ICE arrests slow on Long Island, bucking national trend, new data shows

While immigration arrests surge nationwide, they’ve steadily decreased on Long Island in recent months, newly released data shows.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested a total of 72 people in Nassau and Suffolk counties in July, the same month that arrests nationwide hit an all-time high of nearly 50,000, according to public records released by the nonprofit Deportation Data Project and analyzed by Newsday.

The trend line, both locally and nationally, had been rising since last fall and peaked on Long Island in January, when ICE detained 322 people. That same month, federal agents fatally shot two American citizens protesting an ICE surge in Minneapolis and the ensuing protests led to reduced enforcement through the remainder of the winter and into spring.

On Long Island, monthly arrests hit a low of 58 in April, the data shows, the least since March of last year, when the second Trump administration was just beginning its immigration crackdown.

Since then, despite continued concerns from activists, the arrests haven't gone higher than 84 in any month, holding fairly consistent from April through July. That's in stark contrast with the 58% increase nationally over the same period.

Experts, both locally and nationally, said that the reasons for Long Island's arrests diverging from the new national surge could be explained by a combination of factors. They cited heightened community pushback, local legislation hindering cooperation with ICE in some Suffolk towns and villages and even the politics of Republican Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman, who formally embraced ICE, but who is running for governor and needing to pick up support from moderates. 

“If the data is accurate, it clearly is a positive sign for all the individuals and organizations that have come together, Latino and non-Latino, to resist the aggressive enforcement,” said Larry Levy, the dean of suburban studies at Hofstra University.

Immigration has emerged as a political flashpoint in New York and across the country, as Trump wages one of the most aggressive deportation campaigns in the nation's history, hollowing out communities, leaving business without workers and breaking up families.

The president and his supporters describe the crackdown as necessary to remove violent "criminal aliens" from the country, even if many arrests have ensnared people who had never faced criminal charges, and to restore law and order to a broken immigration system.

ICE referred Newsday's questions about Long Island arrest trends to the Department of Homeland Security, which didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. But Rep. Nick LaLota (R- Amityville) said in a statement that he’s “focused on results, not monthly arrest totals.”

“ICE should prioritize arresting and deporting dangerous criminal illegal immigrants and those receiving taxpayer-funded benefits, while Congress should discourage local sanctuary policies that make our families less safe” LaLota said.

The other three members representing Long Island in the House did not immediately respond to requests for comment for this story.

The newest Deportation Data release differs slightly from previous reporting due to the new inclusion of arrest location, which allowed Newsday to exclude New York City detentions that were only processed on Long Island.

The news that Long Island arrests have slowed comes as a state law went into effect this week banning local agencies from entering into formal cooperation agreements with federal immigration officials. Nassau County initially failed to comply with the law, signaling a potential confrontation between Blakeman and New York’s Democratic governor and attorney general.

But Blakeman said at a news conference Wednesday that Nassau would reluctantly comply with the law.

"I believe in the rule of law. ... We don't get to pick and choose the laws that we have to enforce or abide by," Blakeman said.

Gordon Tepper, a spokesman for Gov. Kathy Hochul, Blakeman's opponent, responded to the updated ICE arrest statistics with a statement saying the governor "has taken a strong stand against federal overreach, signing some of the strongest protections in the country to prevent our locally funded police officers from being commandeered by ICE and turned against the very communities they are sworn to protect.”

Quieter tactics on LI

The new state law prompted White House Border Czar Tom Homan to threaten to “flood the zone” in New York with immigration enforcement if the state enacted the measure.

And in New York, data shows, ICE arrested a record number of people in July, mirroring the national trend.

But as Newsday has previously reported, ICE tactics on Long Island have been much quieter, capitalizing off the area’s car culture to conduct traffic stops to arrest drivers.

Karen Tejada-Peña, a professor of sociology at the University of Hartford who has studied the relationship between Latinos and law enforcement on Long Island, credited local government initiatives limiting cooperation with ICE for the downturn, saying that the fear is causing “neutral voices to be concerned.”

Both East Hampton Town and Village this spring adopted legislation barring local police from cooperating with federal immigration enforcement. In Riverhead, some residents are urging the town to pass a measure that would set a standard for how town governments and police departments respond to ICE activity.

In neighboring Southold, the town board is considering measures over how to respond to reports of immigration enforcement.

“Had it not been for those types of solidarity groups, I think the arrests would continue,” Tejada-Peña said.

Impact of governor's race

Both Tejada-Peña and Levy said the downturn of arrests on Long Island might also be attributed to Blakeman running for governor and trying to limit the political fallout of having potentially disruptive and high profile raids in his backyard.

Blakeman “and his campaign realized that, as supportive as he has been publicly of the Trump administration's aggressive immigration policies, it's starting to cost him politically with moderate swing voters, and particularly with Latinos, who gave him a plurality of their vote when he ran for county executive last year,” Levy said.

A poll conducted by Siena University earlier this month found that 60% of likely voters in New York opposed the way ICE is working to arrest people, while 36% of polled voters supported the agency and the remainder either were in the middle or didn’t know. The poll found that 67% of moderate voters opposed how ICE is operating. 

Among suburban voters polled, 52% opposed how the agency is operating while 45% supported ICE. The majority, 53%, said the agency’s tactics have gone too far, while 32% said their tactics are right and 13% said the agency isn’t going far enough.

The same poll found that Hochul leads Blakeman 49% to 39% of likely voters for governor. 

The poll's results have a margin of error of plus or minus 4.6 percentage points, meaning the answers to any question could vary that much.

"In general, Long Island is going to be a place where you see that the national politics affects the local responses," Tejada-Peña said.

Where arrests are happening

The latest ICE arrest data released by Deportation Data Project for the first time notes the place a detention occurred. Bethpage was listed for 346 arrests since Trump took office a second time, tops on Long Island. The hamlet is home to a U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services processing office where asylum seekers have reported being arrested following interviews.

Hempstead, a heavily Latino community where Latino-owned businesses have suffered amid the immigration crackdown, had the second-most arrests with 277.

Other communities with 100 or more arrests include Mineola, Brentwood, Freeport, East Meadow, Westbury, Williston Park and Central Islip, which is home to the federal courthouse where many immigrants are temporarily held.

The ICE activity, whether waning or gearing up for a new surge, has made Long Island Latinos "more and more organized," Levy said, with opposition coming from elected leaders, church officials, lawyers, civic groups and businesses.

“Over immigration, everybody has come together,” he said.