Latest news with #NaynaGupta
Al Jazeera
11-06-2025
- Politics
- Al Jazeera
Trump's immigration crackdown explained
United States President Donald Trump has promised the 'largest deportation operation in American history', targeting millions of undocumented immigrants. His tough stance on immigration helped to get him elected, but the way he is going about his immigration crackdown is causing alarm among many people and has led to violent protests in Los Angeles. Start Here with Sandra Gathmann explains what is going on. This episode features: Nayna Gupta – Policy director, American Immigration Council Kathleen Bush-Joseph – Policy analyst, Migration Policy Institute David Cole – Professor in law and public policy, Georgetown University Andrea Flores – Vice president of Immigration and Campaigns,
Yahoo
30-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
100 days of Trump immigration policies cast ‘climate of fear'
In President Trump's first 100 days in office, the country has gotten a taste of the mass deportation agenda he has pledged to carry out over the next four years. Trump has charted an ambitious course, pledging everything from finished construction of his border wall to the most deportations the country has ever seen. Border encounters have dropped significantly, with March representing the lowest number on record. Still, his controversial policies have Trump regularly clashing with — and complaining about — the courts. 'If we don't get these criminals out of our Country, we are not going to have a Country any longer,' he said in a recent social media post complaining about a string of legal losses on immigration issues. To advocates, the first 100 days show an escalation from Trump's first term, one in which migrants, including those who arrived through legal pathways, are now top targets in a process that has chipped away at fundamental rights. 'We're seeing the Trump administration really pursuing an attack on core democratic values and using immigration and immigrants as the battleground for that attack. We're seeing the president attack the right to free speech, the right to a fair day in court, these core American ideals,' said Nayna Gupta, policy director with the American Immigration Council. 'They are intentionally attacking those ideas by starting with the immigration system, by weaponizing immigration laws, by resurrecting old wartime authorities, by targeting non-citizens as the first line of attack on these rights. And so while this is very clearly a threat to immigrant communities and non-citizens in our country, it really is a threat to these larger principles and all Americans.' Since taking office, Trump's administration has sent more than 200 Venezuelan and Salvadoran men to a mega prison in El Salvador where it argues they are unreachable by U.S. officials or the courts. The men were taken to the high security prison after Trump quietly signed an executive order on March 14 igniting the Alien Enemies Act, using the wartime powers for the first time to target gang violence. But the order wasn't publicly posted until Saturday, leaving immigration advocates scrambling to determine whether their clients were about to be deported under the rarely used authority. The 1798 law enables migrants to be summarily deported amid a declared war or 'invasion' by a foreign nation. The law has been leveraged just three previous times, all during wars, but Trump contends he can use it because the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua is effectively invading the U.S. It was last used as the basis for Japanese internment during World War II. Despite a court battle that ignited an order from U.S. District Court Judge James Boasberg to halt or turnaround the flights, the Trump administration nonetheless sent the men to the notorious prison in El Salvador, a move the judge later found was a 'willful disregard' of his order. It was the first instance of many of the Trump administration digging in on an issue it sees as a political winner. That's held true even as officials have come under fire for mistakenly sending a Salvadoran national and Maryland resident to the prison through immigration authorities. Kilmar Abrego Garcia was protected by an immigration judge in 2019 from being deported to El Salvador, and the Trump administration has said in court filings that his removal was due to an 'administrative error.' While the battle over Abrego Garcia reached the Supreme Court, which ordered the Trump administration to 'facilitate' his return, White House leaders have said that only requires them to send a plane should El Salvador wish to release him, which Salvador President Nayib Bukele has said he will not. To immigration advocates, the case highlights the need for due process. Like Abrego Garcia, many have denied having any gang ties. And while tattoos on the men were referenced as supporting claims they are gang members, some appear to have little affiliation with gang culture, such as the case of a former professional soccer player with a Real Madrid tattoo. And a second case has since emerged of a Venezuelan man a judge determined should have been protected from deportation — permitted to seek asylum as part of a class action suit but nonetheless sent to El Salvador by the Trump administration. Immigration advocates have since asked the court to force the Trump administration to give migrants 30 days notice they will be deported under the Alien Enemies Act and disclose they may not be deported to their home country, but rather a foreign prison. But Trump has argued the U.S. does not have time to hold trials for all the men he wishes to remove. 'We cannot give everyone a trial, because to do so would take, without exaggeration, 200 years,' he wrote on Truth Social earlier this month. 'We would need hundreds of thousands of trials for the hundreds of thousands of Illegals we are sending out of the Country. Such a thing is not possible to do. What a ridiculous situation we are in.' Krish O'Mara Vignarajah, president of Global Refuge, said the case of a second man ordered returned to the U.S. shows the problems highlighted by Abrego Garcia are not isolated. 