What is the probability of a green card holder to be arrested and detained by ICE?
Executive summary
Recent reporting and official datasets do not provide a clean numeric answer to “the probability that a green card holder will be arrested and detained by ICE,” but they do sketch a clear pattern: lawful permanent residents (LPRs) are not the primary target of broad interior enforcement campaigns in official statements, yet they remain vulnerable—especially when arrested, convicted, traveling through checkpoints, or otherwise flagged—while overall detention levels and interior arrests have risen sharply in 2025–2026 [1] [2] [3]. Because available sources lack a reliable denominator for the LPR population within ICE enforcement datasets, any precise probability cannot be calculated from the provided reporting [2] [4].
1. ICE’s public numbers show detention surging, but don’t isolate green card holders
ICE and independent trackers document a dramatic rise in the detained population—tens of thousands in custody during 2025 and early 2026—but those releases enumerate total detainees, criminal-conviction status, and facility counts rather than a breakdown of lawful permanent residents versus other immigration statuses, so they cannot by themselves yield a direct probability for any individual green card holder [2] [5] [6]. ICE’s public statistics focus on arrests, removals, and detention totals and emphasize legal categories like “mandatory detention” and criminal history, but do not publish a simple share of detainees who were LPRs at the time of arrest in the datasets cited [2].
2. Indicators: detention growth includes many people without U.S. criminal records, which affects LPR exposure
Independent analyses and advocacy reporting show the detained population’s composition shifting toward people with no U.S. criminal convictions—rising from a small share to a much larger share of detainees in 2025—indicating interior enforcement is sweeping beyond traditionally criminally charged cases [3] [5] [7]. That shift matters for green card holders because while many LPRs are safe from deportation absent disqualifying criminal convictions, the expansion of “at-large” arrests, roving operations, and broader enforcement practices increases the chances that an LPR might be encountered and detained after a traffic stop, jail booking, or immigration checkpoint [3] [8] [9].
3. Legal and practical risk factors that raise an LPR’s chance of detention
Legal guidance and civil-rights groups consistently identify specific risk multipliers for LPR detention: criminal arrests or convictions (even relatively minor ones), encounters at airports or checkpoints, travel outside the continental U.S., and interactions that surface old immigration issues or parole applications; these sources advise that LPR status reduces but does not eliminate detention risk [10] [11] [12]. Law firms and advocacy groups caution that ICE is not universally “targeting” all green card holders, but LPRs with those risk factors are more likely to be arrested or picked up via local-custody transfers or detainers [1] [11] [8].
4. Policy shifts and operational memos compress uncertainty upward
Recent reporting documents operational changes—internal memos lowering arrest standards and agency planning for vastly expanded detention capacity—that make any historical estimate of LPR risk a weaker guide to current reality [9] [13]. Those changes, coupled with reported increases in detention funding and rapid growth in bed usage, suggest the environment in which an LPR’s individual risk is assessed has become more permissive of interior arrests and longer detentions, even if official public datasets still don’t break out LPR-specific probabilities [3] [13].
5. Bottom line: cannot produce a precise percentage from the available data; qualitative verdict
The available sources do not supply the numerator (number of green card holders arrested/detained in a given interval) nor a consistent denominator within ICE datasets to calculate an empirical probability for an LPR; therefore a precise percentage cannot be credibly provided from this reporting alone [2] [4]. The qualitative conclusion is firm: for most green card holders with no criminal history and no flagged risk factors, the chance remains relatively low historically, but that chance is not zero and has risen alongside expanded interior enforcement and new operational practices—while for LPRs with criminal records, travel through checkpoints, or arrests that lead to local custody transfers, the probability is materially higher [1] [11] [8].