Mercenary Mogul Erik Prince Pitched Trump on Private Deportation Force

Private military contractors including Erik Prince—the founder and ex-CEO of the notorious mercenary firm formerly known as Blackwater—pitched advisers to President Donald Trump a $25 billion plan to deport 12 million undocumented immigrants before the 2026 midterm elections using a "small army" of citizens, a fleet of 100 private planes, and a network of "processing camps," according to Tuesday reporting.

Politico's Dasha Burns and Myah Ward reported that the 26-page blueprint for an aggressive mass deportation campaign, a copy of which was obtained by the journalists, was presented to advisers to Trump before his inauguration. The group of private contractors, who call themselves 2USV, is led by Prince and also includes former Blackwater chief operating officer Bill Mathews.

Burns and Ward wrote:

Deporting 12 million people in two years "would require the government to eject nearly 500,000 illegal aliens per month," the document says. "To keep pace with the Trump deportations, it would require a 600% increase in activity. It is unlikely that the government could swell its internal ranks to keep pace with this demand... in order to process this enormous number of deportations, the government should enlist outside assistance."

Top White House officials are having multiple conversations with military cfontractors, coinciding with Republicans' mad dash on Capitol Hill to secure more resources for the president's immigration crackdown. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) increased arrests during Trump's first couple of weeks in office, but the pace has since slowed, and arrests do not always equal deportations.

To boost deportations, the 2USV plan calls for deputizing 10,000 private citizens, forming a "skip tracing team" to locate targeted immigrants, a "screening team of 2,000 attorneys and paralegals," a "bounty program which provides a cash reward for each illegal alien held by a state or local law enforcement officer," and "mass deportation hearings." Legal experts warn that components of the plan likely run afoul of the law.

It is unclear whether Trump has seen the 2USV white paper. White House spokesperson Kush Desai told Politico that the Trump administration "remains aligned on and committed to a whole-of-government approach to securing our borders, mass deporting criminal illegal migrants, and enforcing our immigration laws."

Prince, a former U.S. Navy SEAL, founded Blackwater—now called Constellis—in 1997. He rose to prominence during the George W. Bush administration and the so-called War on Terror, in which the U.S. relied heavily upon private contractors.

On September 16, 2007, Blackwater guards massacred 17 men, women, and children in Nisour Square in Baghdad, Iraq. This was one of at least several incidents in which the company's mercenaries harmed Iraqi civilians. Trump pardoned four of the Nisour Square killers—who had been sentenced to 12 years to life in prison for crimes including first-degree murder—in 2020 shortly before his first term ended.

Trump and Prince have long enjoyed warm relations. Prince was a major Trump donor whose sister, Betsy DeVos, served as education secretary during his first administration. Prince also reportedly helped raise money to spy on progressives and Democratic organizations opposed to Trump, and was involved in former senior Trump adviser Steve Bannon's fraudulent campaign to ostensibly build a wall along the U.S.-Mexican border.

Last year, Venezuelan authorities launched an investigation into an online site allegedly fronted by Prince that raised funds for the ouster of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.

Critics interviewed by Burns and Ward cast doubts on 2USV's plan, with former ICE Chief of Staff Jason P. Houser saying that "the idea of forcibly removing 12 million people from the United States is not just operationally impossible—it is a moral and economic catastrophe in the making."

Responding to the Politico report, Beatriz Lopez, co-executive director of the Immigration Hub, an advocacy group, said in a statement that "war profiteer Erik Prince, the same man infamous for spreading chaos and profiting off human suffering, is signing up to help carry out Trump's mass deportation and family separation agenda."

"Simply put, this despicable plan will deploy mass internment, detention camps, and a civilian army to come after our neighbors, family, and friends," she continued. "At $25 billion, this cruel machinery would merely be the opening act in Trump and [White House Deputy Chief of Staff] Stephen Miller's $350 billion campaign of state-sanctioned 'hunts' for immigrant families."

"We're witnessing the deliberate transformation of everyday Americans—parents dropping children at school, healthcare workers saving lives, farmers feeding our nation—into targets who, if the Trump administration has it their way, could be hunted by an unaccountable militia motivated by profit and prejudice," Lopez added. "As Trump expands the definition of who is 'deportable,' the circle of safety shrinks until it contains only those who share his extreme vision. Today immigrants, tomorrow anyone who opposes them."

"Our leaders face a defining choice: stand against this atrocity now, or be complicit in what history will remember as America's darkest chapter," she warned.