NEW: ICE Reports Highest Monthly Arrest Totals Of Trump’s Second Term

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrested 49,571 people in July 2026, the highest monthly total recorded during President Donald Trump’s second term, according to government data analyzed by the Associated Press.

The July figure represents a 15 percent increase from the 43,021 arrests recorded in June and a 70 percent rise from the 29,241 arrests in February. February’s total followed an enforcement surge in Minnesota earlier in the year. Data provided by ICE to the University of California, Berkeley’s Deportation Data Project and obtained through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit formed the basis of the analysis.

In the month before Trump took office in January 2025, monthly immigration arrests hovered a little over 8,000. Those figures consisted largely of individuals transferred from city or state jails and prisons to ICE for removal proceedings.

During the first year of the second Trump administration, arrest numbers increased as restrictions on the locations and categories of individuals ICE could target were loosened. The agency also received substantial additional funding in 2025, which led to the hiring of 12,000 additional agents. By December 2025, monthly arrests exceeded 40,177.

Arrests briefly fell to 30,000 earlier this year after two far-left activists were shot while attacking ICE agents in Minneapolis. The totals remained rather steady for several months before rising above 43,000 in June and reaching 49,571 in July.

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BREAKING: ICE arrests jumped to nearly 50,000 in July, the highest monthly total of President Trump’s second term. https://t.co/CWIwAeLwSm

— The Associated Press (@AP) August 25, 2026

The increase occurred amid a change in operational approach. Earlier high-profile enforcement actions in major cities drew significant public attention. Subsequent efforts shifted toward operations that received less media coverage while continuing to result in arrests, according to the analysis.

Texas and Florida accounted for nearly 20,000 of the July arrests. Both states have expanded use of 287(g) agreements, which authorize participating local and state law enforcement agencies to perform certain immigration enforcement functions in coordination with ICE.

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said shortly after his confirmation earlier this year that the agency would be shifting to a lower visibility approach. “Our arrests are on track, our deportations are way up, and we’re going to continue to go after the worst of the worst,” he said on one occasion. “That’s our focus. We’re trying to get the criminals off our streets.”

Separate reporting based on internal agency figures indicated that ICE recorded more than 46,000 book-ins to detention in July, with an average of approximately 1,500 individuals entering custody each day. Some of those individuals had first been encountered by Customs and Border Protection. Detention populations approached previous peaks recorded earlier in the administration, with figures near 68,000 reported in early August.

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