Trump administration deported 980,000 migrants in 18 months: Report

President Donald Trump administration deported 980,000 migrants during the first 18 months of the second term, according to a new Migration Policy Institute (MPI) analysis.

The analysis showed that the deportations were higher than under the former president Joe Biden administration and Trump’s first term, but still well below early-2000s levels.

It noted that the Trump administration was on track to complete about 660,000 deportations in fiscal year (FY) 2026, up from an annualised count of 620,000 during the first year of his current administration. 

“That is 26 per cent above the average for FY 2021–2024 but below the 1.86 million deportations recorded in FY 2000 and well short of the administration’s goal of 1 million a year,” the MPI analysis stated.

According to the MPI, 69 per cent of the 980,000 deportations carried out by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) between January 20, 2025 and July 31, 2026 were of unauthorised immigrants initially intercepted at the border despite U.S.-Mexico border encounters at historic lows.

The MPI Visiting Senior Fellow Marc Rosenblum, noted that arrests that originated in communities in the U.S. interior accounted for a growing share of deportations, rising from 28 per cent in 2025 to 39 per cent in July 2026.

Mr Rosenblum, who is a former executive director of the DHS Office of Homeland Security Statistics, further stated that the pace of deportations resulting from interior arrests had doubled, increasing from 8,000 per month on average in the first three months of Mr Trump’s second term to 19,000 per month on average between May and July 2026.

“At a time when unprecedented resources and policy attention are being directed at increasing arrests and deportations, this analysis fills a critical gap in understanding immigration enforcement trends,” stated Doris Meissner, director of MPI’s U.S. Immigration Policy Program.

The analysis noted that 61 per cent of ICE deportations, which excluded those resulting from a border turnaround, were of non-citizens who had been in the U.S. at least two years, adding that 390,000 deportations in all—and 15 per cent (90,000) were of immigrants who had been in the country 10 or more years.

“Among deportations of individuals with two or more years of U.S. residence, 71 per cent (about 280,000) had no criminal conviction. For those with 10 or more years of U.S. residence, 61 per cent (57,000) had no criminal conviction.

“Across all 980,000 deportations carried out by ICE or CBP, 20 per cent (190,000) involved a non-citizen convicted of a crime. And just 31 per cent of removals were of convicted criminals, compared to an average 44 per cent criminality rate for FYs 2009–2021,” it noted.

Noting that the most common convictions were for illegal entry or re-entry (23 per cent of all criminal removals) and traffic offences, including driving under the influence (21 per cent), the analysis showed that a growing share of deportations had been returns rather than formal removals in a major break with the pre-COVID-19-pandemic period.

“While the total number of immigrants departing the United States through deportation or ‘self-deportation’ are much higher than at any previous time dating back at least to 2014, it is highly unlikely that 3 million immigrants have departed the country—much less 3 million unauthorized immigrants,” it added.

The MPI report came days after the independent UN human rights warned that the U.S. policy of sending migrants and asylum seekers to third countries was exposing people to torture, persecution and enforced disappearance.