Washington, DC — Congressional Republicans and the White House are careening forward with their budget reconciliation bill, seeking to deliver more than $70 billion to fund mass deportations for the rest of Trump’s term on top of the more than $170 billion windfall just last year for Stephen Miller and immigration enforcement. As the legislative markup process moves forward today, and votes expected later this week, we have a series of fresh headlines and “by the numbers” reminders about the many harms to America associated with mass deportation – harms that would scale up dramatically if the mass deportation budget moves forward intact.
- Harm to American Workers and Industries: New York Times: “Trump’s Deportations Are Costing Americans Jobs,” highlights National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) research on “agriculture, construction, manufacturing and wholesale” industries that found “Deportations had a chilling effect on each of those industries … the affected industries saw a 5 percent drop in employment for male undocumented workers and a 1.3 percent drop for male American-born workers without a college degree. The researchers found no evidence that employers increased wages to attract American workers. Instead, work slowed. In construction … For each arrest, six American-born workers lost a job, and four undocumented workers lost one.”
- Harm to U.S. Children and Families: Brookings Institution study: more than 145,000 U.S. citizen children are separated from their parents due to mass deportation. Brookings found, “146,635 children who are US citizens have had a parent detained during the mass deportation campaign the Trump administration embarked on after he retook office … of those children, more than 22,000 experienced the detention of all of their co-resident parents. Roughly 36% were younger than six years old.”
- Harm to U.S. Tax Revenue: The Guardian, “Trump’s immigration crackdown could cost up to $479bn in lost taxes over 10 years,” highlighting, “The Trump administration’s immigration crackdown could cause the US to potentially lose up to $479bn in lost tax revenue over the next 10 years, with enforcement deterring undocumented workers from filing their taxes this year, according to tax experts.”
The following is a statement from Joanna Kuebler, Chief of Programs of America’s Voice:
“The numbers don’t lie. American taxpayers are being asked to foot the bill for tens of billions more funding for a mass deportation crusade that already is harming key industries, hurting American workers, slashing our tax revenue, and separating American-born kids from their parents. Let’s be crystal clear here – mass deportation makes us poorer, weaker and less safe. Instead of scaling up the devastation and handing Stephen Miller a new blank check, Congress should rein in what is proven to hurt this nation.”
Read the America’s Voice fact sheet: “The Trump-Miller Approach: Doubling Down on Mass Deportations – No Accountability, No Reform, No Oversight”
