The Trump administration's immigration spectacle and its star pupil

With Trump 2.0, mass immigration raids in the United States have returned, but this time transformed into media spectacles designed to generate fear and reinforce the new administration's political narrative. The US president, a former television showman, has two good apprentices in this new phase: Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem and "border czar" Tom Homan. With cameras and influencers far-right at their side, are the protagonists of these anti-immigration operations designed to go viral on the networks.

These propaganda actions that mix the reality show The repression is no coincidence. Trump promised during his campaign to deport millions of undocumented immigrants, but his administration lacks enough agents or sufficient infrastructure to fulfill this promise. In recent years, including his first term, the average number of deportations per year has been around 250,000, with a peak of 347,250 in 2019, far from the peak of 432,228 achieved by Obama in 2013. And all this causes some to leave.

While Homan parades across television as the tough guy who throws out threats, Noem is the queen of social media. Her calculated image is based on a combination of manicured femininity and police brutality. She appears in videos wearing tactical vests, rifles, and studied smiles, surrounded by armored vehicles and influencers far-right figures like Chaya Raichik, who narrates the arrests with sarcasm and emojis. The climax came with a video recorded in the prison in El Salvador, where the United States illegally deported nearly 300 immigrants.Noem appeared in a cruel scene: standing in front of a cell full of half-naked, shaved male prisoners—wearing the cap of the department she heads, tight-fitting sportswear, and a $50,000 Rolex—warning undocumented immigrants in the United States that if they didn't leave, they would be "hunted down" and could end up there.

Many civil rights organizations have criticized the Trump administration's actions and warned about the devastating effects it has on vulnerable communities and the dehumanization of affected individuals. They denounce that the current immigration policy not only ignores fundamental rights, but also uses media spectacle as a tool to reinforce divisive narratives and fuel fear.

In fact, this policy of repression turned into spectacle not only dehumanizes, but also creates a narrative of internal war where any dissent, vulnerability, or difference is presented as an enemy at home. Furthermore, it can lead to injustices like the one suffered by Kilmar Armando Abrego-Garcia, deported due to an administrative error that the Trump administration itself has admitted, as well as the arrests of foreign students with visas because of their denunciation of the genocide taking place in Palestine.

The Supreme Court added a new layer of complexity to Trump's immigration policy last Thursday. The high court's justices unanimously ordered the United States government to facilitate Abreggo-Garcia's return. Her case underscores the dangers of a system that, rather than prioritizing individual rights, is based on political spectacle. Thus, the country that presents itself as the land of opportunity is increasingly moving away from the venerated—but often ignored—values that have shaped it as a refuge for those seeking a better life.