Inside the new secret ICE deportation plan called

The Trump administration has drawn up a plan to send immigration agents to the U.S.-Mexico border to catch immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally and are trying to return home voluntarily for the holidays, according to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement memo obtained by News themezone.

Under the plan, ICE agents would work with U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents on “targeted operations” at land ports along the southern border. They would arrest people who “attempt to expel themselves” after being in the United States without legal authorization.

Agents would target commercial buses passing through ports of entry into Mexico, according to the plan document, which was labeled “sensitive.”

Travelers who do not have criminal or immigration records and who do not pose a risk to public safety would be considered “voluntary returns“To their countries of origin. Others would be processed in accordance with their current immigration cases, the document states, suggesting they would be detained and face formal deportation proceedings.

Officials have tentatively named the initiative “Operation Irish Goodbye,” in reference to the act of escape from a bar or party without saying goodbye to your friends. The document did not offer a clear start date and operations are known to have changed during Donald Trump’s rapid immigration crackdown.

A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security, which includes ICE, said the agency “does not confirm future operations” but said that ““It is common sense that we need to know who is entering and leaving our country.” They accused former President Joe Biden of allowing immigrants to “invade our country.”

“Officials have tentatively called the initiative ‘Operation Irish Goodbye,’ referring to the act of leaving a bar or party without saying goodbye to your friends.”

“Under President Trump and Secretary [Kristi] Noem, DHS has secured our borders and ports to ensure that no illegal alien enters or leaves the United States without proper inspection by authorities for the safety of Americans,” the spokesperson said in an email.

The administration has been urging undocumented people to return home of their own volition, including using a government app that allows them to report their “intention to separate” and offering $1,000 for so-called “intentions to separate.”exit bonuses.” A mission aimed at picking up immigrants who voluntarily walk out the door might seem incompatible with those efforts.

ICE’s website about the call self-deportation process He urges those who are not here legally to “leave on their own initiative.”

“If you are unlawfully present in the US, you do not have to, and should not, wait for ICE officials to arrest you,” the government advises. “Instead, you can leave on your own terms.”

Muzaffar Chishti, an immigration expert at the Migration Policy Institute, said stopping people who leave on their own could be aimed at creating repercussions for those with active immigration cases or criminal records. Formal removal proceedings can prevent a person’s re-entry for a certain number of years or permanently, and make re-entry a crime.

“Expulsion has consequences,” he said.

Photo Beto via Getty Images

However, putting those immigrants into deportation proceedings (rather than quietly letting them leave on a bus south) would allow them to pursue legal remedies, including applying for asylum.

Operation “Goodbye Irish” could also consist of inflating numbers to exaggerate the effectiveness of Trump’s deportation campaign.

The president has promised to expel undocumented immigrants at an unprecedented pace, pressuring his administration officials to deliver numbers that match his campaign rhetoric. Migrants who leave the country undetected through a land port would not be included in the official accounting of expulsions.

The administration has said it is on track to deport almost 600,000 people at the end of Trump’s first year in office. If so, they would not be able to match the 685,000 deportations The Biden administration called in fiscal year 2024, when the number of illegal border crossings was much higheraccording to the Migration Policy Institute.

Chishti said that based on his group’s calculations, the Trump administration is unlikely to match the Biden administration’s recall numbers last year. He was skeptical that such an operation at the border would significantly increase the number.

“They are clearly getting desperate,” Chishti said. “But you can’t get to that scale by eliminating people who are already offering to be eliminated, because that number has not been high.”

The White House has also said its deportation campaign aims to rid the country of “the worst of the worst,” although recent data has shown that the majority of immigrants ICE is detaining in high-profile urban operations have no criminal records.

For example, in Washington, DC, 84% of those arrested by ICE have not faced criminal charges in the United States, and just 2% have a conviction for a violent crime, according to one study. New York Times analysis.

Do you work at the Department of Homeland Security? You can reach our reporter on Signal at davejamieson.99.