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Browse major news stories and see what officials have said.

Sep 28, 2026· Updated

DHS Told Four States It Found 250,000 Noncitizens on Their Voter Rolls — On a Recorded Call, Its Own Staff Called the Nevada Number "the Ceiling," and the Confirmed Count Nevada Got Was 185

In July 2026, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin sent letters to the secretaries of state of California, Nevada, New Jersey and Pennsylvania saying DHS had identified more than 250,000 noncitizens on their voter rolls, and warned officials who did not act that they faced loss of federal election aid, fines and possible prison time. In August, on a call with Nevada election officials that was recorded and later obtained by CNN, DHS staff conceded the state-level figures had not been individually vetted — a USCIS fraud-division official called Nevada's 15,903 "the ceiling" — and a day later the department handed Nevada a list of just 185 registrants it said it was confident were noncitizens, with more than 14,000 cases unresolved. Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar, a Democrat, said his office "will not risk disenfranchising eligible voters" and called the federal effort unsophisticated and dangerous. DHS election-integrity lead Heather Honey told the state the department was "an open book." The reporting lands 10 weeks before the midterms, with DHS pressing states to purge voters on data it has not shown them.

“Your unsubstantiated allegations of noncitizen voter fraud, public recitation of unreliable data, and unwarranted conditioning of continued grant funding for state election security measures on compliance with politically motivated requests for voter data appear to be calculated efforts to undermine confidence in our elections and risks wrongly disenfranchising voters. … You have promoted the President's conspiracy theories about our elections, pressured states to participate in illegal activities, and explicitly threatened to reduce grant funding and initiate criminal investigations for those states that do not comply with the Administration's demands. [Letter to DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin led by Kelly, Gary Peters, Dick Durbin, Alex Padilla and Chuck Schumer and signed by 34 senators, demanding he substantiate his July 17 claim that 250,000 noncitizens were registered to vote in four states.]”
Mark Kelly (D-AZ) · Sep 28, 2026

Sep 23, 2026· Updated

An ICE Officer Shoots a DoorDash Driver in North Austin, Then Agents Move Him Into Federal Custody Before His Wife Can See Him — Greg Casar Says "The Horror Has Come to Our City," and Austin's Mayor Says "Austinites Have a Right to Know What Happened"

Just before 1 p.m. on Sunday, September 20, 2026, an ICE officer shot and wounded Wilber Rafael Garcés Perez, 28, a Venezuelan DoorDash driver, during a vehicle stop and pursuit in North Austin. ICE said it had targeted his car over a license-plate check tied to a final removal order; his attorney says he entered the country legally and held a valid work permit. Garcés Perez called his wife at 12:30 p.m. to tell her he had been shot. He was hospitalized in serious but stable condition, then moved by federal agents to an undisclosed location — without being allowed to see his wife first — before landing in ICE custody pending removal. Rep. Greg Casar posted the same morning that "the horror has come to our city," and hours later sent DHS a formal letter demanding release of the unedited body-camera footage, preservation of evidence, and a briefing for Congress by September 28. Rep. Joaquin Castro said "Trump has allowed ICE to flood our streets and put our communities in harms way again and again and Governor Abbott is complicit every time." Austin Mayor Kirk Watson said "Austinites have a right to know what happened." Texas Senate candidate James Talarico said past incidents show "this agency cannot be trusted to report all the facts," and called for a full independent investigation with all footage released. DHS, without naming Garcés Perez, said he had a final removal order and entered during the Biden administration; Homeland Security Investigations, with FBI assistance, is leading the review.

“If you saw Wilbur, just like if you saw anybody that had been shot three days ago, you would say this person needs a doctor, not a deportation, or a detention center. Why was he taken from the hospital?”
Gregorio Casar (D-TX) · Sep 23, 2026

Families of Five People Killed by Federal Immigration Agents Tell a Democratic Shadow Hearing the Government's "Falsehoods" Amount to "Dual Assassinations" — Richard Blumenthal Says the Anger "Ought to Be Directed at Congress" Too, and Alex Padilla Promises Investigations "When We Get the Gavels Back"

On September 22, 2026, Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and Rep. Robert Garcia (D-CA), the ranking members of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations and the House Oversight Committee, convened their fifth bicameral "shadow hearing" on immigration enforcement in a Senate office building. Relatives of five people killed by ICE or CBP agents — Ruben Ray Martinez, Renée Good, Alex Pretti, Lorenzo Salgado Araujo and Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, who was shot in Biddeford, Maine — described what they called official falsehoods, obstruction of investigations and smears of the victims. Democrats in the minority cannot compel testimony or issue subpoenas; members at the forum pledged formal investigations if their party wins control of either chamber in November.

