“Killers”, “drug addicts”, “gang members” … Donald Trump continues to punish illegal immigrants in the United States. Just chosen for the White House, one of the first measures adopted was to organize its mass expulsion through the application of immigration and customs (ICE).
These evictions are made by road, but also and especially by plane. Enough to create a very juicy business for the US airline, says Financial Times. ICE has an initial annual budget of $ 721 million for the transport and distance of illegal immigrants. But as part of Trump’s new “great” budget, the agency plans to dedicate no less than $ 3.6 billion per year. A true manna.
CSI Aviation, a private company that negotiates private charter flights for the federal government, is the first to benefit from it. According to the Daily American newspaper, this company is in the heart of a system of several billions of dollars by transporting thousands of immigrants in dozens of daily flights between American detention centers and foreign countries.
Expert migrants: 58% of the Globalx company activity
Its charter contract with the federal state is estimated at $ 3.6 billion in five years. If this contract has been interrupted by a dispute with a competitive company, CSI Aviation has been operating with a “temporary” contract since February that has already brought $ 319 million.
The company requires airlines specialized in charter flights such as Globalx or Avelo that obtain millions of dollars thanks to these special contracts. Better yet, these contracts even allow them to save their financial situation.
Also according to the Financial Times, more than half of the flights in 2025 were subcontracted to Globalx, or 5,300 flights for ice, which represented 40% of their turnover and even 58% in the second quarter. What to reconnect with the profits after having chained the losses.
In an internal note obtained by the Financial Times, Avelo judges that ice flights are “too precious not to explode them.” Although the company did not get profits for almost four years, its boss explained that the company turned to ICE to “help us stabilize our finances and allow us to continue our adventure.”
Boycott calls
This resulted in the development of its expulsion activities while reducing its commercial services with the closure of one of its bases in California. This year, Avelo operated at least 568 immigration flights aboard Tres Boeing 737. But he was in charge of re -painting his white plane to erase all traces of the company’s brand image.
Because this business is obviously not unanimous. The associations especially denounce the flight conditions for expelled migrants who are attached to their headquarters, sometimes for 20 hours because they are the rules imposed by the ice. They ask for boycott from consumers.
For Avelo, no problem. In an answer to the FT, she declares: “Any administration, as an American national airline, when our country calls help, our practice is to say yes.”
Source: BFM TV
