Exclusive: DHS admits its website showcasing the ‘worst of the worst’ immigrants was rife with errors
Michael Williams, Alex Leeds Matthews, CNN
Thu, February 19, 2026 at 12:46 PM MST
Kristi Noem, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, during a news conference in Nogales, Arizona, US, on February 4, 2026. - Ash Ponders/Bloomberg/Getty Images
The Department of Homeland Security admitted that its website featuring what it calls the “worst of the worst” arrested immigrants was rife with errors and changed the site this week after receiving questions from CNN about it.
DHS created the website in December and the agency, its secretary Kristi Noem and the White House have all heavily promoted it on social media as the Trump administration has sought to justify its aggressive and heavily scrutinized immigration enforcement operations.
The website currently lists about 25,000 people, along with the crimes the agency says they were arrested for or convicted of — including many who were initially linked only to relatively minor offenses.
But DHS this week conceded its website was filled with inaccuracies. After receiving questions about a CNN analysis of the website, a DHS spokesperson admitted on Tuesday that the charges against hundreds of immigrants listed on the website were described incorrectly by the agency.
The spokesperson attributed the inaccuracies to a “glitch” that they said DHS worked to remedy. The spokesperson said on Wednesday that the glitch had been “resolved.”
A CNN review of the website found that thousands of the people listed on the website were described by the agency as being convicted of or arrested for serious charges — including sex crimes or different forms of homicide. But hundreds more who DHS considered the “worst of the worst” were described as being arrested for or convicted of far less serious crimes, including single charges of traffic offenses, marijuana possession or illegal reentry, a federal felony that involves someone reentering the United States after having been previously deported.
CNN could not independently verify the descriptions of each of the thousands of people listed on the website.
This screengrab shows the Department of Homeland Security’s “worst of the worst” website,” on Thursday, February 19, 2026. - Department of Homeland Security
Asked whether drawing an equivalence between traffic offenders and killers might undermine the agency’s public messaging about its operations, DHS said that many of those the agency listed with single minor crimes had actually been arrested for or convicted of multiple crimes, some of which were more serious: “This is a glitch on the WOW website the impacted about 5% of the entries.”
“Many of these who are listed as traffic offense and illegal reentry, which is a felony, have additional crimes,” the spokesperson said, adding the agency was working “to fix the issue.” The spokesperson did not answer questions about what type of glitch could cause the people on the website to be described incorrectly.
“All of these individuals have been arrested by ICE and all of them committed crimes breaking our nation’s laws, including some who had felonies for illegal re-entry,” the spokesperson said.
Both the White House and DHS have faced intense scrutiny for using false or misleading claims about some immigrants as a pretext to justify enforcement operations, or describing certain incidents in ways which were later contradicted by video or statements from local officials.
Following the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis last month, officials including Noem and White House immigration policy architect Stephen Miller rushed to describe Pretti as “a domestic terrorist” who brandished his gun and intended to massacre law enforcement.
Video later showed that Pretti never brandished the gun that he was carrying when he was shot, and both Miller and Noem blamed their premature descriptions of Pretti on information they received from officers on the ground.
This also isn’t the first time that the Trump administration has acknowledged its descriptions of some immigrants they described as the “worst of the worst” were inaccurate.
In another instance, first reported by NOTUS, the White House conceded it posted a picture of a man who the administration erroneously claimed had been convicted of a sex crime involving a child. (A White House official said the error has been corrected and the administration will continue publicizing “the dangerous criminal illegal aliens being removed from our streets.”)
Taking credit for people likely already in custody
The DHS “worst of the worst” website also includes immigrants’ countries of origin and the city where they were arrested. CNN’s analysis of the site shows that some of the locations representing the greatest number of arrests are relatively small cities – but they contain large prisons, a potential indication that those detained were already in federal prison or had been transferred from state custody. In those cases, that could undercut the agency’s claim that they were “public safety threats” who were “lurking” in communities.