'Mr. Garcia is not a one-off case. He is canary in the coal mine, and if these practices are allowed to continue, I fear they won't stop,' she said. The Trump administration has stripped more than 1,700 student visas since taking office, with many of the most high-profile cases targeting those who have protested on behalf of Palestinians. In some cases, those with stripped visas have had to swiftly leave the country. In others, foreign students have been arrested. Faculty have also seen their work authorizations targeted. The most notable case is that of Mahmoud Khalil, who was arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials without a warrant. The former Columbia University student and green card holder remains in custody in Louisiana. In his and other cases, the government has cited a little-used provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act that allows the secretary of State to revoke someone's immigration status if their actions would lead to 'adverse foreign policy consequences.' Secretary Marco Rubio has championed revoking visas of those he has called 'lunatics,' in Khalil's case accusing the Algerian citizen of participating 'in antisemitic protests and disruptive activities, which fosters a hostile environment for Jewish students.' Khalil's attorneys have called his arrest a clear violation of First Amendment rights. Numerous Jewish groups have also condemned policies they see as using real concerns over antisemitism as a guise to diminish civil rights protections. 'In recent weeks, escalating federal actions have used the guise of fighting antisemitism to justify stripping students of due process rights when they face arrest and/or deportation, as well as to threaten billions in academic research and education funding. Students have been arrested at home and on the street with no transparency as to why they are being held or deported, and in certain cases with the implication that they are being punished for their constitutionally-protected speech,' the groups wrote in a join statement spearheaded by the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, a nonpartisan civil rights group. 'Universities have an obligation to protect Jewish students, and the federal government has an important role to play in that effort; however … these actions do not make Jews — or any community — safer. Rather, they only make us less safe.' Beyond visas, the Department of Homeland Security announced it would begin reviewing applicants' social media accounts when they apply for benefits such as student visas and green cards to see if they have shared any antisemitic content. Since taking office, Trump has also worked to strip legal status from many people who were previously protected, including multiple groups who arrived under the Biden administration. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem has vacated protection from deportation, known as Temporary Protected Status (TPS), for Venezuela, Haiti, Afghanistan and Cameroon. The administration has also stripped parole status from those from Cuba, Nicaragua, Haiti and Venezuela who were paroled into the country under President Biden: some 530,000 people who came to the U.S. after being vetted and securing a financial sponsor. 'This administration has demonstrated really the intent to obliterate the difference between legal and illegal immigration like we've never seen,' said David Bier, director of immigration studies at the libertarian-leaning Cato Institute, calling it 'the biggest conceptual change from the first Trump administration.' 'What is going on that's so different from past administrations is really no one is off limits from these random detentions and arrests and removals.' Noem has been sued for 'vacating' TPS for Venezuelans and Haitians, with opponents arguing she cannot reverse the protections given by her predecessor. The protection is given to those in the U.S. who cannot return to their country due to unrest and dangerous conditions. A judge initially blocked Noem from ending the protections, writing in a scathing opinion that the decision 'smacks of racism' and was 'motivated at least in part by animus,' citing comments the secretary made broadly alleging Venezuelans are criminals. Some 600,000 Venezuelans in the United States have TPS, as do 520,000 Haitians. A judge has also halted the administration's efforts to end parole. Separately, Trump in a Day 1 order also suspended the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program, bringing to a stop the screening and vetting of refugees seeking to come to the U.S. while cutting off funding to support those who are already here. 'The White House has moved to undermine nearly every legal conflict designed to protect people fleeing violence, persecution and disaster,' Vignarajah said. 'The administration is clearly going through executive action rather than legislation, which may be a fast-moving approach, but it's also highly susceptible to legal challenges.' The Trump administration sees sharp declines in border crossings as key to demonstrating its policies are working. Crossings fell sharply even before Trump took office: At the Southwest border, crossings dropped from around 96,000 to around 61,000 between December and January. But in February and March, there were around 11,000 crossings both months, a massive drop from figures that were hovering about 100,000 in the final months of Biden's time in office. According to the administration, authorities have arrested more than 151,000 people and deported over 135,000 within Trump's first 100 days in office. 'President Trump campaigned on border security and immigration enforcement, the American people voted for it, and Secretary Noem and DHS are delivering beyond anyone's expectations,' the department wrote in a press release touting its actions. 'President Trump and Secretary Noem will continue fighting every day to secure our border and keep American communities safe. This is just the beginning of a new Golden Age of America.' But Gupta said those figures reflect the administration's shift away from prioritizing those who may present a public safety risk to anyone who may not be in the country lawfully. 'It is also unprecedented to go after all of the undocumented people here in the United States. This is a country that has historically had bipartisan support for legalization, at the very least, of Dreamers, farm workers, folks who've been here for 10-plus years,' she said. Bier noted it's not just border crossings that are dropping: Tourism to the U.S. is also on the decline, dynamics he said are both a response to a culture of fear. International travel to the U.S. declined 12 percent last month compared to the same period the year prior. 'The border numbers have gone way down, right. That's their big victory and all that. But then if you look at the number of tourists going down, the number of students going down. I mean, you look at these different trends, and you're like, 'Wait a minute — it's not something necessarily specific to the border.' This is a general climate of fear about going to the United States,' he said. 'And that's worrying because that's not something that's going to be easy to correct.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
