Nearly 900 law enforcement agencies across 40 states have entered contracts with ICE and deputized officers to carry out federal immigration laws in addition to local and state policies, according to data obtained by the Washington Examiner.

That is up from 135 when President Donald Trump took office in January.

“287(g) is critical to having the enforcement we need to arrest criminal illegal aliens across the country,” a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson told the Washington Examiner. “DHS has secured 896 signed agreements with state and local partnerships under this program, and we will continue to build on that number despite baseless lawsuits like this.”

Austin Kocher, an immigration trends analyst and professor at Syracuse University in New York, wrote in a recent report that the shift under Trump shows “massive growth.”

The increase in partnerships means that nonfederal police can help the Trump administration carry out its immigration enforcement priorities, the largest-ever deportation operation in U.S. history.

What is 287(g)?

The Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 amended the Immigration and Nationality Act to include Section 287(g), which gave ICE the authority to delegate specific immigration officer duties to state and local police. Counties and states could opt in at their discretion.

The agreements were popular during the George W. Bush administration but were targeted by the Obama administration. When Trump took office in 2017, 35 agreements were in place, according to the America First Policy Institute, an organization created to support Trump’s America First agenda.

Trump ramped up the program in his first term to 150 agreements. Biden had promised as a candidate to do away with the 287(g) program, but was unable to do so.

When Trump took office in January, he signed an executive order that required ICE to authorize state and local police to assist federal immigration authorities with the enforcement of immigration laws to the maximum extent possible.

States and cities can choose to turn over illegal immigrants in jail to ICE, assist ICE with arrests in the community, and team up on task forces.

States partner with the federal government

States such as Florida have been at the forefront of the state effort to get state police and local officers deputized to help ICE.

Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) has encouraged local and state law enforcement to get deputized to be able to pass along suspected illegal immigrants encountered at traffic stops to federal authorities.

Since the state deputized a portion of the Florida Highway Patrol to help out in March, state troopers have encountered roughly 3,600 illegal immigrants at traffic stops and turned them over to federal authorities, a state official told the Washington Examiner this week.

The state encounters, which are in addition to what local police are doing, add to the total number of people that ICE is taking off the street and preparing to deport.

The Trump administration obtained significant funding to reimburse state and local police for helping ICE.

“Additionally, more than $500 million from President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill will go to increasing our 287(g) partnerships with state and local law enforcement,” a DHS spokesperson told the Washington Examiner. “Like hiring, we’re supercharging our efforts to fulfill President Trump and the American people’s mandate to remove the worst of the worst from our country.”

Some have criticized the use of local and state police for federal work. The American Immigration Council, an organization in Washington that advocates for immigrants regardless of legal status, stated in a recent report that two Justice Department investigations have found a “pattern and practice of constitutional violations” against Latinos.

“There are many documented problems with 287(g) agreements. They are an expensive use of taxpayer money,” AIC wrote in the report. “ICE also provides insufficient supervision of local law enforcement agencies. But most egregiously, they have resulted in the widespread racial profiling of brown and Black communities.”

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The Trump administration has not given an estimate for how long it expects it will take the federal government to arrest and deport possibly millions of illegal immigrants. Trump initially said he would prioritize arresting criminals, but he has expanded the deportation operation to include all illegal immigrants.

With the goal of 1 million arrests by next January and roughly 14 million illegal immigrants living in the U.S., four years will not be long enough to complete the undertaking, and it could mean yearslong assistance from employees of other agencies.