Federal agents patrol the halls of immigration court at the Jacob K. Javitz Federal Building in July in New York City. Despite a show of force on immigration raids in cities, arrests by Immigration and Customs Enforcement dropped in August and remain well below the Trump administration’s daily target of 3,000. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

Despite the assistance of armed troops in U.S. cities, federal immigration officials recorded fewer daily arrests in August than in July and remain well short of a Trump administration plan for 3,000 arrests a day, according to a new report.

As of Aug. 29, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrests averaged 1,055 a day for the month, down 14% from 1,124 a day in July, according to data obtained by Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University. The organization tracks federal immigration data.

“President Trump’s orders recently assigning substantial personnel from the national guard and the U.S. military to target Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. may have been counter-productive in failing to increase total arrests countrywide,” said Susan B. Long, co-founder of TRAC and a professor in the Whitman School of Management, in an e-mail statement.

In a Tuesday decision a federal judge ruled that the Trump administration’s deployment of Marines and National Guard units to Southern California, where they assisted with immigration and other arrests, was illegal.

In May, Stephen Miller, a White House deputy chief of staff, told Fox News that the administration was “looking to set a goal of a minimum of 3,000 arrests for ICE every day and President Trump is going to keep pushing to get that number up higher.”

ICE did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security announced it would give more financial incentives to state and local police to cooperate with ICE, including reimbursement for salary and benefits for officers trained in the 287(g) program to assist ICE in making arrests, and “performance awards” for “successful location of illegal aliens.”

“By joining forces with ICE, you’re not just gaining access to these unprecedented reimbursement opportunities — you’re becoming part of a national effort to ensure the safety of every American family,” ICE Deputy Director Madison Sheahan said in a statement.

Stateline reporter Tim Henderson can be reached at thenderson@stateline.org.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrest two people from Guatemala in Florida in August. U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi has threatened states, cities and counties that choose not to assist or cooperate with immigration arrests. (Photo courtesy of ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations, Miami Field Office)

More cities and states have responded to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi’s threat to prosecute them over so-called sanctuary policies limiting law enforcement cooperation with federal immigration enforcement — some by thumbing their noses, at least one by acquiescing.

Written responses defending sanctuary policies have been sent to Bondi from cities including Albuquerque, New Mexico; Boston; Hoboken, New Jersey; Portland, Oregon; and Seattle, along with the states of California, Connecticut, Minnesota, Oregon and Washington. Many noted that courts so far have upheld their right to limit cooperation with deportations.

“Pam Bondi seeks to have Washington state bend the knee to a Trump administration that, day by day, drags us closer to authoritarianism. That’s not going to happen,” Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson, a Democrat, said in an Aug. 19 news conference.

Louisville, Kentucky, is one city that agreed to more cooperation after a confrontation over the issue — before Bondi threatened prosecution in August, but after the attorney general said she had issued a “strong written warning” to the city.

The city had stopped complying in 2017 with so-called detainer requests to hold jailed residents for immigration authorities, but leaders resumed cooperation to avoid being targeted for more raids.

“Cities on the sanctuary city list right now are experiencing a terrifying increase in raids by ICE, including mass raids,” Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg, a Democrat, said in a July 22 statement. “I’ve talked with leaders within our immigrant community before I made this decision. I heard their fears loud and clear about current federal policies and ICE actions. I also heard that they want Louisville off the federal sanctuary city list.”

Bondi issued a revised list of sanctuary cities, counties and states in August.

Rochester, New York, meanwhile, in August amended its municipal code to strengthen its policies against cooperation by adding disciplinary measures for personnel who violate the policy. State Attorney General Letitia James, a Democrat, had earlier supported the city’s existing policies in court, saying in a statement that they “keep communities safe and allow local law enforcement to use resources to address local public safety priorities.”

In Boston, Democratic Mayor Michelle Wu’s response letter accused the Trump administration of “false and continuous attacks” as part of a campaign to “divide, isolate, and intimidate our cities, and make Americans fearful of one another.”

U.S. District Court Judge William Orrick issued a new order Aug. 22 extending a preliminary injunction to more cities, counties and states that had asked for protection against President Donald Trump’s executive orders and agency directives. Trump sought to withhold unrelated federal funding based on similar sanctuary policies.

Orrick’s ruling found the orders and directives are likely to be unconstitutional violations of local rights to set limits on immigration enforcement cooperation.

The injunction covers 50 areas in 14 states: California, Connecticut, Colorado, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Washington and Wisconsin.

Trump administration lawyers asked Aug. 26 to dismiss the case, arguing that the administration’s actions so far “merely instruct agencies to assess federal grant programs to determine where they can lawfully add immigration related conditions.”

A hearing is scheduled Oct.22.

Stateline reporter Tim Henderson can be reached at thenderson@stateline.org.

Stateline is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Stateline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Scott S. Greenberger for questions: info@stateline.org.