The Hill
30-04-2025
- Politics
- The Hill
100 days of Trump immigration policies cast ‘climate of fear'
In President Trump's first 100 days in office, the country has gotten a taste of the mass deportation agenda he has pledged to carry out over the next four years. Trump has charted an ambitious course, pledging everything from finished construction of his border wall to the most deportations the country has ever seen. Border encounters have dropped significantly, with March representing the lowest number on record. Still, his controversial policies have Trump regularly clashing with — and complaining about — the courts. 'If we don't get these criminals out of our Country, we are not going to have a Country any longer,' he said in a recent social media post complaining about a string of legal losses on immigration issues. To advocates, the first 100 days show an escalation from Trump's first term, one in which migrants, including those who arrived through legal pathways, are now top targets in a process that has chipped away at fundamental rights. 'We're seeing the Trump administration really pursuing an attack on core democratic values and using immigration and immigrants as the battleground for that attack. We're seeing the president attack the right to free speech, the right to a fair day in court, these core American ideals,' said Nayna Gupta, policy director with the American Immigration Council. 'They are intentionally attacking those ideas by starting with the immigration system, by weaponizing immigration laws, by resurrecting old wartime authorities, by targeting non-citizens as the first line of attack on these rights. And so while this is very clearly a threat to immigrant communities and non-citizens in our country, it really is a threat to these larger principles and all Americans.' Alien Enemies Act and deportations to Salvadoran prisons Since taking office, Trump's administration has sent more than 200 Venezuelan and Salvadoran men to a mega prison in El Salvador where it argues they are unreachable by U.S. officials or the courts. The men were taken to the high security prison after Trump quietly signed an executive order on March 14 igniting the Alien Enemies Act, using the wartime powers for the first time to target gang violence. But the order wasn't publicly posted until Saturday, leaving immigration advocates scrambling to determine whether their clients were about to be deported under the rarely used authority. The 1798 law enables migrants to be summarily deported amid a declared war or 'invasion' by a foreign nation. The law has been leveraged just three previous times, all during wars, but Trump contends he can use it because the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua is effectively invading the U.S. It was last used as the basis for Japanese internment during World War II. Despite a court battle that ignited an order from U.S. District Court Judge James Boasberg to halt or turnaround the flights, the Trump administration nonetheless sent the men to the notorious prison in El Salvador, a move the judge later found was a ' willful disregard ' of his order. It was the first instance of many of the Trump administration digging in on an issue it sees as a political winner. That's held true even as officials have come under fire for mistakenly sending a Salvadoran national and Maryland resident to the prison through immigration authorities. Kilmar Abrego Garcia was protected by an immigration judge in 2019 from being deported to El Salvador, and the Trump administration has said in court filings that his removal was due to an 'administrative error.' While the battle over Abrego Garcia reached the Supreme Court, which ordered the Trump administration to 'facilitate' his return, White House leaders have said that only requires them to send a plane should El Salvador wish to release him, which Salvador President Nayib Bukele has said he will not. To immigration advocates, the case highlights the need for due process. Like Abrego Garcia, many have denied having any gang ties. And while tattoos on the men were referenced as supporting claims they are gang members, some appear to have little affiliation with gang culture, such as the case of a former professional soccer player with a Real Madrid tattoo. And a second case has since emerged of a Venezuelan man a judge determined should have been protected from deportation — permitted to seek asylum as part of a class action suit but nonetheless sent to El Salvador by the Trump administration. Immigration advocates have since asked the court to force the Trump administration to give migrants 30 days notice they will be deported under the Alien Enemies Act and disclose they may not be deported to their home country, but rather a foreign prison. But Trump has argued the U.S. does not have time to hold trials for all the men he wishes to remove. 'We cannot give everyone a trial, because to do so would take, without exaggeration, 200 years,' he wrote on Truth Social earlier this month. 'We would need hundreds of thousands of trials for the hundreds of thousands of Illegals we are sending out of the Country. Such a thing is not possible to do. What a ridiculous situation we are in.' Krish O'Mara Vignarajah, president of Global Refuge, said the case of a second man ordered returned to the U.S. shows the problems highlighted by Abrego Garcia are not isolated. 'Mr. Garcia is not a one-off case. He is canary in the coal mine, and if these practices are allowed to continue, I fear they won't stop,' she said. Stripping student visas in the name of antisemitism The Trump administration has stripped more than 1,700 student visas since taking office, with many of the most high-profile cases targeting those who have protested on behalf of Palestinians. In some cases, those with stripped visas have had to swiftly leave the country. In others, foreign students have been arrested. Faculty have also seen their work authorizations targeted. The most notable case is that of Mahmoud Khalil, who was arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials without a warrant. The former Columbia University student and green card holder remains in custody in Louisiana. In his and other cases, the government has cited a little-used provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act that allows the secretary of State to revoke someone's immigration status if their actions would lead to 'adverse foreign policy consequences.' Secretary Marco Rubio has championed revoking visas of those he has called ' lunatics,' in Khalil's case accusing the Algerian citizen of participating 'in antisemitic protests and disruptive activities, which fosters a hostile environment for Jewish students.' Khalil's attorneys have called his arrest a clear violation of First Amendment rights. Numerous Jewish groups have also condemned policies they see as using real concerns over antisemitism as a guise to diminish civil rights protections. 