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What Trump's immigration enforcement surge looks like in Oregon, by the numbers

FILE - A badge on the hip of an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent in Broadview, Ill., Oct. 3, 2025.
Erin Hooley
/
AP
FILE - A badge on the hip of an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent in Broadview, Ill., Oct. 3, 2025.

Federal agents arrested more than 1,800 people in Oregon in 2025, data shows. In 2026, as of Aug. 6, they had arrested more than 700.

Federal immigration agents have arrested more than 700 people in Oregon this year as of early August, according to new data.

Those arrests make up about a quarter of the more than 2,500 arrests federal agents have conducted in Oregon under the second Trump administration, according to the Deportation Data Project, a database run by lawyers and academics who collect national immigration arrest data from public records requests to federal agencies.

The Oregon Capital Chronicle analyzed the data, which recently expanded to include arrest numbers from Oct. 1, 2022 to Aug. 6, 2026, to understand what federal immigration enforcement has looked like in Oregon under Trump’s second term.

Immigration arrests in Oregon in 2025 and so far in 2026 combined are eight times higher than the number of Oregon immigration arrests during the final two years of the Biden administration, when federal agents made nearly 300 arrests.

Oregon hit its peak immigration arrests in the fall when the federal government late last year launched an operation targeting immigrants living across the Willamette Valley. Those actions resulted in more than 1,000 immigration arrests in the state between September and November.

Oregon Democrats with majority control of the state legislature responded by passing several laws in February aimed at increasing protections for immigrants, including issuing guidance to schools and hospitals on how to respond when federal agents appear on campus grounds and restricting federal agents from wearing masks. The latter has been tried in other states as well, though with little success standing up to federal court challenges.

Immigration arrests in Oregon in 2026 haven’t returned to peak levels seen last fall, but they’re still outpacing the number of arrests made during the first eight months of 2025 when agents arrested 462 people — 35% fewer than the arrests made so far in 2026.

Demographics of those arrested by immigration agents in Oregon under Trump 2.0

The people immigration agents arrested over the last two years in Oregon came from at least 75 different countries. More than half of them were Mexican citizens, followed by Guatemalan and Venezuelan citizens.

Most of the people agents arrested — 85% — were male. Females made up 13% of those arrested, while the gender of the remaining 2% was listed as unknown.

The oldest person detained was 83 years old. The youngest was 3 years old.

Mia Maldonado covers the Oregon Legislature and state agencies with a focus on social services for the Oregon Capital Chronicle, a professional, nonprofit news organization and JPR news partner. She began her journalism career with the Capital Chronicle's sister outlet in Idaho, the Idaho Capital Sun, where she received multiple awards for her coverage of the environment and Latino affairs.