Washington likes big numbers because big numbers are difficult to feel. Congress can spend $100 billion here and $200 billion there, and after a while the numbers become background noise.
But $3,683 is not background noise.
That is approximately what the Economic Policy Institute estimates the average federal taxpayer in the city of Houston will contribute toward President Donald Trump’s mass-deportation campaign during his second term. The estimate is part of EPI’s new Cost of Deportations Calculator, which puts the projected national spending at about $268.9 billion, or roughly $2,358 per taxpayer nationwide. (Economic Policy Institute)
Houston taxpayers come out considerably higher than the national average. The Houston Chronicle cited the EPI calculator at about $3,683 for the average Houston taxpayer, while Axios calculated that Harris County taxpayers collectively could shoulder about $4.1 billion, or approximately $2,960 per taxpayer. Across Texas, the estimated share is about $23 billion, averaging roughly $2,500 per taxpayer. (Houston Chronicle)
Nobody should expect an ICE bill for $3,683 in the mailbox. EPI allocates the national cost geographically according to each area’s share of federal income taxes, so it is an estimate of how much Houston taxpayers collectively finance, averaged among federal income-tax payers. Individual taxpayers will pay more or less depending on income and taxes owed. (Economic Policy Institute)
Still, $3,683 is a useful number because Houstonians know what $3,683 can buy. It can pay months of groceries, repair a transmission, cover part of a property-tax bill, pay an insurance deductible, buy medicine, keep the electricity on, or remain in somebody’s retirement account.
Instead, according to EPI, it is Houston’s estimated average contribution toward one of the largest immigration-enforcement expansions in American history.
EPI created its calculator partly to make that tradeoff visible. The organization says the projected $268.9 billion in national deportation spending could alternatively finance enormous amounts of education, health care, housing, food assistance and other public services. EPI is an economic-policy organization with a progressive orientation, so its calculator is plainly intended to question those spending priorities, but the congressional appropriations underlying the calculation are real, and the methodology is published with the tool. (Economic Policy Institute)
The Trump administration argues there is another side to the ledger. The Department of Homeland Security says illegal immigration itself imposes substantial costs on taxpayers, and it argues that voluntary departures are cheaper than arrests, detention, and forced removals. DHS has said its “self-deportation” approach can save about $13,000 per removal compared with a conventional deportation. Axios reported that the federal self-deportation program had already helped about 132,000 people leave the country by mid-July, with roughly another 70,000 enrolled to leave. (Axios)
That is a policy argument voters can decide for themselves. But Houston taxpayers might reasonably ask a simpler question: What exactly are we getting for our $3,683?
That question becomes surprisingly difficult to answer locally.
ICE has a Houston field office, but its jurisdiction is much larger than the city. The agency says the Houston office covers the Gulf Coast from Beaumont through Galveston to Corpus Christi. Consequently, a person described in an ICE announcement as being arrested or removed by the “Houston Field Office” may have lived hundreds of miles from Houston. (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement)
ICE does not provide Houstonians with a simple, continuously updated number showing how many people from the city of Houston or Harris County have actually been deported during the current campaign. The government can tell us how much Congress appropriated. Economists can estimate Houston’s share of the bill. Yet determining precisely how many Houston-area residents were removed for that expenditure is considerably harder.
That does not mean the deportations are imaginary. It means the public accounting does not line up neatly with the public spending.
And that is what turns this from another immigration argument into a taxpayer story.
Republicans have spent generations telling Americans to watch government spending, demand accountability, and ask whether taxpayers are receiving value for their money. That standard should not disappear simply because the government program happens to be mass deportation.
If EPI’s estimate is reasonably close, the average Houston taxpayer is contributing about $3,683.
Whether someone supports mass deportation or opposes it, there is nothing partisan about the next question:
What did we buy?
