The news spread like wildfire. The Trump administration unveiled an unprecedented initiative this week: an offer of $1,000 and a free plane ticket to any undocumented person who agrees to “self-deport” from the United States.
“We’re going to have a self-deportation program, where they leave our country themselves… If we think they’re good people, that they’re the kind of people we want in our country, we’ll give them an easier path to return. But if they don’t, and we have to remove them after the deadline, then they’ll never come back,” President Trump explained.
The official explanation is that it aims to save money and expedite deportations. It currently costs the federal government more than $17,000 to detain, confine, and expel each migrant, according to figures from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
What was not mentioned in the official announcement is that the administration continues to fall short of its ambitious detention goals that would allow it to fulfill the promise of the largest deportation initiative in history.
The reality is that US immigration law is trapped in a last-century architecture.
It does not respond to the urgent needs for intensive labor, such as in agriculture, nor to the demand for globalized innovation.
While the market demands flexibility, agility, and talent, the system offers bureaucracy, fixed quotas, and a nearly insurmountable political wall.
The foundation of the immigration system prioritizes family reunification over economic criteria.
This has created an imbalance: while companies need workers at both ends of the spectrum (farmland and Silicon Valley), the system is not designed to respond to those needs.
Furthermore, the quota system is largely rigid. For example, H-2A visas for agriculture or H-1B visas for high technology do not adjust in real time to economic demand. The 85,000 H-1B visa cap is exhausted each year in days, while agriculture relies on a slow, seasonal, and inflexible process.
There is also no clear and comprehensive path for an agricultural worker or technology professional to obtain legal status directly for their labor contributions.
As if that weren’t enough, current laws don’t facilitate temporary migration or allow for easy return without losing rights. Many migrants see no other option but to stay permanently, even if they were originally only seeking seasonal work.
As the 40th anniversary of the 1986 amnesty approaches, no serious attempt at comprehensive reform has overcome the polarization in Congress. And any attempt to expand labor visas is associated with “amnesty” and generates rejection, especially in election years.
The offer of $1,000 may be attractive to some. But it is hardly a policy that will remedy the enormous structural and political obstacles that need to be moved to achieve a rational, modern, and humanitarian migration policy.
