Evidence from credible sources supports the statement as accurate. Learn more in Methodology.
Operation Buckeye was in fact conducted across Ohio during December 16–21, 2025 and resulted in more than 280 arrests, including individuals with the specified conviction types.
The claim is that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) conducted “Operation Buckeye” across Ohio from December 16–21, 2025, and that this targeted enforcement operation resulted in the arrest of more than 280 noncitizens, including individuals convicted of serious offenses such as aggravated assault against a police officer, robbery, criminal firearm possession, and drug trafficking.
DHS’s own January 8, 2026 press release explicitly describes Operation Buckeye as a “targeted enforcement operation conducted throughout the state of Ohio during December 16–21, 2025” and states that “total arrests reached more than 280 illegal aliens from across the Buckeye state,” highlighting convictions such as aggravated assault against a police officer, robbery, criminal possession of a firearm, and drug trafficking. The release names several individuals with these kinds of prior convictions and presents the operation as a completed surge rather than an ongoing initiative.
A December 20, 2025 Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) news release confirms that ICE “launched Operation Buckeye” on December 16, targeting “the worst of the worst criminal illegal aliens in Columbus and throughout Ohio.” That document lists specific individuals with convictions including felony robbery, felony drug possession, DUI, and other offenses, supporting DHS’s assertion that at least some arrestees had serious criminal records, though it does not provide a total arrest count.
Independent data from the Ohio Immigrant Alliance (OIA), reported by multiple Ohio news outlets, corroborate that the operation involved large-scale raids and hundreds of arrests, though with a somewhat different date range and partial coverage. WOSU, an NPR affiliate, reports that according to OIA, more than 214 people were detained in ICE’s “Operation Buckeye” raids in the Columbus area from December 17–23, 2025, and notes that OIA’s count is derived from jail rosters and is likely an undercount. The Springfield News-Sun similarly cites OIA’s analysis, finding at least 214 detainees linked to Operation Buckeye and emphasizing that ICE publicly highlighted only 10 people with criminal histories out of more than 214, with several of those 10 arrested before the official start of the operation.
OIA’s own published analysis, based on publicly available jail data, concludes that at least 214 people were arrested and remained detained as part of Operation Buckeye and explicitly describes this as an undercount because not all jails provide accessible roster information. Both OIA and WOSU report that approximately 80% of those detained appear to be Latino, fewer than 10% African, and roughly 93% male, and they document that the detained group includes legally authorized immigrants, people with valid work permits or pending immigration cases, and at least two U.S. citizens. These findings do not contradict DHS’s assertion that more than 280 noncitizens were arrested statewide, but they do indicate that the operation’s impact extended beyond the “worst of the worst” and included people without serious criminal histories.
The Columbus Dispatch’s January 8, 2026 reporting further confirms both the scale and official framing of the operation. The paper cites OIA’s figure of at least 214 arrests associated with Operation Buckeye and notes that DHS has claimed “more than 280” immigrants were arrested in Ohio over a several-day period in late December. At the same time, the Dispatch reports it was unable to verify ICE’s listed criminal charges for the named “worst of the worst” individuals in court databases, and local legal advocates say that most people they know to have been detained had no criminal history beyond immigration-related issues, underscoring the gap between enforcement rhetoric and the broader set of people caught up in the raids.
Taken together, the evidence strongly supports that Operation Buckeye did occur as an ICE/DHS enforcement surge centered on December 16–21, 2025, that it involved hundreds of arrests across Ohio, and that at least some arrestees had serious prior convictions of the types DHS described. While the exact figure of “more than 280 noncitizens” cannot be independently reconstructed from public jail data, OIA’s documented minimum of 214 detainees—acknowledged as an undercount—and multiple media reports referencing DHS’s >280 figure make that total plausible and not credibly disputed. On this basis, the specific claim that DHS conducted Operation Buckeye in that timeframe and that it resulted in more than 280 arrests, including individuals with serious criminal convictions, is best assessed as complete, even though the official narrative likely overemphasizes a small subset of serious offenders relative to the larger group detained.