There has been a significant rise in Irish people seeking assistance from the Department of Foreign Affairs after being threatened with deportation from the United States this year.
The almost three-fold increase coincides with the election of Donald Trump as US president in January and the launch of a mass deportation campaign which aims to expel millions of undocumented people from the country every year.
As of the end of June, at least 41 Irish people had sought formal assistance from the department or the Irish Embassy in Washington after being served with US deportation orders from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) this year.
In the whole of 2024, the final year of the Biden administration, there were just 15 such requests for assistance, according to figures provided by the department.
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The department handled 36 assistance requests in total over deportation orders for all countries in 2024.
The figures for 2025 are expected to continue to rise in the second half of the year. The Trump administration recently secured billions of dollars in extra funding for deportation operations and the US courts have largely rejected cases aimed at curtailing the campaign.
The actual number of deportations of Irish citizens may be significantly higher, as these figures represent only those people who sought assistance from the embassy. Large numbers of people are likely to have accepted the deportation orders without challenge or without asking for consular help.
There are an estimated 10,000 undocumented Irish people living in the United States.
It is understood Mr Trump’s deportation campaign has put significant additional pressure on Irish officials in the United States tasked with assisting citizens.
Many of the cases involve Irish people who have overstayed holiday visas. There is little Irish officials can do to intervene in these situations, sources said.
There have also been multiple cases of long-term residents of the United States, with families and jobs there, being arrested by ICE officials before being detained in immigration facilities.
This includes Cliona Ward, from Cork, a green-card holder who has been living legally in the United States for about 30 years. She was arrested earlier this year by immigration officials after returning home to California following a routine visit to Ireland.
In her deportation order, officials cited a decades-old conviction for drugs possession and road-traffic offences, charges which were later expunged.
She was released after five days’ detention only to be rearrested by ICE officers and brought to Washington State. Ms Ward was shackled and chained and sent to an ICE detention centre, before being released by a court in Seattle.
In another case, an Irish tourist spent about 100 days in an ICE detention facility after overstaying his 90-day visa by three days.
