President Donald Trump’s administration is considering mobilizing as many as 100,000 National Guard troops to round up unauthorized immigrants, according to a draft copy of an order obtained by The Associated Press on Friday.
Though the AP reported that the memo was written by U.S. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, the White House quickly denied that the report was true.
The AP reports an 11-page draft memo shows the Trump administration is considering an unprecedented militarization of immigration enforcement as far north as Portland, Oregon, and as far east as New Orleans.
Governors in the affected states would have final approval on whether troops under their control participate, according to the AP. Millions of the people who would be affected live nowhere near the U.S.-Mexico border.
During the 2016 campaign, Trump talked at various times about implementing a “deportation force” to conduct raids on undocumented immigrants. In August, during a high-profile speech in Arizona, he pledged to “triple the number of [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] deportation officers” and “create a new special deportation task force focused on identifying and quickly removing the most dangerous criminal illegal immigrants in America who have evaded justice.”
The National Guard is not part of ICE, but the memo obtained by the AP is drawn from the same vein as that August pledge.
Trump’s campaign plan was repeatedly disavowed by members of Congress, including top Republicans. At a recent town hall, House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) said definitively that “there won’t be a deportation force.”
But it’s not clear what, if any, purview the House would have over the mobilization of the National Guard, meaning that Ryan could be powerless to stop this from happening ― if he wanted to at all.
Trump has floated potential executive actions before, only to back away. Most notably, his administration looked into a religious freedom executive order that would have potentially curtailed gay rights. But they ultimately decided against going down that route. The AP story, likewise, says merely that the administration is “considering” this order on immigration deportation.
The Department of Defense has yet to respond to a request for comment from The Huffington Post.
This story is developing and will be updated.
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