ICE’s New Playbook: How Targeted Arrests Are Moving Into Everyday Encounters

The Trump administration’s immigration enforcement strategy has increasingly focused on locating specific people at places where they are already expected to be, a workplace, a courthouse, a jail or, in some cases, a routine police encounter.

The tools behind that approach are not new. ICE has long used immigration detainers, partnerships with state and local agencies and worksite investigations. But policy changes in 2025, including the rescinding of earlier restrictions on immigration enforcement at courthouses, have widened the settings in which those tools can be used. ICE’s 287(g) programme also gives participating state and local agencies limited immigration-enforcement powers under federal supervision.

The evidence does not establish a nationwide decline in large or highly visible immigration raids. The clearer shift is operational: ICE can increasingly seek a known individual through information, local partnerships and predictable points of contact, rather than relying only on finding people at large in the community.

What Changed?

The most visible policy change came in January 2025, when ICE issued new interim guidance governing civil immigration enforcement in or near courthouses. The guidance explicitly rescinded an April 2021 policy that had imposed tighter restrictions on such enforcement and said the new rules would remain in place until superseded.

The significance of that change is not simply that arrests can take place inside or near courthouses. It is that the administration identified a predictable setting in which specific people can be located.

ICE's guidance says civil immigration enforcement may target people including those with certain criminal convictions, gang affiliations, national-security or public-safety concerns, final removal orders, or suspected unlawful re-entry. Where agents have credible information that a target is at a particular courthouse, enforcement can be carried out there. The guidance also says officers should use non-public areas and act discreetly where practicable.

That logic extends beyond courthouses.

Where Does ICE Look?

ICE's enforcement system is built around several points of contact.

At workplaces, agents can investigate employers and workers based on information about employment eligibility or suspected violations. At jails, immigration status can be checked while a person is already in state or local custody. Through 287(g), participating police agencies can exercise limited immigration authority under ICE supervision during certain routine duties. Immigration detainers allow ICE to request notification and temporary continued custody before taking someone into federal immigration custody.

That creates a common pattern: immigration enforcement does not necessarily have to begin with an immigration officer searching for an individual. Another institution can provide the encounter, the location or the information that brings the person to ICE's attention.

ICE itself describes its Enforcement and Removal Operations division as working with federal, state and local partners to identify people through law-enforcement systems and biometric and biographic information. Its mission statement says ERO uses such partnerships and information to locate and arrest people who are subject to immigration enforcement.

What Do Police Add?

The 287(g) programme is one of the most important pieces of that system.

Under the programme, participating state and local law-enforcement agencies can perform specified immigration functions under ICE supervision. ICE currently lists three models. The Jail Enforcement Model allows designated officers to identify and process removable people in local custody. The Warrant Service Officer model allows officers to execute certain civil immigration warrants within detention facilities. The Task Force Model permits limited immigration enforcement during routine police duties.

ICE's own example for the Task Force Model is revealing: an officer can identify a person at a DUI checkpoint and share information directly with ICE. The model therefore creates a route by which a routine policing encounter can become relevant to immigration enforcement without an ICE operation being organised specifically around that location.

The infrastructure predates the Trump administration. ICE's FY2024 287(g) fact sheet recorded 12,612 encounters under the programme during fiscal year 2024. What changed in 2025 was the policy environment in which such existing mechanisms could be used, particularly the removal of previous restrictions around protected locations such as courthouses.

Why Courthouses?

Courthouses offer something an at-large search does not: predictability.

A person who has to appear for a hearing, trial or other proceeding has a known reason to be in a particular place at a particular time. ICE's 2025 guidance expressly says courthouse enforcement can be used when agents have information that a particular target is at a specific courthouse.

The Department of Homeland Security has also argued that courthouse arrests can reduce operational risks because people entering courthouses are normally screened for weapons and other contraband. DHS said the setting can allow officers to make targeted arrests without first locating the person elsewhere in the community. That is the administration's stated rationale for the policy.

