In the latest edition of “Last Week Tonight,” John Oliver examines the practical implications of Donald Trump’s pledge to enact mass deportations of illegal aliens. This is the basis of his campaign. Some version of this idea is supported among about 54% of Americans and 86% of Republicans. “Trump supporters will tell you they love the idea of mass deportation, even if they haven’t really thought about the details,” Oliver says. “In fact, it seems like a lot of people are currently endorsing something that they don’t fully understand what it means.”
Oliver has considered how mass deportation would work, but “just to be clear, the morality of it is despicable,” he said. “Immigrants are people too, no matter what the worst McDonald’s employee says.”
The scale of President Trump’s proposal is staggering: It would displace approximately 13 million people, more than the population of Ohio, many of whom have lived here for decades. Deportation involves arrest, detention and legal proceedings, and requires the government to hire an estimated 220,000 to 409,000 new staff and law enforcement officers. When it comes to incarceration, “I want you to think for a moment about what it means to incarcerate 13 million people,” especially since the overall U.S. prison and jail population is 1.9 million people. “And we have a lot of prisons and jails in this country. They’re kind of ours,” Oliver said. “If we had a slogan, it would probably be ‘America: Home of Prisons and KFC Double Down.'”
As J.D. Vance dryly suggested in an interview with Bill O’Reilly touting his “bite by bite” approach, deporting “just” one million people a year would cost an estimated $88 billion a year. , most of which build concentration camps. Over 10 years, it would cost nearly $1 trillion. “Let me be clear: ‘My biggest problem with spending nearly $1 trillion to build detention centers for immigrants is not the $1 trillion part,'” Oliver said. “But I think it’s worth recognizing how full of shit Trump and Vance are, not just from a moral standpoint, but from a practical standpoint as well.”
For the sake of argument, Oliver pretended that mass deportation was a realistic policy. “The problems that the Trump campaign claims to solve will still not be solved,” he said, trashing Republican arguments about how deportations would help the economy, housing costs and crime.
Mass deportations do not reduce unemployment. In fact, records from the Obama administration show that 500,000 more undocumented workers will be forced out of the country as businesses that rely on immigrants for either their customer base or labor force end up shutting down. per year, there will be 44,000 fewer jobs held by U.S.-born workers. . Additionally, removing 13 million people who spend money in their communities would have a negative impact on the economy. Oliver cited estimates that such measures would lead to a loss of 4.2% to 6.8% of GDP, equivalent to the Great Recession.
When it comes to housing, Oliver took issue with the argument raised by Vance during the campaign stop that housing is simply supply and demand. The house will belong to an American citizen. ”
“Even if it wasn’t all bullshit, the very existence of J.D. Vance is proof that supply and demand don’t always work together,” Oliver countered. “There was no demand for the business-minded bearded sycophant who is routinely ignored by President Trump. I already have two photos of Eric and Don Jr. that I hardly ever use, and they’re unnecessary.” The third one is here.”
In fact, many economists have testified that mass deportations could worsen the housing crisis, as illegal immigrants play an important role in the construction industry. If President Trump’s proposal becomes a reality, 1.5 million construction workers would be laid off, including more than one in three roofers, tilers, plasterers, plasterers and drywall installers. Oliver quoted one economist as blunt: “In the long run, immigration is the solution to the housing crisis. Without immigration, we cannot increase the supply of housing.”
“JD Vance, the important thing is that there is actually supply and demand in play,” he said. “This isn’t some shit I came up with in between drafts of my next memoir, ‘Dingus Sonata.’ I think the solution to poverty is to compare it to a fucking Reuben the turkey.”
Finally, mass deportations will not reduce violent crime. As an example, immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than U.S.-born people, and violent crime has declined since 2020, according to FBI data. That’s the number of Henry Kissinger’s alive,” Oliver joked.
But that hasn’t stopped President Trump and his compatriots, including Stephen Miller, from stoking false panic about an “immigrant invasion” in areas such as Aurora, Colorado and Springfield, Ohio. Residents are loudly protesting.
President Trump has called Aurora a “war zone” despite opposition from the city’s Republican mayor. “And that particular word shows you what his real end goal here is,” Oliver said. “Because President Trump can’t deport 13 million people overnight, or even 1 million people, and even if mass deportations don’t solve any of the problems he says he’s going to use, he’s going to use Aurora-style panic. “They can use the Illegal Alien Act to speed up deportations without due process.”
Additionally, in clearly voting for Kamala Harris, Oliver said the data shows that “when people truly understand what these policies are, for example, they prefer less punitive policies.” “There is a tendency to choose,” he said. “And I believe that the vast majority of people want to do the right thing for the immigrants they know. The challenge is to extend that same humanity to people they don’t have. That’s it.
He also noted that Obama holds the record for the most deportations in a year and that Biden’s immigration policies are “haphazard at best,” adding: “It’s an agenda that both parties would like to see adopted. ” he added.
“It wasn’t immigrants who broke this system,” he concluded. “On the contrary, they make the most of the pieces we have given them and continue to build their lives, their communities, and this country better, richer, and stronger. And for them, we The least they can do is go out on November 5th, demonize their existence, champion their suffering, and call out a president who has proven time and time again that he is a bad guy, to say the least. Don’t choose.”
