Trump’s outrageously false claim of 13,000 migrant murderers ‘on the loose’

“I’m outraged that over 13,000, the exact number’s 13,099, convicted illegal, alien murderers are now on the loose. They allowed to come in, over 13,000 murderers, many of them murdering many more than one person. They’re murderers and they’re out there someplace. … They’re looking all over every city, every state they’re looking. We got 13,000 people that are worse than any criminal that we’ve been looking for a long time.”

— Former president Donald Trump, in a campaign rally in Waunakee, Wis., Oct. 1

“Listen to these numbers though. These are the official numbers. These are certified numbers. … In total during her term, it’s not even believable, she [Kamala Harris] let in 13,099 convicted murderers. Some of them had murdered 10 people, some murdered seven, one murdered six. I’m looking at these. These are stone-cold killers, and they let in people that are worse than any criminal we have.”

— Trump, in a campaign rally in Erie, Pa., Sept. 29

Trump has a shining new talking point — an outrageously false claim that was ginned up by right-wing media and then embraced by the GOP nominee as an “official” fact.

Trump then embellishes the “fact” with additional falsehoods. Notice how he said he’d seen a list and some on it had murdered 10 people? There is no such list detailing the killings committed by the 13,099 people. That’s just a figment of his imagination.

Here’s the truth: Most of these killers are in detention, not prowling the streets, and have been since before Trump was president. It’s false to claim they entered during the Biden-Harris administration.

The Facts

On Sept. 25, acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement director P.J. Lechleitner responded to a request from Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-Tex.), made in March, for data on the number of noncitizens with criminal convictions on ICE’s non-detained docket. As of July 21, he wrote, there were 662,566 people with criminal histories (convicted or pending) not detained by ICE. In a breakdown by crime, he noted 13,099 people convicted of homicide were not detained by ICE.

Two days later, Gonzales tweeted the letter, highlighting the number of killers. “Americans deserve to be SAFE in our own communities,” he wrote. His tweet was immediately interpreted by right-wing media and the Trump campaign as saying these killers entered the country during the Biden administration and were on the loose and roaming the country.

But the letter did not say that these criminals were not in custody. The non-detained docket refers only to individuals not detained by ICE. In fact, in the same letter, Lechleitner told Gonzales that ICE’s detention capacity was 41,500 beds, showing there was not enough space to house these criminals. As of July 21, 277 beds were occupied by convicted killers. The Supreme Court ruled in 2001 that ICE could not detain people indefinitely.

So, with so little space available in ICE detention centers, many criminals convicted of serious crimes are shipped to another facility to serve out their terms. Some noncitizens on the non-detained docket may participate in the agency’s Alternatives to Detention programs, which generally track people with GPS monitoring devices or the SmartLINK phone app, but murderers would not qualify. A 2021 Biden administration memo made detention a priority for noncitizens who pose “a current threat to public safety.”

Moreover, these “noncitizens” include people who entered the country legally with a long-term nonimmigrant visa or earned permanent U.S. residency but were convicted of a crime. There’s no breakdown about how many on the non-detained docket entered the country illegally, but one cannot assume, as Trump does, that these are all undocumented immigrants.

The letter also did not say when the people on the list entered the country.

“The data in this letter is being misinterpreted,” the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement released Sept. 29. “The data goes back decades; it includes individuals who entered the country over the past 40 years or more, the vast majority of whose custody determination was made long before this administration. It also includes many who are under the jurisdiction or currently incarcerated by federal, state or local law enforcement partners.”

Finally, some noncitizens may have served their time but cannot be deported because the United States lacks repatriation agreements with the country of origin, such as China or Cuba.

One complicating factor is that ICE does not release these numbers on a regular basis or by presidential term, making comparisons by presidential term difficult. As far as we can tell, ICE has never released such specific details about the types of crimes committed, so it’s impossible to say how many murderers were on the non-detained docket during Trump’s term. But we can look at the overall numbers — which show the criminal element barely increased even as the number of migrants crossing the border soared under President Joe Biden.

Lechleitner wrote that of those who are not being held by ICE as of July 21 — 3½ years after Biden became president — 425,431 are convicted criminals. About one-third were convicted of violent or sex crimes; other categories include traffic offenses, drugs, fraud, immigration, taxes, and other nonviolent offenses. (An additional 222,141 people have pending charges.)

Here’s the available comparison figures for convicted criminals on the non-detained docket we could find:

August 2016 (five months before Trump became president): 368,574
June 5, 2021 (about five months after Biden became president): 405,786
Dec. 30, 2022 (23 months after Biden became president): 407,983

In effect, from 2016 to 2021 (almost five years, including all of Trump’s term), the figure grew by 10 percent. And then in just over three years of Biden’s term, the figure grew less than 5 percent. So it appears the number is growing slightly more slowly under Biden than Trump, even with a jump in 2023 and 2024.

Meanwhile, the total caseload count of the non-detained docket for ICE grew almost 90 percent, from 3.3 million on Sept. 30, 2020, to 6.2 million as of Sept. 30, 2023, according to ICE’s 2023 annual report. That disparity certainly undercuts Trump’s repeated claim that most of the migrants who have entered the United States are criminals.

We can’t find any example of Trump previously speaking about the non-detained docket, but if it’s as serious a problem as he claims — “I’m outraged” — he ignored it during his presidency.

ICE data analyzed by the Cato Institute found that the Biden administration has released fewer people with criminal convictions or pending criminal charges than the Trump administration.

Lechleitner’s letter noted that the Biden administration has stepped up the deportation of noncitizens. “From mid-May 2023 through the end of July 2024, DHS removed or returned more than 893,600 individuals, including more than 138,300 individuals in family units,” the letter said. “The majority of all individuals encountered at the Southwest Border over the past three years have been removed, returned, or expelled.”

A Trump campaign spokesman did not respond to a request to explain Trump’s use of this data.

The Pinocchio Test

This is another shameful example of Trump weaponizing government data on immigrants to mislead Americans. Contrary to what Trump claims, the Biden-Harris administration did not release more than 13,000 murderers who entered the country in the past three years.

The data only shows they are not detained by ICE; they are more likely in state or federal prison serving their time. Moreover, the number of convicted criminals on the non-detained docket is not much bigger than it was under Trump, indicating they have been on it for a long time.

Trump earns Four Pinocchios.