The city representing the most arrests is Conroe, Texas, which is about 40 miles north of Houston and has an estimated population of about 114,000. That city is home to the Joe Corley Processing Center, a privately owned detention facility that Immigration and Customs Enforcement uses to house immigrants. Other top cities, including Lompoc, California, Yazoo City, Mississippi, and Eden, Texas, have relatively small populations, but large federal detention centers.
The social media feeds of DHS, Noem and the White House have displayed a stream of mugshots of people the administration says it has taken off the streets during Operation Metro Surge, the immigration crackdown it has been conducting in the Twin Cities over the last two months. (The administration is now winding down its Minnesota immigration surge, though it is keeping a small footprint of officers there.)
But local officials in Minnesota have accused DHS of padding their publicized arrest numbers by taking credit for arrests made by local law enforcement, who were then transferred to immigration authorities through routine processes.
“This is no longer a simple misunderstanding,” Minnesota Department of Corrections Commissioner Paul Schnell said during a news conference last month.
At best, Schnell said, “DHS fundamentally misunderstands Minnesota’s correctional system.”
“At worst,” he added, “it is pure propaganda, numbers released without evidence to stoke fear rather than inform the public.”
A DHS spokesperson said in a statement: “All of these individuals have been arrested by ICE and placed in removal proceedings.”
“Under President Trump and Secretary Noem, we are not going to allow criminals to be released from jails and back into our communities,” the spokesperson said.
Among the people who DHS chooses to label the “worst of the worst,” almost half are from Mexico. More than 2,100 are from Honduras; Guatemala and Cuba account for about 1,900 each; El Salvador accounts for almost 1,200; while Iran, China, Nicaragua, Haiti and Jamaica account for scores of people each. Several dozen are from Somalia – a country that President Donald Trump has denigrated repeatedly and which has been a large focus of the administration’s recent crackdown in Minneapolis, where there is a large Somali diaspora.
A federal agent in plain clothes looks on a group conducts immigration enforcement in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on February 5, 2026. - Seth Herald/Reuters
‘That population is not out there’
It is not uncommon for law enforcement agencies large and small to publicize their efforts or arrests — and DHS has come under immense pressure from the Trump administration to boost its public-relations profile and publicize arrests.
“Show the numbers, names, and faces of the violent criminals, and show them NOW,” the president wrote on Truth Social last month. “The people will start supporting the patriots of ICE, instead of the highly paid troublemakers, anarchists, and agitators! MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN.”
But the problem, critics say, is that the proportion of “violent criminals” convicted of charges where there is a nexus to public safety is smaller than the administration presents, even if DHS does adjust its list to reflect a larger number of violent offenders.
“The vast majority of so-called criminal aliens are individuals charged with or convicted of traffic offenses, DUIs and immigration-related offenses,” said John Sandweg, who served as acting ICE director during the Obama administration.
“That was the challenge we faced during the Obama administration,” he added. “I’ll just put it this way – and I spent every day working on this – we are saying we are focused on the worst of the worst, we’re focused on serious criminals, that’s what our mission is, to get them off the streets.”
But when it comes to the scale of the problem as described by the Trump administration, Sandweg said, “That population is not out there. It’s just not there.”
Lawmakers say they’ve been stonewalled by DHS, undercutting attempts to hold Trump officials accountable
Annie Grayer, Gabe Cohen, Evan Perez, CNN
Fri, February 20, 2026
Federal immigration agents conduct immigration operations in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on February 5. - Seth Herald/Reuters
Lawmakers who oversee the Department of Homeland Security say the agency has repeatedly stymied their requests for information in recent months, with even some Republicans alleging they’ve had phone calls go unanswered and data requests left to languish.
As the Department of Homeland Security has found itself embroiled in controversies across the country over high-profile killings by immigration agents and the resulting bitter policy disputes, lawmakers say they’ve stepped up their efforts to try to get answers for the public. But they’ve often been met with resistance, they said — thwarting their ability to hold anyone accountable.