'In recent weeks, escalating federal actions have used the guise of fighting antisemitism to justify stripping students of due process rights when they face arrest and/or deportation, as well as to threaten billions in academic research and education funding. Students have been arrested at home and on the street with no transparency as to why they are being held or deported, and in certain cases with the implication that they are being punished for their constitutionally-protected speech,' the groups wrote in a join statement spearheaded by the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, a nonpartisan civil rights group. 'Universities have an obligation to protect Jewish students, and the federal government has an important role to play in that effort; however … these actions do not make Jews — or any community — safer. Rather, they only make us less safe.' Beyond visas, the Department of Homeland Security announced it would begin reviewing applicants' social media accounts when they apply for benefits such as student visas and green cards to see if they have shared any antisemitic content. Targeting those with legal status Since taking office, Trump has also worked to strip legal status from many people who were previously protected, including multiple groups who arrived under the Biden administration. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem has vacated protection from deportation, known as Temporary Protected Status (TPS), for Venezuela, Haiti, Afghanistan and Cameroon. The administration has also stripped parole status from those from Cuba, Nicaragua, Haiti and Venezuela who were paroled into the country under President Biden: some 530,000 people who came to the U.S. after being vetted and securing a financial sponsor. 'This administration has demonstrated really the intent to obliterate the difference between legal and illegal immigration like we've never seen,' said David Bier, director of immigration studies at the libertarian-leaning Cato Institute, calling it 'the biggest conceptual change from the first Trump administration.' 'What is going on that's so different from past administrations is really no one is off limits from these random detentions and arrests and removals.' Noem has been sued for 'vacating' TPS for Venezuelans and Haitians, with opponents arguing she cannot reverse the protections given by her predecessor. The protection is given to those in the U.S. who cannot return to their country due to unrest and dangerous conditions. A judge initially blocked Noem from ending the protections, writing in a scathing opinion that the decision 'smacks of racism' and was 'motivated at least in part by animus,' citing comments the secretary made broadly alleging Venezuelans are criminals. Some 600,000 Venezuelans in the United States have TPS, as do 520,000 Haitians. A judge has also halted the administration's efforts to end parole. Separately, Trump in a Day 1 order also suspended the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program, bringing to a stop the screening and vetting of refugees seeking to come to the U.S. while cutting off funding to support those who are already here. 'The White House has moved to undermine nearly every legal conflict designed to protect people fleeing violence, persecution and disaster,' Vignarajah said. 'The administration is clearly going through executive action rather than legislation, which may be a fast-moving approach, but it's also highly susceptible to legal challenges.' Falling border numbers The Trump administration sees sharp declines in border crossings as key to demonstrating its policies are working. Crossings fell sharply even before Trump took office: At the Southwest border, crossings dropped from around 96,000 to around 61,000 between December and January. But in February and March, there were around 11,000 crossings both months, a massive drop from figures that were hovering about 100,000 in the final months of Biden's time in office. According to the administration, authorities have arrested more than 151,000 people and deported over 135,000 within Trump's first 100 days in office. 'President Trump campaigned on border security and immigration enforcement, the American people voted for it, and Secretary Noem and DHS are delivering beyond anyone's expectations,' the department wrote in a press release touting its actions. 'President Trump and Secretary Noem will continue fighting every day to secure our border and keep American communities safe. This is just the beginning of a new Golden Age of America.' But Gupta said those figures reflect the administration's shift away from prioritizing those who may present a public safety risk to anyone who may not be in the country lawfully. 'It is also unprecedented to go after all of the undocumented people here in the United States. This is a country that has historically had bipartisan support for legalization, at the very least, of Dreamers, farm workers, folks who've been here for 10-plus years,' she said. Bier noted it's not just border crossings that are dropping: Tourism to the U.S. is also on the decline, dynamics he said are both a response to a culture of fear. International travel to the U.S. declined 12 percent last month compared to the same period the year prior. 'The border numbers have gone way down, right. That's their big victory and all that. But then if you look at the number of tourists going down, the number of students going down. I mean, you look at these different trends, and you're like, 'Wait a minute — it's not something necessarily specific to the border.' This is a general climate of fear about going to the United States,' he said. 'And that's worrying because that's not something that's going to be easy to correct.'
