The Trump administration has begun suing individual illegal migrants for ignoring removal orders and refusing to self-deport back to their home countries, a report says.
The administration has filed suit against an illegal migrant living in Virginia, and is seeking $941,114 plus interest, alleging that Marta Alicia Ramirez Veliz has remained in the country despite being told her request for admittance was rejected by a Justice Department appeals panel in 2022, Politico reported.
The filing notes that Veliz has refused to pay a $998 per-day fine for the 943 days since she was told to return to her home country, and reveals that Immigration and Customs Enforcement sent her an official notice of her total fine in April.
The lawsuit describes Veliz as “an individual and noncitizen residing in Chesterfield County, Virginia,” and does not identify her nationality.
The Department of Justice has filed similar lawsuits against recalcitrant migrants in other districts across the country, as well.
Politico added that a man in Florida has been hit with a $717,000 bill for failing to pay fines after being ordered to leave the country as directed, and migrants in Texas and California have also been the subjects of similar lawsuits.
Congress passed a law, signed in 1996 by Bill Clinton, to allow the federal government to impose civil penalties and fine illegal aliens for failing to self-deport after being told their applications to immigrate were formally declined, but the Trump administration is the first to initiate legal proceedings against migrants who have not paid their fines and yet still remain in the country despite being told to leave.
Trump first began utilizing the rules in his first term, but Biden immediately ended the practice when he took office in 2020. Trump has revived it, though, since taking office for his second term.
Federal officials have now sent out some 10,000 notices of the fines through June of last year.
“The law doesn’t enforce itself; there must be consequences for breaking it,” DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said in June. “President Trump and Secretary [Kristi] Noem are standing up for law and order and making our government more effective and efficient at enforcing the American people’s immigration laws.”
DHS added that migrants using the Customs and Border Protection’s CBP Home app to self-deport will have any fines levied against them waived.
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