Pirate's Cove

Did you know there’s a secret weapon for deporting those who are unlawfully present in the United States? It’s so secret that they even have a name for the process

How Trump is expanding the government’s secret deportation weapon

Under President Donald Trump, immigration arrests have jumped by nearly 35 percent. They’re happening at courthouses, restaurants and in front of people’s homes. And these days, anyone who isn’t authorized to be in the country – from gang members to church pastors – is fair game.

These high-profile arrests put immigrants on high alert and attract media attention, but the actual number of deportations has dropped, in part, because overwhelmed immigration courts just can’t keep up.

The Trump administration has a plan to solve this problem: It wants to dramatically expand the authority of on-the-ground officers to expel immigrants without a judge’s review.

While the move has gotten far less attention than splashy raids and the border fence, it has the potential to radically change immigration enforcement nationwide. But there are already flaws in the current system. And legal experts are raising questions about whether the expansion would violate the U.S. Constitution, and would lead to the wrong people being deported.

This fast-track deportation is called “expedited removal,” and it was designed to quickly deport a certain kind of migrant: those who had recently arrived. For the past two decades, it has been used in a more targeted way near the border. Past administrations have expanded it gradually. Trump’s proposed expansion would take it across the nation.

People within 100 miles of the border who have been unlawfully present for two weeks and under can have this method used against them, and the Supreme Court agrees with this.

Under Trump’s plan, expedited removal would be transformed from a specialized tool for recent crossers arrested near the border to a blanket policy that could be used anywhere, potentially on people with deeper ties to the country. It would be expanded to cover the entire country, for anyone who’d been in the United States for as long as two years, the furthest extent conceivable under the law.

Here’s the thing: it’d be great if it is enacted. Team Trump apparently has discussed doing just this multiple times going back to February, per various media reports, such as this most recent one in July. Why should the taxpayers pony up lots of money to house and feed illegals when they can just deport people who should not be here? A 1996 law gave ICE and the Border Patrol the ability to do this. Right now, though, it’s still just in discussion.