“We're all committed to accountability in all its forms, and when we get the gavels back, we're going to move on that aggressively, starting with the investigations.”
Alex Padilla (D-CA) · Sep 22, 2026

Sep 17, 2026· Updated

Trump Nominates Former Oklahoma Trooper Lance Schroyer as ICE Director — Then Withdraws Him After Rand Paul Refuses a Hearing Over the Minneapolis Shootings

On June 27, 2026, President Donald Trump announced he intends to nominate Lance Schroyer, a former Oklahoma state trooper and U.S. Marine with roughly 29 years of law enforcement experience, to serve as Director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Schroyer currently serves as a senior adviser to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and previously led large-scale enforcement operations in Oklahoma under the 287(g) program. If confirmed by the Senate, he would become the first Senate-confirmed ICE director since 2017, ending a stretch in which the agency has operated under acting leadership. The pick, which followed the May resignation of former director Todd Lyons, drew immediate praise from Oklahoma and Republican officials, while analysts noted his relative lack of federal-agency experience is likely to be scrutinized at a confirmation hearing. Update (September 17, 2026): The White House withdrew Schroyer's nomination in a brief statement that gave no reason. Homeland Security Committee Chairman Rand Paul had declined to schedule a confirmation hearing until DHS provided an update on its internal investigation into the January fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, by federal immigration officers in Minneapolis. Paul said he learned of the withdrawal when it was made public. David Venturella continues to perform the duties of ICE director; the agency has not had a Senate-confirmed director since 2017.

“I don't have a concern with who the nominee was. I had asked them to give me an update on the internal investigation into civilian deaths. And I'm still waiting.”
Rand Paul (R-KY) · Sep 17, 2026

DHS Names Its New York Immigration Sweep "Operation Rotten Apple" and Says It Ran It Because the City Elected a Socialist — 2,197 Arrests, and the Governor Answers That the Federal Government Counts "Anybody Who Crossed the Border" as a Criminal

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin came to Manhattan on September 1, 2026 to announce the results of a month-long ICE surge across New York City, Long Island and the Hudson Valley: 2,197 arrests between July 27 and August 29, in an operation the department named "Operation Rotten Apple." Mullin framed the sweep explicitly as a punishment for New York's politics rather than as routine enforcement, saying the operation was undertaken "because you have a very liberal-slash-socialist mayor here in New York City," calling New York a "crime-ridden city," and promising to send "as many people as we have possible" now that a new state law has forced local agencies out of 287(g) partnerships with ICE. Pressed on whether everyone arrested was a criminal, he answered that entering the country outside legal channels is itself the crime. Governor Kathy Hochul and Mayor Zohran Mamdani rejected the arrest tally at a competing press conference the same day, with Hochul saying there is "no way" that number reflects crimes as New York defines them and Mamdani defending the city's sanctuary policies as bipartisan in origin.

“Operation Rotten Apple did what sanctuary politicians in New York refuse to do: made the Empire State safer.”
Markwayne Mullin (R) · Sep 1, 2026

ICE Signs a $16.7 Million No-Bid Contract for 6,000 Pairs of Gloves That Deliver Electric Shocks — Sixteen Senators Ask Why Its Existing Tools Are Not Enough, and the Border Czar Answers "You Can’t Just Go From 0 to 100"

On August 10, 2026 the Department of Homeland Security published a notice that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement intended to spend up to $20 million on the CTG-5 G.L.O.V.E. — for Generated Low Output Voltage Emitter — a patrol glove made by Compliant Technologies LLC of Kentucky that functions normally until an officer switches it into "electrical mode," at which point contact with exposed skin delivers a charge of up to 380 volts. ICE signed the contract on Wednesday, August 26 and posted the award on Thursday, August 27: $16.7 million, no bid, for 6,000 pairs at roughly $2,495 apiece. The agency wrote in its procurement documents that it "does not currently have an empty hand use of force device to provide to the field amidst unprecedented levels of threats and violence against ICE officers and agents." A DHS spokesperson said ICE is "constantly assessing the needs of our officers in the field." The purchase went through over two rounds of congressional objection. On August 20, Homeland Security Committee Democrats Bennie Thompson, Lou Correa and Shri Thanedar wrote to DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin asking him to stop the procurement, citing what they called a pattern of DHS personnel permanently injuring and nearly killing people with weapons already labeled "less-lethal." On August 27 — the day the award posted — Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto led fifteen colleagues in a letter to Acting ICE Director David Venturella putting more than thirty questions to the agency about protocols, training, safety limits and accountability. The signers included Angus King, the letter's only non-Democrat. White House border czar Tom Homan had defended the device on Fox & Friends on August 13, framing it as a rung on the use-of-force ladder below lethal weapons. The device arrives against the record this site has already documented: fatal ICE shootings in Houston and Maine, an ICE agent charged with firing into a Minneapolis home, and a man in Arlington, Virginia tasered on his way to work who woke with a brain bleed.

