“More than 2 million illegal immigrants residing in the United States have chosen to self-deport or been forcibly removed from the country since President Donald Trump took office.”
That amazing statistic comes courtesy of the Washington Examiner, as reported by the U.S. Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS). The Examiner reports,
The Department of Homeland Security announced Tuesday morning that more than 400,000 illegal immigrants had been deported by Immigration and Customs Enforcement since late January.
The DHS anticipates hitting 600,000 ICE deportations by Jan. 20, 2026. Trump had vowed to hit 1 million in that time.
An additional 1.6 million people chose to leave the U.S. rather than face arrest, detention, and deportation by the government.
You should take into account that the 400,000 was acheived ramping up from essentially zero in January.
I see people express anger that the 1 million mark may not be hit by year end. But I didn’t see anyone predict the huge number of self-deportations.
For those interested in a deeper dive on the subject, the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) has republished (with an update) the publication “Deportation Basics Revisited.” CIS notes,
What is interesting, though — with a few notable exceptions discussed below — is that the immigration laws when I originally wrote this document in 2011 are almost exactly the same as existed through the Biden years all the way up to the present.
How could this be?
The law has changed little, it’s that the willingness of the then-current Presidential administration waxes and wanes.
Reuters reports,
ICE tactics inflame tensions in New York, Chicago and other cities
Dig into the story and you find that it’s not so much ICE “tactics” that are inflaming tensions, but ICE’s continued existence. As recently as the Obama administration, it was widely understood that the nation’s immigration laws should be enforced, perhaps aggressively enforced.
But with the coming of Trump and Trump Derangement Syndrome, Democrats shifted to the idea that immigration laws are immoral, and enforcing them is evil.
CIS noted a recent Washington Post poll on the subject of immigration. They report,
WaPo and Ipsos next asked an unusual question: “Thinking about immigrants who were deported by the Trump administration this year, in your opinion, how many of them should have been deported?”
In response, half — 50 percent — of registered voters said “nearly all” (30 percent) or “most” (20 percent) of the aliens deported under Trump should have been removed, whereas 47 percent said that “less than half” (24 percent) or “hardly any” (23 percent) of them should have required to go.
So the standard Democratic party line on immigration non-enforcement seems to be a minority opinion. On another question,
“Which political party do you trust to do a better job handling immigration?”
In response, a solid plurality of registered voters, 46 percent, put more faith in the GOP to handle immigration, while just 29 percent trusted Democrats, a 17-point gap in favor of the current majority party in the House and Senate.
But that minority is extremely vocal.
