Trump said he wants to deport immigrants by ‘serial numbers’

Some said the idea evokes tattoos and the Holocaust

Host Sharyl Attkinsson interviews former President Donald Trump on Full Measure on Sunday. Photo by Screenshot/YouTube

By Lauren Markoe September 24, 2024

Former President Donald Trump said Sunday that a mass deportation of people in the country illegally could be done quickly because “local police know their names, and they know their serial numbers.”

The comment drew outrage from many who said it evoked the Nazi branding of Jews with numbers during the Holocaust.

“Trump goes full Holocaust,” a headline read on the left-leaning Daily Kos.

“Does he think this is the Holocaust? Do they have Serial Numbers?,” tweeted one user on X. “This is INSANE!!!!!!!!”

OMFG!!! Here is TRUMP saying they know where all the aliens are, even by their "Serial Numbers"
WTF?!!! Serial Numbers?
Does he think this is the Holocaust? Do they have Serial Numbers? This is INSANE!!!!!!!! pic.twitter.com/gAIh6noA2j
— Robert Stern (@RobertCStern) September 24, 2024

Trump made the remark in response to a question on Full Measure, a talk show that is syndicated by the conservative Sinclair Broadcast Group. Host Sharyl Attkisson asked if the deportation of millions of people in the country illegally was realistic.

Trump said it was.

“We’re getting the criminals out, and we’re going to do that fast, and we know who they are, and the local police know their names, and they know their serial numbers,” he said. “They know everything about them.”

Some on social media assumed incorrectly that Trump had said he would “assign” serial numbers to immigrants.

As one commentator tweeted: “#DonaldTrump has announced that if elected, he will, just as #AdolfHitler did, begin assigning serial numbers to the ethnic groups in the US he doesn’t like.”

Trump did not say he wanted to assign numbers, but referred, as Politico reporter Marc Caputo put it, to numbers immigrants “already have.”

Caputo further noted the Department of Homeland Security already assigns 7, 8, and 9-digit numbers to non-citizens. Those numbers however are not referred to as “serial” numbers, which manufacturers stamp on products.

Loads of Hitler comparisons here because because Trump mentioned a “serial number” for immigrants, but the govt already issues something called an “A Number” to “aliens”

That is, they already have serial numbers

It’s on CIS websitehttps://t.co/pBWhds0JKV https://t.co/EyW1Vzoynz pic.twitter.com/RTcwacUf6j
— Marc Caputo (@MarcACaputo) September 23, 2024

Lauren Markoe is news editor of the Forward. A Bronx native, she reported for The Patriot Ledger, several McClatchy newspapers in the South, and Religion News Service, where she was also managing editor. She also produced live radio shows at WAMU in Washington, D.C., where she lives.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO