Trump’s Border Czar: At Least 100,000 Detention Beds Needed for Mass Deportation Plan

Former Acting ICE Director Tom Homan speaks at the National Press Club on June 5, 2018. Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times

Incoming border czar Tom Homan estimates that at least 100,000 beds for illegal immigrants in detention will be needed for the Trump administration to carry out its deportation plans.

President-elect Donald Trump has promised mass deportations, and he tapped Homan, the former acting head of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), to lead the operation.

ICE is currently holding about 38,700 illegal immigrants, according to agency data. An additional nearly 185,000 are being monitored by cellphone or ankle bracelet at a cost of $232,800 per day, ICE data show.

Homan told CNN on Dec. 18 that the operation will involve building new detention facilities and that officials will be seeking to hire more ICE agents.

“It all depends on the funding I get from the Hill,” Homan said, referring to lawmakers in Congress.

Both congressional chambers will be controlled by Republicans come January 2025. Republicans currently control the House of Representatives, but not the Senate.

Homan also said that he will request assistance from the military.

“They’re not going to be out arresting people, but they can be a force multiplier in doing things we need to do that doesn’t require a badge and a gun,” he said.

The first wave of arrests, at least, will target illegal immigrants with a criminal history and those deemed national security threats. But when officials in so-called sanctuary cities decline to allow ICE to take custody of criminals from jails and courts, ICE agents will go into neighborhoods to track them down. That will result in collateral arrests, Homan said this week.

Homan said on CNN that “immigration officers aren’t going to be told to walk away from somebody here illegally.” He also said that illegal immigrants whose children were born in the United States and thus have citizenship, will not be shielded from enforcement operations.

“They put themselves in this position. We didn’t,” he said.

He said that the children can go live with the other parent or a relative.

The first Trump administration carried out about 1.2 million deportations over four years. During President Joe Biden’s first two years in office, deportations plunged to about 65,000 a year, though they jumped to 253,488 in fiscal year 2024, which ended in September.

Some lawmakers and groups have praised Trump’s mass deportation plans.

“Deportations are a critical step in delivering on that promise, restoring the rule of law, and protecting American communities across the country,” the Federation for American Immigration Reform said in a recent article.

Others say that deportations will cause harm.

“Trump’s plans for mass deportation will tear families apart, raid homes, and harm our communities,” Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) wrote on Wednesday on the social media platform X. “We need to resist his hateful agenda and fight back to protect our immigrant neighbors because immigrants make our communities stronger.”