CNN
25-03-2025
- Politics
- CNN
Tattoos, flyers and deleted photos: The limited evidence the Trump administration is using to try to deport migrants
Tattoos. Pro-Hamas flyers. Deleted photos. These are just a few of the pieces of evidence that the Trump administration has cited in its legal efforts to detain and deport migrants from the United States in high-profile actions the past few weeks. The evidence has been cited in efforts to send over 200 Venezuelan men to prison in El Salvador for alleged gang membership, to detain a pro-Palestinian activist and green card holder without charging him with any crime, and to deport a doctor with a visa to Lebanon. People in immigration court already face a lower standard of due process in proceedings, but the Trump administration's moves reflect a stark deterioration of migrant civil liberties even further, immigration attorneys said. 'In this instance under the Trump administration, what we're seeing is yes, allegations using flimsy evidence paired with no meaningful opportunity to refute that evidence in any kind of proceeding before any kind of decision-maker,' said Nayna Gupta, policy director of the American Immigration Council, a pro-immigration non-profit group. 'That's really what makes this different.' The administration's quick pace of detention and deportation has similarly disoriented attorneys. 'Every day we're hit with a different decision, and we just don't know how to make sense of it,' Veronica Cardenas, the former assistant chief counsel for the Department of Homeland Security, told CNN last week. 'Us immigration lawyers are really experiencing the lack of due process circumventing immigration courts, and so it's been a very difficult time.' The Trump administration has pushed back against critics who raised concerns about immigrants' legal rights. 'Due process? What was Laken Riley's due process?' border czar Tom Homan said on ABC's 'This Week,' referring to the nursing student who was killed by an undocumented immigrant from Venezuela. 'What were all these young women that were killed and raped by members of (Tren de Aragua) – what was their due process?' Here's a closer look at some of the evidence being cited in the cases and what attorneys and family members of the migrants have said about its relevance. The Trump administration deported over 230 Venezuelans earlier this month, sending them to prison in El Salvador for alleged gang membership. But some have said they were wrongly suspected due to their tattoos. The Texas Department of Public Safety last year identified an assortment of tattoos connected to Tren de Aragua, many relatively common: stars on the shoulder, royal crowns, firearms, trains, dice, roses, tigers and jaguars. A photo collage of the tattoos even includes a Nike 'Jumpman' logo and Michael Jordan's number 23 jersey number as an identifier of gang membership. José Daniel Simancas Rodríguez, who spent 15 days in detention at Guantanamo Bay before being deported back to Venezuela, told CNN that US authorities had suspected him because of his tattoos and because he was from the gang's original stomping grounds in Maracay. He denies being in the gang. A lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union against the Trump administration related to its deportation efforts tells the story of 'J.G.G.,' a non-citizen from Venezuela and tattoo artist who has requested asylum. J.G.G. has several tattoos on his leg, and that ink that made him the target of deportation efforts, according to the suit. The ACLU said that J.G.G. has two tattoos – a rose and skull on his leg as well as an eye with a clock in it – and neither are associated with Tren de Aragua. 'During an interview with ICE, he was detained because the officer erroneously suspected that J.G.G. was a Tren de Aragua member on account of his tattoos,' the suit states. Lindsay Toczylowski, the co-founder and president of the Immigrant Defenders Law Center, is representing a Venezuelan asylum seeker who they say was abruptly removed to El Salvador. 'He came here seeking protection, seeking asylum, and because of his tattoos – which are the type of tattoos you would see on any person hanging out in a coffee shop in (Los Angeles) – because of those tattoos, he's in a labor prison in El Salvador known for human rights abuse,' Toczylowski said. The deportations stem from President Donald Trump's invocation of the Alien Enemies Act, an obscure 18th century law that has only been invoked three times in US history, all during major military conflicts. Detentions and deportations that occur under the measure do not go through the immigration court system, which provides immigrants the chance to seek relief and make their case to stay in the country. The US recently designated Tren de Aragua as a foreign terrorist organization, and officials have claimed the country is under 'invasion' by the gang to invoke the Alien Enemies Act. CNN previously reported that more than half of the 261 migrants expelled to El Salvador were done under the Alien Enemies Act. The administration has not publicly identified those removed to El Salvador, or presented evidence that the deported Venezuelans belong to Tren de Aragua. CNN has not been able to confirm whether any of the deported migrants identified in this story have any affiliation to the gang. 