On his agency’s Facebook page, Laramie County Sheriff Brian Kozak said that from April 17 to 23, his office had the highest number of immigration arrests of any local or state enforcement agency in the country.
“Our deputies made 85 criminal arrests. Forty-six of those arrests were for criminal illegal immigration violations,” Kozak said in the video.
His county is one of 13 agencies in Wyoming, as of mid-May, that have signed contracts with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to crack down on illegal immigration.
WyoFile’s public safety reporter Maya Shimizu Harris reported on Laramie County’s recent campaign. Wyoming Public Radio’s Melodie Edwards spoke with her about what she learned.
Editor's Note: This story has been edited for clarity and brevity.
Melodie Edwards: I wonder if you can start by talking about how the Laramie County Sheriff's Office handled immigration enforcement leading up to this recent campaign?
Maya Shimizu Harris: The Laramie County Sheriff's Office joined the three 287(g) agreements in June [Editor’s Note: One agreement was signed in May], and Sheriff Kozak has always emphasized that the deputies are only going do immigration enforcement when they stop someone for some kind of criminal violation.
In conjunction with that, he's also emphasized that he wants to do more traffic safety enforcement, and his deputies have done a lot of enforcement along I-80 that has kind of paired with immigration enforcement when they've stopped commercial truck drivers, for instance, and just been able to check their immigration status at the same time.
ME: What did you end up learning about the number of arrests they have most recently been making?
MSH: That week, from April 17 to 23, the Laramie County Sheriff's Office actually topped the nation in terms of the number of immigration arrests it made out of any local or state law enforcement agency that has the power to make immigration arrests.
I don't know too much about the context of that, if Laramie County is typically high up on the list among law enforcement agencies just in terms of the number of immigration arrests that it makes. But I think it was significant just that I don't think people typically think of Wyoming as a place where many immigration arrests would happen.
ME: How did this news come to light? How did you find out about the fact that they had made this list?MSH: I just saw Sheriff Kozak's Facebook post about it. He posted a video right after his deputies had conducted the traffic operation, giving an overview of the number of arrests that they made during the operation and kind of what their goals were. During that video, he said Laramie County happened to top the nation in the number of immigration arrests.
Brian Kozak: Our agency came in number one in the United States. We had 53 total immigration arrests. And keep in mind, we don't go out looking for this stuff. We're just doing our job and we're taking action when we come across violations of state law.
MSH: He didn't provide too many other details, so I just wanted to fill in some of that picture. I checked with ICE and just confirmed some of the numbers that he provided.
ME: How did they compare to other states and other counties?
MSH: That week, the Florida Highway Patrol had 31 arrests and the Oklahoma Department of Public Safety had 27 arrests. Those were the second and third place enforcement agencies in the nation after Laramie County.
ME: This was part of a campaign. Do you mind telling me the name of the campaign, and how did he promote it?
MSH: He's been calling these operations “Truck Around, Find Out.” That's kind of his slogan for them, and he has a cap that has a truck on it with that line. This operation was specifically called Operation Spring Break. Facebook is the main platform that he seems to use to share with the public what's happening at the sheriff's office.
ME: Like you mentioned earlier, we don't think of Wyoming as necessarily someplace where immigration arrests are made. We're in the middle of the country, we're not close to the border, so this is kind of unusual. Why did he explain this was necessary to undertake this campaign?
MSH: I think he explains it a lot in the context of just traffic safety. The 2025 Laramie County Sheriff's Office report said that there were 16 crashes in 2022 and those dropped to eight crashes in 2025. [Editor’s Note: There were six crashes in 2024 and two in 2023.] That was a big motivator for Sheriff Kozak. Sheriff Kozak created a team that focuses quite a bit on traffic enforcement because of that increase in crashes in 2022. These operations, he points out, many of these commercial drivers were driving unsafely.
Brian Kozak: Many of these folks are operating without commercial driver's licenses, unsafe trucks, bald tires, their trucking companies have been revoked or suspended and shouldn't be operating at all.
MSH: Maybe they didn't have their updated registration. Just being able to enforce immigration at the same time kind of helps promote safety on the roads.
ME: In the quotes that you share in the article, [Kozak] is striking a pretty tough tone. How would you categorize the tone that he's trying to strike?
MSH: He stylizes himself as someone who's not going to tolerate crime.
Brian Kozak: Experience the cowboy culture that we have here. But if you're gonna come here to break the law or you're breaking the laws of our country, then turn around and go right back where you came from.
MSH: In his press release about joining the 287(g) program, he said something to the effect that he doesn't want Wyoming to be like a sanctuary state for people who break laws. Actually, the fact that they're doing these traffic operations is something that Sheriff Kozak wants to promote. Obviously, in the public, there are some people who don't feel great about the sheriff's approach to how he presents these operations and just about the 287(g) agreements, in general.
Sheriff Kozak also said that he's talked to many truckers and other commercial drivers who are appreciative. You can see the comments of people on Facebook, often asking if they can buy the cap that he uses in his Facebook videos. I think he doesn't have qualms about sharing this information publicly and that's his branding. He wants to be portrayed as tough on crime.
[Editor’s Note: Kozak is up for re-election on the 2026 ballot.]
