President-elect Donald Trump’s incoming border czar, Tom Homan, revealed a controversial proposal to address the U.S.-born children of undocumented immigrants as part of the administration’s mass deportation plans. In an interview with NewsNation on Thursday, Homan suggested the use of halfway houses to shelter children who are American citizens while their parents face deportation.
“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. This means they’re going to be put in a halfway house,” Homan explained, offering little detail on how such a plan would be implemented.
Instead of relying solely on government action, Homan urged undocumented parents to “self-deport” to avoid family separation.
“I’ve said many times that if we arrest the parent who has been ordered removed and they have a child with them, then they can choose to be removed together, or the child can stay here,” Homan stated. “If you choose to have a U.S. citizen child while in the country illegally, you’re putting your family in that position.”
He also emphasized that having a U.S.-born child does not exempt parents from deportation laws. “A child who is a U.S. citizen does not make you immune to our laws,” Homan reiterated.
The Trump administration also plans to reopen family detention centers that house undocumented parents and their noncitizen children, a significant departure from the policies of the Biden administration. In 2021, President Biden closed these facilities, which previously held around 3,000 migrants, citing concerns from pediatricians and immigration advocates about the harmful effects of detention on children.
