Undue Process: The Inside Story of Trump’s Mass Deportation Program

by Julia Ainsley

A revealing, news driven account of the Trump Administration’s mass deportation program, featuring never-before-told stories and behind-the-scenes reporting from NBC News’ Senior Homeland Security Correspondent.

In Undue Process, NBC’s Senior Homeland Security correspondent Julia Ainsley takes us inside the Trump White House to show how Stephen Miller, Kristi Noem, Tom Homan, and other anti-immigration hardliners are executing the administration’s mass deportation plan, seemingly prioritizing spectacle and punishment over security and legal constraints.

Brimming with revelations from sources within ICE and the Department of Homeland Security, Undue Process is a harrowing chronicle of how the Trump administration aimed to create “the largest deportation force in U.S. history,” only to ignite a resistance within the government and across the country as they redefined the limits of executive power.

Genres: Politics, Nonfiction, History, Audiobook, Race, Government

222 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 5, 2026

Reviews

[Regan]

What a heartbreaking, difficult, but essential read. It's one thing to see the horrors promulgated by Steven Miller and the Trump administration in snippets in the news literally every day -- but to see it day by day, week by week and month by month the arrogance, the lack of compassion, the racism and bigotry of those people in one book, page by page, is beyond horrifying. Ainsley lays it all out in an unbiased, fact based book. Interspersed with her own reporting, not in an egotiscal way, but to show how fact based this read is, she tells her own story. The few snippets where she talks about her own daughter and compares her own fears that but for her being who and what she is, what she saw happening to innocent children add to the factual information in the book. It is a must read and, if we eventually get to bring justice to the administration, it will be part of a road map to prove their criminality. A must read.

[Julia]

A mess and it all feels like it's for show.

[Jon Koebrick]

“The worst of the worst” was always a lie as to the deportation plans and best describes those creating and carrying out the mass deportation plans. This is an excellently written book and shows how the rule of law was and is being eroded. This is a book more American people need to read. 4.75 stars.

[Paulatics]

This book should be read by every American. The Trump Administration’s cruel and inhumane immigration policies, run by Stephen Miller, have been documented in this important book.

“On the afternoon of Trump’s one hundred eighteenth day, a draft bill made its way out of the House Budget Committee that could provide a road map of what was to come.

“The One Big Beautiful Bill included a $75 billion infusion into ICE, a $9 billion agency. The funding made ICE the richest law enforcement agency in the country. They could spend with as little efficiency as they wanted. And the ruthlessness with which the Trump administration could pursue its goals in the next 1,361 days would know no bounds.”

[Allan Vega]

This is solid journalism! The United States has always had a complicated relationship with its immigrant population—celebrated in theory, contested in practice. Right now we're deep in one of the uglier chapters of that story, and Julia Ainsley's Undue Process does a precise, unsettling job of documenting exactly how that ugliness operates at the policy level. This isn't an opinion column dressed up as a book. The author is a reporter, and she writes like one—the narrative is carried by real conversations with White House insiders, immigration lawyers, government whistleblowers, and immigrants caught in the system. That gives the book a level of credibility that is hard to dismiss, whether you agree with its conclusions or not.

The book is very approachable. It's short, easy to read, and never gets bogged down in legal jargon or policy language. If you want to understand how immigration policy is enforced during the second Trump administration, this is a very good place to start.

I would have liked the author to spend more time examining why these draconian policies became so popular in the first place. What convinced millions of Americans that immigrants had become such a threat? What role did conservative media play in shaping that perception? Those questions are just as important as the policies themselves, yet they remain largely unexplored. For readers interested in that broader context, I would recommend They Take Our Jobs! by Aviva Chomsky, which complements this book very well.

I also wish the comparisons with previous administrations had gone further. The book briefly mentions that both the Obama and Biden administrations deported large numbers of immigrants, but it never really explains how their policies differed from Trump's. I think that would have made the book much stronger.

