Claim: Nearly 70% of ICE Arrests Involve Criminal Illegal Aliens. The Reality Is More Complicated.

The claim holds that nearly 70% of ICE arrests target individuals DHS classifies as 'criminal illegal aliens,' implying most people ICE detains have serious criminal histories. The verdict is partially false: the figure is year-dependent, currently well below 70%, and the definition of 'criminal alien' is far broader than the term suggests to most people.

The strongest evidence against the claim comes directly from ICE's own annual reports. In FY2023, ICE made 170,590 total arrests. According to the ICE Fiscal Year 2023 Annual Report, only 73,822 — approximately 43% — had actual criminal convictions. Another 25,895 had pending criminal charges, bringing the combined figure to roughly 58%. The remaining 42% had no criminal record at all. In FY2024, the ICE Fiscal Year 2024 Annual Report shows the figure dropped further, to approximately 56% even when combining convictions and pending charges. These are not close to 70%.

The steelman case for the claim points to FY2022, when ICE made 143,408 arrests and approximately 74% involved individuals with a criminal conviction or pending charge, according to the ICE Fiscal Year 2022 Annual Report. That single year is superficially consistent with 'nearly 70%.' But TRAC Immigration at Syracuse University, which tracks ICE arrest data continuously, documents that this share fluctuates dramatically by year and administration — ranging from roughly 40% to 90% depending on the fiscal year. Citing one peak year as though it represents a stable, general truth is textbook cherry-picking.

The deeper problem is the definition itself. DHS classifies a 'criminal alien' as any non-citizen with a criminal conviction or a pending criminal charge — a category so wide it captures people whose only offense is a prior immigration violation, an unpaid traffic ticket, or a charge that has not been proven in court. The American Immigration Council documented in its analysis of ICE's Criminal Alien Program that the label does not distinguish between a violent felony and a civil immigration infraction. The Migration Policy Institute similarly found that a substantial share of individuals ICE labels 'criminal' have only immigration-related offenses or minor misdemeanors. When the public hears 'criminal alien,' they reasonably picture serious violent offenders. The data describes something far more varied.

To be fair, it is genuinely true that ICE prioritizes individuals with some criminal history, and in most years a majority of arrests do involve people with at least some record. That is a real enforcement pattern worth acknowledging. But 'majority' and 'nearly 70%' are not the same thing, and a pending traffic charge is not the same thing as a violent crime. Both distinctions matter enormously when evaluating the claim.

The manipulation pattern here is a three-part move: select the most favorable year's data, use the government's own expansive label without explaining what it includes, and let the phrase 'criminal alien' do emotional work the underlying numbers cannot support. Watch for this whenever a statistic about immigration enforcement cites a percentage without specifying the fiscal year, or uses 'criminal' without defining whether that means a conviction, a pending charge, or an immigration-only offense. Those omissions are almost never accidental.