President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown is headed to the desert.
ICE plans to make Phoenix, Arizona, its “hub of removal” in the Southwest, ramping up raids in a city that is part of the famously purple Maricopa County, reports The Bulwark.
Former Department of Homeland Security officials still in touch with those under Secretary Kristi Noem told the site that the Arizona capital will “become the next focus of arrests, detentions, and deportations.”
ICE’s focus areas thus far in MAGA 2.0 have primarily been sanctuary cities like Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston, New York, San Francisco, and Minneapolis.
A new emphasis on Phoenix, which has a progressive mayor but is not considered a Democratic stronghold, would mark a notable change for the administration as it starts 2026. ICE did not respond to an email seeking comment.
Federal agents in Phoenix will have more resources than in years past, thanks to a funding increase included in Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill,” which passed last summer.
A robust ICE presence in a swing state may ultimately backfire for Republicans. Polls show that Trump’s deportation crusade, which has gone far beyond targeting only the “worst of the worst,” is among the issues that are dragging down his approval rating.
A Pew Research Center survey in October found that 53 percent of respondents said Trump is doing “too much” in his migrant crackdown, which has regularly led to the arrests of American citizens and included the deportation of Venezuelans to a foreign hellhole prison with no access to the outdoors. Only 10 percent of respondents felt the administration was doing “too little.”
Trump rebounded from losing Arizona in 2020 to carry the state by five points in 2024, but the Republican Senate candidate Kari Lake crashed to defeat and the party gained no House seats.
Polls suggest voters are losing confidence in his leadership, especially regarding the economy. The 2026 midterms are now just 11 months away, and every major poll tracked by The New York Times projects Democrats will regain control of Congress.
At least one political expert in Arizona says that increasing ICE’s presence in Phoenix may backfire politically for Republicans in the all-important swing state.
Chuck Coughlin, a former GOP politico who is now the president of the Arizona-based polling firm HighGround, told the Bulwark an ICE crackdown “won’t go over well with voters,” especially those in Maricopa County, which is home to 60 percent of the state’s electorate.
“I don’t look at this as being a positive move in Maricopa County,” he said. “It’s not going to play well. Everybody believes the border control problem is under control.”
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