Trump’s mass deportations are hurting local economies

One of the desired effects of Donald Trump’s “flood the zone” strategy is to make it impossible for the news media to focus on anything long enough to fully capture the public’s attention before the next atrocity is revealed. The administration’s executive orders and drastic policy changes — including, most recently, the EPA’s intention to eliminate a 2009 finding that greenhouse gas emissions are dangerous to people and the planet — have proven to be successful distractions and diversions from the worst actions of Trump 2.0. None of them have created more human misery than White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller’s heartless mass roundup and deportation program.

When Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), along with Customs and Border Protection (CBP), first started rousting day workers at Home Depots throughout Los Angeles County in early June, the actions garnered widespread coverage — particularly once people started protesting at a federal detention center in downtown Los Angeles. The protests were the normal kind usually held in big cities; the Los Angeles Police Department was handling them easily. But Trump decided it was time to flex his strongman muscles by usurping the authority of California Gov. Gavin Newsom (and showing the president’s hypocrisy on the issue of federalism) by activating the state’s National Guard. Excited by the sight of 2,000 men in military garb on the streets of an American city he hates, the president doubled the number, and then ordered 700 active duty Marines to join them.

Trump’s actions led national news coverage for days, including the spectacle of California Sen. Alex Padilla being wrestled to the ground and handcuffed when he tried to ask Homeland Security Secretary Krisi Noem a question at a press conference in L.A. As the media focused on immigration and civil liberties issues raised by the presence of ICE, CPB and the military, it appeared that the mass deportation program might get the kind of sustained treatment that could exert pressure on lawmakers and possibly force a change in policy. After all, that happened during Trump’s first term, when people protested his “Muslim travel ban” and the media’s intense coverage forced the administration to retreat and regroup.

In L.A., media attention largely dissipated following a laughable, staged show of force in and around MacArthur Park. The National Guard troops were reduced by half and the Marines were quietly sent home. But ICE and CPB raids have continued apace, and they have picked up in other cities as well. New York will likely be next; Noem and Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, have promised to step up the agencies’ presence in the Big Apple, which may refocus attention on the issue due to the proximity to national media outlets.

Because of its large immigrant population and Hispanic character, L.A. was always going to be one of the main targets of Trump and Miller’s mass deportation policy. The City of Angels is the poster child for everything the MAGA movement hates about America. L.A. still hasn’t recovered from the devastating wildfires that destroyed an estimated 16,000 homes in January. With a mass recovery effort underway, the city needs its immigrant labor force more than ever before. But the administration’s cruel actions have forced a wide swath of workers, businesses and customers into the shadows, leaving them terrified and paranoid. They have good reason to feel that way.

These ICE and CPB raids, though, aren’t just separating and traumatizing families. They’re hurting the city’s economy. “In LA’s Boyle Heights, businesses reported losing 50% or more of their customers or revenue over the last several weeks,” Padilla recently posted on X. He encouraged people to “protest with your wallets” and support small businesses in communities targeted by the raids. 

All over L.A., undocumented Latino and Asian immigrants — and citizens alike — are living under siege from unidentified, masked officers bursting into workplaces, grabbing people off the streets and even waiting outside courtrooms to detain and deport immigrants when they appear for hearings.

But it isn’t just small businesses in urban centers that are being impacted. ICE has raided farms, detaining workers or scaring them into not going to work, which has left farms with crops unpicked and rotting on the vine. Factories are also being targeted. This week, the New York Times reported that a once-thriving meat processing plant in Omaha, Nebraska, had lost the majority of its workforce, resulting in a 70% drop in production. It’s happening in manufacturing, with companies forced to shutter assembly lines and actually lay off American citizens. Home health caregivers are being affected. Nursing home staffs — which are around 40% foreign-born, many of whom are from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela — have had their legal status unceremoniously yanked by Trump. In construction, immigrants make up 34% of the construction workforce and aren’t replaceable by Americans, who often don’t possess the required skills.

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All across the American economy, we are about to see a profound disruption as a major part of the workforce is simply being disappeared into camps and then deported — actions the administration blithely waves away by insisting that the proverbial 29-year-old men living in their mother’s basements will be thrilled to work in meat-packing plants or nursing homes to keep their fabulous Medicaid benefits.

Economic statistics about undocumented workers are unequivocal. A new analysis by the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School — the president’s alma mater — projected Trump’s crackdown would “shrink most worker paychecks, erode gross domestic product (GDP) and spike the already-massive federal government budget deficit.” The reason is obvious, as Kent Smetters, professor of business economics and public policy at the Wharton School, told CNN: “There is no question the U.S. economy will get smaller as you deport a lot of the workforce. You simply have fewer bodies to produce. Fewer people means a smaller economy.” 

That’s obvious when you think about it, isn’t it? But apparently the school’s most famous graduate didn’t absorb such sound economic logic.

Most immigrants also pay taxes. They are consumers, and many even pay into Social Security and Medicare while reaping no rewards, which means they are actually helping to support American retirees. Economists are very worried that, as Baby Boomers continue to age out of the workforce, businesses won’t be able to replace them, a problem that will be made even worse by the lack of foreign-born workers.

Between Trump’s inane tariff policy and his draconian deportation operation, it’s only a matter of time before this economy falls apart. When MAGA’s true believers see what these policies will cost them, I wonder if they will think the suffering of these workers was been worth it.