The American embassy in Brazil published a Portuguese-language announcement on Wednesday urging Brazilians in the United States illegally to leave the country, comparing them to the classic movie alien E.T.
“Even E.T. knew when to come home,” a poster showing the iconic image of the alien on a flying bicycle in front of the moon read. “Assume control of your departure with CBP Home.”
The message, posted on the social media site Twitter, uses imagery from the 1982 film E.T. directed by Steven Spielberg. Spielberg has not at press time responded to the use of the images.
“If you are in the U.S. illegally, do like E.T.: it’s time to go home,” the message reads in Portuguese. “Use the CBP Home app and leave now, with support and dignity. You will receive assistance for your travel and a stipend to return to your country of origin.”
CBP Home is a mobile phone application that the administration of President Donald Trump has revamped to include steps allowing illegal immigrants in the United States to willingly leave the country, offering them resources such as travel expenses and stipends for the journey. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials have stated that using CBP Home and voluntarily leaving the country leaves open the opportunity for these individuals to one day apply to enter the United States legally.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has apparently adopted E.T. as a mascot for the application, publishing a similar message in English last week on its official Facebook page.
The American embassy in Brasilia has been enthusiastically promoting the use of the CBP Home application, publishing educational videos and reminding individuals illegally present in America that the application “offers you the chance to return home with dignity and at no cost” — and with a chance to apply for legal entry.
CBP Home is the Trump administration’s version of CBP One, an application the U.S. government first debuted under former President Joe Biden. The Biden version of the application, rather than offering aid in returning home, allowed immigrants to more efficiently register with the U.S. government to stay in the country as their cases were processed. President Trump explained in March, following the launch of CBP Home, that the revamp was necessary in the face of “exploitation” of the U.S. immigration system under Biden. By January 2025, the U.S. government had documented over 970,000 individuals who had used CBP One to enter the United States.
“The Biden administration exploited the CBP One app to allow more than one million aliens to illegally enter the United States,” Trump stated. “Now my administration is launching the CBP Home app to give people in our country illegally an easy way to leave now and self-deport voluntarily.”
“If they do not avail themselves of this opportunity, then they will be found, they will be deported, and they will never be admitted again to the United States,” he warned at the time.
The application includes other features such as allowing non-immigrant aliens to pay fees for a temporary travel permit and allow importers to request certain necessary inspections.
As of this week, the Trump administration has documented tens of thousands of illegal immigrants using the CBP Home application to receive government incentives to self-deport.
Brazil has long been a major source of illegal immigration to the United States. As of 2022, estimates suggested that as many as 230,000 Brazilians were living illegally in America. A DHS report from the time noted that illegal immigrant populations from Brazil and Colombia declined for much of the first Trump term before increasing again under Biden: “The populations from Colombia (240,000) and Brazil (230,000) declined from 2018 to 2019 before increasing from 2019 through 2022 by about 3 to 5 percent per year.”
In 2021, the first year of the Biden term, immigration officials documented an increase in Brazilian illegal immigration of 114,000 percent. Some of these illegal immigration flows appeared to be facilitated by organized human trafficking, as in the case of immigration officials uncovering a scheme in 2022 to smuggle illegal Brazilian nationals into the United States and force them into arduous restaurant labor in Massachusetts.
Massachusetts is home to one of the most robust populations of Brazilian nationals in the country. In February, the Brazilian news outlet G1 reported that Brazilians in the states, fearful of an increase in detentions by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) under the second Trump administration, using group chats organized on the application WhatsApp to share information on sightings of ICE agents and potential immigration raids in the state. Some migrants in the group were reportedly acting as “sentries,” watching ICE activity near known areas with a high Brazilian population.
Local teachers in the community lamented that the increase in deportations had led to a pronounced increase in the number of child absences in the community, and social workers described a surge in the number of concerned phone calls from Brazilians in America illegally seeking help.
In June, ICE announced that it had executed a “monthlong enforcement operation” that resulted in the detention of nearly 1,500 illegal aliens in Massachusetts. The raid focused on individuals identified as linked to “transnational organized crime, gangs, and egregious illegal alien offenders.” Among those detained were two Brazilian nationals with active Interpol Red Notices, or requests for arrest, to their name for drug trafficking allegations and murder, respectively.
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