“At a time when the American people have demanded de-escalation in immigration enforcement, it is not clear why existing tools and tactics are insufficient for the agency.”
Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) · Aug 27, 2026

Aug 25, 2026· Updated

ICE Arrests a 5-Year-Old on His Way to a Soccer Game and Sends Him to the Country’s Only Family Detention Camp — a Federal Judge Appoints Outside Monitors, and ICE Blocks a Congressman From Visiting the Boy

On August 16, 2026, federal immigration agents stopped Victor Martinez Nieto in Austin, Texas, as he drove his five-year-old son, Liam Tadeo, to a soccer game. Video of the stop shows the crying child holding his handcuffed father's hand. Both were taken to the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley — the only family detention facility in the United States, run under contract by the private prison company CoreCivic. Liam was supposed to start kindergarten that week. It was the second time in 2026 that a five-year-old named Liam was taken to Dilley. In January, ICE agents detained Liam Conejo Ramos on his walk home from preschool in Columbia Heights, Minnesota; a federal judge ordered him and his father released at the end of that month. The August arrest landed in the middle of a widening fight over the facility. The Texas Tribune reported on August 12 that federal data showed many children at Dilley had been held 100 days or longer, far past the 20-day limit set by the Flores settlement, and that in the first year after the camp reopened in March 2025 the administration held roughly 3,000 children there, more than half of them beyond 20 days. On August 18, Chief U.S. District Judge Dolly Gee appointed a special master, Andrea Sheridan Ordin, and an independent monitor, Dr. Paul Wise, with authority to inspect facilities, review records and interview detainees — citing minors confined for 50, 91 and even 323 days. Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas), who had led 111 House Democrats in a late-July letter demanding DHS shut Dilley down and terminate the CoreCivic contract, tried to visit Liam Tadeo and was turned away: ICE said the boy's father had not given permission, though Castro's office said it had obtained the mother's. Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas), chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, demanded the release of Liam and of at least 112 children then held at the camp. DHS and CoreCivic have said Dilley meets federal detention standards and undergoes regular audits.

“ICE arrested 5-year-old Liam and refused to safely return him to his mother.”
Gregorio Casar (D-TX) · Aug 25, 2026

ICE Has Detained More Than 50 Spouses and Parents of Active-Duty Troops — an Army Sergeant’s Wife Was Deported to Honduras Days After the Sailor on the USS Lincoln Learned His Father Was Taken in Key West

An Associated Press investigation published August 5, 2026 found that more than 50 immediate family members of active-duty U.S. troops — spouses and parents — have been placed in federal immigration detention since January 2025. At least six had been deported, one self-deported, and eight remained in custody when the AP published. Separately, DHS data obtained by Congress showed that between January 20, 2025 and January 26, 2026, ICE arrested 125 military veterans, nearly two-thirds of whom had no active criminal warrant, and moved to deport at least 282 veterans and family members. The through-line is a policy change: in April, ICE rescinded its long-standing guidance treating military service as a "significant mitigating factor" in whether to pursue enforcement, replacing it with a far less protective policy. Processing time for military parole in place — the discretionary protection recruiters have long cited to non-citizen family members — has more than doubled, to about 12 months. On August 9, 2026, a bicameral group of Democrats sent a letter to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Veterans Affairs Secretary Doug Collins and Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin demanding an accounting. It was led by Sens. Elizabeth Warren, Tammy Duckworth and Richard Blumenthal and Reps. Chrissy Houlahan, Maggie Goodlander, Delia Ramirez and Lizzie Fletcher, and signed by roughly 55 members in all, including Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Nancy Pelosi. The letter argues the Pentagon's new coordination with DHS — detaining people on military property and handing them to ICE — turns bases into "traps" and creates a chilling effect on service members and their families, who "may avoid accessing bases, medical care, housing offices, or support services — or leave the military entirely." The signers set an August 23 deadline for answers. The Pentagon declined to comment and said it would reply directly to the authors. Two cases put faces on the numbers in the last week of August. On Monday, August 24, Cristy Maryori Villafranca-Trejo — wife of Army Sgt. Hedar Leonel Turcios Juarez, stationed at Fort Bliss — was deported to Honduras, at least the seventh military spouse or parent removed under the crackdown. She was detained July 11 outside a Walmart near the base; she had no known criminal record, and her appeal and military parole-in-place application were still pending. Rep. Veronica Escobar, who represents El Paso, had opened a congressional inquiry into her case and visited her in detention. Two days earlier, in Key West, Border Patrol arrested Luis Manuel Aviles Roa, a Nicaraguan handyman of nearly 20 years' residence whose son Joshua is a sailor in his ninth month aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln — the carrier already at the center of a Senate inquiry over its record 250-day deployment. DHS has not disputed the pattern; it has defended it. "Having a family member in the military is not a free pass to violate our nation's laws," the department said of the Aviles arrest, adding that "U.S. military service alone does not automatically grant lawful immigration status, or exempt aliens from the consequences of violating U.S. immigration laws." Republican chairmen of the Armed Services and Veterans' Affairs committees, Roger Wicker and Jerry Moran, did not respond to press requests for comment.