This makes courthouses significant to the broader enforcement model. The location is not incidental; the predictability of the location becomes part of the enforcement strategy.

Why Worksites?

Worksites offer a similar advantage because the investigation can begin with information about a business and lead to particular employees.

In February 2025, ICE said an investigation into a Pennsylvania tyre shop began after the agency received information that the business was hiring unauthorised workers and could be involved in labour exploitation. Agents interviewed workers and administratively arrested three people for immigration violations. ICE said its broader worksite strategy combines compliance inspections, civil penalties and enforcement against employers with administrative arrests of unauthorised workers.

ICE subsequently announced other worksite operations during 2025, including arrests in Connecticut, Pennsylvania and other states. In one Connecticut operation, four employees were administratively arrested following what ICE described as worksite enforcement outreach. In another Pennsylvania operation in June, four workers were arrested.

The significance is not simply the number of people arrested in any one operation. It is the mechanism: information about a workplace can establish where a group of potentially removable people can be encountered.

Why Jails And Detainers?

Jails provide an even more controlled setting.

An ICE immigration detainer is a request to a federal, state or local law-enforcement agency to notify ICE before a potentially removable person is released and, in specified circumstances, hold that person for up to 48 hours so ICE can assume custody. ICE says the agency uses detainers to take custody in a secure setting rather than locate a person in the community.

ICE says its officers establish probable cause to believe a person is removable before issuing a detainer. A detainer is only a request, however, and state and local agencies are not required to honour it solely because ICE has issued one. Where a detainer is not honoured, ICE says its officers may pursue the person in the community instead.

This creates a distinction between two kinds of enforcement. One requires ICE agents to locate someone at large. The other allows ICE to take custody from a facility where another agency has already established control over the person.

What Happens After Arrest?

A targeted arrest is not itself a final removal from the United States.

ICE's enforcement system involves several stages, including arrest, detention, immigration proceedings and, where ordered or otherwise authorised, removal. A person in immigration proceedings can be represented by a lawyer or accredited representative, but the government does not provide counsel. The Department of Justice's Executive Office for Immigration Review says respondents may obtain representation at no cost to the government and that courts provide information about pro bono legal services.

Detention is also distinct from arrest. A person may be detained while proceedings continue, while others can be released under specified conditions. The distinction matters because arrest figures cannot simply be treated as deportation figures.

The Government Accountability Office has also warned that ICE's public detention reporting has not captured every person who passed through temporary facilities before entering immigration detention, meaning official detention totals have previously understated the full number of people detained.

What Are The Risks?

A system built around identification and targeted arrests depends heavily on the quality of the information being used.

That does not mean targeted enforcement necessarily produces mistakes, but historical government oversight shows why identification remains a significant issue. A 2021 GAO review found that ICE and CBP had taken enforcement action against some people identified in agency data as potential US citizens between fiscal year 2015 and the second quarter of fiscal year 2020. GAO cited 674 arrests, 121 detentions and 70 removals of potential US citizens in the available data during that period, while also finding weaknesses in how such encounters were tracked. GAO's recommendations were subsequently marked as implemented. The figures are historical and do not establish a current error rate.

The broader point is that making enforcement more targeted does not remove the importance of verification. It makes the information used to identify a specific person central to the enforcement decision.

What Has The New Model Changed?

The clearest change is not that ICE has stopped conducting large operations. The available evidence does not establish that.

Instead, the Trump administration has expanded the settings in which targeted immigration enforcement can take place and strengthened the operational value of predictable encounters. A courthouse appearance, a workplace, a jail release or a routine police interaction can become a point at which ICE identifies and arrests a particular person.

Some of the mechanisms are decades old, including the 287(g) programme. Others are longstanding ICE practices such as worksite investigations and immigration detainers. What the 2025 policy changes demonstrate is a broader willingness to use those mechanisms across ordinary institutions and encounters.

The result is an enforcement model that is less dependent on searching broadly for people in the community and more dependent on knowing who to look for, where they are likely to be found and which local institutions can provide the point of contact. That is the operational shift the available evidence supports.