The Donald Trump campaign promised Americans a lot of near-instant change and boy has he ever delivered in all-too-many respects, see Canada, Greenland, DOGE, et. al. But one of the more curious developments involves the immigration sub-context. Trump may never have been clearer than he was in his call to “round up” the undocumented, to the point that people envisioned “camps” in the arid West along with the often expected abuses inherent to such a dynamic. But one has trouble finding anything on the immigration-border front in the headlines. The White House has made more noise about Canadian fentanyl (A whopping .2% of the American fentanyl epidemic) than we’ve heard about Mexican cartels. Now we have reports about inner turmoil in ICE, serious frustration from the White House over insufficient numbers of deportations, and a demand for more – all while funding appears to be a major issue. Congress will ultimately have to solve this… Or not.
As reported in Rawstory, even administrators tight with Stephen Miller have been tossed aside. The conversation originates from an MSNBC report by Ali Vitali and Julia Ainsley, as Vitali noted: ‘”You’ve been reporting on for the last two months of this administration, the concern and the frustration that they’re not doing enough fast enough.” Few people are complaining about the administration’s lack of speed but in the immigration context it appears to be driving them crazy.
“You’re right, Ali. I think we also have to remember that they’ve been looking at these numbers, even though we’re just now getting them, I think this explains a lot of that inner turmoil where we saw the acting head of ICE get reassigned to another part of ICE; they replaced him very quickly, that’s someone who had a relationship with Stephen Miller and was handpicked for that job, and now they’re replacing him.”
Handpicked by Stephen Miller – who, we have been told, has been specifically tasked to work on immigration and the border – and yet out in 50 days? Clearly there are some issues as to how they plan to go about things because it’s a bit of a mystery as to how numbers would go down from the Biden administration – as early reports indicate that they have. One can see a scenario where they’re not “as high” as the White House may want, but going down? Or is there another problem lurking? After explaining that Border Czar Tom Homan wants quotas and going so far as to enlist more agents from ATF and DEA to this task, Ainsley said that it also comes down to money and logistics.
“They can increase detention space and then they could arrest and deport more people. Of course, they tried that in Guantanamo Bay and now, as we’ve reported here, of course, they’re rethinking that policy, because that turned out to be so expensive and not logistically possible either.”
I would like to meet the person who believed that flying undocumented immigrants to Cuba was the solution to a border-immigration issue that’s been on the table going back to at least the Clinton administration. One hopes that it is only the undocumented criminals that went to Guantanamo Bay – that’s what we were told, the “worst of the worst.” But as to everyday workers, they are having trouble:
“But this explains, I think, these deportation numbers explain why we’ve seen so much hand-wringing, the anger, the firings/ It’s because of these number and that’s one of the reasons why they haven’t been as public with these as they have been with the arrest numbers, which are up over 100%.”
I have never met anyone with a problem with deporting undocumented immigrants here without authorization if they have a felony on their record – it doesn’t seem too much to ask that if one is in a country without any authorization, they best not be committing crimes. So the “arrest” numbers would seem otherwise fine when juxtaposed against “detention” numbers that apply to those detained without adequate documentation as to their legal status. (“Documentation” becomes a critical word when thinking about parents that might have crossed the border 25 years ago, and now have kids and grandkids that are American citizens, but are still not documented as such.)
There is no real mystery as to what is going on in many respects. As noted above, everyone has understood that we need a new immigration bill since forever. It drove Obama crazy. In this day of instant communication, bar codes, identification, databases, all that – there shouldn’t be any issue with a guest worker program and documenting Dreamers that came over as young children and are functioning Americans. It should all be relatively easy to sort out (As compared to putting in national healthcare). But that’s the problem because the current chaotic environment is conducive to big American business – Ag, tourism, and construction.
American business invites immigrants here with the promise of work. One rarely reads reports of a CEO from ADM, or Hilton, having gone to jail for hiring undocumented workers. To the extent that they face civil penalties it is likely priced in as a cost of doing business. There is a reason that the system hasn’t been reformed. People who are here illegally aren’t going to complain about dangerous work conditions or minimal pay. American business gains from having a servient subset of workers. Meanwhile, the politicians get to use “illegals” as a wedge issue – which many say explains why Trump torpedoed the last potential immigration bill in 2024. He has not proposed a new immigration bill yet. The system as is works just fine as seen from a very limited point of view.
There are still a ton of potential abuses out there awaiting any significant directive from the White House. But there appears to be a growing awareness of just how much of the economy is tied directly to work done by undocumented immigrants and it would be really tough to pull the rug out from those sectors while also implementing the tariffs and cutting at government services across the board. It is possible that the circumstances have shielded the Trump administration from even greater economic concerns.
We will see. It is really on Congress to sort all of this out… But again – this works. There are a very powerful few that don’t see anything to be gained from a new, well-regulated system.
God Bless: I can be reached at [email protected] and on twitter-X at @JasonMiciak, and follow now on Bluesky.Â
Friends, we are struggling to make ends meet. It’s not just us, it’s industry wide. There are star hosts being bumped on MSNBC as we speak. (Joy Reid and Alex Wagner) So if you can afford a small donation or a monthly subscription, it would be greatly appreciated. Thank you. Ursula
I saw something about a town in New Jersey, I didn’t catch the name, where a couple who own a restaurant are being slated for deportation. They are Turkish, and if I remember right, came with a visa for foreigners who assisted the US military. They have tried several times to get green cards, but have been denied. They are much loved members of their community. There has been outcry to their congressional rep, but I don’t know if anything has come of it. More of the indiscriminate, uncaring round up for the sake of numbers.
It’s simply throwing pounds of red meat hatred at a bunch of animals that need to have their anger stoked.
the backlog of green card applications is as much as TWENTY YEARS. It is no wonder that so many are undocumented when getting documents is effectively impossible.
And this now “reassigned” acting head of ICE would be? Nowhere in your piece do you name him. Was it Caleb Vitello, who was reassigned on 2/21? Or the two “newer” ones co-running ICE? Or? I know folks are moving fast but please don’t bury the lead.
And don’t forget Trump is one of the ones who has illegal immigrants working for him and always has!
Well, he is married to one as well.
I am.third generation born here. The Irish and Italians built the Erie Canal and the Chinese and Irish and former slaves built the railroads. Dirty, dangerous work no one else would do.