ICE's Delayed Detention Data is Out, Two Record Highs: 70,000 People Detained, 40,000 on Ankle Monitors

ICE detention has crossed 70,000 for the first time ever, with ankle monitor use topping 40,000. The data was delayed, but it's finally public.

The latest ICE detention data shows that on January 24, 2026, 70,766 people were held in 225 immigrant detention facilities across the country. This number does not include people detained in short-term facilities along the border, ICE field offices, courtrooms, or other locations where ICE has reportedly held people for immigration purposes. This number represents the highest detained population on public record and the first time that the detained population has crossed 70,000.

Detention Data Released After Delay

I raised the alarm last week that ICE was worryingly late in publishing this data. I waited a week before saying anything publicly to give the agency time to resolve any reasonable delay—but worried that ICE was outright ignoring their legal obligation to publish this data. I was grateful to see this data finally released. The dates in the spreadsheet offer some clue to what happened. The data was pulled for January 25 but not released until today, a week later. This isn’t the first time they produced a spreadsheet and sat on it for a while. It’s possible that there were justifiable data quality concerns. Better to release correct data later than incorrect data earlier. But it could also be that they simply forgot about it, ignored it, or someone was on vacation. Regardless, the data is now public.

ICE Withholds Congressionally Mandated Detention Data

FY 2026 Detention Growth Driven by People with Non-Criminal History

The growth in the detained population of people arrested by ICE since the end of the fiscal year in September has come almost exclusively from the growth in numbers of people detained with no criminal charges or convictions. The graph below compares the total number of people in detention on two dates: September 21, 2025 and January 24, 2026. These numbers only include people in detention as a result of an ICE arrest, thus reflecting what is typically referred to as “interior enforcement.” ICE detention includes people arrested by CBP at or near the border, but these cases, by definition, tend to have no U.S. criminal history.

ICE officially classifies these cases as “Other Immigration Violators”. In the public domain, these cases may also be referred to as non-criminal detainees. ICE has claimed publicly that these cases may include people that represent significant safety threats, but the agency has failed, to date, to provide data to support these claims beyond the occasional anecdotal narratives.

As the data shows, the overall single-day detention numbers increased a total of 13,629 this fiscal year so far. Non-criminal detainees represent 70 percent of this growth, 20 percent is attributed to people with, at most, pending criminal charges, and just 10 percent of the growth in ICE detention this fiscal year can be attributed to immigrants with criminal convictions. As many other reports have noted, a small percentage of these convictions represent serious violent crimes or public safety threats. See my previous post from the Chicago lawsuit or David Bier’s detailed post here.

As a matter of total numbers, the following graph reinforces the findings above by showing the increase in the total numbers of people in detention arrested by ICE by criminal history. Since the summer, nearly all of the growth in ICE detention has come from people without criminal convictions or charges—an area of tremendous sustained growth that contradicts the Trump administration’s narrative that they are focused on the worst of the worst.

ICE Arrests Fairly Static for Past Four Months

Despite heavily-publicized enforcement actions in Minneapolis, ICE arrests alone are actually down for January (36,579) compared to December (37,842), and have more or less remained static since October.

Full Detained Population by Arresting Agency

The total detained population—CBP and ICE enforcement both included—is shown below, with nearly half (48 percent) of all people held in detention lacking a criminal history on record. This percentage has remained static for many months.

Over 40,000 People on GPS Ankle Monitors

The overall number of people on alternatives to detention (ATD) continues to hold remarkably steady with a current total of 180,079 people on electronic monitoring. The trend in ICE’s Alternatives to Detention enrollment continues, with ICE shuffling people off the smartphone tracking app known as SmartLINK and ramping up the number of people on the more punitive GPS ankle monitors. There are now more than 40,000 people on GPS ankle monitors, the highest number in ICE’s recorded history.

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