5. Department of Homeland Security

Project 2025 chapter link: DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY

WHO WROTE THIS CHAPTER?: Ken Cucinelli – former “Principal Deputy Director of [USCIS],’ between 2019 and 2021. “His appointment as Acting USCIS Director by the Donald Trump administration was ruled unlawful by U.S. District Judge Randolph Moss in March 2020, who found it to be in violation of the Federal Vacancies Reform Act of 1998. Later that year, the Government Accountability Office ruled his appointment as the acting Deputy Secretary illegal, as well.”

“A self-described opponent of homosexuality, (I.V. comment: …but not of grabbing power illegally) Cuccinelli in his position as Virginia Attorney General defended anti-sodomy laws and prohibitions on same-sex marriage. Cuccinelli rejects the scientific consensus on climate change, and in his position as Attorney General investigated climate scientists whom he accused of fraud.

Characterized as an immigration hard-liner, Cuccinelli sought to prohibit undocumented immigrants from attending universities, repeal birthright citizenship, (I.V. comment: Hey, who else is thinking about doing that?) and force employees to speak English in the workplace.” His work to expand the “public charge” denials for immigrants who needed assistance, led him to infamously redefined the poem on the Statue of Liberty as only applying to “people from Europe.” Meanwhile, the U.S. continues to refuse ownership of some of the main drivers of immigration, such as our political manipulation of Latin American governments and economies, environmental disasters, extreme economic inequality and now the “iron river” of violence fueled by the American gun industry that forces migrants to flee their homes.

Great synopsis from Stop the Coup

Day One strategy: “Project 2025 makes clear its brazen attempt to override the existing Congressional oversight mechanisms to seat loyalists in critical Homeland Security positions and authorize them – however temporarily – to act with unfettered authority. This is how they plan to “dismantle the Administrative State” and rewrite the rules of governance and department policy – from Day One to Day 180 – or the day a Congressional hearing stops them.”

