President Donald Trump premised his mass deportation agenda on the idea that he will be “returning millions and millions of criminal aliens.” Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem has repeatedly claimed that they are arresting the “worst of the worst.” New nonpublic data from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) leaked to the Cato Institute reveal a different story.

Of people booked into ICE custody this fiscal year (since October 1, 2025):

Nearly three in four (73 percent) had no criminal conviction.
Nearly half had no criminal conviction nor even any pending criminal charges.
Only 8 percent had a violent or property criminal conviction.
Only 5 percent had a violent criminal conviction.
A majority of criminal convicts had vice, immigration, or traffic convictions.
The appendix table at the end of this report provides the detailed breakdown of the data by detailed type of crime.