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Price Tag of Trump’s Guantanamo Bay Migrant Disaster Revealed

The operation has unraveled, but still cost the government more than $16 million.

Trump’s failed operation to send migrants to Guantanamo Bay has already burned through at least $16 million, The Wall Street Journal reports. That figure does not include the wildly expensive flights—it costs more than $20,000 to transport a single migrant to the base on military planes. Trump’s scheme to house up to 30,000 migrants in a tent city on the base collapsed before it could begin. Only about 300 migrants have passed through the base since the president announced the operation, and none are detained there now. Despite claims that only undocumented migrants with criminal backgrounds would be sent to Gitmo, a significant number of those detained hadn’t committed crimes, The Wall Street Journal reported. Lawmakers and defense officials who toured the facilities said the tents Trump wanted to hold migrants in weren’t up to government standards, lacking air conditioning, and reeking of mold. The operation was reportedly also mired by the Pentagon and the Department of Homeland Security disagreeing on their responsibilities. Guantanamo Bay, which lies on the coast of Cuba, is best known for holding terror suspects, with 15 still imprisoned at the camp.