The Homeland Security Department has offered illegal immigrants a Christmas season deportation bargain: Go home for the holidays and stay there, and you can get a $3,000 bonus from Uncle Sam.
That’s triple the regular “self-deportation” bonus the Trump administration has been offering, and it’s in addition to the free flight home that the government has said it will give to those who register their self-deportation ahead of time.
Secretary Kristi Noem said the “holiday stipend” is a particularly sweet carrot and a better offer than the stick — deportation — that the government has made clear it is also willing to use on rank-and-file illegal immigrants.
“Illegal aliens should take advantage of this gift and self-deport because if they don’t, we will find them, we will arrest them, and they will never return,” she said in announcing the bonus.
The department called it a “limited time offer” and “the best gift that an illegal alien can give themselves and their families this holiday season.”
The department announced the bounty with a slick press release that replicated a Christmas advertisement. It depicted a decorated Christmas tree in a cozy home, set against a snowy landscape outside.
“Until the end of the year, take advantage of a $3,000 bonus to head home for the holidays!” the ad reads.
It even includes some fine print: “We’re checking names off our naughty list. Don’t be the next name we find.”
On social media, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has posted a picture of a deportation flight, midair, being pulled by reindeer.
“Illegal aliens: Avoid ICE Air and go Ho Ho Home this Christmas,” ICE said.
The department is trying to bolster its final 2025 numbers to impress President Trump, who promised voters “mass deportations.”
The concrete numbers have fallen short of White House hopes of 1 million formal arrests and ousters.
ICE will end 2025 with fewer than half a million formal removals. That would still be a record, and if ICE can carry December’s pace of more than 1,350 a day into 2026, next year will be even higher.
ICE reported holding a record-shattering 68,442 migrants in detention as of Dec. 13. A year ago, under President Biden, that figure was about 39,000.
The numbers show how much else has changed since the Biden era.
At this point in 2023 and 2024, roughly two-thirds of those booked into ICE custody had been arrested at the border.
The Homeland Security Department largely ignored those already in the interior under orders from Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, who said that merely being in the country illegally was not a reason for deportation.
Under Mr. Trump, only a little more than 10% of those booked into ICE custody come from border arrests.
That’s a reflection of the unfathomable drop in illegal border crossings under Mr. Trump and his feverish push to oust the illegal immigrants who were off-limits under Mr. Mayorkas.
One result is that illegal immigrants without criminal records are increasingly being arrested.
Of the migrants in ICE custody as of Dec. 13, just 58% had either criminal convictions or pending charges.
A year ago at this point, that rate was about 94%.
That change has infuriated civil rights groups, who say it betrays Mr. Trump’s promise to target criminal illegal immigrants.
It has also fueled anti-ICE resistance from municipalities that have adopted sanctuary policies and from migrants and U.S. citizens who seek to thwart specific arrests.
In addition to the formal deportations, the Homeland Security Department says “tens of thousands” of migrants have self-deported using the registration app CBP Home, which pays out the bonus.
They are part of a broader count of 1.9 million people who Ms. Noem says have self-deported. That tally has been questioned by those on all sides of the immigration issue, who say they cannot reproduce the Homeland Security Department’s calculations.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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