ICE Is Using TSA Airline Screening Data to Arrest Visa Overstayers at U.S. Airports, Reports Say
News reports and internal agency data show immigration agents making arrests at airports in at least nine states using traveler records from a TSA program built for terrorism screening; DHS says the sharing is lawful and not new, while lawyers and some senators say it breaks the program's original purpose.
Two People, Two Gates, One Database
On July 20, ICE officers stopped Chantal Alejandra Morales Rojas on the jet bridge in Denver, seconds before she could board a Southwest flight. She's a 27-year-old former au pair from Ecuador. Her visa had expired on January 4, 2025[1][2].
Six days earlier, in Nashville, agents arrested Lorenzo Thompson, a Jamaican citizen working as a Southwest flight attendant. His visa had expired in October 2021[6].
Neither arrest happened at an international arrival hall, where travelers expect an immigration check. Both happened at ordinary domestic gates[1][14]. A document obtained by ABC News describes at least 27 arrests like these, spread across at least nine states, from California to Virginia[2].
What ties the cases together is not a new law. It's a database built for a completely different purpose: catching terrorists, not visa overstays.
The System That Was Never Supposed to Do This
Every time you book a flight in the U.S., the airline has to send the government your name, birth date and gender before you fly. That's a federal rule, not optional. The program is called Secure Flight, and it was created in 2007, after the September 11 attacks, to catch suspected terrorists before they could board[3][15].
Here's how it works. TSA takes each passenger list and checks it against the No Fly List and the Selectee List, the government's terrorism watchlists. It then tells the airline whether the person can get a boarding pass at all, or whether they need extra screening. That's the entire job it was designed to do[3][15].
Reuters reported in April that the job has expanded. Between the start of President Trump's second term and February 2026, TSA passed ICE more than 31,000 traveler records. Those tips led to more than 800 arrests[3][4]. That works out to roughly one arrest for every 39 records shared.
DHS has not announced a new airport enforcement program. It hasn't denied the pipeline exists, either. A senior DHS official told NewsNation the data sharing is "nothing new" and that "we get leads from TSA all the time"[13]. What changed is what the leads get used for.
What Nobody Disputes
Start with the facts both sides agree on, because they matter. Overstaying a visa is a real violation of immigration law. ICE can make a civil arrest for it without a judge signing off first[1][9].
The overstay population is also real, and it's large. DHS's own count, from its fiscal 2024 report to Congress, puts the number of people it believed were still in the country past their authorized stay at about 427,000 — a 0.92% overstay rate among people expected to leave[9]. A broader count, which also includes people who eventually left but stayed too long first, comes to about 538,548 people, or 1.15%[9].
And some of the people caught by this system are not sympathetic cases by anyone's definition. Angelina Lopez-Jimenez, the Guatemalan mother whose March 2026 arrest at San Francisco International Airport set off a congressional inquiry, had been under a final deportation order since 2019, after missing an immigration court date. DHS says she tried to flee when agents approached her at the airport, which is why video of the arrest shows her being physically restrained[7][17].
So the dispute was never really about whether visa overstays are against the law. It's about whether a security tool can be quietly turned into an immigration locator system, and who gets to decide that.
The Government's Case: One Department, One Rulebook
DHS's argument has three parts, and each one is straightforward on its own terms. First: the law doesn't have an expiration date on caring. Someone whose visa lapsed five years ago is unlawfully present today, no matter how sympathetic their situation looks now. A DHS spokesperson said the department "reversed the horrendous Biden-era policy that allowed aliens in our country illegally to jet around our country"[2][5].
Second: TSA and ICE are not separate governments. They're both parts of the same federal department. Sharing identity data between components of one agency, DHS argues, is routine interagency work, not a scandal[13].
Third: the scale is small on purpose, not accidental. About 800 arrests came out of more than 31,000 shared records over 13 months. That's a low hit rate, consistent with ICE acting on cases that already had final removal orders or other clear violations, not sweeping up random travelers[3][4]. The Lopez-Jimenez case is the example DHS points to: a woman with a standing 2019 removal order, not someone flagged at random[7][17].
