President Donald Trump continued on Tuesday to float his idea, that some legal experts say it is unconstitutional, to deport US citizens who commit crimes.
Speaking to the press during a tour of a migrant detention center in the Everglades of Florida, the president repeated affirms that there are many immigrants who are now citizens and have been committing serious crimes.
“They are not new in our country. They are old for our country. Many of them were born in our country. I think we should also get them out of here, if you want to know the truth,” he said. “Then, maybe that is the next job.”
President Donald Trump’s president speaks after touring a migrant detention center, called “Aligator Alcatraz”, located at the Site of the Training and Transition Airport of Dade-Collier in Ochopee, Florida, July 1, 2025.
Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP through Getty Images
The proposal occurred weeks after the Attorney General Brett Shumate, a Trump designated one, published a memorandum that gave us prosecutors broad discretions to decide when to pursue the denaturation process to “advance in the administration’s policy objectives.”
Some of the cases that American lawyers must pursue are those against people who have participated in torture, war crimes, human rights human trafficking, says the memorandum.
Legal experts have warned that Trump’s proposals are unconstitutional claiming that they violate the eighth amendment, which prohibits cruel and unusual punishment. The problem has not yet arrived before the courts.
Amanda Frost, a professor at the Law School at the University of Virginia, told ABC News in April that the administration could try to address naturalized American citizens, who can lose their immigration state if they have committed betrayal or falsified information during their naturalization process. However, she said those instances are rare.
“If someone is a naturalized citizen, there could be an effort to denaturalize that person and deport her,” Frost said. “But then they should commit some type of fraud or error in their naturalization process. An unrelated crime could not be the basis to denaturalize and deport someone.”
President Donald Trump visits a temporary migrant detention center known as “Cocodrilo Alcatraz” in Ochopee, Florida, on July 1, 2025.
Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters
Trump acknowledged that he did not know whether to deport US citizens who are convicted of crimes is legal.
“We will have to discover that legally. I just say that if we had the legal right to do so, I would do it in an instant,” he added. “I don’t know if we do it or not, we are seeing it right now.”
Alexandra Hutzler of ABC News contributed to this report.
