The National Priorities Project (NPP) at the Institute for Policy Studies has estimated the federal government plans to spend $268.9 billion to undertake mass deportations throughout the second Trump administration. NPP’s methodology is explained here.
The calculator breaks down who shoulders the cost by state, county, place, and congressional district based on the area’s share of federal income taxes paid. “State” includes the District of Columbia, and “place” as used by the U.S. Census encompasses cities, towns, and smaller jurisdictions, including unincorporated areas. The calculator also estimates the average cost per taxpayer in each state, county, place, and district (it is $2,358 for U.S. taxpayers as a whole). “Taxpayers” are tax filers, including joint filers, who owe federal income tax after credits.
The calculator compares each area’s share of the cost of deportations with potential trade-offs, such as the number of teachers who could be employed over the remaining 2.5 years of the Trump administration if the money were not being spent on mass deportations. The cost of trade-offs varies by state, but cost differences by county, place, or district do not factor into estimates.
Sources and methodology for federal income tax shares
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Statistics of Income (SOI) program publishes tables showing the taxes paid and the number of taxpayers by state, county, congressional district, and zip code. As of July 2026, the most recent geographic tables are for 2022. These tables are used to estimate the share of federal income taxes paid, and, by extension, the share of mass deportation costs for each area.
The denominator used in tax share estimates—total federal income tax paid—is from SOI’s Individual Income Tax Returns Complete Report, 2022. This total is slightly larger than the sum of taxes paid in the 50 states and District of Columbia because it includes taxes paid by taxpayers who live overseas, serve in the military, etc. Similarly, sums for smaller geographic areas within states may be less than state totals because some taxpayers were not assigned to specific counties, places, or districts.
SOI does not publish tax information for cities and towns, only for metropolitan and micropolitan statistical areas, or MSAs. Since MSAs do not generally correspond to administrative jurisdictions, NPP has constructed tax share estimates for cities and towns (“places”) using SOI tax data by zip code. NPP apportioned zip code data to places using Geocorr crosswalks from the Missouri Census Data Center. Because zip codes can span jurisdictions, these tax shares are approximations based on how populations in these zip codes are distributed across places.
Trade-off costs
The cost of trade-offs is based on the cost of a subset of the National Priorities Project’s budget trade-offs, with minor differences described below.
When cost estimates are based on pre-2026 data, they are inflated to May 2026 dollars using the consumer price index (CPI-U). Costs are further inflated to 2027 and 2028 dollars based on the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia’s Second Quarter 2026 Survey of Professional Forecasters (the projections are for CPI inflation rates of 2.4% and 2.5% in 2027 and 2028, respectively).
Compensation costs are a combination of annual mean wages from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) and benefit costs from BLS Employer Costs for Employee Compensation (ECEC) statistics. All data are the latest available as of July 2026.
OEWS annual wages are generally not available for the intersection of state, occupation, and sector. Therefore, annual wage estimates for teachers, firefighters, and nurses include both public- and private-sector workers.
ECEC benefit costs are not available at the state level. They are available for a limited number of occupations and for public- and private-sector workers, but not every combination of sector and occupation. The calculator excludes the cost of paid leave from benefits, since this is already included in OEWS annual wage estimates.
Elementary school teachers
This is an estimate of how many additional elementary school teachers could be employed in a state, county, district, or “place” (city, town, or equivalent) over the remaining 2.5 years of the Trump administration based on the area’s share of federal taxes being spent instead on the mass deportation of immigrants.
Teachers’ annual mean wage by state in May 2025 (inflated to 2026–2028 dollars) is from BLS OEWS data for “Elementary School Teachers, Except Special Education.” Annual wages are estimated by multiplying hourly wages by 2,080 hours. Since many teachers have summers off, this may be a conservative estimate of the number of additional teachers who could be employed.
Teacher benefits are estimated at 51.6% of pay based on national ECEC data for “state and local government workers”/ “preschool, elementary, middle, secondary, and special education teachers” in 2025Q2. The dollar cost of paid leave is excluded because it is included in annual wages.
