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Yahoo
18-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
'They're not worried about accuracy': Lawyers, people across Washington state receive a letter telling them they have 7 days to leave
Apr. 18—Lawyers and people across the Inland Northwest received a letter last week from the Department of Homeland Security telling them they have seven days to leave the United States or face legal consequences. "Do not attempt to remain in the United States — the federal government will find you. Please depart the United States immediately," the letter reads. Olga Lucia Herrera, community liaison at the Spokane Immigrant Rights Coalition, was told about the letter after someone brought it up to her and didn't know what to do. Since then, she has found at least 20 people who have received the same letter. "They're panicking. They were already scared, and now they're more scared," Herrera said. The confusion comes as the second Trump administration has taken numerous unprecedented measures to crack down on immigration. The emailed letters were not addressed to any specific names and started with: "It is time for you to leave the United States." Jason Givens, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesman, told The Spokesman-Review and Spokane Public Radio that they have issued notices terminating parole for individuals who do not have lawful status to remain. Many people seeking legal status are paroled, meaning they have to check in with immigration officials on a regular basis. This letter was not limited to users of the federal online and mobile app for immigrants, CBP One, and does not apply to those paroled under programs such as U4U and OAW, according to their statement. U4U stands for Uniting for Ukraine, a humanitarian program that aims to help refugees and immigrants from Ukraine. OAW stands for Operation Allies Welcome, a U.S. Department of Homeland Security-led effort to support refugees from Afghanistan. "To be clear: If you are an alien, being in the United States is a privilege — not a right. We are acting in the best interest of the country and enforcing the law accordingly," Givens said. Luis Cortes, attorney at Novo Legal LLC in Seattle, said parole started for certain individuals, such as Afghans and Ukrainians. But then the Biden Administration expanded the parole program for people from certain nations. These include Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua and Haiti. "This was Biden's approach to try to stop the surge of people coming from the southern border, because we started seeing a lot of people coming in through the southern border who are from Venezuela, Nicaragua, Cuba and Haiti," Cortes said. "The idea is that instead of them either coming across the border and not being detected, what's happening is that they would come across the border to try to turn themselves into CBP." When they turn themselves over, Cortes said they go through rounds of background checks, finding a sponsor in the United States and asking questions on the state of their situation. "Once all of that is set, then you can come into the United States; the parole, the authorized stay in the United States, is for typically one year that can be renewed," Cortes said. "Or what most people are doing is that they're applying for asylum once they're here. Has everybody applied for asylum? No. So you have all of these parolees in the United States who are in different sections of their immigration processes. "And what the letter really does in its functionality is that it creates a lot of chaos and confusion, which is part of this administration," he said. Some who are U.S. citizens or have legal status have also received this letter. "I've heard of plenty of immigration attorneys in Washington and others receiving these despite the fact that these immigration attorneys are U.S. citizens and cannot be forced to leave the United States," said Aaron Korthuis, staff attorney at Northwest Immigrant Rights Project. Korthuis said knowing that immigration attorneys are receiving this letter undermines the parole process, and he said he finds it strange that they have been thrown into the mix. Other lawyers across the country also have received this message. Nicole Micheroni, a lawyer based in Boston, has been outspoken after receiving the letter last Friday. "It took me a couple of minutes to realize it was sent to me, instead of someone I represent," Micheroni told the Boston Globe. Givens, of CBP, said the agency is aware that some people legally in the country received the order to leave. "CBP used the known email addresses of the alien to send notifications. If a nonpersonal email — such as an American citizen contact — was provided by the alien, notices may have been sent to unintended recipients. CBP is monitoring communications and will address any issues on a case-by-case basis," CBP said in the statement. Herrera said she sent a letter to U.S. Rep. Michael Baumgartner regarding the concerns of numerous people in the community who have received the letter from DHS. "Most of the individuals who received these emails were never granted parole, nor do they have any documentation indicating they ever had such status. Many are asylum seekers, individuals with pending immigration relief, or undocumented people with no criminal history who have lived in the U.S. peacefully for years," her letter to Baumgartner states. A spokesman for Baumgartner said he was unavailable for comment Thursday. "The biggest piece of advice is that people need to make sure that they talk to somebody before they make any moves, before they decide to do or not do anything. They should talk to somebody because, you know, they want to make sure that the steps that they're taking are precise to their situation," Cortes said. He added that there's "nothing illegal" about their entry into the country. "They applied with the government. They came in on their own dime, with the permission of the government. There's nothing about the word 'illegal' that remotely fits in here, but, I mean, the Trump Administration has again shown that they're not worried about accuracy."