“I’m not going to sit here on bended knee hoping to God that somebody returns the call,” GOP Rep. Mark Amodei, the Republican who oversees the DHS budget in the House told CNN, after his request to speak with White House Border Czar Tom Homan went unanswered for days.
One Republican staffer told CNN that the stonewalling extends beyond just thorny policy questions about immigration enforcement. Requests to the Federal Emergency Management Agency on the status of federal disaster funding and questions over potential crimes committed by those detained by federal officers have also been met with silence or evasiveness, the staffer said.
The result, the staffer said, is not only that GOP lawmakers can’t properly oversee the agency, they can’t help blunt possibly unfair attacks from their Democratic counterparts.
“It’s really a shame that DHS has taken such an adversarial posture on sharing data. In some areas, like on immigration and the border they have a great story to tell, and we could be helping them tell that story,” the staffer explained. “In other areas where the story is not so good, like FEMA, we could also help. But they choose to go at it alone, so it’s on them to defend, which is hard to do when no one believes a word they say or a number they put out. There is no trust and there is no way to verify.”
Democrats, meanwhile, say they have received virtually no response from their inquiries to DHS. At least 15 letters sent by members of the party to the department have either been ghosted, received a cursory acknowledgement or were given a non-answer, a Homeland Security Committee Democratic aide told CNN. Another Democratic staffer told CNN that when they’ve asked for specific FEMA updates, whether it’s on mitigation projects, staffing plans or briefings on various press releases, they’ve gotten no response.
A DHS spokesperson told CNN the department works through “official channels” and would “not be litigating our relationship” with Capitol Hill through the press. But they also dismissed claims they’ve not engaged with members of Congress.
“Any suggestion that DHS has ‘refused’ to engage with lawmakers is simply false,” the spokesperson said in part, adding that “this administration has been the most transparent administration in history and has spent the last year clearing out congressional correspondence that went unanswered under the last administration.”
Some Republicans told CNN they’ve been able to leverage their personal relationships with Trump administration officials to get their questions answered and others said they had no issues getting quick responses from DHS – “I communicate with them all the time,” GOP Rep. Andy Ogles said. But two top Republican congressman specifically tasked with overseeing DHS are among those who say they’ve run into issues.
Amodei, the chairman of the House Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee, sought to speak directly with Homan about the operation in Minneapolis shortly after federal officers’ fatal encounter with Alex Pretti there, as well as to receive a broader status update on the administration’s deportation efforts.
Tom Homan speaks during a press conference in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on February 4. - Charly Triballeau/AFP/Getty Images
Amodei’s office put in the request in January and was redirected to White House Office of Legislative Affairs Director James Braid to coordinate the conversation. The request went unanswered for 10 days, prompting the Nevada Republican to eventually withdraw the request, Amodei said.
The administration was focused on executing the mission in Minneapolis at the time of Amodei’s request, an official said when asked by CNN about the request, adding that it could now be arranged.
“At the time, we were prioritizing the actual execution of the mission in Minneapolis,” the administration official said. “Now going forward, we’re happy to offer Chairman Amodei a briefing as well as other congressional committees.”
But Amodei, who projected confidence he’ll get the information another way, suggested it was a question of respect. “I wish they were more professional with how they dealt with the people who handled their budget,” he told CNN from his Capitol Hill office.
After withdrawing his initial request, Amodei has recently spoken with Braid about arranging a call with Homan, the congressman’s office told CNN.
Another Republican chairman — Rep. Andrew Garbarino of the House Homeland Security Committee — tried for weeks to schedule DHS Secretary Kristi Noem for testimony for the annual worldwide threats hearing before his panel, and eventually resorted to asking the White House in December to lean on her to agree on a date, according to a US official familiar with the discussions.
