Report: Trump Wants to Fine Migrants $998 a Day

The Trump administration is continuing its push to deport or otherwise vacate immigrants from the United States, and it's now come up with a plan for those who won't leave on their own: Deplete their bank accounts. Reuters has seen documents that suggest President Trump plans to fine migrants facing deportation orders $998 for every day that they remain in the States, using a decades-old law to justify his actions.

• Details: A Homeland Security rep tells Reuters that undocumented migrants should use the CBP One app available to help them leave the US of their own volition, and that if they don't, "they will face the consequences," including the $998 daily penalty. A senior Trump official says that they're even looking into making the fines retroactive for five years, which would add up to more than $1 million. The administration is also looking at seizing and selling migrant assets.

• Law in question: The 1996 legislation was enforced for the first time in 2018, during Trump's first administration, to hit a group of migrants taking shelter in churches with heavy fines. Court records show at least four migrants were directed to pay about $60,000 each.
• Warning: This isn't the first time the idea has emerged since Trump took office. A March 31 post from DHS noted the possible fines for migrants who don't "self-deport" using the government app. "If they don't, we will find them, we will deport them, and they will never return," the post noted. And in February, reports emerged of possible jail time and fines for undocumented immigrants who don't sign up with a national registry.
• Climate of intimidation? The point of the fines "isn't really to enforce the law, it's to project fear in communities," Scott Shuchart, an ICE policy official in the Biden administration, tells Reuters. American citizens could be affected, too, if fines are levied against someone in their "mixed status" household.
• Management: So who would take the lead on administering the fines and seizing and selling migrants' assets? Reuters' review of correspondence between the White House and Customs and Border Protection show that the Trump administration is eyeing that agency to handle things, though some have said that CBP doesn't have the infrastructure in place. Another possibility: the DOJ's civil asset forfeiture division.

(More President Trump stories.)