Joe Biden spent four years waving millions of illegal aliens into Florida.
Now DeSantis is throwing them out at a pace no governor in American history has ever matched.
New data shows Florida just lapped every other state in the country – and every Republican governor in America needs to see how DeSantis did it.
How Operation Tidal Wave Made Florida Number One in ICE Arrests and Deportations
The Miami Field Office – covering Florida, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands – is averaging 120 arrests per day in 2026, with 9,880 total as of March 10, according to data reviewed by the New York Times.
That’s not a surge. That’s a machine.
The next closest field office is Dallas, running 80 arrests per day.
Minnesota launched a high-profile federal “surge” that made national headlines – and still trails Florida by 4,300 arrests.
DeSantis did this on purpose, and he did it years before Trump returned to office.
He called a special legislative session on immigration before Trump’s inauguration.
He signed all 67 county sheriffs into 287(g) agreements with ICE before the federal push even began.
He built Alligator Alcatraz, a 3,000-bed detention facility in the Everglades, in eight days.
This is what an America First governor looks like in action.
The 287g Immigration Enforcement Blueprint DeSantis Built Before Trump Took Office
Florida’s numbers didn’t happen by accident.
They happened because DeSantis built the infrastructure years in advance.
While California and Illinois were signing sanctuary city laws and telling ICE agents to get lost, DeSantis banned sanctuary policies and went further – requiring every law enforcement agency in the state to actively participate in enforcement, not just tolerate it.
“We’re not a sanctuary state,” DeSantis said. “We banned sanctuary cities, but that just means you can sit on your hands. You were under no obligation to be on the team.”
His 287(g) network turned every traffic stop, every routine arrest, every county jail booking into a potential immigration enforcement action.
Operation Tidal Wave – the formal state-federal partnership launched in April 2025 – became the largest joint immigration enforcement operation in ICE history, resulting in more than 10,400 arrests in its first eight months.
By year’s end, Florida had logged nearly 20,000 total immigration arrests in 2025 – up from roughly 20 per day under Biden to nearly 77 per day under Trump and DeSantis working together.
ICE Deputy Director Madison Sheahan said the results proved what was possible when every level of government got on the same team.
DeSantis Shuts Down the Soft Republicans
The story has one wrinkle worth addressing directly.
Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd – a Republican who chairs the State Immigration Enforcement Council – suggested last week that officers shouldn’t have to arrest immigrants with no criminal charges beyond their immigration violation.
“Those are the folks we need in this country that we embrace,” Judd said, calling for a pathway to citizenship for those immigrants.
DeSantis lit him up Thursday.
“This idea that unless you’re an axe murderer you should be able to stay, that is not consistent with our laws, and it’s also not good policy,” DeSantis said.
He’s right.
Being in the country illegally is the crime.
Every single person deported is someone who was here breaking federal law.
The moment you draw a line at “serious criminal charges,” you’ve just given every cartel member, every gang associate, and every future criminal a grace period to victimize your neighbors before they’re removable.
DeSantis knows that.
https://twitter.com/real_EBS_/status/2027408944097100236?s=20
Trump knows that. Grady Judd should know that.
Florida Has 1 Million Illegal Immigrants Left to Deport and the Pace Is Accelerating
At 120 arrests per day, that’s over eight years of work remaining – and Florida isn’t slowing down.
This isn’t a sprint.
It’s the first years of a generation-defining enforcement operation – and Florida is the model for how it gets done.
The ICE data shows daily arrests in Florida have steadily climbed since Trump’s inauguration in January 2025, from roughly 70 per day to 120 today.
That momentum hasn’t peaked.
Other states are watching.
https://twitter.com/CharlieK_news/status/2016966657806057767?s=20
Indiana and Nebraska have announced plans to open their own detention centers modeled on Florida’s approach.
DeSantis is already planning a third facility in the Florida Panhandle.
The framework DeSantis built – mandatory 287(g) agreements, state-funded detention capacity, political will to enforce the law regardless of criminal history – is a playbook every Republican governor can follow.
The ones who don’t will be left explaining to voters why their state still has an illegal immigration problem while Florida solved it.
Sources:
- “Largest Joint Immigration Operation in Florida History Leads to 1,120 Criminal Alien Arrests,” ICE Press Release, June 2025.
- “Governor Ron DeSantis Highlights Success of Florida-Federal Immigration Partnership as Operation Tidal Wave Reaches More Than 10,000 Arrests,” Executive Office of the Governor, January 5, 2026.
- Madison Sheahan, ICE Deputy Director, official remarks at Operation Tidal Wave press conference, April 2025.
- Ron DeSantis, press conference remarks, Deportation Depot, Baker County, Florida, January 5, 2026.
