Trump’s Migrant Deportation Plan Could Cost $1 Trillion

President-elect Donald Trump has pledged to “carry out the largest domestic deportation operation in American history,” targeting the more than 10 million undocumented and illegal immigrants in the United States.

While the migrant crisis has cost federal, state, and local governments tens of billions of dollars, Trump’s deportation plans would also be enormously costly — close to $1 trillion over the course of a decade, according to a study by the American Immigration Council (AIC).

Migration Deportation Has Significant Direct and Indirect Costs

The AIC report states that a prolonged deportation program would cost roughly $88 billion a year, totaling $967.9 billion over ten years. A large deportation program would require expanding the federal bureaucracy by hiring more agents and constructing infrastructure to detain millions of migrants.

The projected annual costs for a maximalist deportation program are about 80 percent of the current budget of the Department of Homeland Security, whose mandate includes enforcing immigration laws. Over its lifetime, the cost of a full-scale deportation program would add up to about half of this year’s federal deficit.

Deportation of migrants would also slow economic growth and lower employment, according to the non-partisan Peterson Institute for International Economics. A study released by the think tank in October estimates that deporting most unauthorized workers in the U.S. could reduce the economy’s size by 7.4 percent by 2028.

The increase in immigration since 2022, according to a Hamilton Project study, is growth-positive, contributing 0.1 percent in annual real GDP growth and making the U.S. more resilient to economic shocks that have hurt other advanced economies harder.

Undocumented workers provide lower-cost labor for the construction, cleaning, farming, and restaurant industries. A 2023 Florida law clamping down on the use of undocumented workers has resulted in a labor shortage in the state. As of last September, Florida had 53 available workers for every 100 open jobs, according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

Slower growth also likely means less federal revenue, including from undocumented immigrants, who pay tens of billions of dollars in income, Social Security, and Medicaid taxes.

Undocumented immigrants don’t have Social Security numbers, but they are among the millions of U.S. residents who use Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers (ITIN) to pay billions of dollars in federal taxes.

The Migrant Surge Is Also Expensive

At the same time, the migrant crisis has been costly for federal, state, and local governments. The surge in migration across the southern border has been historic.

Since 2021, the U.S. has experienced net migration of over 9 million, most of which has been illegal or undocumented, driving population growth to the highest since the early 1990s.

An anti-immigration think tank study from March 2023 promoted by House Republicans claims that the migrant crisis has cost U.S. taxpayers $150.7 billion — a figure that is challenged by the CATO Institute and other more reputable research organizations.

Since Texas Gov. Greg Abbott began busing migrants to cities across the U.S. in 2022, New York state has spent $1.4 billion on emergency spending for asylum seekers and New York City has spent over $5 billion. Mayor Eric Adams initially proposed cuts to education programs and library services to address a projected budget shortfall, most of which were later reversed.

Using the Military

The Wall Street Journal reports that the incoming Trump administration is considering repurposing some of the Defense Department’s massive budget toward the immigration crackdown and using military infrastructure — including bases and planes — to detain and deport undocumented and illegal immigrants.

Some of the program’s costs could also be covered by increases in citizenship and visa fees, but that would only bring in a few billion dollars at most.

State and local governments could also absorb some responsibilities and costs. The New York Times reported last year that Trump “plans to reassign other federal agents deputize local police officers and National Guard soldiers voluntarily contributed by Republican-run states.”

An expansive deportation program may be costly for taxpayers, but it could also mean big business for contractors. Corecivic, a private prison and detention center company, saw its stock rise by as much as 80 percent after Trump’s election victory last Tuesday.