President-elect Donald Trump has vowed to carry out the nation’s largest deportation operation, removing more illegal immigrants from the United States than any of his predecessors.
To oversee the effort, Trump tapped former U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement leader Tom Homan as his administration’s “border czar.”
Homan, soon-to-be the deporter in chief, gave a new glimpse into what to expect across the country as ICE officers, along with possible backup from retired police and military personnel, move to carry out the operation come Jan. 20.
Homan has already received threats against his life and his family’s over the past few days, he said, but stood by the incoming Trump administration’s posture and plan.
“As far as the people want to push back on deporting these people, what is the option? You have a right to claim asylum. You have a right to see a judge, and we make that happen, but at the end of that due process, when the judge says, ‘You must go home,’ then we have to take them home because if we’re not, what the hell are we doing?” Homan told Fox & Friends on Monday.
Homan cited a “hell of a lot more” illegal immigrants living in the U.S. now than when Trump left office in January 2021 because of the border crisis under President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris. In that time, more than 10 million immigrants have been encountered at the nation’s borders and the majority have been admitted.
To date, the incoming administration has discussed targeting criminals and people with orders to be removed as the first to face deportation, followed by illegal workers.
Criminals and immigrants who were court-ordered removed
Trump and Vice President-elect J.D. Vance have touted starting out arresting and deporting the 500,000 to 1 million illegal immigrants with criminal records — though both have offered varying figures on the number of criminal immigrants in the country.
“President Trump’s been clear; public safety threats and national security threats will be the priority because they have to be. They pose the most danger to this country,” said Homan.
In addition to criminals, the Trump-Vance administration wants to remove the individuals who have already been ordered by a federal immigration judge to be removed.
“We’re going to prioritize those groups, those who already have final orders, those that had due process at great taxpayer expense, and the federal judge says you must go home. And that didn’t. They became a fugitive,” said Homan.
In fiscal 2024, which ended in September, immigration judges ordered 314,000 people deported and 236,000 the previous year, according to federal data compiled by Syracuse University’s Transactional Research Access Clearinghouse.
In total, roughly 1.3 million people have been ordered deported and are still in the U.S., according to the Wall Street Journal.
Homan added that he anticipated broad support from local, state, and federal police, as well as retired police who want to help the government carry out this operation.
“Thousands of retired agents, retired Border Patrol agents, retired military [have called] that want to come in and volunteer to help this president secure the border and do this deportation operation,” Homan said. “It’d be great to have local law enforcement assist ICE.”
Targeting job sites for illegal workers
“Worksite operations have to happen,” Homan said Monday. “Where do we find most victims of sex trafficking and forced labor trafficking? At work sites.”
Worksite enforcement operations entail warnings from ICE going to a company or business about concerns that the employer has workers who do not have permission to work in the country.
Historically, workplace raids have made national headlines as ICE has targeted adults working at food processing centers.
Eric Ruark, director of research at the nonprofit NumbersUSA in Washington, said Trump ought to get Congress to pass a national mandate for E-Verify, a federal program that immediately checks a person’s work status. At present, E-Verify is available to all employers but is not a requirement to vet employees.
NumbersUSA, which is nonpartisan but takes a more rigid approach to immigration, supports a national bill requiring E-Verify.
Implementing E-Verify would take some enforcement pressure off of ICE because it would make the hiring process far more difficult to navigate for illegal workers in the first place.
“A national E-Verify law would cause a lot of people who are here illegally to return to their home countries because the magnet drawing them here are employment opportunities,” said Ruark in a phone call Monday. “I can tell you why it hasn’t been implemented — because it’s effective. We’ve seen in both parties opposition to worksite enforcement. The most effective tool is E-Verify.”
Trump implemented E-Verify at his personal properties in 2019 but did not move on the program during his first term. A campaign spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment on whether Trump would push Congress to pass a national mandate for E-Verify.
Fallout over the deportations
Trump and Vance have claimed 20 million-25 million illegal immigrants live in the country but have not specified how or if they would remove everyone, just that the operation would be historic in size.
Immigrants who were brought to the U.S. as children and are protected by programs from deportation, such as under the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals or temporary protected status would temporarily be protected from deportation.
Each of those statuses is not permanent, meaning the Trump administration could end protections under DACA or temporary protected status, which would render the recipients without lawful presence and set them up to have to go to court where a judge would decide if they will be removed.
When asked in October about the impact mass deportations could have on families, Homan told CBS News’s 60 Minutes that “families can be deported together,” adding that any immigrant parent who illegally entered the country and had a child while here “created that crisis.”
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David W. Leopold, former president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association and now partner at law firm UB Greensfelder in Cleveland, said the impact would have a negative effect on immigrants and the economy for how it would affect the jobs market.
“The fallout of the expected mass round-up will impact the lives of scores of U.S. citizen workers and professionals who will likely seek assistance and/or advice from their employers,” Leopold wrote in an analysis Nov. 8. “Businesses should have a plan to deal with the fallout of mass deportation.”