ICE arrests hit 49,571 in July, highest monthly tally since October 2022

Agency removed nearly 34,000 in July, a second-term record

Federal immigration agents arrested 49,571 people in July — roughly 1,500 per day — making it the highest monthly total since October 2022 and a 15% increase from the previous record set in June, according to government data obtained by the Deportation Data Project and analyzed by The Guardian. The surge comes as the Trump administration has shifted away from the high-profile raids that defined its immigration enforcement last year, toward quieter operations at traffic stops, scheduled office appointments and homes.

A Guardian analysis of the data found July was the first month of Trump’s second term in which a majority of those arrested — 51% — had no criminal convictions or charges, a figure that sits in tension with the administration’s stated focus on targeting people with criminal records.

Removals also reached a record in July. Nearly 34,000 people were deported — an average of about 1,100 removals per day — the most since the start of the second Trump administration.

The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Customs and Border Protection, has been scaling up toward the White House’s stated goal of 2,000 arrests per day, boosted in part by a $70 billion funding surge. Immigrants are being arrested at traffic stops, at scheduled ICE office appointments, outside their homes and, increasingly, at U.S. airports, according to attorneys and advocates interviewed by The Guardian.

“The way that people are being detained is far less flashy, but we are still continuing to see arrests,” Melissa Shepard, director of legal services at the southern California-based immigrant-services group ImmDef, told The Guardian. “It’s just on a quieter scale instead of, you know, 10, 12 officers making one arrest, you have a handful of officers pulling someone over.” Shepard said ImmDef has recently advised even clients who are legally cleared for travel to avoid flying because of the increase in airport enforcement.

Immigration arrests have become harder for bystanders to identify, because local police officers operating under 287(g) agreements — a federal program that deputizes local law enforcement to carry out immigration enforcement — often resemble routine traffic stops, according to The Guardian. DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin has called 287(g) “the greatest partnership we can have” and identified it as central to his goal of conducting enforcement in “a more quiet way.”

In recent weeks, enforcement has been particularly focused on the Springfield, Ohio, area, where a large community of Haitians with temporary protective status settled in recent years. Advocacy groups there said Haitians were being called in to ICE offices and fitted with ankle monitors. The first deportation flight to Haiti since a Supreme Court ruling cleared the way for the administration to strip TPS from 50,000 Haitians and 6,100 Syrians landed last week, according to The Guardian. TPS protections for Salvadorans are scheduled to expire in September, ending protection for about 170,000 people.

“I am anticipating and a little afraid for what it’s going to look like with the end of TPS,” Shepard said. “I think we are at the precipice.”