Credit: U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Public Domain, via Flickr
The budget of the Department of Homeland Security has risen from $10 billion in 2024 to $85 billion in 2025, becoming the highest-funded federal law enforcement agency in the US. The extra funds have been allocated to surveillance and hiring more U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents. However, little has gone toward providing adequate training, with recruits becoming ICE agents after only 56 days. With the administration’s focus on the southern U.S.-Mexico border, a rise in discrimination against Central and South American or Latino immigrants, migrants, and U.S. citizens has been alarming. This increase is observable by both the disproportionate detention rates and stories of harassment and unlawful arrests of Latino residents.
ICE Creating “Criminals”
During Trump’s second administration, mass deportation campaigns have interchangeably used words like “criminals” or “illegals” when referring to immigrants. This creates the inaccurate stereotype that “immigrants are criminals”. Conservative political and media networks are actively working to racialize these stereotypes. They aim to link “being a criminal” with “being an immigrant” or “being Latino.”
The Politics of Who Belongs
ICE has no authority over US citizens, so there is concern that these biases are being used to rationalize ICE’s increased policing and detaining rates. They have been exacerbated by the U.S. Supreme Court’s fast-tracked decision last September to effectively re-permit racial profiling. According to the decision, ICE agents can now legally consider a person to be a suspicious target based on identity markers like race and speaking Spanish.
These tactics are discriminatorily impacting Latino residents. Javier Ramirez, a U.S. citizen of Mexican descent, was arrested by ICE and taken to a detention center for 5 days. During his arrest, he explained he was a U.S. citizen and even dialed 911, while ICE officers refused to listen to him and claimed he was lying. As ICE raids become more rampant in U.S. cities, so do risks for unlawful arrests of those with valid citizenship identification, like Ramirez.
Credit: How Americans See Immigration Officers’ Behaviors and Civilian Actions, Pew Research Center, Washington, D.C. (January 29, 2026)
Minority Populations are the Majority of Those Detained
The New York Immigration Coalition has kept track of ICE’s racial profiling and disproportionate arrest rates. In 2025, Ecuadorians living in New York made up 24% of ICE arrests, despite only 4% of the non-citizen population being Ecuadorian. Similarly, 8% of ICE arrests were Guatemalan, although they make up 1% of the non-citizen residents. The same statistics hold on a national scale. Across all states, the ICE arrest rates of Mexicans, Hondurans, Venezuelans, and Peruvians are disproportionately higher than the actual population.
Credit: U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
These campaigns of “kicking out criminals” are failing to resonate across the nation. A 2026 poll from Pew Research reveals 72% of Americans think it is unacceptable for ICE agents to use a person’s spoken language or looks as justification for arrest. Additionally, 54% believe it’s also unacceptable to increase ICE presence in neighborhoods with immigrants.
Americans, citizens and non-citizens, are increasingly working to protect their neighbors by spreading information about how to exercise their rights and resist unlawful arrest by ICE. Some are even setting up community alert systems, using car horns or whistles to warn residents about ICE presence. Migration has always been a part of human civilization. Immigrants make up our communities, schools, families, and friends. When united, we can better protect our neighbors and loved ones from this unlawful harassment. We must work to build solidarity within communities to find the power for change.
Credit: Trevor Stone, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
This article was written by a guest contributor, S. Jarvis.
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