Eight hundred thousand illegal immigrants removed from the United States in sixteen months. And Tom Homan is just warming up.
The White House Border Czar told the crowd at the Border Security Expo in Phoenix exactly what comes next: "If you think last year's historic number is good, wait till next year. Mass deportations are coming."
The numbers he was referring to would make any prior administration blush. ICE has logged 641,000 arrests in sixteen months — officers are currently averaging 1,200 per day. On May 5, 2026 alone, DHS arrested over 1,900 people. Last week, 2,700 were deported in seven days.
For context: ICE arrests under Trump's second term have already exceeded the 500,000 total arrests logged across all four years of Biden's presidency, and the 548,000 across Trump's entire first term. Obama's deportations peaked at roughly 400,000 in a single year — a number that looked untouchable for over a decade. This administration blew past it before the Expo doors opened.
Homan isn't slowing down because the system is being built to handle real scale. Acting ICE Director Todd Lyons confirmed the agency is hiring 11,000 deportation officers, 2,500 new immigration court attorneys, and 3,500 special agents. Another 5,000 Border Patrol agents are expected in the coming months, with Homan referencing 10,000 additional agents on the border as the next phase. Congress allocated $191 billion through the One Big Beautiful Bill, and DHS projects it will have obligated 75% of that funding by September 2026.
CBP Commissioner Rodney Scott connected the numbers to the broader picture: "The cross-border flows dropped when ICE started making arrests. ICE's role is critical to border security." When people who cross illegally actually get arrested and removed, fewer people attempt the crossing. The data confirms it.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche described the interagency commitment behind the numbers: "It doesn't matter your badge. We had every federal agency focused on the mission of illegal immigration." The DOJ, Blanche added, does "not view this as mission accomplished" and continues to treat border security as a "top priority."
New DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin — who replaced Kristi Noem — said the department has deliberately operated more quietly. "I wanted to get DHS out of the headlines," Mullin said. "We haven't missed a beat." The numbers confirm that too.
Not every governor has gotten the message. New York's Kathy Hochul fired back at Homan's promise to "flood the zone" in sanctuary jurisdictions. "All I have to say to Tom Homan is, Donald Trump himself said he would not send a surge of ICE agents to the state of NY unless I ask," she said. "I'm not asking."
Homan's response was brief and blunt. When jurisdictions refuse 287(g) cooperation agreements with ICE, federal agents don't disappear — they go find people themselves. "You will see collateral arrests increase in these areas," he said. "You see more agents in your neighborhoods because you forced us in this position." Cities that shield criminal aliens from their own jails send federal agents into apartment buildings and workplaces, where everyone nearby gets checked. The math on that trade-off isn't complicated.
For anyone in the president's base who thinks 800,000 removals isn't aggressive enough, Homan had something to say about that too: "For the people out there saying President Trump's weak on mass deportation, what the hell are you talking about?" He also made clear that enforcement extends well beyond convicted criminals. "It doesn't mean because you prioritize criminals, everybody else is off the table. I don't care how long you've been here. If you're here illegally into this country, you cheated."
Eight hundred thousand removed. Six hundred forty-one thousand arrested. Eleven thousand new deportation officers in the pipeline. And the border czar standing at a podium in Phoenix saying the word "coming" like it's a weather forecast.
The question isn't whether this is working. The question is whether the sanctuary governors still saying "I'm not asking" have done the math on what happens when 10,000 new agents show up in their states anyway.
Hochul is about to find out.
