U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement recorded its highest annual arrest and deportation totals in fiscal 2026, the Department of Homeland Security announced Thursday, November 12. The department said arrests exceeded the combined figures from the Biden administration’s final three full fiscal years, while deportations came close to that three-year total.
Officials reported more than 491,000 arrests during the fiscal year. Nearly 475,000 were administrative arrests, a category that also reached its highest recorded annual level for the agency. According to DHS, the overall arrest count was nearly 65,000 higher than the combined total for fiscal years 2022, 2023 and 2024 under former President Joe Biden.
ICE carried out 483,200 deportations in fiscal 2026, according to the department. That surpassed the agency’s previous annual record of 442,640, which had been established the year before. The new figure was fewer than 3,000 below the combined deportation total for the three full fiscal years under Biden cited in the department’s comparison.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin credited President Donald Trump’s leadership for the enforcement figures. He said ICE had been “unleashed” to arrest and remove people in the country illegally, presenting the record totals as a result of the administration’s approach to immigration enforcement.
The department also compared the fiscal 2026 results with those from Biden’s first fiscal year in office. Arrests were more than six times the level recorded during that earlier period, officials said. Deportations were more than eight times higher over the same comparison period, according to the figures announced Thursday.
Monthly arrest figures also reached new heights. Mullin said ICE made 50,925 arrests in August 2026, setting the agency’s record for a single month. September followed with more than 48,000 arrests, which officials described as an increase of more than 300% over the average September total during the previous administration.
Alongside the fiscal-year results, DHS released broader figures for the Trump administration. The department said more than 3 million migrants had left the United States under Trump’s leadership. As of October, it said, the administration had deported nearly 1.2 million people in the country illegally and arrested more than 1.25 million.
Mullin praised ICE personnel as he announced the records. “I couldn’t be prouder of the brave men and women of ICE,” he said.
