President Donald Trump on Wednesday signed an executive order to send 30,000 illegal immigrants to Guantanamo Bay, the latest development in his aggressive effort to close the southern border and carry out mass deportations.
Guantanamo Bay is an infamous detention facility in Cuba where the worst criminals and terrorists are often sent.
Trump said the order instructs the Department of Defense and the Department of Homeland Security to prepare Guantanamo Bay for the incoming migrants.
“We have 30,000 beds in Guantanamo to detain the worst criminal illegal aliens threatening the American people,” Trump said.
“Some of them are so bad we don’t even trust the countries to hold them because we don’t want them coming back, so we’re going to send them out to Guantánamo. This will double our capacity immediately, and … it’s a tough place to get out of,” Trump added.
Trump made the comments at a ceremonial event for his signing of the Laken Riley Act.
As The Center Square previously reported, that law authorizes law enforcement to detain illegal immigrants who are arrested for assaulting law enforcement, stealing or injuring or killing someone.
Trump said the move would help with “eradicating the scourge of migrant crime in our communities.
The Guantanamo order directs the secretaries of the Departments of Defense and Homeland Security to ex[amd the Naval Station Guantanamo Bay to full capacity.
The move comes amidst a flurry of executive orders to close the southern border and begin mass deportations of illegal immigrants, starting with the worst criminals.
Thousands of illegal immigrants have already been caught and deported by Immigrations and Customs Enforcement since Trump took office.
The processing and transporting migrants to other countries is a large, and sometimes expensive, logistical issue. Guantanamo might help with those efforts and sends a strong message of deterrence to potential illegal immigrants.
“It’s just an unforced error that we even have to be doing this,” Trump said. “Now we need Congress to provide full funding for the complete and total restoration of our sovereign borders as well as financial support to remove record numbers of illegal aliens…”
