Mass Deportation: The Cruelty Is The Point

A big focus of Trump’s campaign, and by extension the Project 2025 agenda he plans to enact, are the immediate deportations of up to 12 million undocumented immigrants. He’s promised that process will begin on “day one” of his new administration. At the recent Republican National Convention, signs reading “Mass Deportation” were enthusiastically waved around in the crowd.

For MAGA, undocumented immigrants are an easy target. As a group, they’re demonized and blamed for literally everything. There’s this idea that just removing them will turn America into some clean, crime-free paradise. But what are the real-world impacts of losing immigrants?  Governor Ron DeSantis did a little test run in Florida, enacting draconian penalties on employers for hiring undocumented people. The result? Construction projects fell wildly behind, and farms, restaurants, and hotels didn’t have enough staff as immigrants fled the state for other places more welcoming. The economic impact for the first year was estimated to have cost the state $12.6 billion.

Trump’s Project 2025 plan for mass deportation would have an immediate impact on our national economy, which would last for decades. One estimate notes that annual revenue losses could start at $50 billion; over 10 years, it could rise to as much as $860 billion. Our economy could instantly shrink by almost 6%.

Undocumented immigrants pay billions in taxes, plus they also spend their money in their communities supporting and creating jobs. Almost 14% of construction jobs and 12% of agriculture work are done by immigrants. Don’t know about you, but I haven’t seen a whole lot of American workers dying to put on a roof or pick lettuce in 100-degree heat.

Outside of the economic impact of Trump’s mass deportation, there’s the practical: exactly how would this be handled? Early morning raids on sleeping families?  Stormtroopers coming onto the floor of the chicken-rendering plant? What about homes where one breadwinner is legal and one isn’t; what happens to that family? Who determines (and how) who’s undocumented and who’s not? And with the numbers they’re talking about, it’s a fair bet it won’t be a neat, tidy process that just puts them on a plane. Which begs the question, where do these people stay in the meantime?

There’s talk of building camps. Yes, CAMPS. That calls up some very dark things, such as the WWII-era Japanese internment camps and of course, the Nazis. During the last Trump administration, the chaotic attempts at “closing the border” resulted in little kids ripped away from their parents, kept in cages, and frequently gone missing. The visuals were brutal and cruel, but perhaps that was the point.

Yes, our immigration system needs reform (not for nothing, there was a bipartisan bill to greatly improve the process; it was killed at the 11^th hour by the GOP so that Joe Biden wouldn’t get a “win” on the issue). But resorting to draconian “mass deportation” measures is not only devastating by every fiscal metric, it’s cruel and unusual.

Judging by the enthusiasm with which MAGA was waving their “Mass Deportation” signs during the RNC, this seems to be the part that gets them most excited.

Make sure you’re registered to vote; while you’re at it, check with three other people that they are, too.

Cindy Grogan is a writer, lover of history and "Star Trek" (TOS), and hardcore politics junkie. There was that one time she campaigned for Gerald Ford (yikes), but ever since, she's been devoted to Democratic and progressive policies.