The Migration Policy Institute says its fiscal 2026 projection of 660,000 deportations falls below the 1 million annual removals target it identifies for the Trump administration.
That projection is not a completed fiscal-year count. MPI estimated about 980,000 deportations from Jan. 20, 2025, through July 31, 2026, and annualized partial-year data to project 660,000 for fiscal 2026. The projected pace is 26% above the fiscal 2021-24 average; MPI put the fiscal 2025 annualized pace at 620,000.
MPI describes 1 million annual removals as the administration’s target. A May 2025 White House release quoted the House Judiciary Committee as saying the funding bill would support at least that number of removals each year.
An Oct. 20 White House release said nearly 1.2 million people had been “deported or removed” during Trump’s second term. It gave no cutoff date or calculation method, so the total cannot be directly compared with MPI’s estimate through July 31.
MPI assembled its estimate from public Department of Homeland Security (DHS) data, including U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) records obtained under the Freedom of Information Act and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) records released by the Deportation Data Project. The institute noted differing DHS figures: 845,931 deportations through July 16 and more than 985,000 as of July 12. MPI did not explain the discrepancy.
Of MPI’s total, 69% involved people first intercepted at the border. About 340,000 were turned back by CBP, another 340,000 were later deported by ICE, and about 300,000 followed arrests inside the United States. Interior arrests accounted for 28% of deportations in 2025 and 39% in July 2026.
MPI estimated that 20% of all deportations involved people with a criminal conviction. Among deported people who had lived in the United States for at least two years, 71% had no conviction.
MPI’s definition includes formal removals and returns, which have different legal consequences. The institute says formal removals can make someone ineligible for U.S. visas for five years or longer, while returns do not carry those penalties. Doris Meissner, director of MPI’s U.S. Immigration Policy Program, said the analysis “fills a critical gap.”
