On July 1, 2025, Dan Sullivan cast one of the 50 votes that passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which included $45 billion for single adult alien detention capacity and family centers. In June 2026 he voted for $69.5 billion more for ICE and Border Patrol, and he voted against amendments to take back ICE's money, require body cameras and inspect detention centers. Immigration detention reached nearly 70,000 people by March 2026.
Sullivan voted to confirm Kristi Noem and Markwayne Mullin to run the Department of Homeland Security and Joseph Edlow to run United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. In Alaska, which has no federal detention center, ICE had arrested at least 47 people by April 2026 and held them in state jails.
Dan Sullivan's Votes and Confirmations on Immigration Enforcement
- Sullivan Cast One of the 50 Votes for the Law With Nearly $75 Billion for ICE. On July 1, 2025, Dan Sullivan voted yes on H.R. 1, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which passed 50 to 50 with the Vice President's tie-breaking vote, so the bill would have failed without his vote. The law appropriates $45 billion for single adult alien detention capacity and family residential centers and $29.85 billion for ICE hiring and removals, available through September 2029. The detention money is a 308 percent increase on an annual basis over ICE's 2024 detention budget, according to the American Immigration Council. ICE detention reached nearly 70,000 people by March 2026, and more than 70% of them do not have criminal convictions, KPBS reported, citing ICE data.
- Sullivan Voted for $69.5 Billion More for ICE and Border Patrol in June 2026. On June 5, 2026, Sullivan voted yes on S. 2, the Secure America Act, which passed 52 to 47 and gives ICE and Customs and Border Protection a total of $69.5 billion dollars until September 30, 2029. In April he had voted to adopt the budget resolution that set up the bill. Together with the 2025 law, Congress has provided nearly a quarter of a trillion dollars to DHS through these two bills, the American Immigration Council found.
- Sullivan Voted for the Laken Riley Act, Which Requires Detention Before Any Conviction. On January 20, 2025, Sullivan voted yes on S. 5, the Laken Riley Act, which passed 64 to 35 and requires ICE to detain immigrants who have been accused or arrested for theft and other offenses, before any conviction. Immigration judges now cite the law to hold people never charged with violent crimes, KPBS reported in August 2026.
- Sullivan Voted Against Taking Back ICE's Unspent Money in January 2026. On January 30, 2026, six days after Border Patrol agents killed Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, Sullivan voted no on an amendment to repeal the appropriations for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the 2025 law and take back the unspent money. It failed 49 to 51. The money kept flowing, and ICE's count of deaths in custody for fiscal 2026 rose to 36.
- Sullivan Voted Against Body Cameras, Detention Inspections and Penalties for Abusive Contractors in June 2026. During the June 2026 debate on the Secure America Act, Sullivan voted against setting aside money for body-worn cameras on immigration officers, which failed 46 to 53; against stopping payments to detention contractors where DHS finds substantiated misconduct, excessive force, or violations of law or detention standards, which was voted down 46 to 53; and against paying for an unannounced inspection of the Delaney Hall Detention Facility in Newark, which lost by the same margin. Immigration agents have killed nine people since January 2025, NPR reported. Most detention facilities are run by for-profit companies, which reported a combined $1.4 billion in quarterly revenue in spring 2026, and by mid-April 2026 twenty-nine people had died in ICE custody since October, a record for a fiscal year.
- Sullivan Voted to Keep a Rule That Makes Immigrant Workers Lose Their Work Permits. On April 29, 2026, Sullivan voted no on taking up S.J.Res. 99, which would have overturned the rule ending automatic extensions of work permits for people with pending renewals. It failed 47 to 50. The Department of Homeland Security itself wrote that the rule would result in temporary lapses in employment authorization, with lost compensation to workers, and estimated 293,000 to 449,000 pending renewal EAD applicants at risk without extensions.
- Sullivan Voted to Confirm Kristi Noem, Whose Department's Agents Killed Two Citizens in Minneapolis. On January 25, 2025, Sullivan voted to confirm Kristi Noem as secretary of homeland security. During her tenure an ICE officer killed Renee Good, 37, a citizen, in Minneapolis on January 7, 2026, and the medical examiner listed her death as a homicide; Border Patrol agents killed Alex Pretti, a VA nurse, who was fatally shot while filming an immigration operation. Her department also ended protected status for 348,202 Venezuelans.