  • Proposals:
    • Create a stand-alone border and immigration agency at the Cabinet level – becoming the third largest federal department with over 100,000 employees — by combining the US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR), the Department of Justice (DOJ) Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR), and the Office of Immigration Litigation (OIL)
    • Move the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) to the Department of Transportation
    • Move the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to the Department of the Interior or, if combined with CISA, to the Department of Transportation
    • Move the US Coast Guard (USCG) to the Department of Justice and — in time of full- scale war — to the Department of Defense (DOD). Alternatively, move the Coast Guard to DOD for all purposes
    • Split the US Secret Service (USSS) in two: move the protective element to the Department of Justice and move financial enforcement to Treasury
    • Privatize the Transportation Security Administration (TSA)
    • Move the Science and Technology Directorate (S&T) to the DOD
    • Move the Office of Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction to the FBI
    • Cut all remaining elements of DHS to save taxpayers’ money
    • Prioritize border security and immigration enforcement, including detention and deportation
    • Repair the “historic damage done by the Biden Administration,” and establish a lawful, orderly immigration system that would protect the homeland from public safety threats
  • Proposals for Day One Strategy.
    • New legislation “to establish a more durable but politically oriented line of succession for agency decision-making purposes”
    • in cases where career officers are in a position, hold that seat for a loyalist
    • redistribute DHS employees, and transfer all law enforcement capacity in office billets to field positions “to maximize law enforcement capacity”
    • Give explicit decision-making powers to individuals wielding “acting” Secretary authority to finalize agency actions, including regulations, to ensure fulfillment of department’s homeland security mission
  • Customs and Border Patrol (CBP):
    • Expand CBP arrest and detention capacities
    • Bring back horseback-mounted Border Patrol, and “clear the records and personnel files of those who were falsely accused by Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas of whipping migrants and issue a formal apology on behalf of DHS and CBP”
    • Fund and expand border wall and Port of Entry sites
  • Detention:
    • Put into law a single nationwide detention standard to overcome having to adhere to varying state standards and oversight; this would “allow the flexibility to use large numbers of temporary facilities such as tents”
    • Congress should mandate and fund more tents and beds for 100,000 illegal aliens
    • Congress should fund 20,000 Expedited Removal Officers (ERO) and 5,000 attorneys at the Office of the Principal Legal Advisor (OPLA)
  • ICE:
    • Direct ICE to take custody of all aliens with records for felonies, crimes of violence, DUIs, previous removals, and any other crime considered a national security or public safety threat under current laws
    • Eliminate T and U visas
    • Cap H-2B (seasonal non-agricultural) visas and avoid issuing any regulations that would favor certain foreign nationals seeking an H-2 guest worker visa
    • Take executive action to eliminate visas for foreign students “from enemy nations”
    • Give ICE authority to arrest, detain, and remove “immigration violators” anywhere; eliminate “sensitive zones” where ICE now can’t operate
    • Next administration should challenge current ICE limits of “expedited removal” of “eligible aliens” to within 100 miles of the US border. “This is not a statutory requirement,” states Cucinelli
    • Expand the use of workplace search warrants (Blackies Warrants) to allow ICE to question or apprehend workers ICE suspects of being undocumented immigrants
  • USCIS:
    • Limit USCIS to a screening and vetting agency, not to speed up immigration, but crack down
    • Move away from expanded-access and temporary patrol programs “that are contrary to Congressional intent”
    • Crack down on prosecution of possible citizenship fraud cases and create a criminal investigation team to investigate possible immigration benefits fraud of Title 8 cases
    • Refocus USCIS on law enforcement and eliminate transfer of USCIS officers to work with “DACA, mass parole for Afghans, Ukrainians, Venezuelans, etc.”
  • Additional proposals:
    • End chain migration while focusing “on the nuclear family”
    • End the current employment visa program to reward only “best and brightest.” Transform the current H1-B visa program into an elite program
    • Require all visa applicants rejected for any benefit or status adjudication to immediately leave the US
    • Remove “credible fear” and fear of gang violence as grounds for asylum
    • Repeal immigration benefits for unaccompanied children
    • Remove alien children from HHS jurisdiction
    • Amend Section 235 of the Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008 (TVPRA) to more easily return unaccompanied children to home countries
    • Set new national standards for large-scale temporary tents to house undocumented families
    • End funds to nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) to process and transport illegal aliens into and throughout the United States
    • Set stricter limits of employment for legal immigrants and non-immigrants
    • Restart the Remain in Mexico Protocol, working to keep asylum seekers and other immigrants from entering the US
    • With presidential approval, refuse to allow mass migration of groups of aliens
  • FEMA
    • Transfer control of FEMA grants to states
    • Privatize and/or end the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP)
    • Cut needed FEMA Senate-confirmed positions to one – the Administrator
    • Eliminate FEMA’s “springing Cabinet position” to support coordinated agency responses
  • CISA (Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency)
    • Realign CISA with the government’s priorities
    • End current “censorship of misinformation and disinformation” that began after alleged Russian misinformation in the 2016 election. (“That turned out to be a Clinton campaign ‘dirty trick,’” says Cucinelli)
    • Fire CISA Cybersecurity Advisory Committee on Day One (Jan. 20, 2025)
    • Move CISA’s emergency communications and Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS) roles to FEMA
    • Move CISA’s school security functions to state homeland security offices o CISA should not duplicate cybersecurity functions done elsewhere (DOD, FBI, NSA, USSS)
    • For election security/preparation, CISA should help states and localities assess if they have “good cyber hygiene” in their hardware and software — but nothing more
      • CISA should not be significantly involved closer to an election, nor participate in messaging or propaganda
  • Coast Guard:
    • USCG’s budget should reflect mission activities
    • Counter China’s influence and encroachment in the Pacific region (a conservative priority)
    • Fund Pacific wartime drills
    • As with DOD, re-onboard USCG personnel dismissed from service for refusing to take the COVID-19 “vaccine,” with time in service credited to them

(Niskanen Center) The most troubling proposals include plans to:

  1. Block federal financial aid for up to two-thirds of all American college students if their state permits certain immigrant groups, including Dreamers with legal status, to access in-state tuition.
  2. Terminate the legal status of 500,000 Dreamers by eliminating staff time for reviewing and processing renewal applications. 
  3. Use backlog numbers to trigger the automatic suspension of application intake for large categories of legal immigration.
  4. Suspend updates to the annual eligible country lists for H-2A and H-2B temporary worker visas, thereby excluding most populations from filling critical gaps in the agricultural, construction, hospitality, and forestry sectors.
  5. Bar U.S. citizens from qualifying for federal housing subsidies if they live with anyone who is not a U.S. citizen or legal permanent resident.
  6. Force states to share driver’s licenses and taxpayer identification information with federal authorities or risk critical funding.

