U.S. President Donald Trump has launched a massive crackdown on illegal immigrants, with reports indicating that the expense of using military transport aircraft exceeds that of commercial airline first class.
On the 31st (local time), Reuters reported that, based on explanations from U.S. military and Guatemalan government officials, the calculation of the expense to deport each illegal immigrant came to this conclusion.
According to the report, the operational expense of the U.S. military C-17 transport aircraft used to return illegal immigrants to Guatemala since Trump took office has reached $28,500 (about 41.4 million won) per hour. Excluding the time the transport aircraft stays at the airport or undergoes maintenance, the pure flight time for a round trip between the U.S. and Guatemala was about 10 hours and 30 minutes.
On the 27th, the United States returned a total of 64 immigrants to Guatemala via a C-17 transport flight. Based on this, it is estimated that the expense to send Guatemalan immigrants back to their home country using military transport aircraft is about $4,675 (approximately 6.79 million won) per person. This significantly surpasses the expense of a commercial flight from El Paso, Texas, to Guatemala. The one-way first-class fare on American Airlines for that route is around $853 (about 1.23 million won). This means the unit price for the C-17 transport is more than five times higher.
Reuters pointed out that the transport expense for military aircraft is much higher compared to chartered flights typically used by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to deport illegal immigrants.
During the review of the 2023 budget by the U.S. Congress, ICE reported that transporting 135 immigrants on a flight usually taking 5 hours incurs an expense of $17,000 (approximately 24.69 million won) per hour. Based on this, it can be inferred that the expense per illegal immigrant for the ICE charter flight is estimated to be about $630 (around 910,000 won), which is less than one-seventh of the military aircraft transport.
Trump's "military aircraft deportation of immigrants" appears to be a strategy to maximize the symbolic effect by demonstrating the full mobilization of U.S. authority rather than focusing on expense.