The DNA of migrant children taken by the Trump administration

According to Wired, thousands of migrant children have reportedly been entered into an FBI criminal DNA database under a policy instituted in 2020, during the Trump administration’s first term.

NEW: The US government has added the DNA of approximately 133,000 migrant children and teens to a criminal database, which critics say could mean police treat them like suspects “indefinitely.”

— WIRED (@wired.com) 2025-07-16T17:31:10.284Z

According to the most recent data from the first quarter of 2025, there has been a marked increase in DNA collections, bringing to over 1.5 million the number of migrants whose DNA would have been collected by Customs and Border Protection (CBP) since the program was launched.

Among them, migrant children, sometimes as young as 4 years old, have also been involved, with over 133,000 DNA samples recorded, according to estimates reported by Wired.

These data were integrated into the permanent CODIS (Combined DNA Index System) database, usually used in criminal investigations to compare DNA samples taken from crime scenes or from people convicted of serious offences.

According to Wired, of more than 133,000 young migrants under the age of 21, 230 were children under the age of 13, some as young as 4, and more than 30,000 were aged between 14 and 17, all permanently added to the criminal DNA database.