How have ICE annual budgets changed year‑by‑year since 2015, and what drove the largest increases?
Executive summary
ICE’s budget has moved from modest levels in the mid‑2010s — about $5.96 billion in 2015 — to a dramatically larger footprint by 2025–2026 as Congress and the White House layered regular appropriations, supplemental reconciliation funding, and policy priorities that explicitly fund massive detention and removal capacity [1] [2]. The single largest drivers were the multi‑year “One Big Beautiful Bill” / reconciliation package that earmarked roughly $75 billion for ICE over four years and Administration requests tied to an aggressive removals and detention strategy that sought up to 100,000 detention beds and “mass removal” capacity [3] [4] [2].
1. From 2015’s $6 billion era to the decade of expansion
In 2015 Congress approved roughly $5.96 billion for ICE, a level that observers described as nearly $1 billion below the Obama administration’s request that year and representative of a relatively modest post‑creation funding trend for the agency [1]. For much of the late 2010s and early 2020s ICE’s annual appropriations hovered near the $10 billion mark, a scale that was small compared with many other DHS components until the mid‑2020s when partisan politics and new policy priorities shifted that trajectory [1] [2].
2. 2024–2025: the immediate run‑up and baseline rebounds
By fiscal 2024 ICE’s regular appropriations were still described as “less than $10 billion,” but the political climate — shootings, custody deaths, and public debates over enforcement — set the stage for larger supplemental measures and new administration requests that would reshape the baseline going into 2025 and 2026 [5] [1]. Congress appropriated roughly $10.4 billion for ICE through the regular 2025 process, establishing a new near‑term baseline ahead of larger reconciliation moves [2].
3. 2026: reconciliation money, multiple estimates, and why numbers diverge
The reconciliation/omnibus package commonly called the One Big Beautiful Bill assigned approximately $75 billion to ICE over four years, which analysts and journalists translated into very large single‑year uplifts — estimates vary because of front‑loading choices, pro rata assumptions, and out‑of‑cycle obligations. Some reporting and analyses place the combined 2026 figure in the high tens of billions (estimates around $27.7B to $30B) once the reconciliation allocation and the annual appropriations are combined; other official briefings note an $18.7 billion-per‑year arithmetic share of the four‑year appropriation [3] [6] [7] [2]. The variability reflects different methodological choices about how much of the multi‑year money will be obligated in FY2026 and how DHS will apportion funds among components [7] [2].
4. What specifically drove the largest increases: detention, removals, and political compromise
The reconciliation money was explicitly tied to expanding detention capacity and enforcement operations — including language and program changes to support a strategy of up to 100,000 detention beds and an Administration‑stated removals target that DHS documents framed as enabling “mass removal” operations and up to 1,000,000 removals per year [4] [3]. Advocacy groups and watchdogs framed the new funding as creating a “deportation‑industrial complex” because tens of billions were carved out largely for detention construction, operation, and enforcement logistics [3]. Legislative dynamics — House Republicans largely supporting the package while some Democrats joined to avoid a shutdown and other Democrats openly protested — also explain why a large omnibus passed despite internal party objections and why some appropriations kept the agency’s base near prior levels while adding supplemental sums [8] [9] [10].
5. Reporting discrepancies, operational effects, and limits of available data
Public sources diverge on precise year‑by‑year totals because some figures cite only regular annual appropriations while others fold in the multi‑year reconciliation pot and DHS internal obligation plans; independent estimates (e.g., $27.7B or $30B for 2026) and agency requests (roughly $11.3B requested for FY2026) sit alongside Congressional summaries that calculate pro rata shares of the $75B supplemental funding [11] [6] [7] [2]. DHS’s FY2026 Congressional Justification lays out programmatic drivers — detention, automated screening, staffing increases, and technology — but does not lock every dollar’s timing, leaving room for credible alternative accounting and for political choices [4] [12]. Where sources conflict, the primary facts are consistent: ICE moved from roughly $6B in 2015 to a baseline near $10–11B by mid‑decade and then received an unprecedented multi‑year infusion that, depending on allocation and front‑loading, produced the largest single‑year increases in the agency’s history [1] [2] [3].