Despite Trump's hype, ICE's 'worst first' arrest policy isn't new. The difference is who else is being swept up. - The Boston Globe

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

59% : A few days later, Trump emphasized his focus on people with convictions or warrants.
55% : Homan has "adopted basically the same kind of enforcement policy that every law enforcement agency carries out, which is we're going to prioritize the bad guys, but it doesn't mean that we're going to give everybody else a free pass," said Ira Mehlman, spokesperson for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which advocates for reducing legal and illegal immigration.
54% : " ICE had about 6,000 immigration enforcement officers last year.
48% : Even if the Trump administration is able to deputize other federal, state, and local officers to help with arrests and deportations, as it plans to, and Republicans provide more money for ICE, it would take time to ramp up operations, he said.
45% : On Monday, an ICE official said on X that arrests of undocumented immigrants with criminal records had nearly doubled compared to a year ago but provided few specifics. NBC News reported Wednesday that it obtained data showing 41 percent of the 4,422 people taken into custody by ICE in the first two weeks of February did not have criminal convictions or pending charges.
44% : After that ruling, the percentage of people ICE arrested with criminal convictions or pending charges increased to nearly three out of every four -- 72 percent -- in the 2024 fiscal year, from 33 percent in 2022.
43% : Under Trump, ICE briefly posted on X its daily number of arrests, with the last post on Jan. 31.
39% : " Homan said on Feb. 6 that ICE had arrested 14,000 people since Jan. 20 and that 76 percent were criminals, a similar percentage to 2024 but on pace for a higher overall total.
37% : ICE handles enforcement in the interior of the country while the Border Patrol is responsible for apprehending people just after they cross into the United States illegally.
33% : "Under President Trump, ICE agents have been instructed that they should arrest anyone who might be living in the United States in violation of immigration law even if that person hasn't committed any crimes, doesn't pose any danger, and isn't the person who agents are looking for," said César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández, a law professor at Ohio State University and expert on immigration enforcement.
32% : But the Associated Press has reported that Trump officials are upset with the pace of immigration arrests so far and have reassigned two top ICE officials.
27% : " But ICE doesn't have enough officers to do massive arrests of undocumented immigrants, not to mention the limited capacity of immigration courts to process them, said John Sandweg, a former acting director of the agency during the Obama administration.
24% : During his campaign, Trump frequently asserted without evidence that foreign countries were sending criminals from their prisons to the United States and promised mass deportations.
18% : The White House X account frequently posts similar images, as does a new government ad in which Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem thanks Trump for "deporting criminal illegal immigrants.
15% : " On Fox News Friday, Homan said the total immigration arrests were up to nearly 16,000 people since Trump took office, but provided no additional detail. ICE and the White House did not respond to requests for comment.
14% : Trump has said his focus would be on arresting serious criminals but the executive order on immigration that he signed on Jan. 20 revoked the Biden administration arrest priorities.

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