tags: Press Releases

Four Key Immigration Questions for Trump Ahead of Univision Town Hall

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Washington, DC — Last week, VP Kamala Harris joined a Univision town hall in Las Vegas, where she fielded questions from undecided Latino voters, highlighted her support for a popular, balanced immigration approach and engaged in a powerful and empathetic exchange over legalization with a questioner (read AV’s recap and key moments here). 

On Wednesday night in Miami, Donald Trump is scheduled to join a Univision town hall with a similar format. The event comes as Trump is leaning even more into his anti-immigrant message and making false, divisive and racist narratives about dark-skinned killer immigrants and his call for indiscriminate mass deportations the centerpiece of his closing argument. Ahead of the Trump event tonight, and underscoring the contrasts between the candidates, the Harris campaign will hold a news conference featuring several of the thousands of children who were separated from their parents during the 2018 Trump family separation policy.

Below are four key immigration questions we hope Donald Trump answers at the Miami town hall, followed by a short overview of related context and resources.

  1. Would Dreamers – with or without DACA – be subject to deportation under a Trump administration? 
  2. What are the specific details of your plan for the “bloody” mass deportation of millions – can you describe how the mass roundups, mass detention camps and mass purges would work? How would you guarantee that no U.S. citizens get caught in the dragnet? 
  3. Given your supposed rejection of Project 2025, do you not support its immigration provisions? Do you agree with Project 2025’s goal of ending DACA and TPS and making those beneficiaries deportable? Do you agree with provisions that would harm U.S. citizens and those who live in mixed-status families? 
  4. You talk a lot about reducing “illegal immigration” but during your first term, you reduced “legal immigration” by more than 60%. Do you plan to reduce legal immigration by a similar percentage if again elected and what types of legal immigration will you eliminate in a second Trump term?

Question 1: Would Dreamers – with or without DACA – be subject to deportation under a Trump administration? 

  • Last week, a Republican-led challenge to the DACA program renewed attention on the stakes for Dreamers in this election. 
  • During his first presidential term, Trump attempted to end DACA and ongoing Republican-led legal challenges to the program have both barred younger Dreamers from applying into the DACA program while imperiling the future of the program for current DACA recipients (while Republicans in Congress have blocked a legislative solution for Dreamers).
  • Now, Trump’s proposing the “largest deportation operation in the history of our country” and making clear it would be unsparing and indiscriminate in targeting even long-settled immigrants: 
    • Trump’s former acting ICE director Tom Homan said “no one is off the table” and Trump has said the targets would include “a woman with two children, three children” and pledged that “getting them out will be a bloody story.”
    • Recently, the Republican ticket has been promising to make as many immigrants as possible deportable, no matter their current legal status or whether they have deep roots in this nation.
  • Bottom Line: Trump needs to clarify – or admit – what his plans for Dreamers with and without DACA would be.

Question 2: What are the specific details of your plan for the “bloody” mass deportation of millions – can you describe how the mass roundups, mass detention camps and mass purges would work? How would you guarantee that no U.S. citizens get caught in the dragnet?

  • The Trump and Vance pledge for the largest mass deportations in history – involving mass roundups, mass detention, and a mass purge of both long-settled immigrants and recent arrivals – is the single most consequential immigration and economic issue of the 2024 campaign
  • At both presidential debates, Trump refused to answer specific moderator questions about how his mass deportation program would work and pivoted to tell lies about immigrants (JD Vance similarly avoided answering in specifics during the VP debate). 
  • Trump’s anti-immigrant architect Stephen Miller has called for the building of mass detention camps “on open land in Texas near the border” and, as HuffPost detailed, in “multiple interviews, Miller has ‘gleefully described daily flights out of the camps to all corners of the world, an undertaking he said would be ‘greater than any national infrastructure project’ in American history.'” Earlier, the Trump team noted the plan would involve deploying red state National Guard troops in blue state communities and mass detention camps run by the military.
  • This mass deportation plan would not only terrorize immigrant families, but would come at a catastrophic cost to the U.S. economy and native-born workers – see this excellent Boston Globe op-ed from leading expert Michael Ettlinger, “Trump’s plan to vaporize the economy” as one of many examples about the economic toll of mass deportation on America.
  • Bottom Line: The American people deserve to hear specifics about their signature mass deportation plan and how it would work, as well as its costs and consequences for all Americans.

Question 3: Given your supposed rejection of Project 2025, do you not support its immigration provisions? Do you agree with Project 2025’s goal of ending DACA and TPS and making those beneficiaries deportable? Do you agree with provisions that would harm U.S. citizens and those who live in mixed-status families?

  • Trump and his campaign’s disingenuous attempts to disavow knowledge and ties to Project 2025 should refocus attention on whether Trump will embrace or reject many of the extreme policy ideas embedded in that document if asked.
  • The array of radical and damaging ideas in Project 2025 are dizzying, on virtually every policy issue, including on immigration (read the AV fact sheet, “10 Things You Need to Know About Project 2025 on Immigration” and read the Niskanen Center’s assessment of Project 2025 and immigration for a detailed recap of what’s proposed). 
  • Some of the most extreme and damaging immigration policies proposed include:
    • Proposals to block federal financial aid for “up to two-thirds of all American college students” if their state permits Dreamers to access in-state tuition,
    • Repealing TPS and terminating DACA status for Dreamers by “eliminating staff time for reviewing and processing renewal applications,”
    • Eviscerating legal immigration by suspending application intakes. 
    • Putting in place personnel and operational plans to enact the proposed largest mass deportation vision in American history.
  • Bottom Line: Given Project 2025’s intention as a policy blueprint for a second Trump term, the candidate and his campaign should be asked specifically about their views on the extreme policies outlined.

Question 4:  You talk a lot about reducing “illegal immigration” but during your first term, you reduced “legal immigration” by more than 60%. Do you plan to reduce legal immigration by a similar percentage if again elected and what types of legal immigration will you eliminate in a second Trump term?

  • Bottom Line: Stephen Miller and the Project 2025 architects now want to go much further in a Trump second term, including slashing legal immigration and the refugee resettlement program, eviscerating legal pathways that alleviate border pressures, and even making some legal U.S. residents and citizens deportable.