“My heart breaks for her, her children and the soldier who must feel so betrayed by the country he is sacrificing for. There are far too many families like theirs who are being targeted instead of supported.”
Veronica Escobar (D-TX) · Aug 24, 2026

The First Deportation Flight to Haiti After TPS Ends Lands in Cap-Haïtien With 161 People — Into a Country the U.S. Government Itself Bars Its Own Citizens From Flying Into

On Thursday, August 20, 2026, an ICE charter carrying 161 people left Alexandria, Louisiana and landed at Cap-Haïtien — the first deportation flight to Haiti since the Trump administration formally terminated Temporary Protected Status for roughly 350,000 Haitian nationals, a termination the Supreme Court affirmed in June. Those aboard included former TPS holders as well as people who had completed prison sentences. DHS has said it plans twice-weekly flights. The destination is itself the story: the U.S. government's own ban on commercial flights into Port-au-Prince, in force through early September because of gang violence, forced the flight to land 130 miles north in Cap-Haïtien. The United Nations has warned that Haiti — where armed groups control most of the capital and more than a million people are displaced — cannot absorb mass returns. Local officials in Cap-Haïtien said they were not ready. Democratic lawmakers who have spent two years trying to extend Haitian TPS by statute responded within hours. Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), who led the House effort to extend the designation, called the deportations "cruel and shameful." Rep. Yvette Clarke (D-N.Y.), co-chair of the Haiti Caucus, said the removals were "a humanitarian betrayal that will stain America for generations." Rep. Greg Landsman (D-Ohio), whose Cincinnati-area district has one of the country's larger recently arrived Haitian populations, said the deportations were "inhumane." Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) called the flight "utterly shameful," and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said it was "cruel" to strip the protections now. No congressional Republican was found on the record about the flight in the first 48 hours.

“Our Haitian neighbors asked only for safety from the gang violence, rampant sexual exploitation, and vicious anarchy that has totally overtaken their nation. Donald Trump saw their suffering, and asked only how he could make it worse. His act to force thousands of men, women, and children back into the same hell they barely escaped with their lives is a humanitarian betrayal that will stain America for generations.”
Yvette Clarke (D-NY) · Aug 21, 2026

Aug 20, 2026· Updated

A 4-Foot-11 Man Walking to Work in Arlington Is Tasered by ICE and Wakes Up With a Brain Bleed — Then the Ankle Monitor ICE Fitted Him With Blocks the MRI His Doctors Ordered

