The Trump administration is weighing a costly new immigration enforcement tool that a former official warns “raises serious concerns at every step.”
Officials have held early talks about loading migrants onto ships, including ferries and a 500-foot former training vessel, and sailing them to Central and South America, The New York Times reported Thursday, citing two U.S. officials.
The trips could stretch for days and cost millions of dollars apiece, far more than the deportation flights the government already relies on.
One official, who requested anonymity because of the plan’s sensitivity, told the Times that the Training Ship Golden Bear, docked in California, is among the vessels under consideration. Defense Department officials have also contacted companies about ships in Europe, the official said.
The Golden Bear spent 30 years as a training ship for cadets at Cal Poly Maritime Academy before the school retired it this summer. It is unclear what authority the federal government would use to press it into service.
A second official, from the Department of Homeland Security, stressed that the idea remained hypothetical and that no decisions had been made.
In a statement, DHS said it is “assessing all our resources, to maximize efficiency and continue to deliver on President Trump’s mission of securing the homeland for all Americans.” The Pentagon did not comment.
Claire Trickler-McNulty, a former top Immigration and Customs Enforcement official under President Joe Biden, said the concept amounts to detention at sea.
“What ICE is functionally contemplating is prison ships,” she told the Times. “That raises serious concerns at every step.”
She warned that moving people through international waters for days “raises hard questions about which laws apply and who has jurisdiction if something goes wrong,” adding that “holding hundreds of people on a ship is also an enormous operational and safety challenge.”
Trickler-McNulty, who also worked at DHS as a career official under former President Barack Obama and during Trump’s first term, said staff had floated ideas like ships and trains before but never seriously pursued them.
It remains unclear whether detainees would be held for the entire voyage, where they would sleep or whether receiving nations would accept the arrangement. Possible destinations include El Salvador, Honduras and Venezuela.
The Times noted that the proposal also recalls a notorious 1950s federal campaign that expelled hundreds of thousands of Mexicans, in part by sea. In August 1956, 40 passengers leapt from one ship near Tampico, Mexico, and five drowned, the Times reported at the time. Mexico shut down the operation by September.
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