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The mass deportation of Jews in Bielefeld, Germany, on Dec. 13, 1941. Photo courtesy city archive, Bielefeld, Germany.

Since the inauguration there has been an avalanche of absurd executive orders – many obviously illegal or unconstitutional. If implemented these will have severe negative repercussions on all of us and the country. Trump thinks he has unlimited dictatorial powers and he is proceeding to fully implement the extreme, reactionary Project 2025 agenda. 

The actions being taken on immigration are just the beginning of the chaos and destruction to come.

The mass deportation of “criminal” illegal immigrants is the top Trump priority. Never mind that immigrants are not “criminals.” Being in the country without legal status is a civil misdemeanor not a criminal offense. Never mind that undocumented immigrants are less likely than citizens to commit crimes. Nor are they taking jobs from “real Americans” or bankrupting the country with social services. They are simply people, just like all our immigrant ancestors, trying to find the “American Dream.” 

As I have explained in past articles, immigrants are essential the the economy and massive deportation will create problems for many citizens and business owners. This is not just my opinion. There are many economists and policy research organizations that have documented and clearly explained the costs of Trump’s irrational immigration policies.

The best website I have seen for factual information about all aspects of immigration is by the American Immigration Council (AIC). Their report, “Devastating Costs to America, Its Budget and Economy” says, “Deporting undocumented workers would wreak havoc on industry, exacerbating labor shortages and triggering additional job losses for American workers” (link below).

Mass deportation would also result in losses of tens of billions of dollars in federal, state, and local tax revenues. In 2022, undocumented immigrant households paid $46.8 billion in federal taxes and $29.3 billion in state and local taxes, and contributed $22.6 billion to Social Security and $5.7 billion to Medicare. 

In 2022, undocumented immigrants also spent $256.8 billion supporting businesses and sustaining jobs for American workers. The AIC report found “mass deportation would reduce the U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) by between 4.2 and 6.8 percent ($1.1 trillion to $1.7 trillion in economic activity).

The AIC report also says it will be expensive to deport millions of immigrants. They estimate the cost of a “one-time operation...to arrest, detain, process, and remove all 13.3 million targeted immigrants...would cost at least $315 billion..” Deporting one million immigrants per year would cost $88 billion. It would take over 10 years and cost $967.9 billion to deport all the current undocumented immigrants. The majority of this spending would be for “...building hundreds to thousands of new detention facilities...” (a boon for politically connected construction companies and the for-profit prison industry). 

Employment and jobs are not a zero sum game. One person’s spending is another person’s job. The work one person does supports another person’s job. A recent study found that for every 500,000 immigrants deported the economy would lose 44,000 jobs because of the overall decline in economic activity. Everyone does better when everyone does better. 

In “Mass Deportation: A bad ideas for the U.S. economy,” the Center for Economic Policy and Research (CEPR) says, “While the overall number of unauthorized immigrants is small in comparison to the entire U.S. population, the fact that they are concentrated in particular sectors of the economy would make their rapid removal disruptive” (link below). CEPR says  undocumented immigrants are “over-represented” in domestic services (maids, house cleaners, cooks and child care) and commercial grounds maintenance and  janitors. Immigrant workers in agriculture, food processing meat packing and construction are especially important to the economy. Mass deportation would increase the costs for businesses and prices for consumers.

We tend to stereotype immigrants as low-wage workers. But immigrant workers can be found throughout the economy. CEPR says many immigrants work as nurses, computer programmers, educators, and other professionals. Immigrants also have a higher rate of entrepreneurship than U.S. citizens. According to CEPR, “Almost half of the 500 largest companies in the United States were founded by immigrants or their children.” 

There are also many immigrants who are small business owners. Mass deportation would  affect one million undocumented immigrant entrepreneurs. In 2022 immigrants generated $27.1 billion in small business income. These included businesses in construction, professional services, grocery stores, restaurants, clothing shops, gas stations and motels. These were an integral part of local communities and a source of jobs for other Americans.

Clearly deporting millions of workers will create economic problems, increase inflation and reduce the supply of many goods and services. This is especially true with food. Almost all agricultural produce is picked or processed by immigrants. Between 30 and 50 percent of meat packing plant workers are immigrants. Many large industrial scale farms are dependent on immigrant labor. There is no way that food prices will not increase because of Trump’s excessive obsession with undocumented immigrants. 

What is needed is rational, comprehensive immigration reforms. CEPR says, “There is bipartisan acknowledgment that the U.S. immigration system is broken and needs to be fixed, but political gamesmanship continues to stymie reform.” Trump shows no intention to “pursue the comprehensive immigration reform needed to fix the broken system and to strengthen the US economy.”

From Trump’s past behavior it is obvious that his immigration agenda is mostly “political gamesmanship.” It was fear mongering to get elected. Its primary purpose now is to be a smoke screen to divert attention from the wholesale dismantling of all federal government activities that regulate or annoy the billionaire plutocracy who support his anti-government agenda 

In addition, his irrational statements on tariffs are going to create unnecessary trade wars, further increase inflation, and exacerbate the economic problems created by mass deportation. Throw in the planned deregulation of the financial markets and severe cuts in federal spending and our economic future looks like a meltdown waiting to happen.

But the American people have spoken and they have no one to blame but themselves. The evidence of Trump’s incompetence, venality, and dictatorial arrogance was abundant. But they chose to vote on the price of eggs.