Trump’s Deportations Rise, but New Report Finds Administration Still Falling Short of Target

By: Ebenezer Adugyamfi & Emmanuel Ayiku for GhanaianNewsCanada
22 OCTOBER 2026

The administration of United States President Donald Trump has increased deportations as part of its sweeping immigration crackdown, but the number of people removed from the country remains below the White House’s stated goal of one million deportations annually, according to a new analysis by the Migration Policy Institute.

The report estimates that the Department of Homeland Security carried out approximately 980,000 deportations during the first 18 months of Trump’s second term, which began in January 2025.

During the most recent fiscal year examined, the administration deported an estimated 660,000 people, representing a 26 per cent increase over the average annual figure recorded during former President Joe Biden’s administration from 2021 to 2024.

Despite that increase, the figures remain below the one-million-per-year target associated with Trump’s mass-deportation agenda.

The findings offer a new assessment of the administration’s immigration enforcement efforts at a time when the government has stopped regularly publishing detailed deportation statistics, making it more difficult for researchers and the public to independently evaluate its progress.

Deportations increase under Trump

Trump returned to the White House in January 2025 promising a major expansion of immigration enforcement, including increased arrests, tighter border controls and the removal of people living in the United States without legal authorisation.

His administration has introduced stricter immigration measures and expanded enforcement operations across the country. Billions of dollars approved by Congress were intended to strengthen the government’s capacity to carry out the campaign.

The new analysis suggests that deportations have increased compared with the annual average under Biden. However, the findings also show that higher enforcement activity has not translated into the one million annual deportations the administration sought to achieve.

The report’s estimate of 660,000 deportations in the most recent fiscal year is also below the 1.86 million deportations recorded in 2000 under former President Bill Clinton.

That historical comparison demonstrates that the current figures, while substantial, are not the highest recorded in the history of modern U.S. immigration enforcement.

The report was prepared using publicly available information and records obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests. Researchers have increasingly relied on such material because the Department of Homeland Security stopped regularly publishing comparable detailed figures after Trump returned to office.

Why the administration is struggling to meet its target

The analysis identifies several practical obstacles that complicate efforts to deport people at the scale promised by the White House.

One challenge is the changing composition of the migrant population. Immigration authorities are dealing with people from a wider range of countries, which can make removals more complicated when governments must establish identities, secure travel documents and coordinate with foreign authorities.

Immigration court backlogs also create delays. Some people facing removal have pending asylum applications or other legal claims that must be considered before deportation can proceed.

People who have lived in the United States for many years may have additional opportunities to challenge their removal through the legal system. As a result, an arrest does not necessarily mean that a person can be deported immediately.

The report’s findings underline the difference between increasing the number of arrests and increasing completed deportations. Authorities must move cases through legal processes, arrange transportation and secure cooperation from receiving countries.

These requirements can limit how quickly the government can turn an enforcement operation into a completed removal.

Voluntary departures reach a record high

The report also found that voluntary departures have increased significantly since Trump returned to office.

An estimated 170,000 people had chosen to leave the United States voluntarily during the period examined, a figure the analysis described as an all-time high.

Voluntary departure generally involves a person agreeing to leave the country rather than continuing to contest their immigration case through the courts. Depending on the circumstances, it can have different legal consequences from a formal deportation order and may affect a person’s ability to return to the United States.

However, immigration advocates and lawyers have raised concerns that some people agree to leave because they want to escape prolonged detention rather than because they freely prefer to abandon their legal claims.

The figures therefore raise questions not only about the scale of departures but also about the circumstances in which people decide to leave.

For the administration, voluntary departures are part of the wider effort to reduce the number of people remaining in the country without legal status. For critics, the circumstances surrounding those departures warrant scrutiny to ensure that people understand their rights and available options.

More deportations involve arrests inside the country

The report also points to a shift in where people are apprehended before being deported.

In 2025, approximately 28 per cent of people deported had been arrested inside the United States rather than intercepted at the border. By July 2026, that share had risen to 39 per cent.

The change reflects the administration’s expanding efforts to identify and detain migrants already living in American communities.

However, people arrested within the country may have lived in the United States for years, established families or businesses, or have pending immigration cases. Their circumstances can make removal more complicated than cases involving people intercepted at the border.

The analysis found that approximately 69 per cent of deportations between January 20, 2025, and July 31, 2026, involved people initially intercepted at the southern border.

These figures show that border enforcement continues to account for a substantial share of removals even as the administration increases arrests in the country’s interior.

Most deportees had no criminal conviction

Another significant finding concerns the administration’s stated emphasis on removing dangerous offenders.

Trump and his officials have repeatedly said immigration enforcement is intended to prioritise people they describe as the “worst of the worst.”

However, the Migration Policy Institute analysis found that most people deported during the period examined had no criminal convictions.

The finding does not mean that every person without a criminal conviction has legal permission to remain in the United States. Immigration violations and criminal convictions are separate matters, and a person can be subject to removal without having been convicted of a crime.

Nevertheless, the figures raise questions about how closely the administration’s enforcement activity matches its public emphasis on targeting people with serious criminal records.

They also reflect the broader scope of the crackdown, which has affected people facing different immigration circumstances rather than being limited to those convicted of serious offences.

Questions over transparency and official figures

The absence of regularly published detailed deportation statistics has made it more difficult to assess the administration’s performance.

Before the change, government data provided researchers with a more consistent basis for comparing enforcement activity across administrations. Since January 2025, analysts have increasingly depended on records obtained through public-records requests, lawsuits and information released intermittently by federal agencies.

The Trump administration has released its own figures describing its immigration enforcement achievements. In a document published earlier this week, it said 1.2 million migrants had been deported or removed during the president’s second term.

However, that figure does not immediately reconcile with the Migration Policy Institute’s estimate of 980,000 deportations during the first 18 months.

The difference may reflect variations in reporting periods, definitions or the categories included in the totals. The two figures cannot be directly compared without a clearer explanation of the methods used to calculate them.

The dispute highlights the importance of consistent public reporting, particularly when deportation targets are a central part of the administration’s political commitments.

Without regular, detailed data, independent researchers face greater difficulty determining how many people have been formally removed, how many have departed through other procedures and how enforcement patterns have changed over time.

What the findings mean for U.S. immigration policy

The report suggests that Trump’s immigration crackdown has resulted in more deportations than the annual average during Biden’s presidency, but it also shows the limits of the administration’s ability to reach its stated target.

Legal procedures, court backlogs, international coordination and the practical requirements of transporting people out of the country all affect the final number of completed removals.

The findings also indicate that the administration’s approach extends beyond people arrested at the border, with a growing share of deportations involving arrests inside the United States.

For immigrant communities, the expansion of interior enforcement has heightened the importance of understanding immigration status, legal rights and the potential consequences of removal proceedings. Individuals facing immigration action may need qualified legal advice to understand their specific circumstances.

For policymakers and researchers, the challenge is to assess enforcement not only by the number of arrests or deportations but also by the consistency of official data, the handling of legal claims and the consequences for affected families and communities.

The latest analysis provides a clearer picture of the scale of deportations under Trump, but it also underscores continuing uncertainty about the administration’s reported totals.

With deportations remaining below the promised annual target, the central question is whether the government can increase completed removals further while navigating the legal, logistical and diplomatic barriers that have historically shaped U.S. immigration enforcement.