There's also a numbers argument underneath the legal one. Overstays, not illegal border crossings, account for a large share of people living in the U.S. without legal status. An immigration system that tracks entries carefully but never enforces exits, the argument goes, isn't really a system at all[9].
The Lawyers' Case: A Promise the Data Made
Immigration lawyers and civil-liberties groups don't dispute that overstaying is illegal. Their argument is about a different, narrower promise: what the government said it would do with your information when it collected it.
Federal privacy law says an agency has to publish what a database of records is for, and can only share it in ways that fit that stated purpose. This is often called "purpose limitation." Secure Flight's published purpose was terrorism screening, full stop[3][15]. Travelers hand over their real name and birth date because the law forces them to, for security reasons. Critics say using that same information to build civil immigration arrest lists is exactly the kind of mission creep the privacy rule exists to stop. If it's allowed here, they argue, the rule doesn't really protect anyone, because tomorrow it could be tax records or health data instead of flight bookings[7].
There's a due-process piece too. Some of those arrested were spouses of U.S. citizens or former exchange visitors with green-card applications pending — meaning the government itself hadn't finished deciding their case yet[1][15]. Being arrested and detained before an immigration judge ever hears that pending case makes it far harder to keep fighting it.
And there's a chilling effect that's already visible. The ACLU and the National Immigration Law Center have told noncitizens without settled status to think twice before flying domestically, not just internationally[12][14]. Senators Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff sent DHS, TSA and ICE a letter in April asking a direct question: what legal authority allows this, and is there a written agreement between the agencies? As of this writing, no such agreement has been made public[7][8].
The Part That Doesn't Depend on Who's Right
Underneath the legal argument sits a plainer, structural one. ICE's real constraint isn't willpower, it's officer hours and detention space. A field arrest takes surveillance and travel time. An airport arrest is nearly free by comparison: the agency already knows the person's identity, their exact location and the minute they'll be there[3][4]. Any administration under pressure to show arrest numbers will drift toward whatever database gives it that, regardless of what the database was originally built for.
The exit half of America's immigration system has also never really been built, across administrations of both parties. The government tracks who enters far better than who leaves, which is exactly why DHS's own count still puts roughly 427,000 suspected overstays in the country as of fiscal 2024[9]. That gap creates a standing pool of removable people that any enforcement-minded administration can draw on without passing a single new law.
Coverage of the story split along familiar lines, though the underlying facts didn't move much between outlets. Newsmax and Fox News led with the individual's years out of status and gave the "jet around our country" quote room to breathe, while treating the data-sharing question as routine background[5][6]. CNN and ABC News led with the sympathetic cases and the "built to stop terrorists" framing, sourced largely to immigration attorneys describing a trend rather than to a government confirmation of a new program[1][2]. Reuters and Forbes stayed closest to the internal numbers themselves, with Forbes' "tip-offs" phrasing carrying a faint suggestion of impropriety that Reuters' more neutral "tips from" avoided[3][4]. Al Jazeera, writing for an international audience already deciding whether the U.S. is a safe place to fly into, framed the story as ICE expanding into ordinary civilian infrastructure[11].
What happens next is still an open question. Padilla and Schiff are waiting on an answer DHS hasn't given: what document, if any, authorizes this. Until one surfaces, the arrests will keep happening under a legal basis nobody outside the government has actually seen[7][8].
Summary
Immigration and Customs Enforcement has been arresting foreign nationals at U.S. airports, including people whose visas expired while they had applications pending, according to reporting by CNN, ABC News and Reuters[1][2][3]. A document obtained by ABC News described at least 27 such arrests across at least nine states, from California to Virginia[2]. Some of those arrested were spouses of U.S. citizens or former exchange visitors waiting on paperwork[1][15]. Many arrests happened at domestic gates and jet bridges, not at international arrival halls where immigration checks are normal[1][14].
