Nearly 50,000 ICE arrests in July as Haitians face deportation after TPS ends
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested nearly 50,000 people in July, the highest monthly total since President Donald Trump began his second term, according to government data analyzed by The Associated Press. The surge is landing with particular force on Haitian immigrants, tens of thousands of whom lost deportation protections this summer after the U.S. Supreme Court cleared the way for the administration to end their Temporary Protected Status.
ICE made 49,571 arrests in July, up 15% from 43,021 in June and up 70% from 29,241 in February, the data showed. The month before Trump returned to office, immigration arrests stood at just over 8,000, most involving people already transferred from local or state jails to ICE custody.
Haitians targeted after TPS termination
Among those increasingly caught up in the crackdown are Haitian nationals whose legal status evaporated this summer. In June, the Supreme Court ruled that the Department of Homeland Security has the authority to end Temporary Protected Status with little judicial oversight, upholding the administration’s move to terminate the designation for Haiti
The ruling affected roughly 350,000 Haitians who had been allowed to live and work legally in the United States. Lawyers for Haitian TPS holders warned the decision would put lives at risk, arguing that people who fled Haiti’s violence and instability were now being sent back into it. Homeland Security’s general counsel, James Percival, defended the ruling, saying TPS had become a de facto amnesty rather than the temporary status Congress intended.
Arrests mount in Haitian communities
In Ohio, home to a large Haitian population in Springfield, federal sources told reporters that ICE arrested roughly 300 Haitian nationals in a matter of days in late August as the agency moved from encouraging TPS holders to self-report to actively tracking down those who had not. Among those detained was Gilbert Joubert Adrien, a Haitian pastor arrested at a gas station in Springfield, along with a second Haitian man who was with him, according to Springfield G92, a faith-based group that supports Haitian immigrants in the city.
Deportation flights resume
The first deportation flight to Haiti since the TPS termination landed August 20 in Cap-Haïtien, carrying more than 160 people. It marked the eighth deportation flight to Haiti so far in 2026, and the Department of Homeland Security has signaled flights could increase to twice weekly.
Most deportees declined to speak with journalists on arrival, and several covered their faces for safety, fearing they could be targeted by gangs. One man who identified himself as Jean Diane Louis told the AP he had lived in the U.S. since age 5 and was removed despite disputing the conviction cited in his case. Haiti’s National Office of Migration said the government has little choice but to accept the flights, even as the United Nations warns the country’s capacity to absorb returnees is already stretched thin amid displacement, gang violence and a fragile transitional government.
Nationally, the data reviewed by the AP shows more than half of those arrested by ICE in July had no criminal convictions and were not facing criminal charges; less than a quarter had been convicted of a crime. Texas and Florida together accounted for nearly 20,000 arrests in July. At least 10 people have died in encounters with immigration agents since Trump returned to office.
