DHS: Assaults on ICE Officers Rose 1,649% Since Trump Took Office, Citing 647 Incidents

The Department of Homeland Security says assaults on Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers have exploded since President Donald Trump returned to office, and the department wants sanctuary city politicians to own it.

DHS reported Thursday that 647 assaults against ICE personnel occurred between Jan. 20, 2025, and Sept. 20, 2026. During the same 20-month window early in the Biden administration, from Jan. 20, 2021, to Sept. 20, 2022, DHS recorded 37 assaults. That's an increase of 1,649%, according to the department's own math.

"The brave men and women of ICE, who are simply enforcing the laws mandated by Congress and protecting the American people, are under attack every single day," DHS Secretary Kristi Noem said in the Thursday statement. "Since President Trump unleashed ICE to do their jobs, assaults against them have risen by more than 1,600% in the first year and a half of the administration."

Noem didn't stop at the numbers. She blamed "sanctuary politicians and their foot soldiers who are involved in anti-ICE riots and other acts of violence" for spreading what she called "vicious lies" about federal officers, according to the DHS release.

The Incidents DHS Cited

The department backed the statistic with specific cases. In Minneapolis, a rioter allegedly bit off an ICE agent's finger. In Houston, an illegal immigrant allegedly hit an officer in the face with a metal coffee cup, leaving a wound that needed 13 stitches and facial burns.

In Bellevue, Nebraska, in June 2025, Gabriel Hurtado-Cariaco, identified by DHS as a member of the Tren de Aragua gang, allegedly threw an ICE agent to the ground during an arrest attempt, slammed her head into the pavement, and tore off her body armor. She was treated at the University of Nebraska Medical Center for head and arm injuries. Hurtado-Cariaco is charged with attempted murder.

In July 2025, anti-ICE demonstrators opened fire outside the Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado, Texas, wounding a law enforcement officer. Eight defendants tied to that shooting were sentenced in June to between 30 and 100 years in prison, DHS said. The department also cited a sniper attack at an ICE facility in Dallas that killed two detainees and injured a third, and an October 2025 arrest of Eduardo Aguilar, a Mexican national living in Dallas, accused of posting a Spanish-language TikTok video soliciting the murder of ICE agents.

DHS also singled out elected officials for what it called "hateful rhetoric," pointing to Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz comparing ICE to a "modern-day Gestapo" and Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) saying the agency was "turning us into Nazi Germany" and running "slave patrols."

The Numbers Need Context

A 1,649% jump sounds staggering, and it is a real, documented rise. The 37-assault baseline from 2021-2022 was small to begin with, so even a modest increase in raw incidents produces a huge percentage swing. This doesn't make the underlying assaults less real or less dangerous to the officers involved. The percentage figure alone, without the raw numbers alongside it, can overstate how dramatic the shift feels compared to how much ICE enforcement activity itself has expanded.

That expansion is significant. According to CNN's ongoing tracking of federal immigration data, ICE detention has risen nearly 70% since early 2025, deportations have accelerated, and the death rate in detention facilities has hit its highest point since the pandemic. More agents making more arrests in more encounters creates more opportunities for confrontation on both sides.

The Other Side of the Ledger

CNN also reports that at least 21 people have been shot by on-duty ICE or Customs and Border Protection agents during the second Trump administration, with several shootings this summer drawing scrutiny from state and local investigators as well as DHS's own internal review. No findings have been announced in those cases as of this writing, and DHS has described the uses of force in initial statements as justified.

Immigrant rights advocates and some local leaders, per CNN, argue DHS is endangering communities with aggressive tactics, including car-window smashing and physical takedowns during arrests. DHS has countered that officers are trained in de-escalation and use only the minimum force necessary. Both claims are open questions pending the outcome of those investigations, not settled facts.

On who ICE is actually arresting, the two sides also don't agree. The Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University found that most people arrested by ICE don't have criminal convictions on record. DHS disputes that characterization, saying nearly 70% of those arrested have either been convicted of or charged with a crime in the United States. Neither figure has been independently reconciled in the available reporting.

What isn't in dispute: ICE officers are facing documented assaults with real injuries, several defendants have already been sentenced to decades in prison for a 2025 shooting at a Texas detention center, and at least one attempted-murder charge is pending in Nebraska. Whether the broader spike in violence is driven primarily by political rhetoric, as Noem argues, or by the scale and tactics of the enforcement operation itself, as advocates argue, remains unresolved and is likely to stay that way until the pending state, local, and internal DHS investigations into ICE shootings conclude.