The Cost of Trump’s Mass Deportation Plan
2 min readJan 25, 2017
Trump’s mass deportation plan could cost taxpayers more than $117 billion over ten years (at least).
- $9 billion: Mandating detention at the border
- $25 billion: Building a giant concrete wall
- $0: Amount Mexico will contribute to the wall
- $7.5 billion: Maintenance of giant concrete wall
- $6.6 billion: Tripling the number of ICE deportation officers
- $60.4 billion: Non-apprehension costs for “aggressive interior enforcement” including, $13.4 billion: Legal processing; $11.3 billion: Transportation; $35.7 billion: Detention
- 8.6 billion: Increase CBP by 5,000
This, at a time when the federal government already spends more enforcing our immigration laws than all other enforcement combined.
- $200 billion: Amount we will already spend over the next 10 years on ICE and CBP alone under current law, more than we spend on all other enforcement combined.
- 1600%: Increase in immigration enforcement spending since the mid-1980s.
- 200%: Increase in the number of border agents since 2002.
Here’s what else we could spend $117 billion on:
- 7,191 new elementary schools
- 214,482 new teachers hired and paid for a decade
- 1,212,435 students to attend a 4-year public school
Trump’s mass deportation plan could reduce GDP by nearly $5 trillion.
- $4.7 trillion: Reduction in cumulative GDP over 10 years
- $74 billion: Loss to the manufacturing industry
- $65 billion: Loss to the wholesale and retail trade industry
- $54 billion: Loss to the leisure hospitality industry
Trump’s mass deportation plan could contribute to the loss of nearly 3.5 million jobs over the next four years.
- Nearly 3.5 million jobs: According to Moody’s, Trump’s immigration policies would contribute to the loss of nearly 3.5 million jobs over the next four years
