Noncriminal ICE arrests spiked in June
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Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrests of people without criminal charges or convictions surged in June, newly obtained data shows.
Why it matters: The numbers illustrate a major shift that came soon after the Trump administration tripled ICE's arrest quota.
Driving the news: People without criminal charges or convictions made up an average of 47% of daily ICE arrests in early June, up from about 21% in early May, before the quota increase.
- The average number of daily arrests for those with charges or convictions also increased in early June, but not to the same degree.
- As of June 26 — the most recent data available — ICE was reporting an average of 930 daily arrests, about 42% of which involved people without charges or convictions.
How it works: That's according to agency data obtained by the UC Berkeley School of Law's Deportation Data Project via Freedom of Information Act requests, and based on seven-day trailing averages.
The big picture: The spike in non-criminal ICE arrests came despite the Trump administration's claimed focus on criminals living in the country illegally.
- And it happened just after the Trump administration told ICE to arrest at least 3,000 people daily, up from 1,000.
Context: Being in the U.S. illegally is a civil, not criminal, violation.
What they're saying: "The media continues to peddle this FALSE narrative that ICE is not targeting criminal illegal aliens," Department of Homeland Security assistant secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement emailed to Axios.
- "The official data tells the true story: 70% of ICE arrests were criminal illegal aliens with convictions or pending charges. Additionally, many illegal aliens categorized as 'non-criminals' are actually terrorists, human rights abusers, gang members and more — they just don't have a rap sheet in the U.S. This deceptive 'non-criminal' categorization is devoid of reality and misleads the American public."
- A DHS spokesperson did not immediately answer Axios' follow-up question about the origins of the 70% figure.
Between the lines: "ICE has the authority to arrest immigrants who are suspected of violating immigration laws, regardless of criminal history," writes Austin Kocher, research assistant professor at Syracuse University's S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications and immigration expert, in an analysis of the new data.
- "Nevertheless, the administration has gone to great lengths in the press and on social media to emphasize the criminality of people they are arresting. Both things can be true, of course. ICE can arrest some people with violent criminal histories and a lot of people without criminal histories."
The latest: New legislation in Congress would stop ICE from detaining — and possibly deporting — U.S. citizens, Axios' Russell Contreras reports.
What's next: Trump's plan to deport millions of immigrants likely will depend not on removing criminals, but on telling people who are in the U.S. legally that they're no longer welcome, Contreras and Axios' Brittany Gibson write.
