Why Trump's Deportation Flights Are the Steal of the Century for American Taxpayers

The liberal media are complaining about the price tag attached to President Donald Trump's mass deportation operations, claiming that the use of U.S. military planes to airlift illegal aliens out of here is an expensive burden on American taxpayers.

CNN said that U.S. defense officials "are moving as quickly as possible without regard for the cost." The Mirror US bemoaned that the Trump administration's first deportation flights—carrying an average of 80 illegal aliens on each airplane—cost up to $852,000 per trip.

To assist Trump's first set of "repatriation" flights, the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) provided two C-17s and a pair of C-130Es. According to DoD comptroller data, as of fall 2022, the hourly cost of operating a C-17 averages about $21,000, and for a C-130E, between $68,000 and $71,000. Based on these figures, the C-17 flight that took off Thursday from El Paso, Texas, to Guatemala City could be priced at roughly $252,000. For the same 12-hour flight aboard the C-130E, that would have been in the range of $816,000 and $852,000.

If libs think this is pricey, wait until they see how much illegal immigration costs U.S. taxpayers annually.

As Trump's border czar Tom Homan recently explained on the Immigration Reform Law Institute (IRLI)'s "No Border, No Country" podcast, even though the Trump administration's deportation plan will not be cheap, it is a one-time investment and cost-effective compared to current spending on illegal aliens in the U.S. Those here illegally enjoy a seemingly endless supply of housing, food, medical care, and other needs, courtesy of U.S. taxpayers. "This is in perpetuity; this doesn't end," Homan said of the way things were under President Joe Biden.

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According to the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR)'s 2023 fiscal analysis, each illegal alien or American-born child of an illegal alien costs the U.S. about $8,766 every year, amounting to an annual net cost of at least $150.7 billion.

FAIR arrived at this estimate by subtracting the tax revenue that illegal aliens generate (a little over $31 billion in tax contributions) from the gross negative economic impact of illegal immigration ($182.1 billion in total national expenditures).

Illegal aliens only contribute approximately $31.4 billion in taxes at the local, state, and federal levels, covering around a sixth of the staggering costs they impose on U.S. taxpayers, who ultimately foot the bill for things like social services. A large percentage of the illegal alien population who work in the underground economy often avoid paying any income tax at all.

Back in 2010, the average illegal immigrant household received more than $24,700 in government benefits while paying some $10,300 in taxes, according to a Heritage Foundation cost study. Since the taxes paid didn't offset the benefits received, this created a fiscal deficit of around $14,390 per household. Keep in mind that's an outdated, Obama-era number. It's certainly much higher now.

Reporting on results from the 2022 Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP), The Center for Immigration Studies found that 54 percent of households headed by immigrants (including illegal aliens, legal residents, and naturalized citizens) used one or more major welfare program. The rate is 59 percent for non-citizen households (i.e. green card holders and illegal immigrants). Compare that to 39 percent of U.S.-born households. Immigrant-headed households have especially high use of food programs (36 percent vs. 25 percent of U.S.-born), Medicaid (37 percent vs. 25 percent), and the Earned Income Tax Credit (16 percent vs. 12 percent).

Upon unlawful entry into the United States, illegal aliens also enjoy a host of other hand-outs, thanks to the supposedly cash-strapped Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

Over the past four years, the Biden-Harris administration has restructured FEMA, transforming it into an illegal alien resettlement agency. Since late 2022, FEMA has splurged taxpayer funds on the housing, travel, and care of illegal immigrants released from federal custody and awaiting immigration court proceedings through the Shelter and Services Program (SSP). Last year, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) pledged $640.9 million in taxpayer dollars towards such "humanitarian" services assisting illegal aliens. A year before that, DHS doled out $363.8 million.

According to a congressional report, FEMA runs SSP in conjunction with U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to help curb the overcrowding of short-term CBP holding facilities.

The multi-million dollar initiative financially supports state and local governments dealing with the influx of illegal immigrants flooding border towns as well as cities in the interior, such as New York, a so-called "sanctuary city" where the city's budgetary oversight office just received more than $38 million from the FEMA-administered program.

/3 For example, of that $1 billion, FEMA gave over $38 million to NYC – a sanctuary city overrun by illegal aliens.

NYC, in turn, is handing out gift cards and hotels to illegal aliens. pic.twitter.com/RNn5WzY2XU

— America First Legal (@America1stLegal) September 30, 2024

This, of course, does not account for the price we've paid in American lives—those killed by violent illegal aliens on Biden's watch. The death toll includes 12-year-old Jocelyn Nungaray, a young girl in Houston who was lured under a bridge, bound, stripped naked, sexually assaulted, and allegedly strangled to death by two Venezuelan nationals, and 22-year-old Georgia nursing student Laken Riley, the murder victim of another illegal alien from Venezuela. 

In the latter case, Riley was out on a run when now-convicted Venezuelan national Jose Ibarra was "hunting for females" on the University of Georgia's campus. During testimony at trial, it was revealed that he had taken a taxpayer-funded trip to Georgia.

In September 2022, Ibarra illegally crossed over the United States-Mexico border through El Paso, Texas. He was released into the country on parole "due to detention capacity" at the border town's Central Processing Center. A witness testified that after Iberra illegally entered the country, he stayed at New York City's once-luxury Roosevelt Hotel, which was transformed into a migrant-processing hub, on the taxpayer's dime before flying on a "humanitarian flight" from Manhattan to Atlanta in September 2023.

Evidently, the consequences of Biden's open border policies go far beyond U.S. tax dollars.