GoKawiilICE agents gathered outside Delaney Hall in Newark, New Jersey, during protests against poor conditions in the immigrant detention facility, in May 2026.
ICE agents gathered outside Delaney Hall in Newark, New Jersey, during protests against poor conditions in the immigrant detention facility, in May 2026.
ICE says ‘millions’ of immigrants have left or been deported in Trump’s crackdown. But where are the receipts?
Raphael Romero Ruiz Additional reporting by
The shooting deaths of two immigrants at the hands of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in the past week have brought the Trump administration’s violent crackdown into sharp relief once again, triggering protests and calls for accountability. But the government has kept the total number of people caught up in enforcement efforts under wraps since April, angering conservatives and progressives alike.
Dozens of immigrants have died in ICE detention since Trump took office. In recent days, two people, Lorenzo Salgado Araujo and Joan Sebastian Guerrero, have been fatally shot by ICE agents. In a midterm election year, experts say the need for transparency is urgent. Voices on the political right want proof the president is delivering on his promise to deport millions of people, while others on the left want to know how much damage has been done in immigrant communities.
“Even if there is a good reason for not releasing this information, it still gives the impression they are trying to hide something,” said Jessica Vaughan, director of policy studies for the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates for restrictions on legal immigration. “They should be worried about giving that impression because they are already under so much scrutiny.”
ICE hasn’t released its semimonthly “Detention Management” report on arrests, detentions and deportations since April 9, when the agency reported holding more than 60,000 people in custody.
News media, think tanks and academia have requested the missing data, and ICE has refused to deliver it, sparking at least three separate lawsuits, including one by a far-right group demanding the “true deportation statistics.”
In an email, the Department of Homeland Security told The Marshall Project that, through June 24, the administration had arrested more than 981,000 people and deported 948,000 since Trump took office in January 2025.
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