Immigration detention numbers have fallen to their lowest point since last fall, according to newly released data, published with a long delay that the Department of Homeland Security attributed to a partial government shutdown amid funding negotiations.
The data, released by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on April 9, offers a glimpse into the agency’s enforcement operations at a time of heightened public pressure following the fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens, a leadership shakeup, and a growing string of court losses.
Experts said it’s still too early to say if the changes will hold, but pointed to a few possible explanations behind the early April drop.
According to ICE data, the number of people detained climbed to historic high levels since President Donald Trump took office in 2025. Even with the recent decline, it is still significantly higher than at any point during the Biden administration.
Trump campaigned for his second term with the promise of mass deportation, but that came with serious logistical challenges. As the number of people booked into detention each month climbed, the number of people removed did not keep the same pace, leading to more people held in the system.
The surge in people detained from ICE arrests was largely driven by more people without a criminal record, according to ICE data analyzed by USA TODAY. The recent release shows a drop in that population, but it remains the biggest group.
Experts noted an increase in recent court cases that challenge the lack of due process following some detentions. There could be an effort by ICE to release some people ahead of challenges to avoid having to adjust policies on a more permanent basis from these rulings, experts said.
“There’s a question of whether they’re getting the most bang for their buck because they’re spending a lot to detain people who are not easily removable. So, it could reflect a shift in focus,” said David Bier, the director of immigration studies at the Cato Institute.
The latest detention data from ICE shows that at the start of the fiscal year in October, there were 46 court-ordered releases. That number jumped to 1,005 by March — the latest complete month.
“If they don’t have the resources to defend what they’re doing and defend locking people up, they’re going to have to release them or not bring them in in the first place,” Bier said.
In a statement to USA TODAY, DHS claimed that “nearly 70% of ICE arrests” are of immigrants charged or convicted of a crime in the United States.
But the agency’s own data tells a more complex story: As of April 4, 32% of detainees from the ICE arrests had a criminal conviction; 33% had pending charges; while 35%, the largest single group, had no criminal record.
DHS also stated that “more than 3 million” immigrants are “out of the country.” The agency had previously included in its tally over 2 million people who it said had self-deported. A CNN report in March found that DHS internal documents showed the number was closer to 72,000.
The overall detention drop also coincides with changes in immigration leadership after two American citizens were fatally shot in Minneapolis. After mounting backlash, U.S. Border Patrol Chief Greg Bovino, who also oversaw operations in Chicago, took a step back as White House border czar Tom Homan was sent to Minnesota, where he later announced a scale-down of operations.
“I think that and the attention by the public put more pressure to have a more targeted approach,” said Ariel Ruiz Soto, a senior policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute.
Ruiz Soto also added that more time is needed to see if the trend will continue.
“If in a couple of months from now we’re seeing that this decline continues into May or June, the early summer, then we would potentially see this as a defining moment in the administration’s immigration enforcement,” Ruiz Soto said.
ICE has been on a partial shutdown as budget negotiations extend for two months, though the agency still has a significant amount of funding. During Trump’s signature funding bill in 2025, the agency received nearly $75 billion — money it has used to hire more personnel and expand its detention facility infrastructure.
“I think it’s more of the optics and the way that the tactics change, and not so much that there isn’t the capacity for them to detain or arrest more people,” Ruiz Soto said.
Even though DHS is not publishing the entire cache of data that the previous administration did, these limited datasets still help immigration researchers, lawyers, and advocates track immigration enforcement insights, such as who is targeted and how many are in detention.
So far in 2026, it has taken ICE an average of 27 days to update detention data, according to a USA TODAY analysis. Congress requires it to publish the data every two weeks, though it is unclear where the mandate stands during a government shutdown.
Still, Ruiz Soto said that slower and more inconsistent data releases make it hard to pinpoint the impacts of changes in policy or in administrations and leadership.
“Attributing, for example, a judge’s order to a decrease in a particular week could have been helpful. Now the best we can do is monthly averages, but they wouldn’t be able to be specific to the timeline of different policy decisions,” Ruiz Soto noted.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: ICE is detaining fewer people, new data shows. What it could mean
Reporting by Ignacio Calderon. USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
