Trump’s Border Czar Suggests Using Halfway Houses for Children of Illegal Immigrants

Tom Homan speaks at the National Press Club at an event hosted by the Center for Immigration Studies, on June 5, 2018. Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times

President-elect Donald Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, suggested on Thursday that the incoming administration may use halfway houses for the children of illegal immigrants.

“As far as U.S. children—children, that’s going to be a difficult situation, because we’re not going to detain your U.S. citizen children, which means, you know, they’re going to be put in a halfway house,” Homan told NewsNation, referring to children who are citizens but whose parents are illegal immigrants.

He said that “they can ... stay at home and wait for the officers to get the travel arrangements and come back to get the family.”

Speaking to the Washington Post in a separate interview on Thursday, he said that parents in that situation came to “the country illegally and chose to have a child.”

“You put your family in that position,” he said.

He also said that the administration will have to construct new detention facilities to hold families who are exiting the United States.

“We’re going to need to construct family facilities,” Homan told the Washington Post. “How many beds we’re going to need will depend on what the data says.”

In an interview with CNN earlier this month, Homan predicted that 100,000 beds would be needed for the incoming administration’s mass deportation efforts. During the campaign, one of Trump’s main promises was to initiate the deportation plan, while Homan later said that the administration would first target illegal aliens with criminal records.

Trump has also floated the idea of rescinding birthright citizenship, which would likely face a significant number of lawsuits. But Homan told NewsNation on Thursday that illegal immigrants having children who were born in the country will not preclude them from being removed.

“Having a U.S. citizen child does not make you immune to our laws, and that’s not the message we want to send to the whole world, that you can have a child and you’re immune to through the laws of this country,” Homan said.

There were an estimated 11 million immigrants in the U.S. illegally in January 2022, according to a Department of Homeland Security report, a figure that has likely risen in recent years. The pro-immigration American Immigration Council found the cost of removing all illegal immigrants would lead to a loss in gross domestic product, although Trump and his surrogates have said that it would boost the economy.

Earlier in December, Trump told Time magazine that he would use the U.S. military to the fullest extent of the law to back the deportation efforts. When asked about a U.S. law that generally prevents the military from being used in domestic law enforcement, Trump said illegal immigration amounted to an invasion that needed to be stopped.

“I consider it an invasion of our country,” Trump said. “We‘ll get National Guard, and we’ll go as far as I’m allowed to go, according to the laws of our country.”

Trump did not rule out building new detention facilities to house illegal immigrants awaiting deportation but said his administration would aim to deport them quickly, limiting the need for camps or other sites.

“I don’t want them sitting in camp for the next 20 years. I want them out, and the countries have got to take them back,” Trump said in the Time magazine interview.

Reuters contributed to this report.