Noem finally agreed to a hearing, where she was excoriated by Democrats for her handling of immigration, FEMA and other issues. The administration official declined to comment on any coordination with Garbarino, saying they don’t discuss private conversations with members.
Garbarino said at the eventual December hearing that he made “numerous accommodations” for Noem’s appearance.
From left: Director of the National Counterterrorism Center Joseph Kent, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, and Operations Director of the National Security Branch at the Federal Bureau of Investigation Michael Glasheen testify on December 11, 2025. - Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
“This is why this hearing is so important. Congress must hear from the Executive. Oversight is not unfair. And asking questions is not unwarranted. We must ensure the people’s representatives are informed,” the New York Republican said at the time.
CNN has reached out to Garbarino’s office for comment.
According to a data analysis compiled by ProQuest Congressional Data and shared with CNN, there has been a 28.7% decline in appearances of DHS officials before congressional committees in 2025, compared to the first year of previous administrations.
Democratic Rep. Bennie Thompson, the top Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee, said he’s never seen it this bad.
“I’ve never met Secretary Noem other than the two times she came before the committee last year. I’ve met every secretary since the department was created in my office or in a number of occasions,” Thompson said.
The Mississippi Democrat said that for a year, he had not had any direct interaction with an ICE official until he met the director the day before his scheduled hearing before the committee earlier this month. Witnesses before a hearing are required to submit their written testimony to Congress the day before a hearing, but Thompson said the ICE director came to his meeting with his prepared testimony in hand and said he was still working on it.
“If the legislative is to function, then the executive branch has to be forthcoming with the information. If they’re not forthcoming with the information, then it’s almost impossible for the legislative branch to basically provide any road maps for future success because we don’t have access to the data,” Thompson said.
CNN news
Annie Grayer, Gabe Cohen, Evan Perez, CNN
Fri, February 20, 2026
Federal immigration agents conduct immigration operations in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on February 5. - Seth Herald/Reuters
Lawmakers who oversee the Department of Homeland Security say the agency has repeatedly stymied their requests for information in recent months, with even some Republicans alleging they’ve had phone calls go unanswered and data requests left to languish.
As the Department of Homeland Security has found itself embroiled in controversies across the country over high-profile killings by immigration agents and the resulting bitter policy disputes, lawmakers say they’ve stepped up their efforts to try to get answers for the public. But they’ve often been met with resistance, they said — thwarting their ability to hold anyone accountable.
“I’m not going to sit here on bended knee hoping to God that somebody returns the call,” GOP Rep. Mark Amodei, the Republican who oversees the DHS budget in the House told CNN, after his request to speak with White House Border Czar Tom Homan went unanswered for days.
One Republican staffer told CNN that the stonewalling extends beyond just thorny policy questions about immigration enforcement. Requests to the Federal Emergency Management Agency on the status of federal disaster funding and questions over potential crimes committed by those detained by federal officers have also been met with silence or evasiveness, the staffer said.
The result, the staffer said, is not only that GOP lawmakers can’t properly oversee the agency, they can’t help blunt possibly unfair attacks from their Democratic counterparts.
“It’s really a shame that DHS has taken such an adversarial posture on sharing data. In some areas, like on immigration and the border they have a great story to tell, and we could be helping them tell that story,” the staffer explained. “In other areas where the story is not so good, like FEMA, we could also help. But they choose to go at it alone, so it’s on them to defend, which is hard to do when no one believes a word they say or a number they put out. There is no trust and there is no way to verify.”
Democrats, meanwhile, say they have received virtually no response from their inquiries to DHS. At least 15 letters sent by members of the party to the department have either been ghosted, received a cursory acknowledgement or were given a non-answer, a Homeland Security Committee Democratic aide told CNN. Another Democratic staffer told CNN that when they’ve asked for specific FEMA updates, whether it’s on mitigation projects, staffing plans or briefings on various press releases, they’ve gotten no response.
