ProPublica Documents 506 U.S. Citizens Detained

PHOTO CAPTION: U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers conduct an Enforcement and Removal Operations arrest in Manassas, Virginia, in April 2022. A new ProPublica investigation published Oct. 6, 2026, documents 506 U.S. citizens detained by federal immigration agents since January 2025. The individuals pictured are not connected to the new investigation. ICE photo by Erica Knight.

A new investigation has documented 506 U.S. citizens detained by federal immigration agents since January 2025, offering the broadest accounting yet of Americans caught up in the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement operations.
ProPublica published the investigation Tuesday after reviewing incidents across the country between January 2025 and September 2026.
The federal government does not publish an equivalent count.
To build its database, ProPublica reviewed court records, Department of Homeland Security statements, local reporting, social media, video and its own reporting.
The newsroom said it required at least two sources before including a detention in its core dataset. ProPublica
The 506 cases cover several very different circumstances.
More than 100 Americans were detained after agents questioned their citizenship, according to the investigation.
At least 70 were children or teenagers, including about 20 who ProPublica says were handcuffed or zip-tied.
At least 63 citizens were detained while recording immigration activity.
And 36 Americans were held for at least a day without being able to contact a lawyer or family member. ProPublica
ProPublica also identified roughly a dozen U.S. citizens who were removed from the country, most of them children who left with parents being deported.
The report says one adult citizen in Texas was held for four days and deported to Mexico after officers disputed his claim of citizenship. He was later allowed to return to the United States after suing and presenting his birth certificate.
DHS has disputed aspects of that case. ProPublica
But a large portion of the 506 cases did not begin with agents questioning whether someone was American.
ProPublica counted more than 300 citizens detained after agents accused them of assaulting, obstructing or interfering with federal officers, including people arrested during protests or while immigration operations were taking place.
The newsroom found federal criminal charges in 137 cases.
Nearly half of those charges were later dropped or dismissed. Three dozen citizens had received prison or probation sentences as of Sept. 15, while roughly another three dozen cases remained pending. ProPublica
That distinction is important.
Federal immigration agents can detain U.S. citizens in certain circumstances, including when officers have reasonable suspicion about immigration status or when a citizen is suspected of committing a crime such as interfering with or assaulting an officer.
DHS defended its enforcement practices when ProPublica presented the department with its findings.
“DHS enforcement operations are highly targeted. We do our due diligence,” the department said.
DHS also said people who obstruct federal agents can face consequences including arrest. ProPublica
ProPublica’s methodology excluded arrests based on judicial warrants and generally excluded encounters at airports and borders, where immigration authorities have broader powers.
It also did not count incidents in which citizens were subjected to force but were never actually detained.
The newsroom says that means its tally is likely an undercount.
In one Idaho operation, witnesses reportedly estimated that as many as 200 citizens were detained, but ProPublica counted only the 30 people it could individually identify and verify. ProPublica
The new figure is also a significant expansion of the picture available one year ago.
In October 2025, ProPublica had identified more than 170 U.S. citizens detained during immigration enforcement operations.
Its new investigation extends that accounting through September 2026 and raises the documented total to 506. ProPublica
The government still does not maintain a publicly available nationwide count of how often immigration agents detain American citizens.
For now, 506 is ProPublica’s independently compiled number, not an official DHS statistic.