I finished this book convinced that Donald Trump, Stephen Miller, Kristi Noem, and the rest of these MAGA clowns didn't simply create harsh immigration policies—they normalized cruelty. They turned human suffering into political theater. But I put just as much of the blame on their supporters, the people in the stands cheering these human rights violations like it's a sport. Every abuse of power needs an audience willing to excuse it. History is full of those audiences, and I have no doubt history will judge this one as harshly.

Go read it!

[Laura]

Rating: 3.5 rounded up

Julia Ainsley is NBC.MS NOW senior Homeland Security correspondent and immigration is her beat. Undue Process chronicles D0nald Trump's Mass Deportation program as implemented during the first 100 days of his second tern under the administration of Stephen Miller, Kristi Noem and Tom Homan. Its public presentation indicated the program would locate and deport "the worst of the worst, criminal immigrants illegally in the United States. That's not what happened, as Ainsley's thorough reporting shows. This is an important book, long on factual reporting. Her last two chapters offer her evaluation of the program: ICE indiscriminately seize, arrested and deported only limited numbers of their announced targets, while the bulk of their victims were non-criminals, often legally in the U.S. and sometimes actually U.S. citizens. The program's 2 successes: Illegal border crossings are in fact down, and the immigrant population of the country is generally petrified, waiting to be the next set of victims. The markdown to a 3.5 rating reflects the genuinely lousy job of editing and proofing done on this book -- it is full off almost incomprehensible sentences, typos, and grammatical errors. Somebody really slipped up.

[Jacqueline Kawate]

This is a heartbreaking look inside the Department of Homeland Security, ICE, and Border Patrol. They were tasked by Stephen Miller to detain and deport any immigrant, regardless of legal status. If constrained by the court, they were told to tell the judge “fuck you” and ignore court orders. (Their curse, not mine). This was never about getting “the worst of the worst”. It was about Miller’s dream of a whites only American. Any lawyers or agents who disagreed with or questioned the tactics being used were fired. Great book, I hate that it needed to be written. However bad you thought Stephen Miller, Kristi Noem, Greg Bovino and Tom Homan were, they are 10 times worse. And why did Corey Lewandoski wield so much power at DHS? Hmm.

[Thief of Pages (Ty)]

This was a tough read but an important one. The public needs to be aware of how truly inhumane and cruel this administration’s immigration policy is. As much as I disagreed with Biden’s approach to immigration, this disgusting and evil approach by Trump and his band of parasites ain’t the answer either.

[Lisa Samuelson-Jones]

The Mass Deportation

This book gives excellent insight on Trump, the DOJ, and ICE actions so far in his 2nd term. It exposes the lies told by government officials and the constant attempts (and successes) to defy the US Constitution and the US judges.

[Korie Dean]

Really glad we have journalists like Ainsley to chronicle in such depth and detail what the federal government has been doing in the second Trump administration. The analysis and narrative she presents here made me feel far more informed, and I’m grateful for her work.

[Edward ott]

I wish I could say I was shocked.

[Hannah Kastengren]

Highly recommend. So informative and important.

[Leandra]

An unfortunate, but important read

[Ron Schneider]

Even though we have lived through this madness over the past 18 months, it's still disturbing as hell. Our treatment of immigrants is shameful.

[Micah]

Absolutely insane. There's truly no words for how blatant, brazen, and un-checked Trump's power-trip is and has been since day 1, and how deeply baffling it is that nothing can seem to stop him.

[Eileen O'Flaherty]

Excellent!

[Kelly Ambrose]

Loved the content and information, and very much agree, just didn’t love the writing. 3.5 stars.

[Margie]

Highly recommend! Good synopsis of immigration process in past and present administrations. And how deportations have evolved to a whole new level.

[Mindy Greiling]

How so many were taken in by the President's sinister ICE plan is even worse than we thought.

[Maxine]

Súper importante and interesting. Sad stuff

[Louise Wu]

The first 100 days of Trump administration and deportations. A bit scary. Who will they go after next