Seeking to Ramp Up Deportations, the Trump Administration Quietly Expands a Vast Web of Data
May 29, 2025
Policy Beat
By Muzaffar Chishti and Colleen Putzel-Kavanaugh
To help accomplish its aim of mass deportations, the Trump administration is tapping into numerous federal, state, and local databases at an unprecedented scale, and making more of them interoperable. The reach into and communication between information storehouses—including ones containing sensitive information about all U.S. residents’ taxes, health, benefits receipt, and addresses—allows U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and other authorities to harvest, exchange, and share a vast trove of data. The aim of tapping government and commercial databases appears twofold: attempt to secure large-scale arrests and deportations of removable noncitizens, and instill a sense of fear so that others “self deport.”
In This Article
DOGE has accessed a range of government databases, including those not previously used for immigration enforcement
Recent changes build on ICE's already significant surveillance capabilities
Immigration authorities' access to data about U.S. residents has increased dramatically since 9/11
It remains to be seen if greater data access results in increased arrests and deportations
The Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), launched by Elon Musk, has played an oversized role in this data-leveraging mission, accessing sensitive databases across government agencies and breaking down long-standing silos erected for operational and privacy reasons. And the software company Palantir, a longtime ICE contractor, has been awarded a new contract initially for $30 million to build a “streamlined” database to aid immigration enforcement.
Palantir’s Immigration Lifecycle Operating System (ImmigrationOS) will add to an already formidable arsenal of data available to ICE, including from the private sector. The agency is believed to be among the largest government purchasers of commercial credit, utility, motor vehicle agency, and other information—including airline passenger data, according to recent reporting. By one estimate, in 2022 ICE was able to know the addresses of three out of four U.S. adults—citizen and noncitizen alike.
https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/trump-ice-data-surveillance
