Rep. Byron Donalds Downplayed the Military Being Used to Implement Trump’s Mass Deportation Plans

RUSH TRANSCRIPT:
RADDATZ: “Let’s talk about how he’s going to do it. He said he’s going to declare a national emergency and use military assets to execute his mass deportation plan. What does that look like?”

DONALDS: “Well, first and foremost, we have been very clear throughout the entire campaign that the first order of business is going to be removing, repatriating these criminal illegal aliens, almost to the tune of a million of them back to their home countries. That is step one. Step two, we already talked about, making sure that our borders, whether it’s at the point of entry —“

RADDATZ: “But how do you do that? I want some detail there.”

DONALDS: “Or illegal points they’re not allowed to come through.”

RADDATZ: “Give me detail there. What’s the military going to do?”

DONALDS: “Well, first of August, when you’re talking about military assets being used, that’s only in an extreme last resort. There are more than 6,000 officers who have been — who have dedicated their lives to having to remove illegal aliens from our country. People who already have illegal deportation order, but they haven’t — it hasn’t been affectuated by Joe Biden. What Donald Trump is going to do, we’re going to repatriate those people using those personnel at I.C.E. And other parts of the Department of Homeland Security to remove them. I think if you are going to use military assets, that’s in the last resorts, but it’s only for a logistical purposes, Martha, and so I think that what we have to be very careful of is not to try to throw out this idea that you’re going to have troops in the United States going door to door. That is not going to happen.”

RADDATZ: “A recent analysis found it would cost about $315 billion and take at least 10 years to deport everyone in the U.S. Without legal status. You often talk about the need to cut government spending. So how is this mass deportation going to be paid for?”

DONALDS: “Well, Martha, I will tell you what realready know is, is that the cost of massive illegal immigration to the federal government, to state governments, and to local governments is more than $150 billion per year. So if you are going to say that it cost us $300 billion over a decade to repatriate illegal aliens to their home country versus the American taxpayer having to pay more than a trillion dollars over the same decade to keep those illegal aliens in the United States, that is a savings to the American people, and so it is important that yes. We are going to have to use resources to repatriate these people back to their countries where they belong, but it pales in comparison to the costs of massive illegal immigration ending in the United States, not just trying to subsidize people living here, but it’s also the crime that has occur. You can bring up Rachel nongarry with the tragedy that’s happened to her. Laken Riley, the tragedy that’s happened to her, and not to mention the displacement of Americans in their own cities when it comes to rampant illegal immigration. As far as I’m concerned this is a savings for the American people.”

RADDATZ: “Quickly if you will, how many undocumented immigrants do you expect President Trump to deport during his four years? There are 11 million, 13 million. How many?”

DONALDS: “Listen. As far as I’m concerned, stopping the flow is number one, and then at a minimum, I would say just speaking with you anecdotally, it’s at a minimum going to be 2 million, but it’s going to be more because the amount of people who already have a deportation order, people who are in our country who have committed crimes, people who have already been convicted of murder, they need to go, and go immediately, and then when you have an active deportation process, we do know that there are aliens who are going to want to go back to their home country. They’re not going to want to be caught up in the process of dealing with I.C.E. Because if you are deported through that process, then you will actually be barred from returning to the United States for a period of 10 years.”

RADDATZ: “Okay. I’m going to have to stop you there.”

DONALDS: “When you turn off — Martha — hold on, Martha. Real quick. When you turn off the spigots of opening our borders, when you turn off the spigots of all this aid going to illegal aliens in the United States, and then you have a president of the United States and a government who is serious about repatriating people back to their home country, you will see that the — the enticement of coming of coming to America, its not going to be what it was under Joe Biden,”