New analysis projects 660,000 Trump deportations in fiscal 2026
Migration Policy Institute estimates show deportations rising under Donald Trump but remaining below the administration’s one-million-a-year target, while the White House reports a higher cumulative total.
The Trump administration is on pace to carry out about 660,000 deportations in fiscal 2026, according to a Migration Policy Institute analysis released Thursday, October 22. That would be an increase from an annualized 620,000 in fiscal 2025, but still below the administration’s stated goal of one million a year.
The nonpartisan institute estimated that the Department of Homeland Security completed about 980,000 deportations between Donald Trump’s return to office on January 20, 2025, and July 31, 2026. The Associated Press independently reported the findings Thursday. The figures combine formal removals and several kinds of returns by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection.
What the new estimate shows
MPI calculated that fiscal 2026’s projected total was 26% above the annual average during fiscal years 2021 through 2024 and 42% above the average during Trump’s first term. The analysis nevertheless placed the current pace far below the 1.86 million deportations recorded in fiscal 2000. Its fiscal 2026 number is a projection based on data available through July 31 rather than a final year-end count.
Of the estimated 980,000 deportations during the first 18 months of Trump’s second term, about 340,000 were immediate border turnarounds handled by CBP. Another 340,000 involved people first arrested at the border and later deported by ICE. The remaining 300,000 followed arrests in the U.S. interior.
Interior enforcement is growing
Although border-related cases still made up 69% of the total, the balance shifted toward enforcement inside the country. MPI estimated that deportations following interior arrests rose from an average of 8,000 a month during the administration’s first three months to 19,000 a month from May through July 2026. Their share of all deportations increased from 28% in 2025 to 39% in July 2026.
The report also examined how long people had lived in the United States and whether they had a criminal conviction. Excluding immediate CBP border turnarounds, 61% of ICE deportations involved people who had been in the country for at least two years, and 15% involved people with at least 10 years of U.S. residence. Across all 980,000 cases, MPI said 20% involved a person with a criminal conviction.
That measure identifies convictions in the underlying data; it does not by itself describe the seriousness or age of an offense. MPI said 71% of deportations involving people with at least two years of residence concerned individuals with no criminal conviction.
Voluntary departures and competing totals
About 170,000 cases were ICE grants of voluntary departure or voluntary return, which the institute described as an all-time high. Those procedures allow a person to agree to leave without completing the ordinary removal process. Immigration lawyers and advocates cited by the AP said detention pressure can influence that decision; the administration promotes voluntary departure as a faster and less expensive option.
The White House published a different cumulative figure on October 20, saying nearly 1.2 million people had been deported or removed during Trump’s second term. It also said more than three million migrants had left the country, a broader claim that includes estimated voluntary departures. The AP said the difference between the administration’s deportation figure and MPI’s estimate could not immediately be reconciled.
MPI said detailed federal reporting has been limited since January 2025. Its deportation estimate draws on CBP data obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests and ICE records obtained by the University of California’s Deportation Data Project. Definitions and time periods also matter: counts can include removals, returns, border turnarounds or estimated departures by people who leave without a recorded enforcement action.
Why the numbers matter
Deportation is central to Trump’s second-term immigration agenda, and Congress has provided DHS with $240 billion through fiscal 2029, according to the institute. The new analysis indicates that enforcement has accelerated and increasingly reaches people arrested away from the border, while also showing that the government has not yet reached its one-million-per-year target.
The disagreement over cumulative totals is not simply a dispute about whether enforcement increased; both the institute and the administration say it did. It reflects different datasets and categories, as well as the absence of regularly released, detailed DHS statistics that would allow outside researchers to reproduce the government’s claims. Final fiscal 2026 data could change the projected annual figure.
Sources and image credit
Primary analysis and methodology: Migration Policy Institute.
Independent report on the findings and administration response: The Associated Press, via the Winnipeg Free Press.
Administration’s October 20 immigration totals: The White House.
Image: an ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations officer patrols a removal flight; photograph by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, via Wikimedia Commons; public domain. File image from January 5, 2016; cropped to 1600×900 with no text added.