President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he is directing the opening of a detention center at Guantanamo Bay to hold up to 30,000 immigrants who are living illegally in the United States. People who are in the United States illegally and are accused of theft and violent crimes would have to be detained and potentially deported even before a conviction.

President Donald Trump signed an executive order to instruct the Pentagon and the Department of Homeland Security to prepare a 30,000-person migrant facility at the Guantánamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba.

He said the facility at the US Navy base in Cuba, which would be separate from its high-security military prison, would house "the worst criminal illegal aliens threatening the American people". Guantanamo Bay has long been used to house immigrants,