Photo: AFP
The Trump administration wants to fine migrants under deportation orders up to $998 a day if they don't leave the United States and potentially seize their property if they do not pay those fines.
According to documents reviewed by Reuters, the White House is seeking assistance from U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to handle the penalties issued to migrants and possible property seizures and sale of their assets.
As part of their plan, the Trump administration would also apply the penalties retroactively for up to five years. This could result in fines of more than $1 million.
Former ICE Director John Sandweg said this is more so about the Trump White House getting individuals to self-deport.
"A lot of the administration's actions here are designed to self-deport," said Sandweg. "It's going to be incredibly hard to do a mass deportation with 10 to 12 million people."
Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said in a recent statement that immigrants in the U.S. illegally should use the rebranded CBP Home app, formerly known as CBP One, to "self deport and leave the country now."
Sandweg said the Trump administration is trying to put pressure on people in the country illegally so there's less people that they would have to deport themselves.
"The administration is really open about it and they want to put pressure on the immigrant community so people self-deport," he said.
The planned fines target roughly 1.4 million migrants who have been ordered to be removed by an immigration judge. Sandweg said the biggest issue would be collecting the money from the fines.
"I hear they might do some seizures and I'm sure in some cases they might, but generally, these are poor people and more importantly is when they actually catch them, their primary focus will be on deporting them, not collecting funds from them," Sandweg said of the Trump's plans.
In another email obtained by Reuters, the White House National Security Council and deputy Chief of Staff for policy Stephen Miller have been urging CBP to hand out the fines and handle seizures, according to a CBP official.