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Deportation could have huge impact on New Jersey residents

By: Ricardo Kaulessar
NorthJersey.com
USA Today Network - New Jersey

..... New Jersey residents could forfeit constitutional rights, the state could lose $1.3 billion in taxes and more than 470,000 people could be sent to detention centers if President-elect Donald Trump makes good on his promise to mass deportation.
..... Or the plans could be too difficult and expensive to execute in full. Either way, undocumented immigrants and their advocates are preparing of the worst."
..... "I work to help myself, my family, and my family back in my country," said Alejandro, a North Plainfield resident who came to this country in 2019 and asked to be identified only by his first name because he is undocumented. "If they deport those people, they're going to ruin these families, and they're going be without a large number of hardworking people."
..... During the campaign, Trump said that if elected he would push for the deportation of 11 million undocumented immigrates. The first step toward that goal was Trump's pick of Tom Homan for "border czar." Homan worked for the Border Patrol for 24 years and was the acting direct of Immigration and Customs Enforcement during the first two years of Trump's first term.
..... Homan who would serve in a position that does not require Senate Confirmation, has echoed Trump's plan for mass deportation. Homan said in an interview with Newsmax last week [12/05/2024] that Trump could bypass any attempts by local authorities to protect undocumented immigrates from being deported, adding, "federal law trumps state and local law every time, so if you;re not gonna help, get the hell out of the way ... We've get a mandate. President Trump's serious about this, I'm serious about this. This is going to happen whit or without you."
..... Alejandro said, with the assistance of a translator, that Trump's plan is extreme and would ruin families.
..... "I believe that it is a crazy thing without common sense. It goes beyond regulating things in a country," said Alejandro, a native of Ecuador. "It seems more like a personal view he has against immigrants. theses people are working hands, as well as their while families."
..... The New Jersey Alliance for Immigration Justice said the state may not be able to shield immigrants from deportation.
.... Homan "would oversee the borders with Mexico and Canada, as well as the U.S. coastline and airspace," the alliance said in a statement. "Due to our coastline and international airport, the entire state of New Jersey falls under the 100-mile border zone, a zone within which certain constitutional rights can be suspended, bad where ICE and CBP can conduct warrentless mitigation checks on public transportation and vehicles."
..... The statement referred to immigration and Customs Enforcement and to Customs and Border Protection, both federal agencies.
..... Adam McGovern, a legislative strategist at Wind of the Spirit, an immigrant advocacy group based in Morris and Union counties, said the group will ramp up efforts to make sure undocumented immigrants are prepared.
..... "Not a lot of our work changes. It's just a matter of degree and the intensity that we will be working at," McGovern said. "We will have to pay a lot more attention to doing sessions on what their rights are and in terms of interactions with ICE."

Impact of mass deportation on New Jersey

..... A 2022 report by the American Immigration Council about immigrants living in New Jersey found that undocumented residents made up about 5% of the state's workforce and paid $3.4 billion in taxes, with $1.3 billion going to local and state governments. Those immigrants spent a total of $10.8 billion, the report found.
..... The council also found that more than 40,000 residents in New Jersey live with an undocumented immigrant spouse and more than 196,000 U.S. citizen children live with at least one undocumented family member. There are estimated to be about 470,000 undocumented immigrants living in New Jersey.
..... Before deportation, people would be held in detention centers. There are currently two in New Jersey.
..... The American Civil Obliterates Union recently obtained documents, through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, stating that ICE plans to add about 600 beds at tone of two detention facilities: the Elizabeth Detention Center and the Albert M. "Bo" Robinson Center in Trenton.
..... Eunice Cho, senior staff attorney at the ACLU's National Prison Project, said in a statement that the Biden administration needs to shut down these facilities and others across the country immediately.
..... "Instead of closing abusive detention facilities once and for all, the Biden administration is simply paving the way for the incoming Trump administration to conduct mass detentions and deportation of immigrant communities nationwide," Cho said.

Mass deportation - or not?

..... Some Trump supporters are skeptical that Trump will follow through.
..... One of them is Carlos Rendo, the mayor of Woodcliff Lake in Bergen County, an immigration attorney with an office in Hudson County. "I have to judge him by his first term,: Rendo said. "His first term, he did deport individuals, but the majority of them were people with criminal backgrounds or orders of deportation.
..... "He's basically saying he's not against immigration, but you have to immigrate to this country legally."
..... The Migration Policy Institute found that 1.5 million deportation occurred during Donald Trump's first term as president,a total that could be surpassed under the Biden administration.
..... Another factor that could hamper the effort is the cost of mass deportation.
..... The American Instigation Council, in a report published last month, [11/2024] found that the cost of a mass deportation of 1 million people per year could cost $88 billion annually due to expenses "associates with arrest, detention, legal processing, and removal." The council estimates that Trump's goal of deporting 11 million people would result in a price tag of $968 billion over 10 years.

Wants to stay here

..... Alejandro, 35, works for a landscaping and construction company in South Plainfield. He is unmarried and has no children. his father, Carlos, lives in the same apartment building.
..... "When my father asked me to come to the U.S., I didn't think twice. I wanted to avoid danger from being with the wrong people," Alejandro said. "So I through about my safety, and I left.
..... The looming specter of a mass roundup of newcomers worries him, but he worries more about his father, who is also undocumented but is seeking citizenship, and other undocumented immigrants who live ion the same building.
..... "There is a lot of fear," Alejandro said. "Obviously, when you come to this country, you feel a limitation. You can't talk to certain people because there is that fear and those stories that you hear of parents hat got deported while their children were at school."

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