The Deportation Con: Two Months Later, How is this aging?
Two months ago, I argued that Trump’s deportation campaign was the most expensive marketing operation in American history—theater dressed up as enforcement, with numbers inflated by an invented “self-deportation” category that no previous administration ever used. (See: The Deportation Con: How Trump’s Immigration Theater Obscures Obama’s Quiet Efficiency)
The data since November hasn’t vindicated the administration. It’s made my case stronger.
The Numbers Gap Has Become a Chasm
In November, I noted that independent trackers showed formal deportations roughly matching Obama’s pace despite vastly increased spending. The gap between DHS claims and verified removals has since widened into something approaching farce.
DHS now claims 622,000 deportations in Trump’s first year, plus 1.9 million “self-deportations”—a total of 2.5 million people allegedly removed.
Where does that 622,000 come from? DHS uses the term “deportations” rather than the standard “removals”—which lets them combine different categories without explaining the mix. They haven’t released the methodology or a breakdown.
Where did that 1.9 million figure come from? A blog post by the Center for Immigration Studies—an anti-immigration think tank—using Current Population Survey data that the Census Bureau itself says shouldn’t be used to measure population changes. Even CIS included caveats that the apparent decline might be a statistical artifact. DHS took that estimate and ran with it.
No previous administration ever counted “self-deportation.” It’s a nice sounding term, but what constitutes a self-deportation? There’s no established methodology for measuring it, and DHS hasn’t proposed one. We’ll stick with actual removals that independent sources can verify.
The Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC), a nonpartisan research organization at Syracuse University that obtains case-by-case records directly from ICE through Freedom of Information Act requests, puts the actual number at 290,603 total ICE removals during the Trump administration. DHS claims nearly double that.
The Brookings Institution, using ICE detention management reports, estimates 310,000-315,000 removals for 2025—a figure “lower than some public statements from the administration.” DHS’s claimed 622,000 is nearly double these independent analyses of ICE’s own data.
Meanwhile, TRAC reports the total is “just 7 percent more than were removed in FY 2024 during the last full year of the Biden administration despite the enormous increase in resources and government personnel devoted to this effort.”
Seven percent more. For $170 billion in new enforcement funding through 2029.
To put that in perspective: the enhanced ACA subsidies that expired on December 31—leaving 22 million Americans facing premium increases averaging 114%—cost roughly $35 billion per year. The detention expansion alone ($45 billion over four years) could have funded those subsidies for more than a year. The full $170 billion could have extended them through 2030. Instead, working families are watching their health insurance premiums double while the government spends far more to achieve a 7% increase in deportations of people who mostly aren’t criminals.
The “Worst of the Worst” Lie Has Collapsed
TRAC’s data tells the story. As of November 2025, 73.6% of ICE detainees had no criminal conviction whatsoever. Among those with convictions, most were for minor offenses like traffic violations.
Stephen Miller’s reported May directive—”Why aren’t you at Home Depot? Why aren’t you at 7-Eleven?”—has been fully implemented. Even if that quote were apocryphal, the arrest composition makes the policy direction unmistakable. ICE is raiding worksites while the 435,000 unauthorized immigrants with criminal convictions that ICE told Congress it had identified remain largely untouched.
DHS’s response to these numbers is revealing. They now argue that people without U.S. criminal records might have “warrants or criminal histories outside of the U.S., or otherwise pose a threat to national security”—but have released no data showing how many fall into those categories. When your defense is “trust us, they’re probably criminals somewhere,” you’ve already lost the argument.
What I Got Wrong
In November, I projected 350,000-400,000 formal ICE removals for Trump’s first full fiscal year. The actual number came in lower—around 290,000-340,000 depending on source—because the administration’s inefficiency exceeded even my skeptical estimates. They spent more and achieved less than I predicted.
I also underestimated how explicitly the administration would abandon even the pretense of targeting criminals. The shift to arresting anyone, anywhere, regardless of criminal history, happened faster and more completely than I anticipated. Miller’s “Home Depot” directive wasn’t subtext—it became operational doctrine.
The $170 Billion Question, Revisited
Two months ago, I asked whether the goal was genuinely removing dangerous criminals or appearing tough for political purposes.
The data now makes the answer unmistakable. If the goal were public safety, you’d prioritize the 435,000 immigrants with criminal convictions ICE says it has identified. Instead, 73% of detainees have no conviction at all.
We are paying a huge cost for a 7% improvement in what Biden was already getting for removals. That’s not enforcement failure—it’s enforcement designed for optics, not outcomes.
We are paying for theater, not results.