THE Philippine Embassy in the United States (US) announced that it will help Filipinos who may be affected by President-elect Donald Trump’s potential mass deportation policies.
The 78-year-old Republican tycoon has promised to unleash the greatest deportation operation of undocumented immigrants in American history on the first day of his presidency.
“The Philippine Embassy has scheduled a planning session with the consulates in the first week of December to discuss how we can assist Filipinos,” stated Philippine Ambassador to the United States, Jose Manuel “Babe” Romualdez.
Romualdez stated that there were between 250,000 to 350,000 undocumented Filipinos in the United States. However, in order to provide adequate help, the Philippine government must first understand the circumstances of the mass deportations.
“As soon as details are available, they will be forwarded to our immigration lawyers. They will go through everything and determine who is qualified to follow the legal path and remain in the United States. However, if there is no legal way to stay, leaving is preferable because being deported means you will never be able to return. “Once deported, you will be blacklisted,” Romualdez threatened.
Trump, who never admitted to losing the 2020 election, completed a miraculous comeback to the presidency on November 5, solidifying what will be more than a decade of US politics dominated by his harsh right-wing position.
Throughout his campaign, he constantly railed against unauthorized immigrants, using harsh rhetoric to describe those who “poison the blood” of the United States.
In rally speeches, he inflated local tensions and misled supporters about immigration statistics and policies.
Violent crime, which peaked under Trump, has decreased in each year of President Joe Biden’s administration.
Migrants undertake less offenses than the native population, but foreign suspects have been identified in a few high-profile cases of brutal attacks on women and children, aggravating Republicans.
The number of US border patrol interactions with illegal migrants passing from Mexico is now roughly the same as in 2020, Trump’s final year in office, after reaching a record 250,000 in December 2023.
Trump promised to combat migrant gangs with the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, which empowers the federal government to pick up and deport aliens from enemy countries, as part of a sweeping deportation effort dubbed “Operation Aurora.”
Aurora was the site of a viral video depicting armed Latinos rioting through an apartment building, which fueled broad, misleading notions about the town being terrorized by Latin American immigration.
Trump has additionally promoted the false claim that Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio, are eating locals’ pets.