Florida law enforcement agencies are playing a growing role in arresting and holding people on behalf of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, according to a report by a group that opposes local collaboration in the federal crackdown.
Florida has the highest rate of arrests involving requests for local jails to hold people for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, known as immigration detainers, after they’ve been picked up for another offense, according to the analysis by the Prison Policy Initiative.
The state had an annualized rate of 125 arrests involving ICE detainers per 100,000 residents through Aug. 5, up from 28 during the last year of Biden’s administration, a roughly fivefold spike.
The Prison Policy Initiative is a Massachusetts-based nonprofit and research group that advocates for prisoners’ rights and supports limits on local law enforcement cooperation with ICE. The group used federal immigration records obtained by UC Berkeley’s Deportation Data Project.
Wanda Bertram, communications strategist at the Prison Policy Initiative, said what is happening in Florida mirrors what the organization is seeing nationwide. The Trump administration is again pushing for 3,000 immigration arrests per day, CNN reported.
“It is clearer than ever that the Trump administration is reliant on local police departments to do its work detaining and deporting immigrants en masse,” Bertram said. “In other parts of the country where communities have not been as cooperative as in Florida, ICE arrests of all types, but especially those that are law-enforcement-assisted, have not risen as much in 2026.”
Bertram said arrests at law enforcement locations without an ICE detainer increased the most this year. Statewide, the annualized rate for such arrests doubled in 2026 compared with 2025, while rates rose 53% for community arrests and 31% for arrests involving ICE detainers.
In Hillsborough, Pinellas and Pasco counties, there were 633 immigration arrests from Jan. 20 through Aug. 5, the group found. The total included: 288 involved ICE detainers, 158 occurred at law enforcement locations without a detainer and 187 were community arrests made in places such as homes, workplaces and neighborhoods, with or without local law enforcement assistance.
Hillsborough had the most arrests across all three categories during that period, 474, followed by Pinellas, 137, and Pasco, 22. The numbers are based in ICE records, researchers said. A small number of ICE arrests lacked county information and were excluded from the regional calculation.
Florida expanded its cooperation between state and local law enforcement agencies and federal immigration authorities under a partnership known as the 287(g) program.
Florida also has the fourth-highest annualized immigration arrest rate in the country, at 226 per 100,000 residents, behind Texas (312), Wyoming (281) and Arizona (231), according to the analysis.
Last year, Gov. Ron DeSantis signed new measures that put millions into immigration enforcement. Among other provisions, Florida’s legislation approved enhanced criminal penalties based on immigration status and created the State Board of Immigration Enforcement.
On Sept. 29 the board approved about $88 million in grant requests and amendments for dozens of law enforcement agencies and detention sites statewide. The funding included $5.47 million for the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office, $9.29 million for the Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office and $11,250 for detention beds in Pasco County.
The money was approved to cover costs tied to cooperation with federal immigration authorities.
