No, Joe Biden didn’t reverse US policy to deport felony criminals. That’s False.

In a hearing where senators grilled the now-ousted Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on immigration enforcement under her watch, Noem had a friend in Florida Republican Sen. Ashley Moody.  

After praising the agency’s deportation actions, Moody turned her ire at former President Joe Biden, a Democrat.

"President Biden came in and upended precedent of Democratic and Republican presidents," Moody said during the March 3 hearing. "And that precedent was to deport those here illegally that had committed felony crimes — from trafficking to violent crimes to other types of crimes — where they would have been deported. They stopped doing that. They reversed that policy." 

As evidence, Moody’s press office referred PolitiFact to a Jan. 20, 2021, Biden executive order and a DHS memo issued later the same day. 

The executive order rescinded a 2017 Trump administration order that made anyone illegally in the country a deportation priority. The Biden-era DHS memo, meanwhile, paused some deportations for 100 days and directed agencies to review immigration enforcement policies.

Neither proves that Biden stopped or reversed policy to deport criminals. PolitiFact has rated similar claims False. 

The Biden administration’s deportation moratorium was temporary and did not apply to everyone. Still eligible for deportation were new arrivals at the border, people who were suspected of engaging in terrorism and people who the agency determined posed a danger to national security and public safety. 

Public safety threats included people convicted of an aggravated felony, which includes murder, rape or sexual abuse of a minor.

In the last two years of Biden’s term, his administration deported more than 413,000 migrants — 158,665 of them with criminal charges or convictions. The U.S. oversaw more than 4.6 million total removals, returns and expulsions combined throughout his term, DHS data shows.

What were Biden’s actions on deportations?

On his first day in office, Biden revoked several of Trump’s first-term executive orders on immigration and directed DHS to prioritize protecting national security, border security and public safety, using prosecutorial discretion.

The Jan. 20, 2021, DHS memo acknowledged that, because of resource constraints and increased illegal border crossings, resources should be directed to the border and removals should be prioritized for people who pose a threat, or who entered the U.S. after Nov. 1, 2020. 

The 100-day deportation pause lasted only a few days before a federal judge blocked it. 

On Feb. 18, 2021, Tae D. Johnson, then-acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, issued interim guidance repeating that the agency would focus deportation efforts on threats to national security, border security and public safety. 

"Individuals are presumed to be a threat to public safety if, for example, they have been convicted of an aggravated felony or engaged in certain activity as part of a criminal gang or transnational criminal organization and there is reason to believe they currently pose a threat," the ICE memo said. An aggravated felony includes murder, rape or sexual abuse of a minor.

ICE also said immigration officers and agents were not prohibited from arresting, detaining or removing people not on the priority list. Those actions, though, would be "subject to advance review," the guidance said.

In September 2021, then-DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas issued final guidelines, saying the agency would continue focusing on removing noncitizens who threaten national security, public safety and border security and start conducting case-by-case assessments.

"For the first time, our guidelines will, in the pursuit of public safety, require an assessment of the individual and take into account the totality of the facts and circumstances," Mayorkas said. 

The guidelines, Mayorkas said, would serve as "a break from a categorical approach to enforcement," with the assessments aimed to ensure resources were focused on people who posed a threat.

Courts also halted those guidelines in 2021, before they were reinstated in 2023 after a U.S. Supreme Court decision. The court said that no administration has had enough resources to arrest or remove all people illegally crossing the border, and the federal government, therefore, had to prioritize the use of available resources.

Beyond ICE’s immigration enforcement unit, the agency also has a Homeland Security Investigations division, which focuses on cases related to human smuggling and trafficking, money laundering, transnational gang activity, and other crimes. Biden did not order any freeze or reversal of that unit.

How many people did Biden deport?

Overall, deportations were lower in the first years of the Biden administration. 

A lot of that had to do with a surge of migrants at the border. When ICE sent many of its agents to the border to help Customs and Border Protection remove recent arrivals in 2021 and 2022, deportations dropped. Title 42 was also still in place, resulting in more people being expelled at the border instead of possibly deported later on.

Deportations increased in the last two years of Biden’s presidency.

In fiscal years 2023 and 2024 combined, Biden’s administration deported over 413,000 noncitizens — 158,665 of them with criminal charges or convictions. Another 7,100 known or suspected gang members were also removed, as well as 376 known or suspected terrorists.
Throughout Biden’s term, the U.S. oversaw over 4.6 million total removals, returns and expulsions combined, according to PolitiFact’s analysis of DHS data.

Our ruling

Moody said Biden reversed U.S. policy and precedent of deporting people in the country illegally who had committed felonies, including trafficking and violent crimes.

Biden established new deportation priorities and initially ordered a temporary pause on certain, not all, deportations. People who posed national security or public safety threats, including those convicted of serious crimes, such as murder, rape or sexual abuse of a minor, remained a deportation priority under his administration.

In the last two years of his term, the Biden administration deported about 158,665 people with criminal charges or convictions.

We rate Moody’s claim False. 

PolitiFact Staff Writer Maria Ramirez Uribe contributed to this report.