'We are not going to reveal operational details about a counter terrorism operation,' White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said last week. She added that ICE and Customs and Border Protection agents had 'great evidence.' 'They were 100% confident in the individuals that were sent home on these flights and in the president's executive authority to do that,' Leavitt said. The administration has argued in court the migrants sent to El Salvador were 'carefully vetted' through investigative techniques and a review of information to ensure they were members of Tren de Aragua, according to a court declaration submitted last week from an agency official. Robert Cerna, acting field office director for ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations, argued that the agency 'did not simply rely on social media posts, photographs of the alien displaying gang-related hand gestures, or tattoos alone.' ICE also looked at previous criminal convictions, testimonies and interviews with known Tren de Aragua members, according to the filing. 'Members of TdA pose an extraordinary threat to the American public. TdA members are involved in illicit activity to invoke fear and supremacy in neighborhoods and with the general population,' the filing states. Mahmoud Khalil, a prominent Palestinian activist, was arrested by immigration officers nearly three weeks ago outside of his apartment on the campus of Columbia University. A legal permanent US resident and green card holder, he played a central role in protests against the Israel-Hamas war on the Ivy League campus last year. Secretary of State Marco Rubio ordered Khalil's detention, relying on an obscure section of US law which gives him wide authority to revoke a person's immigration status if their 'activities in the United States would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences' to the country. Leavitt, the White House press secretary, accused Khalil of organizing protests that 'distributed pro-Hamas propaganda, flyers with the logo of Hamas,' a claim his attorneys have denied. During the briefing, she said she had a copy of the flyer but did not present it. Khalil has not been charged with any crime since he has been detained. Khalil described himself as a 'political prisoner' in a letter dictated to his attorneys from inside the ICE detention facility. 'My arrest was a direct consequence of exercising my right to free speech as I advocated for a free Palestine and an end to the genocide in Gaza,' Khalil said. In a court filing Sunday, the Trump administration said that his deportation is justified because Khalil did not reveal his previous work at the Syria office of the British Embassy in Beirut or his membership in United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East in his application to become a permanent US resident. Khalil 'sought to procure an immigration benefit by fraud of willful misrepresentation of a material fact,' the US government wrote. Khalil was an unpaid intern with UNRWA in 2023, but was never on staff, spokesperson Juliette Touma told CNN. His defense attorneys argue the new justification to deport him is weak and doesn't 'cure the obvious taint of retaliation.' 'It's a recognition that the initial charges are unsustainable,' attorney Baher Azmy told CNN. 'So, they're going with a theory that they must think is more legally defensible.' Dr. Rasha Alawieh, 34, was deported last week from Boston to her native Lebanon after federal agents found photos of former Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and Iran's supreme leader on her cell phone, a court filing by the Trump administration said. It was not immediately clear why federal officers were examining her phone. 'In explaining why these multiple photos were deleted by her one to two days before she arrived at Logan Airport, Dr. Alawieh stated that she did not want to give authorities the perception that she supports Hezbollah and the Ayatollah politically or militarily,' the court filing reads, per CNN affiliate WCVB. Alawieh, who attended Nasrallah's funeral in Lebanon, described him as a highly regarded religious leader and told them she follows his religious and spiritual techniques but not his politics, a source familiar with the case told CNN. 'Alawieh openly admitted to this to CBP officers, as well as her support of Nasrallah,' a spokesperson for the DHS said in a statement. Alawieh also acknowledged to immigration officers Hezbollah is a terrorist organization, a source familiar with the case told CNN. Alawieh's attorney, Stephanie Marzouk, who told the court all Alawieh's other attorneys had withdrawn from the case, spoke briefly to reporters last week outside a federal courthouse in Boston. 'Our client is in Lebanon, and we're not going to stop fighting to get her back in the US to see her patients, and we're also going to make sure that the government follows the rule of law,' she said. The groundwork to deport these people did not just begin with Trump. DHS has a long history of using 'flimsy or unsubstantiated' allegations to deport people in the immigration system, said Gupta, the American Immigration Council policy director. 'This is the most egregious final step in what has been many years of devolving due process in the immigration system,' she said. CNN's Michael Williams, Priscilla Alvarez, Michael Rios, Norma Galeana, Ivonne Valdés, Gloria Pazmino, Sabrina Souza, Alejandra Jaramillo and Andy Rose contributed to this report.
