By Michael Hernandez
WASHINGTON (AA) – President Donald Trump is looking at the possibility of deploying as many as 100,000 National Guardsmen to round up undocumented migrants, according to a report published on Friday.
Trump is weighing an “unprecedented militarization of immigration enforcement” that would encompass wide swathes of the southern and western United States, according to an 11-page draft memo obtained by the Associated Press.
The targeted areas are home to nearly half of those living in the country illegally, according to the Pew Research Center, which used census data from 2014 to develop the estimate.
The memo, dated Jan. 25, says that National Guard troops would be authorized "to perform the functions of an immigration officer in relation to the investigation, apprehension and detention of aliens in the United States".
The proposal was making the rounds through the Department of Homeland Security, and was actively discussed as late as last Friday, the AP reported.
The memo comes in the wake of stiff resistance from major cities across the U.S. to Trump's stated intent to deport those in the country illegally.
According to the Pew report, Los Angeles -- where over one million undocumented migrants live -- has said its local law enforcement officers will not participate in any such action.
The city is home to the second largest undocumented population in the U.S., behind only New York City.
On Friday, White House spokesman Sean Spicer quickly rejected the AP's report, calling it “irresponsible”.
“That is 100% not true. It is false,” he told reporters. “There is no effort at all to round up, to utilize the National Guard to round up illegal immigrants.”
He slammed the wire service for what he says was a lack of inquiry to the White House before the report’s publication, which an AP reporter responded to by saying that they inquired multiple times before the report went out.
Still, Spicer said he could not categorically reject that such a proposal was never subject to consideration in the administration, while adding that there is no ongoing effort to take such action.
"It is not a White House document,” he said.
At the Pentagon, spokesman Capt. Jeff Davis went further, saying the report is "categorically false".