'ICE Is Everywhere': Investigation Reveals More Arrests Than Ever, With Quieter Tactics

The Trump administration may have deliberately toned down its highly visible, militarized immigration raids that generated widespread backlash, but US Immigration and Customs Enforcement is arresting more people than ever, an investigation published Monday by The Guardian revealed.

The British newspaper examined what it called the increasingly “invisibilized” immigration dragnet reaching into workplaces, airports, traffic stops, convenience stores, and communities far from the US-Mexico border, declaring "ICE is everywhere."

“Before, [ICE] were storming around, making a lot of noise,” Gracie Willis, a rapid-response attorney with the National Immigration Project, told The Guardian. “Now, they are moving more quietly.”

"More quietly" does not mean fewer arrests. In fact, The Guardian reported that ICE apprehended nearly 50,000 people in July, a record high. The agency has also more than doubled its workforce this year to more than 22,000 officers and staff after Congress provided the Department of Homeland Security with $75 billion in additional funding.

As of September 15, ICE had also signed more than 2,500 agreements allowing state and local law enforcement agencies to participate in federal immigration enforcement.

“The detentions are happening in a flash—we’re talking, like, 90 seconds from the time ICE shows up to that person being driven away,” Willis said. “And often they are moving very quietly, with very soft feet.”

The shift in tactics came after the administration's highly publicized operations provoked intense opposition, especially following a series of fatal shootings, including of American citizens.

President Donald Trump said earlier this year that “maybe we could use a little bit of a softer touch,” while Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin told senators that "my goal in six months is that we’re not in the lead story every single day.”

Still, immigration attorney Kate Lincoln-Goldfinch told The Guardian that “we’re seeing a lot of racial profiling" in immigration enforcement, adding that agents “might have their sights set on a big job site... and just slowly patrol that site and just take people in day after day until nobody’s going to work there anymore.”

The Guardian investigation comes amid continued condemnation of ICE's methods.

Amnesty International published a report last week based on interviews with 154 people affected by enforcement operations in Chicago, Minneapolis-St. Paul, New Orleans, and Washington, DC, documenting allegations including racial discrimination, arbitrary detention, excessive force, unlawful surveillance, incommunicado detention, and inhumane detention conditions.

“Masked and armed federal agents attacking people in the streets with impunity doesn’t make our communities safer—it puts everyone in danger,” said Amnesty International USA Executive Director Nadia Daar. “ICE is fundamentally broken and cannot be fixed.”

An increasing number of Republicans—especially those facing tough reelection battles—are criticizing the administration's heavy-handed immigration enforcement.

A campaign ad for Congresswoman Monica De La Cruz (R-Texas) even features a woman whose husband the lawmaker helped free from immigration detention.

“I have been very direct with the White House, with leadership, that enforcement policy should be focused on the criminals and on the cartels that are terrorizing our communities,” De La Cruz said last week during an interview on "The Joe Pags Show."

“They should not be on hardworking immigrants that are navigating the immigration process," she added.

In July, Democratic lawmakers sent a letter to Department of Homeland Security officials noting that agents had shot at least 22 people during Trump's second term, and that in multiple cases, federal authorities had made allegations against shooting victims that were later contradicted by evidence.

More than 50 people have died in ICE custody since Trump returned to the White House last year.