If Donald Trump’s mass
deportations weren’t already dystopian enough, the acting director of
Immigration and Customs Enforcement says he wants to make them look like Amazon
Prime.
Todd Lyons made the remarks at the 2025 Border Security Expo in Phoenix
Tuesday, saying that he envisions lines of trucks arresting and detaining
immigrants much like the retail website delivers orders across the U.S.
“We need to get better at
treating this like a business,” Lyons said, adding that the detention process
should be “like (Amazon) Prime, but with human beings.”
The arrests, detention, and
transportation of immigrants seemed to be the whole theme of the conference,
which hosted other Trump administration officials, including “border czar” Tom
Homan and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. The main reason for the
expo, though, was to showcase the many companies who stand to profit from
arrests and deportations to government agencies, as Homan pointed out in his
keynote address.
“We need to buy more beds, we
need more airplane flights, and I know a lot of you are here for that reason,”
Homan said to the crowd. “Let the badge and guns do the badge and gun stuff,
everything else, let’s contract out.”
The audience was made up of
countless security contractors with strong ties to the Trump administration, as
well others such as private prison company Geo Group, whose stock has shot up
since Trump’s election. Government agencies in attendance included Customs and
Border Protection, the Army, local Arizona police, and countless more.
The fact that ICE and DHS’s
deportation efforts have turned into flashy raids with right-wing influencers in tow, with agents dressed in
ski masks and street clothes, make Lyons’s remarks all the more odious. The
raids have even moved on to legal immigrants who are denied due process or arrest
warrants over political opinions the Trump administration dislikes. And it
seems there are several companies looking to profit from this destruction of
civil liberties.
-The New Republic
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