The trump administration is carrying out ethnic cleansing.

1. What critics point to: Gaza—explicit proposals and international alarm

Human Rights Watch—and other rights groups—flagged President Trump’s public statements about "taking over" the Gaza Strip and moving Palestinians out as an alarming escalation that, if implemented, would constitute forced displacement amounting to ethnic cleansing and possible war crimes, an assessment echoed by U.N.-affiliated investigators who call forcible displacement of an occupied people an international crime ^{[1] [2] [5]}.

2. How experts define the line: forcible displacement as an international crime

Legal experts and U.N. investigators stress that forcible displacement of an occupied population violates international law and is treated as ethnic cleansing in political and legal discourse; Navi Pillay, chair of the U.N. Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, told POLITICO that such forced displacement amounts to ethnic cleansing and is illegal under international law ^[2].

3. Domestic allegations: remigration, deportation plans and hostile rhetoric

Inside the United States, critics and investigative reporting point to the administration’s "remigration" proposals, expanded detention plans, public encouragement of widespread deportations and a pattern of federal social-media language that has echoed white‑supremacist tropes as evidence that the administration’s immigration program and messaging are aimed at removing non‑white immigrants and reshaping the country’s demographic composition ^{[3] [6] [4] [7]}.

4. Evidence versus interpretation: policy actions, budgets and rhetoric

There is documented administrative activity—budget requests for large detention capacity, proposed new offices oriented to repatriation, and intensified enforcement—that critics describe as the functional elements of ethnic‑cleansing campaigns, but most of these accounts come from advocacy groups, opinion columns and investigative reporting that characterize intent and effect rather than from international courts or formal legal determinations against the U.S. domestically ^{[6] [3] [8]}.

5. Counterarguments and limits of the record

Supporters of the administration argue these are immigration‑control measures and national‑security policies, not an organized program of ethnic elimination; independent sources compiled here show strong allegations and warnings but do not contain a universally accepted international legal ruling that the U.S. government is carrying out ethnic cleansing within its borders, and some commentary asserting a domestic "ethnic‑cleansing" campaign is explicitly opinion or advocacy ^{[9] [10] [11]}.

6. Bottom line — a qualified answer

For Gaza, authoritative human‑rights organizations and U.N. investigators have concluded that proposals to depopulate or forcibly displace Palestinians would amount to ethnic cleansing and violate international law if implemented, making the charge credible and grounded in expert legal assessment ^{[1] [2] [5]}. For the United States, there is substantial and growing evidence of hostile rhetoric, enforcement priorities, and institutional proposals (remigration office, expanded detention) that critics say amount to ethnic‑cleansing intent in practice, but that claim remains contested and has not been the subject of a formal international legal finding against the U.S.; reporting and opinion pieces document the concern, while legal redress and universal consensus on that domestic label are not established in the sources provided ^{[3] [4] [6] [7]}.