plans to hire about 12,000 deportation officers and investigative agents.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin had earlier pledged to keep ICE out of the headlines, suggesting that the administration would adopt a less publicly confrontational approach to immigration enforcement.
However, the latest arrest figures indicate that the administration has continued to pursue President Trump’s broader mass-deportation agenda, even as the nature and visibility of enforcement operations have changed.
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