President Trump’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement quietly carried out one of the most successful enforcement operations in the agency’s history, arresting a staggering 1,328 illegal aliens in Virginia and Maryland in just 14 days.
The massive operation targeted communities surrounding Washington, D.C., including sanctuary-style jurisdictions where Democrat officials have restricted cooperation with federal immigration authorities.
Fox News correspondent Bill Melugin reported that ICE conducted the operation from August 1 through August 14. The sweep, officially named “Operation Safe Community — Washington, D.C.,” resulted in nearly 400 illegal aliens with criminal convictions or pending criminal charges being taken into custody.
Fox News reported that the operation was described by federal sources as one of ICE’s most successful to date.
BREAKING/EXCLUSIVE: DHS tells @FoxNews that ICE has quietly carried out one of its most successful operations in agency history, resulting in the arrests of 1,328 illegal aliens in just a 14-day span in the states of Virginia & Maryland. Nearly 400 of the aliens had criminal… pic.twitter.com/ZCcWuAxxZS
— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) August 24, 2026
Other targets reportedly included illegal aliens accused or convicted of attempted murder, rape, sexual battery, kidnapping, robbery and driving while intoxicated.
ICE did not limit the operation to aliens with criminal records. Agents arrested individuals found to be living in the United States illegally regardless of whether they had previously been convicted of another crime.
FIRST ON FOX: ICE arrests 1,328 illegal immigrants across Virginia and Maryland in a sweeping 14-day enforcement operation in the D.C. region, which federal sources describe as one of the agency’s most successful operations to date.
Nearly 400 of those arrested have criminal… pic.twitter.com/yDfOa41vJ9
— Fox News (@FoxNews) August 24, 2026
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin praised the ICE agents responsible for the historic sweep.
“Over the course of just two weeks in Virginia and Maryland, they arrested sexual assailants, kidnappers, drunk drivers, robbers, and gang members,” Mullin told Fox News.
Mullin blasted sanctuary politicians in Virginia and Maryland for prioritizing illegal aliens over American citizens and vowed that the Trump administration would continue removing illegal aliens from American communities.
The scale of the operation offers another devastating indictment of the sanctuary policies embraced by Democrat officials around the nation’s capital.
As The Gateway Pundit previously reported, Virginia Democrat Governor Abigail Spanberger used one of her first actions in office to rescind former Governor Glenn Youngkin’s executive order requiring Virginia State Police to participate in the federal 287(g) immigration-enforcement program and assist ICE with detainer requests.
Youngkin’s order had also established a task force of federally deputized state troopers to help identify and apprehend criminal illegal aliens who posed a threat to public safety.
Spanberger dismantled that cooperation immediately after taking office, claiming state and local police should not be required to devote their resources to enforcing federal immigration laws.
The Gateway Pundit also previously reported that Spanberger walked away without answering when confronted by a reporter about whether she would cooperate with DHS and turn violent criminal illegal aliens over to federal authorities.
At the time, DHS said three of the four defendants facing murder trials in Fairfax County that year were illegal aliens. Federal officials also accused Fairfax County of refusing to honor more than 1,150 ICE detainers in recent years.
In May, The Gateway Pundit reported that Mullin said illegal aliens were responsible for roughly half of the murders in Fairfax County and directly blamed sanctuary policies for encouraging additional criminal activity.
Maryland officials have also attempted to hinder immigration enforcement.
In January 2025, The Gateway Pundit’s Jordan Conradson confronted the Biden-era sanctuary resistance during a White House briefing, noting that the Maryland attorney general had issued guidance limiting local police cooperation with ICE.
Despite those political roadblocks, ICE agents moved into the Washington suburbs and arrested more than 1,300 illegal aliens in only two weeks.
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