The arrests are tied to Secure Flight, a Transportation Security Administration program. Here is how it works. When you book a flight, the airline must send TSA your name, date of birth and gender before departure. TSA runs that list against federal watchlists — the No Fly List and the Selectee List — and tells the airline whether to print a boarding pass. The program was created in 2007 after the September 11 attacks to catch suspected terrorists[3][15]. Reuters reported in April 2026 that TSA passed ICE records on more than 31,000 travelers between the start of President Trump's second term and February 2026, and that those tips led to more than 800 arrests[3][4]. That is roughly one arrest for every 39 records shared.
The Department of Homeland Security has not confirmed a new airport program. It has defended the enforcement. A DHS spokesperson said the department 'reversed the horrendous Biden-era policy that allowed aliens in our country illegally to jet around our country'[2][5]. A senior DHS official told NewsNation the data sharing is 'nothing new' and that 'we get leads from TSA all the time'[13]. Immigration lawyers and civil-liberties groups say the practice takes data collected for counterterrorism and uses it for routine civil immigration cases, and that it now makes domestic air travel risky for people with pending applications[1][12].
The central dispute is not whether overstaying a visa is a violation — all sides agree it is. It is whether data gathered under a security mandate may be reused for civil immigration enforcement, and what legal document authorizes it. Senators Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff of California asked DHS in April 2026 to identify that authority and to say whether a written agreement between TSA and ICE exists[7][8]. As of this writing, no such agreement has been made public.
The Event
Between roughly July 14 and July 28, 2026, news organizations reported a pattern of ICE arrests of noncitizens at U.S. airports, including at Denver International Airport and in Nashville[1][2][6]. A document obtained by ABC News described at least 27 arrests using the tactic, in at least nine states[2]. On July 20, ICE officers detained Chantal Alejandra Morales Rojas, a 27-year-old Ecuadorian former au pair, on the jet bridge as she boarded a Southwest Airlines flight in Denver; DHS said her visa had expired on January 4, 2025[1][2]. Earlier, on July 14, ICE arrested Lorenzo Thompson, a Jamaican citizen working as a Southwest flight attendant, in Nashville over a visa that expired on October 16, 2021[6]. The reporting followed an April 2026 Reuters account of TSA sharing traveler records with ICE[3][4].
Undisputed Facts
- TSA's Secure Flight program was created in 2007 to match airline passenger records against federal terrorism watchlists[3][15].
- Airlines are required to send TSA each passenger's name, date of birth and gender before the flight; TSA then tells the airline whether a boarding pass may be issued[3][15].
- Reuters reported that TSA gave ICE records on more than 31,000 travelers between the start of the second Trump administration and February 2026, and that ICE made more than 800 arrests after those tips[3][4].
- A document obtained by ABC News described at least 27 airport arrests of suspected visa overstayers across at least nine states[2].
- DHS has not disputed that TSA data reaches ICE; a senior DHS official told NewsNation the practice is 'nothing new' and that ICE gets leads from TSA regularly[13].
- Overstaying an authorized period of admission is a violation of U.S. immigration law, and ICE may make a civil administrative arrest for it without a judicial warrant[1][9].
- DHS's Entry/Exit Overstay Report for fiscal year 2024 put the suspected in-country overstay rate — people believed to still be in the U.S. past their authorized stay, about 427,000 people — at 0.92%, and DHS confirmed departure or a status change for more than 99.08% of nonimmigrants expected to leave by air or sea[9].
- Senators Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff sent DHS, TSA and ICE a letter in April 2026 asking for the legal authority and any written agreement behind TSA referrals to ICE[7][8].
- Angelina Lopez-Jimenez, the Guatemalan mother whose March 2026 arrest at San Francisco International Airport prompted the Padilla-Schiff inquiry, had been under a final removal order since May 2019 after missing immigration court proceedings; DHS says she attempted to flee when ICE agents approached her at the airport[7][17].
- The ACLU and the National Immigration Law Center issued advisories in 2026 telling noncitizens without secure status to weigh the risk of flying, including on domestic flights[12][14].
The Pressure
Strip away the moralizing and blame. What structural realities persist regardless of which narrative wins?
- Cheap arrests beat expensive ones
- ICE's binding constraint is officer hours and detention beds, not willingness. A field arrest requires surveillance and travel. An airport arrest uses data the traveler already surrendered: exact identity, exact location, exact time. Any administration under numerical pressure will drift toward whichever database gives it that, regardless of what the database was built for[3][4].
