President Donald Trump continued on Tuesday to float his idea, which some legal experts say is unconstitutional, to deport U.S. citizens who commit crimes.
Speaking to the press during a tour of a migrant detention center in the Florida Everglades, the president repeated claims that there are many immigrants who are now citizens and have been committing serious crimes.
“They’re not new to our country. They’re old to our country. Many of them were born in our country. I think we ought to get them the hell out of here, too, if you want to know the truth,” he said. “So maybe that will be the next job.”
The proposal came weeks after the Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate — a Trump appointee — released a memo giving U.S. attorneys wide discretion to decide when to pursue the denaturalization process to “advance the Administration’s policy objectives.”
MORE: DOJ looking at denaturalization for American citizens convicted of certain crimes
Some of the cases U.S. attorneys should pursue are those against individuals who have engaged in torture, war crimes, human trafficking and human rights violations, the memo says.
Legal experts have warned that Trump’s proposals are unconstitutional claiming they violate the Eighth Amendment, which prohibits cruel and unusual punishment. The issue has not come before the courts yet.
MORE: Trump wants to send US citizens to foreign prisons. Legal experts say he can’t.
Amanda Frost, a professor at the University of Virginia School of Law, told ABC News in April that the administration could try to target naturalized U.S. citizens, who can lose their immigration status if they’ve committed treason or falsified information during their naturalization process. However, she said those instances are rare.
“If someone’s a naturalized citizen, there could be an effort to denaturalize that person and deport them,” Frost said. “But then it would have to be that they committed some sort of fraud or error in their naturalization process. An unrelated crime could not be the basis for denaturalizing and deporting somebody.”
Trump acknowledged that he didn’t know if deporting U.S. citizens who are convicted of crimes is legal.
“We’ll have to find that out legally. I’m just saying if we had the legal right to do it, I would do it in a heartbeat,” he added. “I don’t know if we do or not, we’re looking at that right now.”
ABC News’ Alexandra Hutzler contributed to this report.
