Trump announces “the largest expulsion of migrants in the country's history”

President-elect Donald Trump said Thursday that one of his first priorities upon taking office in January would be to make the border “strong and powerful”. Asked about his campaign promise of mass deportations, Trump said his administration would have “no choice” but to implement them.
 

Trump said he saw his resounding victory over Vice President Kamala Harris as a mandate to “bring sanity” to the country. “We obviously have to make the border strong and powerful and, and we have to, at the same time, we want people to come to our country,” he said. “And you know, I'm not someone who says, 'No, you can't come in.' We want people to come.”
 

As a candidate, Trump had repeatedly pledged to carry out “the largest deportation effort in American history”. Asked about the cost of his plan, he replied, “It's not about the price. It's not - in fact, we have no choice. they're going back to those countries because they're not staying here. There is no price.” Trump's victory included record gains among Latino voters, which Democrats had tried to capture by highlighting Trump's rhetoric on immigrants and a pro-Trump comedian's racist joke about Puerto Rico.
 

Trump also emphasized the diverse coalition of voters he has attracted, highlighting the gains he has made among Latino voters, young voters, women and Asian-American voters from 2020. “I began to see that a realignment could take place because the Democrats are out of step with the thinking of the country,” said the president-elect. “You can't refuse to fund the police, that sort of thing. They don't want to give up and they're not working, and people understand that.”
 

Trump also talked about his phone calls with Harris and President Joe Biden since the election. “Very nice calls, very respectful both ways,” Trump said, describing the conversations, adding that Harris ”talked about transition and she said she'd like it to go as smoothly as possible, which I agree with, of course.”
 

In his concession speech at Howard University on Wednesday, Harris said he told Trump, “We will help him and his team in their transition and commit to a peaceful transfer of power.” Biden, addressing the nation Thursday morning from the White House, urged voters to “accept the choice the country has made” in re-electing Trump. Trump also said that he and Biden, on the phone, had agreed to have lunch together “very soon”.
 

He also said he had spoken with “probably” 70 world leaders since Wednesday morning, including Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whom the president-elect described as having a “very good conversation”. Trump also said he had spoken with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, but did not disclose details of that conversation.