President Donald Trump on Monday indicated that his administration is considering deporting American citizens who have repeatedly committed violent crimes.
His comments came during a joint press conference with El Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, who visited the White House to meet with Trump on immigration-related matters.
During the conversation, Trump suggested to Bukele that he needs to open up more prison facilities to house criminals and the illegal immigrants the White House wishes to send to El Salvador.
“Are you willing to pay for those facilities to be opened if new ones were going to be built?” a reporter asked.
Trump replied, “I’d do something, we’d help them out, yeah.”
The president continued: “ They’re great facilities, very strong facilities, and they don’t play games.”
He then suggested he would like to “go a step further” because “we also have homegrown criminals that push people into subways, that hit elderly ladies on the back of the head with a baseball bat when they’re not looking, that are absolute monsters.”
“I’d like to include them in the group of people to get them out of the country, but we’ll have to be looking at the laws on that,” Trump said.
President Donald Trump says he wants to deport American citizens who have committed violent crimes.
— Jeff Charles, The Nullifier🏴 (@jeffcharlesjr) April 15, 2025
"We also have homegrown criminals that push people into subways, that hit elderly ladies on the back of the head with a baseball bat." pic.twitter.com/nzdZDn5OwE
This isn’t the first time Trump has floated such a policy. While speaking at a House Republican Retreat in Doral, Florida, he said he wished to deport American criminals to other countries that will imprison them for “a small fee,” Newsweek reported.
I don't want these violent repeat offenders in our country anymore. If they've been arrested many, many times, I want them out of our country," Trump said. "Let them be brought to a foreign land and maintained by others for a very small fee as opposed to being maintained in our jails for massive amounts of money, including the private prison companies that charge us a fortune. Let them be brought out of our country and let them live there for a while and see how they like it. You'll see crime all over the country dry up.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt earlier this month also explained the plan.
So the president has discussed this idea quite a few times publicly he's also discussed it privately you're referring to the president's idea for American citizens to potentially uh be deported these would be heinous, violent criminals who have broken our nation's laws repeatedly and these are violent repeat offenders in American streets the president has said if it's legal right if there is a legal pathway to do that he's not sure we are not sure if there is it's an idea that he is simply floated and has discussed very publicly as in the effort of transparency.
BREAKING NEWS: In a shocking statement, Karoline Leavitt confirms the Trump Administration is taking steps on a pathway to deport AMERICAN CITIZENS to El Salvador. This is absolutely insane. pic.twitter.com/UVesM2yKrd
— CALL TO ACTIVISM (@CalltoActivism) April 8, 2025
Trump and Leavitt both stressed that the administration would see whether deporting American citizens is allowable by law. In reality, the federal government cannot deport citizens except in rare circumstances.
American citizens, whether born in the US or naturalized, retain their citizenship for life. However, it is possible to lose one’s citizenship. Those convicted of treason can have their citizenship stripped, especially if they take up arms against the US or attempt to overthrow the government. Also, people can go through the denaturalization process to relinquish their citizenship.
Denaturalization can occur by obtaining citizenship in another country, pledging an oath of allegiance to another country, or serving in a foreign military under certain conditions. Also, joining prohibited organizations like the Communist Party or terrorist organizations could be ground for deportation.
As the law stands today, a president cannot deport an American citizen for being a repeat violent criminal. Perhaps it is better this way. Sure, if the government changed the law to allow for Trump’s idea, how long might it be before it empowers itself to deport citizens for lesser offenses? We definitely wouldn’t want this type of power in the hands of someone like Kamala Harris or Gavin Newsom, would we?