Which ICE or HSI recovery operations since 2019 included the largest numbers of located missing children, and how were those recoveries documented?
Executive summary
HSI/ICE-led recoveries with the largest publicly announced counts since 2019 include a two-month New Mexico effort that located or recovered 78 minors and a three-week West Texas operation that located or recovered 70 children, and larger identification efforts tied to online exploitation investigations that HSI says produced hundreds to thousands of identified victims; these totals are drawn from ICE/HSI press releases, local media reports and agency statements, which define “recovered” and “located” in specific administrative terms [1] [2] [3]. Documentation for these recoveries comes primarily from agency press releases, NCIC status updates, formal news conferences, and after-action descriptions of partner participation and victim services, although reporting practices and public-data definitions vary across operations [4] [2] [1].
1. Operation Rescue Me (Southern New Mexico): 78 minors located/recovered and how ICE documented it
A spring 2025 multi-agency effort dubbed Operation Rescue Me, led by HSI Las Cruces and the U.S. Marshals Service, is credited in ICE’s public release with locating or recovering 78 missing minors over two months, with the agency specifying some individuals were located in Mexico and that several investigations were opened into sexual abuse and human trafficking as a result [1]. ICE’s public documentation consisted of a formal press release that lists participating agencies, describes offers of victim services, and states that the operation used NCIC records and partnerships with NCMEC and state child-welfare agencies to identify and remove entries for returned minors [1] [4]. Local media picked up the ICE release and repeated the agency’s distinction—ICE defines “recovered” as those active in NCIC as missing/runaway—so much of the public record rests on agency-supplied tallies and NCIC-status changes rather than independent case files published publicly [4].
2. Operation Lost Souls (West Texas/El Paso): 70 children recovered and the public record
HSI El Paso announced Operation Lost Souls as a three-week effort that located and recovered 70 missing children across West Texas—some of whom were described as sex-trafficking victims or abuse survivors—and released results at a news conference coinciding with National Missing Children’s Day, with statements from HSI and state partners about victim services provided [2] [5]. Public documentation again is based on an ICE/HSI press release and a news conference that quantified results, credited cooperating local police and school districts, and said the operation produced additional leads; independent outlets like Fox News and local affiliates amplified those counts from the agency release [5] [6]. As with other operations, the agency emphasized a victim-centered approach and follow-up investigations, but public materials do not generally provide itemized case-level documentation in the release itself [2].
3. Large-scale online exploitation operations: hundreds to thousands identified and how identification differs from “recovery”
HSI’s online child-exploitation sweepwork—exemplified by coordinated initiatives like Operation Renewed Hope III and broader FY2024 reporting—produced far larger numbers of identified or “rescued” child victims in aggregate, with HSI claiming identification and/or rescue of 1,783 child victims in its FY2024 portfolio and large analytic efforts such as Renewed Hope III analyzing tens of thousands of files to generate leads shared across 47 countries [3]. These identifications are documented through forensic analysis of seized digital media, Interpol and NCMEC database matches, dissemination of leads to field offices and international partners, and consolidated ICE summaries rather than contemporaneous NCIC “recovery” entries—meaning “identified” victims from online material may or may not align with the administrative category used in field recovery operations [3].
4. Other notable tallies, definitions, and reporting caveats
HSI has also reported operations identifying hundreds (for example, a cited Operation Sunflower identified 123 sexually exploited children) but these initiatives similarly rely on agency press releases and partner summaries for public documentation [7]. Journalistic and oversight scrutiny has shown different statistical frames—ICE’s NCIC-based “recovered” vs. HSI’s broader “identified/rescued” counts—and an Inspector General report and advocacy pieces note gaps and different definitions for missing or unaccompanied minors, underscoring that public counts can mix administrative status changes, investigative identifications, and welfare interventions [8].
5. What the public record supports—and what it does not
The clearest, largest single-operation counts in the public record since 2019 are the 78 minors in Operation Rescue Me and the 70 in Operation Lost Souls, both documented primarily via ICE/HSI press releases, news conferences and partner statements that cite NCIC checks and victim-service referrals [1] [2] [4]. Beyond those, HSI’s large-scale online efforts claim much larger totals of identified victims, but those figures reflect forensic identifications across many cases and jurisdictions rather than single, localized recovery sweeps, and the public documentation is summary-level rather than case-by-case [3] [7]. Where sources are silent—such as detailed case files, demographic breakdowns, or public accountability audits of how many identifications became confirmed recoveries—this reporting does not invent missing details and relies on the agency’s own published statements [2] [1].