ICE currently contracts with various companies to charter planes for its deportation flights, which can cost nearly $27,000 per flight hour.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is pushing for ICE to use an influx of funds to buy and operate its own fleet of planes to deport immigrants.

Buying, owning, and operating its own planes could allow ICE to deport twice as many undocumented immigrants each month, former officials said