Those entering the US illegally will “face severe consequences,” President Donald Trump’s press secretary has said
The US has begun flying hundreds of illegal immigrants back to their home countries after a nationwide wave of arrests, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt announced on Friday.
”Deportation flights have begun,” Leavitt wrote on X, adding that “President [Donald] Trump is sending a strong and clear message to the entire world: if you illegally enter the United States of America, you will face severe consequences.”
Leavitt posted two photos showing lines of men being led onto military transport aircraft. According to Fox News, one of the pictures was taken at Biggs Army Airfield at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas. The airplane pictured took 80 people to Guatemala, the network’s sources said.
Deportation flights have begun.
President Trump is sending a strong and clear message to the entire world: if you illegally enter the United States of America, you will face severe consequences. pic.twitter.com/CTlG8MRcY1
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents launched a series of raids across the US this week, arresting more than 500 people and detaining 373 for removal on Thursday alone, according to the agency.
The cities they targeted included Boston, New York, Newark, and San Francisco, and agents focused on arresting immigrants who had committed subsequent crimes after entering the US illegally, ICE said.
Newark Mayor Ras Baraka bitterly condemned an ICE raid on a fish market in the city, accusing agents of violating the US Constitution by entering the business without a warrant. “Newark will not stand by idly while people are being unlawfully terrorized,” he said, adding that he is “ready and willing to defend and protect civil and human rights.”
Agents arrested people from dozens of countries, including Afghanistan, Angola, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Senegal and Venezuela, Fox News reported. More than a dozen gang members and multiple child molesters were reportedly among those detained.
Trump promised on the campaign trail that, if elected, he would lead “the largest deportation operation in American history.” In an interview with MSNBC last month, he said that he would start by deporting illegal immigrants who have committed crimes inside the US, before moving on to “people outside of criminals.”
There are thought to be anywhere between 11 million and 35 million illegal immigrants currently living in the US.
Immediately after his inauguration earlier this week, Trump signed a slew of executive orders aimed at ramping up border security. The president declared a national emergency at the US-Mexico frontier, designated drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations, and ended automatic birthright citizenship for children born to parents who are neither US citizens nor lawful permanent residents.
The Pentagon sent 1,500 soldiers and Marines to the border to assist in building barriers and flying detained migrants out of the country this week, acting Defense Secretary Robert Salesses said in a statement on Wednesday.
”As commander-in-chief, I have no higher responsibility than to defend our country from threats and invasions, and that is exactly what I am going to do,” Trump stated during his inaugural address.