- The exit half of the system was never built
- The U.S. records who enters far better than who leaves. DHS's own fiscal 2024 report shows a 0.92% suspected in-country overstay rate and about 427,000 people it suspected were still in the country[9]. That gap has existed across administrations. It creates a permanent, large pool of technically removable people that any enforcement-minded government can draw from without new legislation.
- Compelled data always attracts new users
- Secure Flight works because federal rules force airlines to hand over accurate passenger identity data[3][15]. Once a high-quality identity database exists inside a department, other components of that department have a standing incentive to reach it. The Privacy Act's purpose limits are the only thing standing against that pull, and they are enforced mainly after the fact, in court.
- Both sides need the same cases to be visible
- The administration wants long overstays — and cases with standing removal orders — publicized because they make enforcement look obvious. Advocates want citizen spouses and pending applicants publicized because they make it look cruel. Both are real people in the same 27-arrest document, which is why the two narratives can run on identical facts[1][2].
Material realityA working data channel now exists between airline booking systems and immigration enforcement, and it has produced arrests at a documented scale: more than 31,000 traveler records shared and more than 800 arrests over roughly 13 months, per internal ICE data reported by Reuters[3][4]. That channel is technical and already built; it does not go away if the political argument goes the other way. On the ground, the practical effect is already visible regardless of who wins the legal fight: immigrant-rights organizations are advising noncitizens without settled status not to board domestic flights[12][14], which means a class of people is functionally restricted to ground travel inside the United States. Meanwhile, the underlying population is unchanged — roughly 427,000 suspected in-country overstays in fiscal 2024 alone by DHS's own count[9] — and no arrest count in the hundreds meaningfully reduces it. The dispute is therefore less about deportation math than about whether compelled security data can be redirected, because that answer will apply to the next database too.
How Each Side Sees It
Each major actor’s view — how it frames things, its underlying incentive, and how it’s materially affected. Tap a side to read it.
Frames it asThe government's case rests on three points. First, the law is the law: a visa is a time-limited permission, and someone whose visa expired years ago is in the country unlawfully no matter how sympathetic the case. DHS says it ended a prior policy that let people in the country illegally 'jet around our country'[2][5]. Second, DHS is one department. TSA and ICE are components of it, and sharing identity information inside a single federal department for law-enforcement purposes is ordinary, not novel — a senior DHS official said 'it's something we have always done'[13]. Third, the arrests are targeted and small in number, not a dragnet: about 800 arrests came out of more than 31,000 records shared over roughly 13 months, which officials would describe as ICE acting on the cases that already had final removal orders or clear violations, not on travelers at random[3][4]. DHS points to the San Francisco case that triggered the Senate inquiry as an example: Angelina Lopez-Jimenez had a final removal order dating to 2019 and, DHS says, tried to flee when approached, rather than being a traveler flagged at random[7][17]. Advocates of stricter enforcement add a structural argument: overstays, not border crossings, account for a large share of the unlawfully present population, and an entry-exit system that never enforces the exit half is not a system at all[9].
WhyThe administration ran on large-scale deportations and is judged internally on arrest and removal numbers. Airports are efficient: the person's identity, location and travel time are already known in advance, so an arrest costs far less officer time than a field operation[3][4].
Impact on themThe department gains a low-cost, high-yield lead source. It also absorbs political and legal risk: congressional inquiries[7][8], likely Privacy Act and Fourth Amendment litigation, and pressure on TSA's own mission, since the screening system depends on public willingness to hand over accurate passenger data[12].
Frames it asTheir strongest argument is about purpose limitation, and it needs the mechanism to make sense. The Privacy Act of 1974 requires a federal agency to publish what a records system is for, and to limit sharing to 'routine uses' that fit that stated purpose. Secure Flight's stated purpose was terrorism screening[3][15]. Passengers hand over their real names and birth dates because federal law compels it for security. Critics say using that compelled security data to build civil immigration arrest lists is exactly the reuse the Privacy Act was written to prevent — and that if it is allowed here, no published purpose limit means anything. Their second argument is due process in practice: people with pending applications, work-visa extensions or citizen spouses are being arrested before an immigration judge ever hears the case, and detention makes it much harder to keep fighting it[1][12]. Their third is chilling effect: when advocacy groups have to tell lawful applicants not to board domestic flights, ordinary internal travel becomes a checkpoint for a whole class of people[12][14].