Yahoo
25-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Tattoos, flyers and deleted photos: The limited evidence the Trump administration is using to try to deport migrants
Tattoos. Pro-Hamas flyers. Deleted photos. These are just a few of the pieces of evidence that the Trump administration has cited in its legal efforts to detain and deport migrants from the United States in high-profile actions the past few weeks. The evidence has been cited in efforts to send over 200 Venezuelan men to prison in El Salvador for alleged gang membership, to detain a pro-Palestinian activist and green card holder without charging him with any crime, and to deport a doctor with a visa to Lebanon. People in immigration court already face a lower standard of due process in proceedings, but the Trump administration's moves reflect a stark deterioration of migrant civil liberties even further, immigration attorneys said. 'In this instance under the Trump administration, what we're seeing is yes, allegations using flimsy evidence paired with no meaningful opportunity to refute that evidence in any kind of proceeding before any kind of decision-maker,' said Nayna Gupta, policy director of the American Immigration Council, a pro-immigration non-profit group. 'That's really what makes this different.' The administration's quick pace of detention and deportation has similarly disoriented attorneys. 'Every day we're hit with a different decision, and we just don't know how to make sense of it,' Veronica Cardenas, the former assistant chief counsel for the Department of Homeland Security, told CNN last week. 'Us immigration lawyers are really experiencing the lack of due process circumventing immigration courts, and so it's been a very difficult time.' The Trump administration has pushed back against critics who raised concerns about immigrants' legal rights. 'Due process? What was Laken Riley's due process?' border czar Tom Homan said on ABC's 'This Week,' referring to the nursing student who was killed by an undocumented immigrant from Venezuela. 'What were all these young women that were killed and raped by members of (Tren de Aragua) – what was their due process?' Here's a closer look at some of the evidence being cited in the cases and what attorneys and family members of the migrants have said about its relevance. The Trump administration deported over 230 Venezuelans earlier this month, sending them to prison in El Salvador for alleged gang membership. But some have said they were wrongly suspected due to their tattoos. The Texas Department of Public Safety last year identified an assortment of tattoos connected to Tren de Aragua, many relatively common: stars on the shoulder, royal crowns, firearms, trains, dice, roses, tigers and jaguars. A photo collage of the tattoos even includes a Nike 'Jumpman' logo and Michael Jordan's number 23 jersey number as an identifier of gang membership. José Daniel Simancas Rodríguez, who spent 15 days in detention at Guantanamo Bay before being deported back to Venezuela, told CNN that US authorities had suspected him because of his tattoos and because he was from the gang's original stomping grounds in Maracay. He denies being in the gang. A lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union against the Trump administration related to its deportation efforts tells the story of 'J.G.G.,' a non-citizen from Venezuela and tattoo artist who has requested asylum. J.G.G. has several tattoos on his leg, and that ink that made him the target of deportation efforts, according to the suit. The ACLU said that J.G.G. has two tattoos – a rose and skull on his leg as well as an eye with a clock in it – and neither are associated with Tren de Aragua. 'During an interview with ICE, he was detained because the officer erroneously suspected that J.G.G. was a Tren de Aragua member on account of his tattoos,' the suit states. Lindsay Toczylowski, the co-founder and president of the Immigrant Defenders Law Center, is representing a Venezuelan asylum seeker who they say was abruptly removed to El Salvador. 'He came here seeking protection, seeking asylum, and because of his tattoos – which are the type of tattoos you would see on any person hanging out in a coffee shop in (Los Angeles) – because of those tattoos, he's in a labor prison in El Salvador known for human rights abuse,' Toczylowski said. The deportations stem from President Donald Trump's invocation of the Alien Enemies Act, an obscure 18th century law that has only been invoked three times in US history, all during major military conflicts. Detentions and deportations that occur under the measure do not go through the immigration court system, which provides immigrants the chance to seek relief and make their case to stay in the country. The US recently designated Tren de Aragua as a foreign terrorist organization, and officials have claimed the country is under 'invasion' by the gang to invoke the Alien Enemies Act. CNN previously reported that more than half of the 261 migrants expelled to El Salvador were done under the Alien Enemies Act. The administration has not publicly identified those removed to El Salvador, or presented evidence that the deported Venezuelans belong to Tren de Aragua. CNN has not been able to confirm whether any of the deported migrants identified in this story have any affiliation to the gang. 