Trump Signs Executive Order Expanding DHS Access to Criminal Records

The order is designed to further improve immigration screening, vetting, and border enforcement.

President Donald Trump signs a bill in the Oval Office on Feb. 3, 2026. Alex Wong/Getty Images

President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Feb. 6 targeting criminal illegal aliens in the United States, instructing federal agencies to improve their sharing of records.

The order requires the Department of Justice to give the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) full access to federal criminal history information to further improve immigration screening, vetting, and border enforcement. It’s the latest action in accordance with Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign vow to carry out the largest deportation operation in U.S. history.

The executive order is called “Protecting the National Security and Welfare of the United States and its Citizens From Criminal Actors and Other Public Safety Threats.”

DHS is tasked with preventing dangerous goods, narcotics, and firearms from entering the United States’ borders, while also detecting and responding to terrorists, drug smugglers, and human smugglers. Trump’s order said that to fulfill these responsibilities, DHS immigration authorities must have access to criminal history records in federal agencies.

“The Attorney General shall provide DHS with access ... to the maximum extent permitted by law,” the order reads.

Trump instructed Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to also exchange criminal history record information with Visa Waiver Program countries and other trusted allies. Visa Waiver Program countries include dozens of nations around the world that collaborate in combating and preventing serious crime.

The criminal history information provided to allies will be for the sole purpose of screening travelers and immigrants trying to stay in the country, according to the order.

“Any exchange of [criminal history record information] by the Secretary of Homeland Security with foreign countries shall be on the basis of reciprocity and under a bilateral or multilateral agreement or arrangement entered into by DHS that contains appropriate safeguards to protect the privacy of United States persons,” the order states.

This is the latest push by the Trump administration to improve or broaden record sharing across federal agencies.

In late December 2025, a federal judge ruled that the administration can continue sharing some immigrants’ Medicaid data, including basic biographical, location, and contact information, with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

On Dec. 10, 2025, DHS announced that more than 2.5 million illegal immigrants had left the United States since the start of Trump’s second term. More than 605,000 of these individuals were deported as part of federal enforcement operations, and about 1.9 million voluntarily self-deported.

“Illegal aliens are hearing our message to leave now. They know if they don’t, we will find them, we will arrest them, and they will never return,” DHS Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin previously said.

The Trump administration was dealt a setback regarding data sharing between federal agencies on Feb. 5. A federal judge temporarily blocked DHS from using IRS information, such as addresses, for immigration enforcement purposes.

Trump signed a flurry of executive orders and presidential actions on Feb. 6 along with the criminal record-sharing directive.

They included orders expanding commercial fishing in the Atlantic, establishing an arms transfer strategy putting America first, and rescinding a punitive tariff on India over the country’s purchases of Russian oil.