WhyThese groups exist to defend noncitizen clients and to enforce statutory limits on surveillance. They also need the practice documented publicly, because a legal challenge requires a written policy or agreement to attack — which is why the demand for the TSA-ICE agreement matters as much as the individual cases[7][8].
Impact on themClient demand rises, but so does the difficulty of the work: detained clients are harder to represent, and rapid-response networks and know-your-rights guidance now have to cover domestic terminals as well as border crossings[12][16].
Frames it asThis group's argument is that they are not the people the system was aimed at. Many are working legally or waiting on the government's own backlog — a pending adjustment of status, meaning an application to move from a temporary visa to a green card, often filed through a U.S.-citizen spouse[1][15]. Their point is that being out of status while a government agency sits on your file is not the same as hiding from the law. They also note the practical trap: to attend a hearing, a job or a family emergency in another state, you have to fly, and flying is now the thing that gets you arrested[12][14]. Employers, including airlines, argue they verified work authorization in good faith and are losing trained staff mid-process[6].
WhyKeeping families together and keeping jobs. For many, staying in the U.S. long enough for a pending case to be decided is the entire objective.
Impact on themDirect and material: detention, lost wages, missed hearings, and separation from citizen spouses and children[1][14]. Some cases end in removal even where an application was pending. Employers face sudden vacancies and legal exposure[6].
Frames it asTheir case is institutional rather than about any one arrest. They argue Congress authorized Secure Flight for aviation security and never voted to turn it into an immigration locator system, so an executive-branch decision to repurpose it is a change Congress should have been told about[7][8]. They point out that DHS has not produced any memorandum of understanding or interagency agreement, which they say is itself the problem: a program big enough to touch 31,000 travelers should have a published legal basis[3][7]. Their broader warning is precedent — the same logic would let any compelled federal data set, from health records to tax filings, be redirected to enforcement[7].
WhyOversight of the executive branch, plus a political base — especially in California — that is directly affected. Padilla and Schiff opened their inquiry after a Guatemalan mother and her child were arrested at San Francisco International Airport[7][8].
Impact on themThey control no enforcement lever while in the minority. Their realistic tools are document demands, inspector general referrals, and building a record that supports later litigation or appropriations riders[8].
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The Bias Ledger average rating 3.7
The same story, as framed by outlets across the spectrum, ordered least to most biased. The bias score (1 = straight, 10 = heavily spun) is an AI assessment of that framing — click an outlet to see its track record. The tell is the word choice or omission that reveals the angle.