WIRED
13-04-2025
- Politics
- WIRED
Homeland Security Email Tells a US Citizen to 'Immediately' Self-Deport
Apr 12, 2025 9:35 PM An email sent by the Department of Homeland Security instructs people in the US on a temporary legal status to leave the country. But who the email actually applies to—and who actually received it—is far from clear. The front entrance to the US Customs and Border Protection headquarters. Photograph: United States Department of Homeland Security sent an email this week informing people living in the US on a temporary legal status that their "parole" has been revoked and instructed them to leave the country "immediately." However, the email was also addressed to at least one US citizen, an immigration attorney from Massachusetts. And it remains unclear who must abide by the email's instructions—or why the apparent revocation of legal immigration status was delivered via email at all. The email informs the recipient that 'DHS is now exercising its discretion to terminate your parole,' which it says will go into effect '7 days from the date of this notice.' The email appears to be similar, if not identical, to messages received by users of CBP One, an app developed during the Biden administration that allows non-citizens from certain countries to schedule appointments at US points of entry in an effort to seek asylum. A spokesperson for US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) tells WIRED, however, that the email was sent more broadly. 'CBP has issued notices terminating parole for individuals who do not have lawful status to remain,' says CBP assistant commissioner for public affairs Hilton Beckham. 'This process is not limited to CBP One users and does not currently apply to those paroled under programs such as U4U and OAW.' U4U refers to Uniting for Ukraine, a program launched under the Biden administration to allow for expedited immigration to the US for Ukrainians fleeing Russia's war against its neighboring country. Former President Joe Biden began OAW, or Operation Allies Welcome, in 2021 following the US military's exit from Afghanistan to allow for the safe resettling of 'vulnerable Afghans, including those who worked alongside us in Afghanistan for the past two decades,' according to DHS. The email itself does not identify these or any other exemptions, nor does it make clear to whom it applies beyond the recipient. Beckham also confirmed that the email was sent to whatever email address the agency had associated with the intended target, leading to confusion for at least one immigration attorney. 'Some personal news: the Department of Homeland Security has given me, an immigration lawyer born in Newton, Massachusetts, seven days to leave the US,' wrote Nicole Micheroni, a partner at Cameron Micheroni & Silvia LLC, in a post on Bluesky on Friday night. 'Does anyone know if you can get Italian citizenship through great-grandparents?' Micheroni tells WIRED that she first thought the email was intended for one of her clients, but she quickly noticed that it was only addressed to her. 'I don't feel like I'm actually going to be deported in seven days, but it's concerning that this is the level of care they're using to send these out,' Micheroni says. She adds that it's possible that the DHS email was 'intended for one of my clients or somebody else,' as it's not uncommon for immigrants in the US to list their attorneys as the point of contact The Trump administration has sought to revoke the parole of some 532,000 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans who entered the US under a Biden-era humanitarian parole program. While it moved to subject them to expedited deportation effective April 24, on Thursday a federal judge in Boston said she would issue a protective order blocking that attempt. The order may complicate the instructions in the email, which stipulates that it does not apply to people who 'have otherwise obtained a lawful basis to remain' in the US. CBP's Beckham did not immediately respond to WIRED's questions about whether the court order would impact any recipients of the email. Attorney Lauren Regan, founder and executive director of the nonprofit Civil Liberties Defense Center, tells WIRED that the lack of clarity about whether the revocation of temporary parole applies to the recipient of the email is likely causing fear and confusion among many immigrants, especially those without access to adequate legal guidance. 'So many people don't have a lawyer, or their lawyer has 6,000 clients,' Regan says, which 'completely overloads' the attorneys who often provide pro bono legal services to immigrants. 'A lot of people that are here on parole status don't know the nuances of immigration law, so they get this email and they don't know if it applies to them,' Micheroni says. 'And most of them assume that it does because everything is really scary for people right now.' It's also unclear whether the email is related to recent efforts by Elon Musk's so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). In an April 10 post on X, DOGE claimed that 'CBP identified a subset of 6.3k individuals paroled into the United States since 2023 on the FBI's Terrorist Screening Center watchlist or with criminal records. These paroles have since been terminated with immediate effect.' Beckham did not immediately respond to questions about whether the email was intended for these 6,300 individuals, nor did she answer WIRED's questions about how many people received the email. Then there's the matter of the email being an email at all, Regan says, adding that 'it is absolutely not common' for a change in legal immigration status to arrive via email, which typically happens in person or via certified mail. 'People would think it's a phishing email or something not legitimate,' Regan says. Also, the fact that the email does not appear to have been first posted on a government website added to questions about its authenticity. 'Normally if the government is going to change a practice, they would first do it on their websites,' Regan says, adding, 'but the fact that this was not on the website first and then sent out as a direct communication is very, very unusual.' Regan also notes that many immigrants do not have email addresses, and therefore couldn't receive the communication in the first place. Even for Micheroni, a US citizen and immigration attorney, the Trump administration's aggressive immigration enforcement practices have made life less stable. The email only made matters worse. 'I have gotten some serious inquiries from my parents or other family members or friends being like, 'what do I do if you stop answering me or if you disappear? Like, who do you want me to call?'' she says. 'And if people in my life are feeling this way, and this is what I do, I know a lot about it,' Micheroni adds. 'I can't imagine what it's like for people that don't fully understand immigration law.'