'We are not going to reveal operational details about a counter terrorism operation,' White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said last week. She added that ICE and Customs and Border Protection agents had 'great evidence.' 'They were 100% confident in the individuals that were sent home on these flights and in the president's executive authority to do that,' Leavitt said. The administration has argued in court the migrants sent to El Salvador were 'carefully vetted' through investigative techniques and a review of information to ensure they were members of Tren de Aragua, according to a court declaration submitted last week from an agency official. Robert Cerna, acting field office director for ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations, argued that the agency 'did not simply rely on social media posts, photographs of the alien displaying gang-related hand gestures, or tattoos alone.' ICE also looked at previous criminal convictions, testimonies and interviews with known Tren de Aragua members, according to the filing. 'Members of TdA pose an extraordinary threat to the American public. TdA members are involved in illicit activity to invoke fear and supremacy in neighborhoods and with the general population,' the filing states. Mahmoud Khalil, a prominent Palestinian activist, was arrested by immigration officers nearly three weeks ago outside of his apartment on the campus of Columbia University. A legal permanent US resident and green card holder, he played a central role in protests against the Israel-Hamas war on the Ivy League campus last year. Secretary of State Marco Rubio ordered Khalil's detention, relying on an obscure section of US law which gives him wide authority to revoke a person's immigration status if their 'activities in the United States would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences' to the country. Leavitt, the White House press secretary, accused Khalil of organizing protests that 'distributed pro-Hamas propaganda, flyers with the logo of Hamas,' a claim his attorneys have denied. During the briefing, she said she had a copy of the flyer but did not present it. Khalil has not been charged with any crime since he has been detained. Khalil described himself as a 'political prisoner' in a letter dictated to his attorneys from inside the ICE detention facility. 'My arrest was a direct consequence of exercising my right to free speech as I advocated for a free Palestine and an end to the genocide in Gaza,' Khalil said. In a court filing Sunday, the Trump administration said that his deportation is justified because Khalil did not reveal his previous work at the Syria office of the British Embassy in Beirut or his membership in United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East in his application to become a permanent US resident. Khalil 'sought to procure an immigration benefit by fraud of willful misrepresentation of a material fact,' the US government wrote. Khalil was an unpaid intern with UNRWA in 2023, but was never on staff, spokesperson Juliette Touma told CNN. His defense attorneys argue the new justification to deport him is weak and doesn't 'cure the obvious taint of retaliation.' 'It's a recognition that the initial charges are unsustainable,' attorney Baher Azmy told CNN. 'So, they're going with a theory that they must think is more legally defensible.' Dr. Rasha Alawieh, 34, was deported last week from Boston to her native Lebanon after federal agents found photos of former Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and Iran's supreme leader on her cell phone, a court filing by the Trump administration said. It was not immediately clear why federal officers were examining her phone. 'In explaining why these multiple photos were deleted by her one to two days before she arrived at Logan Airport, Dr. Alawieh stated that she did not want to give authorities the perception that she supports Hezbollah and the Ayatollah politically or militarily,' the court filing reads, per CNN affiliate WCVB. Alawieh, who attended Nasrallah's funeral in Lebanon, described him as a highly regarded religious leader and told them she follows his religious and spiritual techniques but not his politics, a source familiar with the case told CNN. 'Alawieh openly admitted to this to CBP officers, as well as her support of Nasrallah,' a spokesperson for the DHS said in a statement. Alawieh also acknowledged to immigration officers Hezbollah is a terrorist organization, a source familiar with the case told CNN. Alawieh's attorney, Stephanie Marzouk, who told the court all Alawieh's other attorneys had withdrawn from the case, spoke briefly to reporters last week outside a federal courthouse in Boston. 'Our client is in Lebanon, and we're not going to stop fighting to get her back in the US to see her patients, and we're also going to make sure that the government follows the rule of law,' she said. The groundwork to deport these people did not just begin with Trump. DHS has a long history of using 'flimsy or unsubstantiated' allegations to deport people in the immigration system, said Gupta, the American Immigration Council policy director. 'This is the most egregious final step in what has been many years of devolving due process in the immigration system,' she said. CNN's Michael Williams, Priscilla Alvarez, Michael Rios, Norma Galeana, Ivonne Valdés, Gloria Pazmino, Sabrina Souza, Alejandra Jaramillo and Andy Rose contributed to this report.
