DFA: Trump's deportation plan has no 'calamitous impact' on Filipinos in US

MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) on Monday said United States (US) President-elect Donald Trump's deportation plan would not have a calamitous impact on the Filipino community living in America.

 

The DFA said Trump's statement must be put into context.

 

"For years the US government has had in place a system where US authorities deport illegal immigrants in a timely and orderly fashion. These have occasionally included Filipinos arrested because of immigration irregularities and criminal violations."

 

As the plan would only affect illegal immigrants, the DFA said that it would not negatively affect a vast majority of the three million Filipinos residing in the US who are in America legally, pay their taxes and generally obey the laws. 

 

Trump said on CBS' "60 minutes," his first television interview since winning the presidential election, that he's willing to deport or incarcerate 2-3 million illegal immigrants who "are criminal and have criminal records, gang members, drug dealers." 

 

This, however, was a lower number from his initial campaign promise of deporting 11 million people living illegally in the US.

 

The US president-elect, whose signature campaign issue is illegal immigration, emphasized that his priority would be securing the country's southern border. Critics have slammed Trump's promised policies for its xenophobic tendencies.

 

He had proposed building a 2,000-mile wall along the US-Mexico border which elicited chants of "Build that Wall" from thousands of supporters who packed his rallies throughout America.

 

His latest proposal last June was to ban immigrants “from areas of the world where there is a proven history of terrorism against the United States, Europe or our allies."

 

But in the interview, Trump conceded that he would accept a fence instead of a wall in some places along the border.

 

Filipinos in the US sent the most in remittances in 2015 at $8.04 billion.