| Outlet | Vantage | Bias | How they frame it | The tell |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reuters | U.S./international wire, center | 2 | Exclusive: ICE arrested more than 800 people after tips from U.S. airport security agency | Leads with the count and the internal data, not with a named victim or a policy verdict. The framing choice is the phrase 'tips from' — it describes the pipeline without characterizing it as a leak or a scandal. Minimal adjectives; the contested part is left to attribution. |
| ABC News | U.S. center | 3 | Federal immigration authorities targeting airports for arrests | 'Targeting' does light framing work — it implies deliberate selection of a place rather than of a category of person. The piece anchors on a document it obtained (27 arrests, nine states) and includes the DHS quote, which keeps it close to the record. |
| Forbes | U.S. business press, center-right on economics | 3 | ICE Arrested More Than 800 Travelers After TSA Tip-Offs | 'Tip-offs' carries a whiff of the informal and improper. The piece is written for travelers, so it foregrounds the DHS 'this is nothing new' response as a claim to be tested rather than an explanation. |
| CNN | U.S. center-left | 4 | ICE arrests at US airports are happening more frequently, attorneys say. Here's what we know | Sources the trend claim to immigration attorneys in the headline, which is honest about the evidence being lawyer-reported rather than government-confirmed. But attorneys are also an interested party, and the sympathetic cases — citizen spouses, pending applications — are placed above the underlying overstays. |
| Al Jazeera | Qatari state-funded | 4 | ICE agents deployed to US airports: Which airports are affected? | Frames the story as ICE spreading into civilian infrastructure, with a service-journalism list of airports for an international readership deciding whether to travel. Includes the TSA's 'non-specialised security functions' line, but the cumulative emphasis is on the U.S. as a hardening destination. |
| Newsmax | U.S. right | 5 | Report: ICE Expands Airport Arrests to Visa Overstays | 'Report:' distances the outlet from the finding. The story centers on legal status and gives the DHS 'jet around our country' quote prominence, while the Secure Flight repurposing question — the actual legal dispute — gets little space. |
| Fox News | U.S. right | 5 | Southwest Airlines flight attendant arrested by ICE for alleged visa overstay | Puts the expiration year in the URL and the overstay length at the center. Focusing on a five-year overstay makes the enforcement look self-evidently justified; the surveillance mechanism that located him is not the story. |
References
- ICE arrests at US airports are happening more frequently, attorneys say. Here's what we know — CNN · U.S. center-left; commercial cable/digital news owned by Warner Bros. Discovery
- Federal immigration authorities targeting airports for arrests — ABC News · U.S. center; broadcast network news owned by Disney
- Exclusive: ICE arrested more than 800 people after tips from US airport security agency — Reuters · International wire service, Thomson Reuters; subscription/licensing funded, center
- ICE Arrested More Than 800 Travelers After TSA Tip-Offs — Forbes · U.S. business magazine; contributor-heavy model, generally market-friendly
- Report: ICE Expands Airport Arrests to Visa Overstays — Newsmax · U.S. right; conservative for-profit cable and digital outlet
- Southwest Airlines flight attendant arrested by ICE for alleged visa overstay — Fox News · U.S. right; commercial network owned by Fox Corporation
- Padilla, Schiff Launch Inquiry into TSA, ICE Data Sharing Following Alarming Arrest at San Francisco International Airport — Office of U.S. Senator Alex Padilla · Primary source; official press release from a Democratic senator — an interested party, not neutral
- Democrats investigating TSA, ICE data sharing after San Francisco airport incident — The Hill · U.S. center; Washington political trade publication owned by Nexstar
- Entry/Exit Overstay Report, Fiscal Year 2024 — Report to Congress — U.S. Department of Homeland Security / Customs and Border Protection · Primary source; the enforcing agency's own statistical report to Congress
- Entry/Exit Overstay Report, Fiscal Year 2025 — Report to Congress — U.S. Department of Homeland Security / Customs and Border Protection · Primary source; agency report to Congress
- ICE agents deployed to US airports: Which airports are affected? — Al Jazeera · Qatari state-funded international broadcaster
- Community Alert: Immigration Arrests at Airports — National Immigration Law Center · U.S. immigrant-rights advocacy nonprofit; foundation-funded, litigates against DHS — an advocate, not a neutral analyst
- The TSA shares traveler data with ICE. It's led to 800 arrests — NewsNation · U.S. center; Nexstar-owned cable network positioning itself as nonpartisan
- Bay Area Immigrant Advocates Warn Noncitizens to Avoid Air Travel After ICE Arrests — KQED · U.S. public radio, Northern California; member- and foundation-funded, center-left audience
- Secure Flight Was Built to Stop Terrorists. ICE Is Using It to Arrest Visa Holders — Tech Times · U.S. commercial technology news site; aggregation-heavy, critical framing of surveillance
- For spouses, green card interviews turn into arrests — Deccan Herald · Indian English-language daily; commercial, audience of Indian nationals affected by U.S. visa policy
- TSA tip led to ICE airport arrest of mother, daughter seen in viral video: documents — The National Desk (Sinclair Broadcast Group ABC affiliate wire) · U.S. local-affiliate wire content distributed across Sinclair-owned stations; reports on federal documents and DHS's own statements