A new report from the Department of Homeland Security shows that illegal immigrants have been leaving the United States in extraordinary numbers since President Donald Trump took office. DHS says 1.9 million have self-deported. Another 600,000 have been removed by ICE.
“Illegal aliens are hearing our message to leave now. They know that if they don’t, we will find them, we will arrest them, and they will never return,” said DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin.
The effect has been felt in unexpected ways. Public services are easing. Local job markets, long strained, are finding room to breathe again. DHS frames it as a correction—an overdue clearing of the system.
Since January, the administration has carried out a broad deportation campaign aimed at illegal immigrants with criminal records. At the same time, officials have urged others living here unlawfully to return home voluntarily.
The CBP Home Mobile App offers them a plane ticket, free of charge, and a $1,000 exit bonus. Outstanding fines for overstaying are forgiven. It is an unusual blend of firmness and incentive—stern in purpose, soft at the edges.
This week, DHS added a new feature: a “Worst of the Worst” webpage listing criminal illegal immigrants arrested in recent operations. The transparency is deliberate. So is the public pressure.
Criticism has followed, especially from Democratic officials and city leaders who argue that civil rights—of citizens and immigrants alike—have been brushed aside. Their voices rise in hearings, in press conferences, in letters of protest.
But the administration’s position remains unchanged. In the numbers, they say, is a simple story: a country enforcing its laws, and a system finally being brought back to order.
