What might Trump's deportations look like? 'A system that defies imagination'
Source: The Guardian
What might Trump's deportations look like? 'A system that defies imagination'
Target of 2-3 million undocumented immigrants means Trump will
have to cast a wide net – and raises concerns about due process for
those in the crosshairs
Oliver Laughland
Thursday 17 November 2016 17.13 GMT
In his first televised interview as president-elect, Donald Trump gave a glimpse into his plans for large-scale deportations. He suggested his administration would initially target 2-3 million undocumented immigrants for removal, people who he branded criminals, “gang members, drugs dealers”. But even a cursory analysis of Trump’s target number of deportations shows that he will have to deport far more than undocumented immigrants convicted of serious crimes.
The incoming Trump administration will try to implement the harshest immigration regime in presidential history, with his closest advisers making clear they will seek to expedite these deportations. And those deported are likely to include a far greater number of those who have lived in the US for years – perhaps, experts warn, even those who are in the US on temporary visas or green cards.
The US already deports vast numbers of undocumented immigrants. During the first six years of his tenure, Barack Obama deported two and a half million people, under the guise of ridding the US of “criminals, gang bangers, (and) people who are hurting the community”. Obama’s rhetoric was somewhat misleading – a New York Times investigation found that two-thirds of those deported by the administration by 2013 had only minor criminal convictions or none at all. This underlies the impossibility of Trump’s pledge: there simply are not enough people who match his description as serious criminals to deport, and many speculate the targets he wants to reach will mean not only dramatically broadening the scope of deportations to meet targets, but also seriously curtail any oversight within the system.
“It’s important to point out that Obama was actively trying to deport a record number of people, and even he hit two and a half million over two terms,” said Grace Meng, a senior immigration researcher at Human Rights Watch’s US program. “So the idea of 2 to 3 million, whether it’s immediately, or even within a couple of years, would require a system that really defies our imagination of what a fair system might be.”
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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/17/donald-trump-deportations-undocumented-immigrants
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