Immigration arrests go on unabated despite Trump's misgivings after GOP's midterm wipeout

It's business as usual for President Donald Trump's deportation offensive despite the Republican wipeout in the midterm elections. In Los Angeles, masked immigration officers in body armour blocked a hospital emergency room driveway in a heavily Latino neighbourhood early Saturday (November 7, 2026).

In central Alabama, twin 19-year-old brothers from Venezuela were arrested while driving back to college a day after the election. Advocates reported arrests from California to Michigan to Massachusetts. After Democrats trounced the GOP and won control of the next Congress, Mr.

Trump said his immigration crackdown may have been “too tough” and suggested it was time to sit down with the rival party. “I'd love to do something on immigration,” he said in an interview with CBS “60 Minutes” recorded Friday (November 6, 2026).

Hours later, he named Stephen Miller, the architect of his hardline immigration agenda, as his new chief of staff. Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, meanwhile, said his orders had not changed. “Deportations will continue,” Mr.

Mullin wrote in an online post the day after the election, warning that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement takes no days off and that “this includes on Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Election Day.” María Bilbao, a campaign coordinator for the American Friends Service Committee in Miami, said she has received at least one call a day from someone detained in South Florida since the election.

“Everything remains exactly the same. The arrests have not ceased at all,” Ms. Bilbao said. Florida Highway Patrol officers and ICE agents have detained people in their cars, as well as in places including supermarkets, pharmacies and gas stations.

Immigrants under supervision have also been arrested when they showed up at ICE's Miami office for their appointments. Erick Gasca, 31, got home Friday night (November 6, 2026) after an evening playing board games with friends.

He lives near Adventist Health White Memorial Medical Center in Los Angeles. An “unprecedented” number of vehicles with tinted windows and no license plates were parked near the hospital's emergency room entrance, he said.

“I thought they were going to raid the hospital or something,” he recalled. The Department of Homeland Security declined to explain the officers' presence there, though Bill Essayli, the top Justice Department prosecutor in Los Angeles, said they were bringing a detainee for medical treatment.

Essayli said two people were arrested for assaulting federal agents. Also Read : U.S. appeals court rejects Trump policy allowing swift deportations to third countries “ICE does not target hospitals, schools, or churches,” DHS said in a statement.

The agents' presence attracted some 30 residents and passersby. Footage shot by Gasca's cousin, Michelle Rivera, shows protesters shouting and officers pinning someone down. “White Memorial does not participate in immigration enforcement,” hospital president Daniel Fontoura said in a statement, adding it would not let such activities "compromise our commitment to patient care and safety.”