"Voluntary" Departures

Although we often think of deportation as the most important form of immigration enforcement, for the last 100 years the most common form of forcible expulsion by far has been voluntary departure. It was created in 1927, due to a budget crisis, when the U.S. Immigration Service authorized Border Patrol officers to offer Mexican and Canadian immigrants facing deportation the option to voluntarily depart to their home countries. By selecting “Voluntary Departure” (VD) or “Voluntary Return” (VR) instead of deportation, immigrants could avoid detention and a formal deportation hearing, and the U.S. Immigration Service saved the time and money they would have otherwise had to spend on detention and formal deportation proceedings (which provide greater due process protections). Of course, such “voluntary” agreements come with a degree of coercion. Since 1927, approximately ninety percent of all coercive removals out of the United States have occurred via the Voluntary Departure process. An estimated ninety percent of all people receiving Voluntary Departures have been Mexican.

Federal immigration authorities have reported issuing more than 50 million voluntary departure orders since 1927. When combined with the more than 8 million formal deportation orders they have issued since 1895, the United States government has reported more than 58 million orders of coercive removal from the United States since 1895.