By New York Post (U.S.) | Created at 2026-07-29 17:56:02 | Updated at 2026-07-29 22:16:43
4 hours ago
You’re no longer free to move about the cabin.
ICE has begun arresting foreign nationals who have overstayed their visas when they check into airports around the US — following reports that the TSA is sharing passenger data with immigration officers.
At least 27 people from over a dozen countries have been arrested while traveling through US airports, according to ABC News, citing Department of Homeland Security documents.
“DHS reversed the horrendous Biden-era policy that allowed aliens in our country illegally to jet around our country. Under President Trump, DHS will no longer tolerate this,” DHS said.
“This administration is working diligently to ensure that aliens in our country illegally can no longer fly unless it is out of our country to self-deport.”
Airports, of course, require flyers to share their personal details in order to get on planes — giving ICE agents clear opportunities to identify target illegal migrants for arrest.
Anti-Trump legal group American Oversight on Tuesday released a document outlining a data-sharing agreement between ICE and the Transportation Security Administration.
The document, signed in May 2025, describes in non-specific terms that TSA will provide ICE with certain passenger data elements which the agency will collect and retain.
However the appendices in the document identifying the precise data being shared were all but completely redacted.
The expanded enforcement effort marks the opening of a new front for the DHS as it scrambles to meet administration arrest quotas numbering in the thousands per day.
The exact airports where arrests have been made was not immediately clear, but there have been reports of ICE arrests at Los Angeles International Airport, Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas, Nashville International Airport, Denver International Airport and San Francisco International Airport.
Footage of some of the arrests have been making the rounds on social media, including the apprehension of Phu Nguyen, an Australian citizen born in Vietnam on a visa that expired in 2015, at LAX on Monday.
Another widely circulated shows ICE officers arresting Chantal Morales Rojas, 27, an Ecuadorian woman living in Oakland about to board a flight home from Denver International Airport.
ICE told the Denver Post that Rojas’ visa had expired in January 2025 and was therefore in the country illegally.
Although the arrests have only recently ramped up, ICE has had a toehold at US airports for more than a year.
More than 3 million illegal immigrants have left the US or been deported since the start of the second Trump administration — 2.2 million of whom opted to self-deport, DHS revealed to The Post in May.
