By Michelle Hackman and Josh Dawsey
WASHINGTON -- President Trump is seeking to lower the profile of his mass deportation effort, and has directed his top advisers to adopt a new approach on one of his central campaign promises, according to people familiar with the matter.
In conversations with top advisers and his wife Melania, Trump has become convinced that some of his administration's deportation policies have gone too far, and voters don't like the term "mass deportation." The president has told them he wants to see more attention on arresting "bad guys" and less chaos in American cities, according to people familiar with the matter.
The desire for an immigration reset is being driven in part by Trump's White House chief of staff, Susie Wiles, who believes the president's immigration team has turned one of his marquee issues into more of a challenging issue ahead of the midterms, the people said. As a result, the administration is attempting to change not only how it talks about the issue -- but also what actual enforcement looks like on the ground.
The shift has been spearheaded by White House border czar Tom Homan since he took over ICE operations in Minneapolis. Long a relatively measured voice inside the administration on immigration issues, Homan prefers ICE officers to focus on bread-and-butter arrests of criminals, particularly those who can be handed over by local jails.
ICE leadership isn't moving forward, for now, with high-profile operations like the ones it previously conducted in big blue cities like Chicago, Washington, D.C., and Minneapolis, according to officials familiar with the matter. Administration officials said they still could increase operations in the future.
Arrests of immigrants have ticked down to roughly 1,200 a day, from more than 1,500 a day when ICE was running its unprecedented operation in Minnesota, according to people familiar with the numbers.
"Nobody is changing the Administration's immigration enforcement agenda. President Trump's highest priority has always been the deportation of illegal alien criminals who endanger American communities," White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said.
Trump's advisers view the firing of Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem as a prime moment for a reset. Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R., Okla.), the president's pick to succeed Noem, said at his confirmation hearing that if confirmed he would redirect ICE from some of the more confrontational clashes that have come to define the agency under Trump, in favor of a more cooperative approach with local officials.
He also promised to reverse several of Noem's ICE directives, including one policy -- which the agency kept secret for months -- giving officers permission to force entry into immigrants' private homes without a criminal warrant signed by a judge.
"My goal in six months is that we're not in the lead story every day," Mullin said.
Trump has complained to advisers in recent days about the bad headlines the administration received under Noem's tenure, and has asked aides if they were aware of her unusual contract approval process, according to people familiar with the matter.
Several polls early in Trump's term found that voters strongly supported his goal of deporting illegal immigrants. Since then, some polls have found increasing opposition to his approach. A Washington Post/ABC News survey last month found 58% agreeing with the statement "Trump is going too far" with deportations, up from 48% last April.
The shift in tone is alarming some of the president's closest outside immigration allies, who spent years preparing for a second Trump term in which they hoped he would enact the widespread deportation campaign they have long advocated for.
"Republicans need to turn out their base for the midterms, and not talking about President Trump's promises, his signature campaign promise, is not the way to turn them out," said Rosemary Jenks, co-founder of the Immigration Accountability Project, a conservative immigration group.
Several outside groups, including Jenks's, have formed a new campaign called the "Mass Deportation Coalition" to pressure the administration to continue an aggressive approach. Rather than criticize Trump outright for carrying out what, in their view, is far too few deportations, they have instead branded his first year in office the initial phase of the campaign. "Now it is time to move to the second phase: removing large numbers of deportable aliens from the country expeditiously," the group says in its mission statement.
They are urging ICE to carry out a minimum of one million deportations in 2026, the goal Trump's key immigration adviser Stephen Miller publicly set for 2025 but that the administration didn't come close to achieving. On the campaign trail, Trump suggested he would deport as many as 20 million people.
Democrats and immigration advocates have voiced skepticism that much will change from the administration, given that Miller is still in place. "I want to make sure that if you're there, you're in charge and not Stephen Miller," Sen. Ruben Gallego (D., Ariz.) told Mullin at his confirmation hearing.
Even after Mullin takes over, ICE officials are likely to focus more on operations like small workplace raids, which advisers view as more politically justifiable, according to people familiar with the matter.
Trump's advisers have shown him polling that finds the "mass deportation" term is less popular, and he has repeatedly emphasized to aides in Oval Office meetings and in phone calls that they should use the word "criminals" to describe who their targets are, one senior administration official said. Trump wants to show some of the most hardened-looking criminals in a visual way ahead of the election, the official said.
James Blair, one of the president's top advisers, recently told Republican members of Congress to talk about "criminals" instead of "mass deportations," messaging that is desired by the president, according to administration officials.
"We've got to focus on the criminals," Trump has told senior aides.
Write to Michelle Hackman at michelle.hackman@wsj.com and Josh Dawsey at Joshua.Dawsey@WSJ.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
March 19, 2026 20:30 ET (00:30 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2026 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
