How do 2025 ICE detentions of green card holders compare to 2024 and 2023?
Executive summary
Detention of noncitizens by ICE surged sharply in 2025 compared with 2024 and 2023, with daily populations and facility counts rising by roughly three-quarters to nearly 80 percent in many accounts and record-high totals by mid- and late‑2025 [1] [2]. The sources do not provide a clean, published time series isolating lawful permanent residents (green card holders) across 2023–2025, but multiple reports document new tactics and patterns in 2025—including arrests during immigration interviews and a larger share of detainees without criminal convictions—that point to an expanded risk facing green card applicants and certain long‑term residents [3] [4] [5].
1. Overall detention trends: dramatic expansion in 2025 after smaller baselines in 2023–24
ICE detention levels rose to unprecedented totals in 2025, with mid‑December counts of roughly 68,000–70,000 people—an increase on the order of 75–78 percent compared with mid‑December 2024—and ICE using dozens more facilities, including tent sites, to accommodate the inflow [1] [2]. Independent tracking and academic estimates also show large increases in arrests and detentions after January 2025 and especially through the late spring and fall, with daily detention beds used for interior arrests tripling in some analyses between the second half of 2024 and fall 2025 [6] [7].
2. What the reporting says specifically about green card holders: scattered, alarming examples but no comprehensive count
Investigative and legal outlets in 2025 documented new practices that directly affect green card applicants and holders—reports of ICE arrests taking place during USCIS green card interviews and accounts of detainees with pending adjustment applications pressured into voluntary departure—but none of the sources supply an authoritative nationwide tally of how many lawful permanent residents (LPRs) were detained in 2025 versus 2024 or 2023 [3] [4]. VisaVerge and VisaLawyerBlog flag the tactic and its chilling effects on applicants, but both are case‑based or advocacy reporting rather than a statistical breakdown of LPR detentions [4] [3].
3. Composition of the detained population: more people without criminal convictions, which implicates green card holders
Multiple analyses find that a large share of people detained in 2025 had no criminal convictions—one dataset put that share at roughly 70–74 percent of those in custody as of late 2025—meaning interior enforcement swept broadly, affecting non‑criminal long‑term residents and asylum seekers as well as others [4] [5]. Cato/Brennan Center and other researchers reported that tens of thousands were arrested in the period spanning late 2024 into mid‑2025 and that a majority had no criminal record; that pattern suggests the increase in 2025 detention was driven by expanded interior arrests that could capture green card holders in certain circumstances [8].
4. Enforcement tactics changed in 2025 in ways that increase risk to LPRs and applicants
First‑hand reporting and legal practitioners documented enforcement at civil venues such as USCIS offices and courthouses and escalated community raids—tactics that differ from classic Border Patrol apprehensions and that make it more likely that green card applicants attending interviews or check‑ins could be arrested [7] [3]. Scholars and watchdogs also show that discretionary releases fell sharply and that ICE applied “maximum use of detention” policies, reducing bond opportunities and increasing deportations directly from custody, which raises the stakes for any LPR or applicant who is detained [9] [2].
5. Oversight, mortality and conditions: worsening environment in 2025 amplifies harms to detained LPRs
As detentions ballooned in 2025, facility oversight inspections dropped and documented violations—overcrowding, medical care failures and increased deaths—rose, creating a far riskier detention environment for everyone inside, including lawful permanent residents and those with pending status claims [1]. Advocacy groups argue these conditions and the collapse of discretionary release channels have produced coercive pressures—some detainees choosing voluntary departure rather than protracted detention and court backlogs—again a dynamic reported in 2025 but not framed as a numerical comparison with 2023 or 2024 for green card holders specifically [4] [1].
6. Limitations, competing narratives and the policy context
Federal dashboards and ICE public statistics were updated through 2024 but 2025 figures are chiefly reconstructed by watchdogs, FOIA-based projects and advocacy groups; those sources converge on a large 2025 increase but differ in emphasis and methodology, and none supply a validated national time series counting detained green card holders across 2023–2025 [10] [6]. Proponents of the 2025 enforcement surge frame it as restoring rule‑of‑law interior enforcement; critics and legal groups depict it as an expansive, punitive program that sweeps in non‑criminal LPRs and applicants—both perspectives appear across the coverage [6] [9].
Exact comparative counts of detained green card holders by year are not present in the supplied sources; the responsible conclusion from the reporting is that 2025 saw a broad and historically large expansion of ICE detention and of tactics that have tangibly increased the risk of arrest for green card applicants and some lawful permanent residents, but a precise numeric comparison for LPRs alone between 2025, 2024 and 2023 cannot be drawn from the available material [2] [1] [3].