How Trump’s mass deportation plan could use artificial intelligence to combat immigration | Wilnesh News

One of President-elect Donald Trump’s signature campaign promises was the mass deportation of undocumented U.S. residents. On September 12, at a campaign event in Tucson, Arizona, Trump promised to “begin the largest mass deportation mission in the history of our country.”

Trump appoints Thomas Homan as ‘border czar’ Stephen Miller serves as deputy chief of staff for policyTwo officials seen as hard-liners on immigration said the administration’s repressive approach would seek to deliver on that promise and take aggressive steps, but the Trump transition team has yet to provide details.

Trump said he would begin mass deportations of criminals, but he also vowed to abolish individuals’ Temporary Protected Status. He said in a brief interview with NBC News after the election that he had “no choice” but to seek mass deportations after the results came in and “at no cost.”

“No one is excluded. If you’re here illegally, you better be careful,” Homan, the former acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said earlier this year. he swore “Managing the largest deportation force this country has ever seen.”

However, fulfilling these commitments is logistically daunting. Artificial intelligence may help.

While artificial intelligence was not widely used during the Trump administration’s first immigration crackdown, the technology has become more accessible and widely deployed in many systems and government agencies, and President Biden’s administration has begun moving the Department of Homeland Security’s budget and organizations focus on investing in the technology.

In April, the Department of Homeland Security established an Artificial Intelligence Security Council to help establish boundaries and protocols for the use of the technology. The 2025 DHS budget includes $5 million to open an artificial intelligence office in the DHS Office of the Chief Information Officer. According to the Department of Homeland Security’s budget memorandum, the office is responsible for promoting and accelerating the “responsible use” of artificial intelligence through the development of standards, policies and oversight to support the Department of Homeland Security’s increasing adoption of artificial intelligence.

“Artificial intelligence is a transformative technology that can advance our national interests like never before. At the same time, it poses real risks that we can mitigate by adopting best practices and taking other specific, researched actions,” Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said at the launch of the new board.

Now, experts worry the Department of Homeland Security’s mission will shift toward deportations and use untested artificial intelligence to help. Security experts close to the Department of Homeland Security worry about how a bolder and refocused Department of Homeland Security might use artificial intelligence.

A spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security declined to speculate on how the Trump administration might use artificial intelligence.

The Trump Transition and Homan did not respond to requests for comment.

Petra Molnar is a lawyer and anthropologist who specializes in the impact of migration technologies on people crossing borders and the author of Walls Have Eyes: Migrant Survival in the Age of Artificial Intelligence. has studied the use of technology along the border, including drones and robot dogs, and is a faculty member at Harvard University’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society. She has been critical of the use of artificial intelligence at the border under Democratic administrations, but she does believe the weaponization of artificial intelligence will intensify under the Trump administration.

“Knowing that the Trump administration has said they want to do the largest mass deportations in U.S. history, and that they have these tools at their disposal, it creates a surveillance dragnet not just at the border but inland that can capture people all over the U.S. community,” Molnar said, adding that an entire industry ecosystem has been created to regulate borders and immigration.

“The private sector has had a huge impact on the development of industrial issues at the border,” Molnar said, adding that private companies have taken the lead in introducing robotic dogs (with names like Snoopy and Sniffer), drones and artificial intelligence. Injection tower.

“Much of the surveillance technology has been expanded under Democratic administrations, but the incoming administration has signaled that technology will be a tool to help them achieve their goals,” Molnar said.

Artificial Intelligence Immigration Dragnet and Artificial Intelligence Deregulation and Growth

Remaya Campbell, acting commissioner of the Department of Homeland Security in the District of Columbia, said artificial intelligence can bypass traditional processes and automate immigration-related decisions.

“Artificial intelligence can be used broadly to identify individuals for deportation. With little regard for privacy or due process,” Campbell said, adding that artificial intelligence decision-making systems operate according to the values ​​assigned by the users. “In the Trump administration, this will certainly mean reinforcing intersectional biases to align with political priorities,” she said. “At the very least, we can expect artificial intelligence to be used not as a tool to improve efficiency, fairness and safety in immigration-related decision-making, but rather as a tool for systemic bias and authoritarian rule,” Campbell added.

Neil Sahota, an artificial intelligence adviser at the United Nations’ Artificial Intelligence for Good initiative, said he shares the same concerns as artificial intelligence already plays a powerful role in managing the vast, difficult-to-monitor U.S. border and is under Trump’s administration. Under leadership, the use of artificial intelligence will expand.

Sahota said the Department of Homeland Security’s Customs and Border Protection agency has used artificial intelligence drones with machine learning capabilities to identify unusual patterns that could signal illegal border crossings. The drones can differentiate between people, animals and vehicles, and have Helps minimize false positives. Sensor towers equipped with artificial intelligence provide 24/7 monitoring, enabling faster response times and freeing up human resources.

“The Trump administration is expected to push for more artificial intelligence surveillance, possibly introducing autonomous patrols and expanding biometric screening,” Sahota said.

While this could improve border security, it could also raise privacy concerns, especially for people who live near the border. Sahota added that the Trump administration’s use of artificial intelligence may expand beyond security and deportation assistance. “AI surveillance systems will become a cornerstone of Trump’s deportation strategy,” Sahotra said. Sahotra added that “enhanced artificial intelligence could fast-track deportations,” which could lead to human rights violations and racial profiling. possibility.

These systems use facial recognition and behavioral analysis to identify people suspected of entering the country illegally, but he warned that these systems not always done right. “How do we deal with situations where artificial intelligence makes mistakes in identifying people’s immigration status? What if the system mistakenly flags legal residents or citizens for deportation? The consequences for families and our communities are devastating,” Sasana said. Horta said.

Laura MacCleery, senior policy director at Unidos US, the largest Latino advocacy group in the United States, said that the accuracy problem of artificial intelligence is well known, and the conclusions drawn by the system are inaccurate, and the data of people of color is often less accurate. .

DMV records, utility bills, and facial recognition technology at borders and airports will all become tools that can be augmented with artificial intelligence to seek deportations.

“These technologies are likely to continue to change and have different guardrails across different governments. Concerns about mass deportations are the increased use of artificial intelligence by immigration enforcement and an increased ability to monitor public data,” McCleary said.

Artificial intelligence will inevitably engulf American citizens, she said.

“Because some U.S. citizens live with people of different immigration status and these people are swept away, the due process rights of people who are here legally may be violated, which is a super problem and an inevitable result of the overuse of these people. Technology,” McCleary said.

But Marina Shepelsky, CEO, co-founder and immigration attorney at New York-based Shepelsky Law Group, said she doesn’t view the Trump administration’s artificial intelligence policies as a scary dystopian technology. “He’s a businessman who will see the value in the advancement and growth of artificial intelligence to make the lives of lawyers, doctors, scientists and others like me easier,” Schepersky said.

She believes artificial intelligence will flourish and be deregulated under the Trump administration. “Hopefully, President Trump, with Elon Musk’s support, can push for more foreign tech AI experts to come to the U.S. faster and cut through red tape to improve AI and reduce its current embarrassment,” Schepersky said. “I’m not an alarmist and I’m not going to be worried about Trump being our next president. I may not like all of his policies, but with artificial intelligence – I do think he’s going to advance artificial intelligence and make it happen. More flexible laws and regulations allow artificial intelligence to grow.