President Donald Trump’s first year has been marked by an “unprecedented” attack on migrants in the United States, with a heavy-handed policy that combined record arrests, increasingly violent tactics, restrictions on legal migration and heavy use of executive action, the humanitarian and economic consequences of which, experts warn, will be felt for years to come.
Last year, a total of 622,000 citizens were deported since the beginning of the current term, according to data from the Department of Homeland Security.
Trump’s first year on immigration
While this is a high figure, it falls short of the 778,000 repatriations in the last full fiscal year of Joe Biden’s administration and far short of the Republican pledge of one million annual repatriations.
To boost the numbers, the Administration resorted to measures that have been harshly criticized and challenged in the courts, such as the expulsion of migrants to third countries.
In the first year, hundreds of people were sent to at least 14 countries other than their country of origin, including Cameroon, El Salvador, Poland, Rwanda and South Sudan.
Record arrests and abuse allegations
ICE claims this video is edited. It is not.
DHS asked us to take it down. We refused.
Pass it on.Agents brutally detain U.S. citizen community volunteer-kneel on his head & neck.
After George Floyd murder-it is not legal to put a knee on a suspect “that makes breathing hard or… pic.twitter.com/ux0bhtBpkf
– LongTime🤓FirstTime👨💻 (@LongTimeHistory) January 16, 2026
Arrests did reach historic levels.
On average, more than 73,000 migrants remained in custody, the highest number since the creation of the Department of Homeland Security in 2001.
The American Immigration Council warns that the government “is incarcerating hundreds of thousands of people – most with no criminal record – in a harsh detention system that makes it nearly impossible to fight their cases or achieve freedom.”
Organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and Amnesty International have described conditions in the centers as “inhumane”, with reports of overcrowding and physical and psychological abuse.
2025 was the deadliest year in at least two decades for people in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody, with more than 30 deaths.
ICE: more agents, more confrontation
Looks like images from any dystopian movie where everything collapses and paramilitary groups take over, but it’s ICE and the US under Trump. Minneapolis is the rehearsal for the regime change the country is in.https://t.co/CzBhSk0agR pic.twitter.com/DVvGqQHYkA
– Eduardo Bayón (@edubayon_) January 16, 2026
According to official figures, the number of ICE agents doubled, from about 10,000 to 22,000, and many were deployed in cities governed by Democrats such as Chicago or Minneapolis.
Various NGOs have criticized the violent tactics and direct confrontation with residents. Since the start of the second Trump administration, federal agents have shot at people in some 30 raids, according to data from the specialized portal The Trace.
Under the new Republican administration, agents also began wearing ski masks to cover their faces and operating in unmarked vehicles.
The emphasis on detentions resulted in arrests of people with citizenship or legal status: more than 170 U.S. citizens were detained by immigration agents, according to ProPublica.
ICE also transferred arrests to immigration courts and US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) offices, detaining migrants in legal proceedings, including spouses of citizens or persons about to naturalize.
The government launched an offensive to eliminate programs such as Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for citizens of 11 countries – among them Venezuela, Haiti and Honduras – and the humanitarian parole created during the Biden Administration. As a result, more than one million legal entrants were at risk of deportation.
For Houston-based immigration attorney Juan Molina, these decisions create a paradox.
“They are unconsciously rewarding the person who was illegal and never tried to legalize their status; those people have more benefits than the person who tried to do it the right way,” he told EFE.
Closed border and fewer crossings
The border is more guarded than ever. Border Patrol detains and deports illegal crossers. You can be banned from the U.S. for life. #NiLoIntentes pic.twitter.com/U9bVLL1vX6m
– U.S. Embassy in Mexico (@USEmbassyMEX) January 18, 2026
At the border, the elimination of the possibility to apply for asylum (both at ports of entry and after irregular crossings) caused a plunge in crossings and apprehensions to the lowest levels in 50 years, with an average of about 9,700 crossings per month.
The measures extended to legal migration: suspending migrant visas to 75 countries, halting the refugee program, and ending the diversity lottery and various family reunification mechanisms.
Molina also emphasizes a cultural component in the official discourse.
“When you go to the USCIS page or their social networks, there is an emphasis on ‘defending the nation,’ on the idea of invasion and a homogeneous culture, as if that is the reality of the country,” he said.
Executive actions
The Migration Policy Institute (MPI) also highlights the intensive use of executive action.
As of January 7 of this year, Trump has signed 38 executive orders on immigration, about 17% of the total issued in his first year.
MPI estimates that the Administration took more than 500 immigration actions in this period.
In its analysis, the center warns that the government “pushed through sweeping changes in immigration policy, unprecedented in their breadth and scope,” which have made the U.S. “more hostile” not only to undocumented immigrants, but to migrants of all legal statuses, with impacts that “will be felt for years to come.”
Filed under: Trump’s first year on immigration
With information from EFE