At about 6:30 a.m. on August 11, 2026, José Mejía Hernández, 45, was walking to work in Arlington, Virginia when two trucks pulled up and men got out and ran at him. He did not know who they were, according to his attorney, and he ran. He believes he was hit in the back with a stun device. He remembers nothing after that. He woke in a hospital with a brain hemorrhage, blackened eyes, facial lacerations and cuts requiring stitches — and two ICE officers at his bedside, who his lawyer Carlos Jurado says never left, meaning he was never given a private moment with his doctors. He was discharged within 72 hours, fitted with a GPS ankle monitor and handed immigration forms. When doctors ordered an MRI more than a week later to measure the bleeding and swelling in his brain, the metal ankle monitor made the scan impossible, and ICE refused to remove it. "Mr. Mejia Hernandez is 4'11," Jurado said. "He's 125 pounds. This man is not a Division 1 athlete." The Department of Homeland Security disputes the account. It said Mejía Hernández "attempted to flee from the scene requiring ICE to use necessary force to gain control of the situation," and called it "FALSE" that he was unconscious and woke in a hospital bed, saying officers rendered aid and asked the responsive individual if he was okay. The incident occurred a day after an ICE agent pointed a loaded gun at U.S. citizen Carolina Molina a few miles away in Falls Church — an encounter her dashcam contradicted DHS's account of — and Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) said he was "certainly very concerned that it's the same group of ICE agents running the corridor along Columbia Pike." Beyer called the injuries "extremely disturbing" and told constituents to "exercise extreme caution," saying ICE agents in Northern Virginia "are disappearing people, and they are all too frequently becoming out of control or violent." Arlington's elected prosecutor and county board chair both said publicly that they were investigating what they could. Arlington Commonwealth's Attorney Parisa Dehghani-Tafti said "no one is above the law — not any individual, not law enforcement, and not federal officials." County Board Chair Matt de Ferranti said ICE does not communicate with the county about its operations at all.

“We’re certainly very concerned that it’s the same group of ICE agents running the corridor along Columbia Pike.”
Don Beyer (D-VA) · Aug 20, 2026

After Bulldozers Reach Santa Elena Canyon, CBP Halts Border Barrier Construction Inside Big Bend National Park — With a Republican Senator, a Republican Border Sheriff and the Texas Governor All Against the Project

On August 16, 2026, Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Rodney Scott announced he was pausing all construction activity for the border barrier inside Big Bend National Park while he traveled to West Texas for what he called a personal, on-the-ground evaluation. Video of crews clearing pristine Chihuahuan Desert wilderness near Santa Elena Canyon had circulated for days, and the project was already facing litigation, including a suit by the Lipan Apache and a petition for a temporary restraining order filed by Texas state Sen. Roland Gutierrez. The opposition was not partisan. Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) had written to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin on August 7 asking him to halt work until stakeholders were consulted, citing a bipartisan group of Texas border sheriffs, county judges and private landowners, and arguing that Big Bend's 1,000-foot riverbank cliffs and canyon terrain are their own deterrent. Terrell County Sheriff Thaddeus Cleveland, a Republican, said he had been urging Scott to visit for months because the original plan was flawed. Gov. Greg Abbott said Mullin had assured him no barrier of any kind would go up in the park at all, and that drones and fiber optics would secure the area instead. Democrats treated the pause as incomplete and, in Abbott's case, belated. Gutierrez called it a good thing but pressed for a full stop, accusing CBP of having characterized the clearing already done as mere surveying. State Rep. Gina Hinojosa said Abbott had known about the project for months and said nothing while the bulldozers worked.

“Good thing, for sure.”
Roland Gutierrez (D-TX) · Aug 17, 2026

ICE Moves to Buy Up to $20 Million of Electric Shock Gloves, Drawing Denunciations From a Dozen Congressional Democrats

On Monday, August 10, 2026, the Department of Homeland Security posted a procurement notice signaling that Immigration and Customs Enforcement intends to buy thousands of "Generated Low Output Voltage Emitter" devices — marketed as the G.L.O.V.E., or CTG-5 — from Compliant Technologies LLC of Lexington, Kentucky, on a no-bid basis. The gloves function as ordinary patrol gloves until an officer presses a switch, at which point they deliver a painful electric shock on contact. Reporting by Axios and CBS News on August 12 put the value of the planned purchase at $10 million to $20 million, with deliveries to be completed by the end of March. ICE and DHS have described the device as a "conductive distraction and de-escalation device." A DHS spokesperson said ICE "is constantly assessing the needs of our officers in the field to ensure they have the tools and equipment necessary to safely arrest and remove criminal illegal aliens from our country," and the agency said its officers "regularly receive ongoing use of force training." Within 48 hours at least a dozen congressional Democrats — four senators and eight House members — publicly condemned the plan, most of them on social media. Several tied the purchase directly to the roughly $70 billion in ICE and Customs and Border Protection funding Congress approved in June over Democratic objections, and several used the occasion to renew calls to abolish the agency. Reps. Delia Ramirez (D-Ill.) and Yvette Clarke (D-N.Y.) had introduced the Melt ICE Act in January to dismantle DHS. No congressional Republican was on record defending or criticizing the purchase in the first days of coverage.

“Beyond cruel. This is appalling and inhumane.”
John Hickenlooper (D-CO) · Aug 13, 2026

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