The Urge to Purge: US gives immigration officials discretionary powers to determine if social media posts are 'anti-American'
TOI Correspondent from Washington:
The Trump administration has announced it will undertake broad discretionary screening of social media posts for "anti-American" views while adjudicating applications for visa, green card, and citizenship.
In an updated guidance issued on Tuesday, the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), the nodal agency in charge of legal immigration, said its officials will have discretionary powers to determine whether applicants, including those in the US, have expressed or promoted "anti-American ideologies" online.
In a statement, USCIS said it has expanded the types of benefit requests that receive social media vetting, and reviews for anti-American activity will be added to that vetting.
The guidance did not specify the range of speech USCIS would categorize as "anti-American," but such activity would be an "overwhelmingly negative factor" in any discretionary analysis, it warned.
'America's benefits should not be given to those who despise the country and promote anti-American ideologies. Immigration benefits -- including to live and work in the US -- remain a privilege, not a right," USCIS spokesman Matthew Tragesser said in a statement.
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Separately, the Department of Homeland Security also tightened citizenship standards last week in a memorandum that said applicants will need to prove 'good moral character,' including contributing to the community, having a good education, holding down a job and paying taxes on time.
The Trump administration's updated guidance on social media vetting comes amid signs the MAGA dispensation is now intent on purging critics -- even domestic detractors -- of its "America First" policy, potentially aggravating the divide between conservative Republican leaning states and liberal Democrat tilting ones.
Earlier this month, deep red Oklahoma, which faces a teacher shortage, announced that teachers from liberal New York and California who apply for jobs in the state will be tested to screen out 'woke indoctrinators' with left-wing views.
Teacher applicants from these states will have to take civics test to complete their certification because teaching standards there are 'antithetical' to Oklahoma values, local officials said.
Trump himself amplified the growing divide on Tuesday, lashing out at museums across the country in a post on his "Truth Social" platform on Tuesday, saying they are "the last remaining segment of 'woke.' He said he has instructed his attorneys to "start the exact same process that has been done with Colleges and Universities where tremendous progress has been made."
The MAGA supremo has clashed with several universities including Harvard and Columbia, seeking to strip hundreds of millions of dollars in federal government funding over their alleged failure to crack down on anti-Israel protests, which were sometimes construed as anti-American and pro-Hamas.
On Tuesday, Trump unloaded on the Smithsonian, the complex of national museums within shouting distance of the White House, saying it is "OUT OF CONTROL, where everything discussed is how horrible our Country is, how bad Slavery was, and how unaccomplished the downtrodden have been."
The National Museum of African American History and Culture, colloquially known as the Blacksonian, is closest to the White House, across from its southern facade.
Showcasing black history, it was inaugurated by President Obama in 2016.
"Nothing about Success, nothing about Brightness, nothing about the Future," Trump raged in his post, asserting, "This Country cannot be WOKE, because WOKE IS BROKE."
"We have the 'HOTTEST' Country in the World, and we want people to talk about it, including in our Museums," he added.
But prospective immigrants and even domestic detractors could be finding it a bit too hot as the MAGA dispensation seeks to shape the US to its idea of what America was and should be.
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