- Sullivan Voted to Confirm Markwayne Mullin After He Called a Nurse Killed by Border Patrol "a Deranged Individual". On January 25, 2026, then-Senator Markwayne Mullin called Alex Pretti "A deranged individual who came in to cause massive damage with a loaded pistol". On March 23, 2026, Sullivan voted to confirm him as secretary of homeland security. Under Mullin, ICE officers in Houston and Maine shot and killed individuals in their cars in July 2026.
- Sullivan Voted to Confirm the Immigration Services Director Who Ended Automatic Work-Permit Extensions. On July 15, 2025, Sullivan voted to confirm Joseph Edlow as director of United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, by 52 to 47. His agency's October 2025 rule ended automatic work-permit extensions, and the agency froze green card and citizenship cases for people from 39 countries until a court held USCIS's pause on processing cases of individuals from the 39 affected countries was illegal.
- Sullivan Voted to Confirm the Head of the Agency Whose Border Patrol Agents Led City Surges. On June 18, 2025, Sullivan voted to confirm Rodney Scott as commissioner of Customs and Border Protection, by 51 to 46. The agency's Border Patrol ran the operations in Charlotte and Minneapolis, where its agents killed Alex Pretti, and the Border Patrol commander reported bypassing the typical chain of command to Scott.
- Sullivan Praised the Law's Enforcement Money as "the Most Robust Enforcement Package in a Generation". In his July 1, 2025 statement on the bill's passage, Sullivan said it secures the border with "the most robust enforcement package in a generation", naming "$46 billion for the wall, billions more for Border Patrol and law enforcement." That package financed the detention build-up that the Brennan Center found is mostly run by for-profit companies.
- Sullivan Said He Had Not Heard About ICE Detaining a Soldotna Family. On February 18, 2026, during his address to the Alaska Legislature, a lawmaker asked Sullivan about ICE's detention the day before of a Soldotna family, including a mother, two teenagers and a five-year-old; he responded that he hadn't heard about it, the Alaska Beacon reported. The Soldotna detention was one of the at least 47 ICE arrests in Alaska in the first months of 2026.
What ICE Enforcement Dan Sullivan Funded Has Meant in Alaska
- Arrests. So far in 2026, ICE has arrested at least 47 people in Alaska, one of them pregnant, Alaska Public Media reported in April 2026.
- State jails. Because Alaska lacks a federal detention facility, people arrested by ICE are held in state jails.
- Families. The family ICE detained in Soldotna in February 2026 included a mother, two teenagers and a five-year-old, according to the Alaska Beacon.
Frequently Asked Questions About Dan Sullivan on Immigration and enforcement
What is Dan Sullivan's record on immigration and enforcement under Trump?
Dan Sullivan cast one of the 50 votes that passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, and voted for $69.5 billion more in June 2026. He voted against amendments to take back ICE's money and to add body cameras and detention inspections, and he voted to confirm Kristi Noem, Markwayne Mullin and Joseph Edlow. In Alaska, ICE arrested at least 47 people in the first months of 2026.
Did Dan Sullivan vote for more ICE funding?
Yes. Dan Sullivan voted for the 2025 law that appropriated $45 billion for single adult alien detention capacity and family centers and for the June 2026 Secure America Act, which passed 52 to 47. He called the 2025 money "the most robust enforcement package in a generation".
How did Dan Sullivan vote on body cameras for ICE agents?
Dan Sullivan voted no on June 5, 2026 on an amendment to fund body-worn cameras for immigration officers and give footage to the people filmed; it failed 46 to 53. Alex Pretti was fatally shot while filming an immigration operation in Minneapolis five months earlier.
Where does ICE hold people it arrests in Alaska?
Dan Sullivan voted for the detention money in the 2025 law, but Alaska has no federal immigration detention center, so people arrested by ICE in Alaska are held in state jails, Alaska Public Media reported. At least 47 people had been arrested there by April 2026.
Last updated: 2026-10-25