A DHS spokesperson told CNN the department works through “official channels” and would “not be litigating our relationship” with Capitol Hill through the press. But they also dismissed claims they’ve not engaged with members of Congress.
“Any suggestion that DHS has ‘refused’ to engage with lawmakers is simply false,” the spokesperson said in part, adding that “this administration has been the most transparent administration in history and has spent the last year clearing out congressional correspondence that went unanswered under the last administration.”
Some Republicans told CNN they’ve been able to leverage their personal relationships with Trump administration officials to get their questions answered and others said they had no issues getting quick responses from DHS – “I communicate with them all the time,” GOP Rep. Andy Ogles said. But two top Republican congressman specifically tasked with overseeing DHS are among those who say they’ve run into issues.
Amodei, the chairman of the House Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee, sought to speak directly with Homan about the operation in Minneapolis shortly after federal officers’ fatal encounter with Alex Pretti there, as well as to receive a broader status update on the administration’s deportation efforts.
Tom Homan speaks during a press conference in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on February 4. - Charly Triballeau/AFP/Getty Images
Amodei’s office put in the request in January and was redirected to White House Office of Legislative Affairs Director James Braid to coordinate the conversation. The request went unanswered for 10 days, prompting the Nevada Republican to eventually withdraw the request, Amodei said.
The administration was focused on executing the mission in Minneapolis at the time of Amodei’s request, an official said when asked by CNN about the request, adding that it could now be arranged.
“At the time, we were prioritizing the actual execution of the mission in Minneapolis,” the administration official said. “Now going forward, we’re happy to offer Chairman Amodei a briefing as well as other congressional committees.”
But Amodei, who projected confidence he’ll get the information another way, suggested it was a question of respect. “I wish they were more professional with how they dealt with the people who handled their budget,” he told CNN from his Capitol Hill office.
After withdrawing his initial request, Amodei has recently spoken with Braid about arranging a call with Homan, the congressman’s office told CNN.
Another Republican chairman — Rep. Andrew Garbarino of the House Homeland Security Committee — tried for weeks to schedule DHS Secretary Kristi Noem for testimony for the annual worldwide threats hearing before his panel, and eventually resorted to asking the White House in December to lean on her to agree on a date, according to a US official familiar with the discussions.
Noem finally agreed to a hearing, where she was excoriated by Democrats for her handling of immigration, FEMA and other issues. The administration official declined to comment on any coordination with Garbarino, saying they don’t discuss private conversations with members.
Garbarino said at the eventual December hearing that he made “numerous accommodations” for Noem’s appearance.
From left: Director of the National Counterterrorism Center Joseph Kent, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, and Operations Director of the National Security Branch at the Federal Bureau of Investigation Michael Glasheen testify on December 11, 2025. - Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
“This is why this hearing is so important. Congress must hear from the Executive. Oversight is not unfair. And asking questions is not unwarranted. We must ensure the people’s representatives are informed,” the New York Republican said at the time.
CNN has reached out to Garbarino’s office for comment.
According to a data analysis compiled by ProQuest Congressional Data and shared with CNN, there has been a 28.7% decline in appearances of DHS officials before congressional committees in 2025, compared to the first year of previous administrations.
Democratic Rep. Bennie Thompson, the top Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee, said he’s never seen it this bad.
“I’ve never met Secretary Noem other than the two times she came before the committee last year. I’ve met every secretary since the department was created in my office or in a number of occasions,” Thompson said.
The Mississippi Democrat said that for a year, he had not had any direct interaction with an ICE official until he met the director the day before his scheduled hearing before the committee earlier this month. Witnesses before a hearing are required to submit their written testimony to Congress the day before a hearing, but Thompson said the ICE director came to his meeting with his prepared testimony in hand and said he was still working on it.
“If the legislative is to function, then the executive branch has to be forthcoming with the information. If they’re not forthcoming with the information, then it’s almost impossible for the legislative branch to basically provide any road maps for future success because we don’t have access to the data,” Thompson said.
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