How many immigrants were deported during Bill Clinton’s presidency by year?
Executive summary
The best publicly available year-by-year counts for formal deportations (DHS “removals”) during Bill Clinton’s presidency come from federal yearbook tallies: FY1993 — 42,469; FY1994 — 45,621; FY1995 — 50,873; FY1996 — 69,588; FY1997 — 114,292; FY1998 — 172,547; FY1999 — 180,101; FY2000 — 188,467, for a total of 863,958 removals across FY1993–FY2000 (the Clinton years) [1].
1. What the official yearly removal numbers show
The Department of Homeland Security–based compilations reported by independent fact-checkers and analysts list removals by fiscal year during the Clinton administration as: FY1993 = 42,469; FY1994 = 45,621; FY1995 = 50,873; FY1996 = 69,588; FY1997 = 114,292; FY1998 = 172,547; FY1999 = 180,101; FY2000 = 188,467, summing to 863,958 formal removals for FY1993–FY2000 [1].
2. Removals versus returns — why aggregate totals vary widely
Those yearly “removal” counts are only one part of the commonly quoted totals: many analyses add “returns” (people turned back at the border or otherwise returned without a formal removal order), and when those are included Clinton-era figures approach or exceed 12 million; for example, Migration Policy Institute and other observers report roughly 11.4 million returns and about 0.9 million removals in the Clinton years, yielding totals commonly cited as ~12.3 million expulsions/returns during 1993–2000 [2] [3].
3. Competing tallies and corrections in the record
Public debate has produced competing headline numbers — some early summaries and political claims overstated removals before corrections — and fact-checkers have documented revisions (for example, earlier misstatements were corrected to reflect roughly 827,100–863,958 removals depending on the dataset and adjustments) [3] [1].
4. Why counts jumped in the late 1990s
The steady rise in DHS removals from the mid‑1990s into FY2000 reflects policy changes, increased enforcement capacity and new procedural authorities enacted in 1996 that expanded expedited processes and enforcement tools — a context that helps explain the growth from ~42,000 removals in FY1993 to ~188,000 by FY2000 [4] [5].
5. Limits of the available figures and what they don’t show
Yearly DHS-style removals capture formal, ordered departures but do not by themselves measure the broader universe of border “returns,” administrative turnbacks, or enforcement activity; several credible sources therefore present both removals and returns, and analysts warn that different definitions produce very different headline totals [2] [1].
6. How to read the numbers in political debate
When presidents are compared on “deportations,” proponents and critics often point to different metrics — some emphasize removals (formal orders), others aggregate returns and removals together to produce much larger totals — so accuracy requires naming the metric used and the fiscal‑year basis for comparison [3] [2].
7. Bottom line for the record on a year-by-year answer
The defensible, source‑traceable year-by‑year counts for formal DHS “removals” during Clinton’s tenure (FY1993–FY2000) are the eight figures listed above and total 863,958 removals; if one includes border returns and administrative returns the commonly cited total for the same period rises to roughly 12.3 million, but that larger figure mixes distinct procedural categories and depends on inclusion choices [1] [2].