One of the policies articulated by Donald Trump in his remarkable march to the White House was his promise to deport the estimated 11 million “illegal immigrants” present in the US. In his very first interview – on the CBS network programme “60 Minutes” – Trump elaborated that he would begin by focusing on “criminal illegals”:
“What we are going to do is get the people that are criminal and have criminal records, gang members, drug dealers, where a lot of these people, probably two million, it could be even three million, we are getting them out of our country or we are going to incarcerate. But we’re getting them out of our country,” he vowed. This policy had already raised concerns in countries such as Guyana from where many illegals originated because even in execution of present US enforcement of its immigration laws, the deportation of criminals by the US had strained the capacity of our criminal justice system.
Presently, even if immigrants were legally in the US, but did not naturalise their status into citizenship and are convicted of a crime, they are subject to a deportation order on the completion of their sentence. Individuals who literally grew up in the US, and graduated from prison as hardened criminals could be thrown into Guyana. Now that Trump has signalled he will up the ante and articulated a target on deportees he will be shooting for, it is clear Guyana will be forced to deal with a deluge rather than the steady stream of criminals.
Even before the 60 Minutes interview, President David Granger had been asked about the Trump doctrine on “criminal illegals”. He pointed out that all countries have a right to control their immigration policies but conceded that Guyana is ill equipped to deal with an upsurge of criminal deportees. He said he would expect that the US should give advance warning of the number of criminal deportees so that Guyana can begin to improve its absorption programme.
But this answer only suggests that the President is putting off making a decision that will have to be made sooner rather than later. Trump’s figure of two million criminal illegal immigrants was most likely pulled from estimates that the Department of Homeland Security proposed for its 2013 budget. The money was already allocated and all the new Trump administration has to do is to step on the gas and insist that targets be met. We can expect a slackening of review standards under the new dispensation for those targets to be met, especially in the beginning of the term. Guyana has to proceed on the assumption that beginning in 2017 there will be an upsurge in criminal Guyanese illegals whose numbers will keep going skywards.
Earlier this year, the US Ambassador had released figures on their deportees between the years 2008-2013 and these suggested that the numbers had been decreasing from around 200 annually to half of that. Most of the deportations were for violating their visa stipulations but there were also, in fact some “criminal illegals” or those “legal” now deemed “illegals” because of their criminal record. The US had also unforced a modest programme back in 2009 to assist in reintegrating these deportees back into peaceful Guyanese civilian life.
If a President Trump’s administration will demand Mexico pay for a wall to keep out immigrants to the US, it is very unlikely they will pay us to receive “our illegals”. We suggest that the administration immediately convene a task force from both sides of the political divide to craft a plan to confront this imminent threat.
For instance, it is quite likely we may have to introduce legislation to modify our criminal laws and institute a “parole” system where “criminal” deportees are required to check in to their nearest police stations weekly to ensure they are keeping on the “straight and narrow.”
Our home-grown criminals do not need American-sourced tutelage.