Firefighters
This is an estimate of how many additional firefighters could be employed in a state, county, district, or “place” (city, town, or equivalent) over the remaining 2.5 years of the Trump administration based on the area’s share of federal taxes being spent instead on the mass deportation of immigrants.
Firefighters’ annual mean wage by state in May 2025 (inflated to 2026–2028 dollars) is from BLS OEWS data. Firefighter benefits as a percent of pay are estimated at 57.5% based on BLS ECEC data for “state and local government workers”/ “all occupations” in 2025Q2. The dollar cost of paid leave is excluded because it is included in annual wages.
Medicaid recipients
This is an estimate of how many additional people could receive Medicaid benefits in a state, county, district, or “place” (city, town, or equivalent) over the remaining 2.5 years of the Trump administration based on the area’s share of federal taxes being spent instead on the mass deportation of immigrants.
The number of people who could receive Medicaid benefits is based on Medicaid spending, by state, for all full-benefit enrollees, analyzed by the Kaiser Family Foundation based on data from the Medicaid Statistical Information System (T-MSIS). The data year is 2023, inflated to 2026–2028 dollars.
Veterans’ medical care
This is an estimate of how many additional military veterans could receive medical care from the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) in a state, county, district, or “place” (city, town, or equivalent) over the remaining 2.5 years of the Trump administration based on the area’s share of federal taxes being spent instead on the mass deportation of immigrants.
The average cost to provide military veterans with VA medical care is based on a state’s total VA medical care expenditures divided by the state’s total number of unique patients using data from the National Center for Veterans Analysis and Statistics for fiscal year 2024, inflated to 2026–2028 dollars.
Head Start
This is an estimate of how many additional children could participate in a Head Start program in a state, county, district, or “place” (city, town, or equivalent) over the remaining 2.5 years of the Trump administration based on the area’s share of federal taxes being spent instead on the mass deportation of immigrants.
Head Start costs are calculated by dividing total federal Head Start funding in each state by the number of funded enrollments. The data are from the headstart.gov website for fiscal year 2024, inflated to 2026–2028 dollars.
Registered nurses
This is an estimate of how many additional registered nurses could be employed in a state, county, district, or “place” (city, town, or equivalent) over the remaining 2.5 years of the Trump administration based on the area’s share of federal taxes being spent instead on the mass deportation of immigrants.
Registered nurses’ annual mean wage by state in May 2025 (inflated to 2026–2028 dollars) is from BLS OEWS data. Benefits are estimated at 44.6% of pay based on BLS ECEC data for registered nurses in 2025Q2. The dollar cost of paid leave is excluded from benefits because it is included in annual wages.
SNAP benefits
This is an estimate of how many additional people could receive Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits in a state, county, district, or “place” (city, town, or equivalent) over the remaining 2.5 years of the Trump administration based on the area’s share of federal taxes being spent instead on the mass deportation of immigrants.
The cost of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits is based on preliminary data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Food and Nutrition Administration website for February 2026 (inflated to 2027 and 2028 dollars). The annual cost per recipient is derived by dividing total monthly benefits in each state by the number of participants in the state and multiplying by 12.
Paid parental leave
This is an estimate of how many parents could take 12 weeks of paid parental leave in a state, county, district, or “place” (city, town, or equivalent) over the remaining 2.5 years of the Trump administration based on average wages in the state and the area’s share of federal taxes being spent instead on the mass deportation of immigrants.
The cost of paid parental leave is based on the average annual wage by state across all occupations from BLS OEWS data for May 2025 inflated to 2026–2028 dollars. The measure does not include self-employed workers. We assume the cost of parental leave is equivalent to 12 weeks of wages, not including benefits.
Public housing
This is an estimate of how many additional households could have access to low-cost public housing in a state, county, district, or “place” (city, town, or equivalent) over the remaining 2.5 years of the Trump administration based on the area’s share of federal taxes being spent instead on the mass deportation of immigrants.
The annual cost of public housing units by state is based on the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) “Average HUD Expenditure Per Month” on public housing for 2025, multiplied by 12 and inflated to 2026–2028 dollars.
The Cost of Deportations Calculator was developed in partnership with
