Data shows dramatic increase in arrests by ICE in Pittsburgh area

Data obtained by KDKA Investigates shows the dramatic increase in arrests by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the Pittsburgh area, providing a picture of those being detained and deported. 

"It's disgusting what's happening," said Monica Ruiz, the executive director of Casa San Jose, a nonprofit in the Pittsburgh area that supports Pittsburgh's Latino community through social services and immigrant rights advocacy. 

Sheriff Michael Slupe of the Butler County Sheriff's Department, which has a 287(g) cooperation agreement with ICE, said of undocumented immigrants, "They shouldn't be here. Period." 

Data shows increase in ICE arrests

KDKA Investigators obtained and analyzed years of arrest data from the Department of Homeland Security via a Freedom of Information Act request by the Deportation Data Project. Since President Trump took office, the rise in ICE arrests in the Pittsburgh area has been dramatic, jumping from 448 in the final year of the Biden administration to 1,425 in the Trump administration's first year in 2025. That's an increase of 218%.   

And with 358 ICE arrests just in January and February of this year, that pace appears to be increasing.  

'"Every day, there's at least four or five people that are picked up here locally," said Ruiz. 

Immigrants living in "terror," advocate says

It's had an impact on immigrant communities like the Pittsburgh neighborhood of Beechview, where Ruiz said fear of what she calls ICE's "Gestapo tactics" means most people no longer go outside.

"Terrifying small children, having their wives seeing their husbands taken away in handcuffs, breaking down doors when people are sleeping in their bedrooms," Ruiz said. "This is terror. This is not what this country stands on. And that's what we're living. It's a reality every single day."  

But that's not everyone's assessment. 

"These guys, I'm telling you straight up right now, are so professional," said Sheriff Slupe of ICE agents. "They're great to work with. They're very well-trained. Some of the things you hear on TV and the news, whatever, the bad words that are being used are absolutely not true."

Butler County Sheriff's Department works with ICE

The Pittsburgh Bureau of Police and Allegheny County Police Department have declined to enter into 287(g) agreements, which allow local police to enforce immigration laws and cooperate with ICE. Both city and county councils have passed resolutions forbidding it. But beginning last June, the Butler County Sheriff's Department came on board. Since then, Sheriff Michael Slupe says his deputies have worked alongside ICE in arresting 52 immigrants.

"The criticism has been that these are kind of warrantless searches, busting into homes or taking people off the street without an investigation," KDKA's Andy Sheehan said. 

"Absolutely not busting into people's houses," Slupe replied. "They have rights just like everybody else. Unfortunately, they're here illegally. So once they are determined they're illegal, then they are taken to ICE and then they are transported away."  

Data shows majority of detainees have no criminal record

The Trump administration initially said it would target the "worst of the worst" — immigrants charged or suspected of murder, rape and other violent acts in their native country or in the U.S. But the figures compiled by the Deportation Data Project in western Pennsylvania shows the vast majority – about two-thirds – of detainees have no criminal record. Eighty percent have no criminal convictions, according to the figures. 

Still, Slupe says those arrested are breaking the law. 

"I'd like to think I'm a law-and-order sheriff, a law enforcement officer for almost 40 years," Slupe said. "And I think that most of the residents in this county are very supportive of what we're doing. And getting illegals, whether a crime's been committed or whether they've entered into our country illegally, is an important part of what we should be helping with."

Slupe says most of the immigrants arrested in Butler County have been working in the construction trades. The data shows most immigrants arrested since 2025 in the western Pennsylvania area are from Mexico, followed by Guatemala.

Ruiz argues most are not illegal and have filed asylum claims. She says rather than hire more ICE agents, the Trump administration should appoint more immigration judges to decide their fate in court. 

"Give people due process," Ruiz said. "That's all we're asking for."

DHS defends arrests

KDKA Investigates reached out to the Department of Homeland Security and ICE with what our data showed. In a statement in response, a DHS spokesperson said the dataset from the Deportation Data Project is not accurate, especially regarding the data that most of those detained have not been charged or convicted of a crime. 

"Many of the individuals that are counted as 'non-criminals' are actually terrorists, human rights abusers, gangsters and more; they just don't have a rap sheet in the U.S. Further, every single one of these individuals committed a crime when they came into this country illegally," the DHS said. 

The New York Times analyzed the nationwide data from the same dataset used by KDKA Investigates. Just as in the Pittsburgh-area data, it found that the pace of arrests has increased nationwide in the first months of 2026. And it revealed that while the Philadelphia field office, which oversees Pittsburgh, arrested an average of 35 people every day, the most arrests are taking place in the Miami, Atlanta, San Antonio and St. Paul, Minnesota, field offices. Those offices are reporting between 65 and 120 people arrested daily.