These proposals, along with the others discussed herein, mark a significant divergence from traditional conservative immigration priorities like promoting merit-based immigration, fostering assimilation, and enhancing interior enforcement. Instead, they are designed to cripple the existing immigration system without regard for the extraordinarily harmful effects on the health and wealth of our country. They would weaken our nation’s prosperity and security and undermine the vitality of our workforce, with far-reaching consequences for future generations of Americans. (Full paper here)

UPDATE!: (cmsny.org) ALIEN ENEMIES ACT AND DEPORTING OVER 10 MILLION PEOPLE:

“Former President Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican Party 2024 presidential nominee, has laid out a plan to round up any undocumented immigrant in the country, place them into “tent” camps, and summarily deport them. Using data from the 2022 American Community Survey (ACS, the most recent year of data available), the Center for Migration Studies of New York (CMS) estimates a total undocumented population of 10.9 million people. While the details of Trump’s plan are sketchy, the goals are clear: to conduct immigration “sweeps” throughout the country using any and all enforcement personnel, and to rid the United States of persons who are, in his own words, “poisoning the blood of our country.”

Trump  has pledged to use the Alien Enemies Act — part of the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798 — to target suspected gang members, drug dealers and cartel members.” This is the same law that created detention camps on American soil like Manzanar – allowing non-citizens “to be apprehended, restrained, secured, and removed as alien enemies” without any form of due process. The last mass deportation,1955’s “Operation Wetback” “was lawless; it was arbitrary; it was based on a lot of xenophobia,” Hernandez told CNN in 2016. “And it resulted in sizable large-scale violations of people’s rights, including the forced deportation of U.S. citizens.”

What do we think? We think that the GOP is not only gratutitously cruel, but profoundly stupid, as well. Maybe they see a way to consolidate more power while quashing the social unrest that follows tanking our economy and making food scarce and astronomically more expensive. Here is our call-to-your-legislators action regarding all this.

Economic Crisis – Forcing women to have babies isn’t going to solve this.

“There are areas throughout the country where immigration has become a lifeline in terms of maintaining population levels and younger workers coming into the labor market.“
– Doris Meissner, commissioner of the former U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service

“Some people apply, but almost never do any of them stay. So there’s no way that we can take care of and pick our crops without immigrant labor…We would have to abandon most of our crops” – Ventura County Ranch owner Ellen Brokaw, on attempts to hire U.S. workers.

  • (Cato Institute)“Our view is simple: people are the ultimate resource. New people are not threats to suppress but assets to celebrate… Fundamentally, immigrants aren’t competitors. They are collaborators. Unfortunately, America’s immigration system fails to recognize this fact, leading to catastrophic consequences.
    • (cmsny.org) Deporting our undocumented population would reduce our Cumulative Gross Domestic Product (GDP)  by 2.6 percent, or nearly $5 trillion over ten years
    • Legalizing undocumented population would raise the GDP by $1.5 trillion over the next ten years.
    • The nation’s housing market would be jeopardized because a high percentage of the 1.3 million mortgages held by households with undocumented immigrants would be in peril.
    • Undocumented workers contribute as much as $6 billion tax dollars to the federal government each year,
    • Undocumented workers pay $12 billion into the Social Security system each year
  • Immigrants can save the United States from population decline.…The U.S. population is growing slower than at any point in its history…Without immigration, the U.S. population will start to decline by the 2030s. Already in 2022, about half of all the counties in the United States saw declining populations.
  • Immigrants can save America from labor force decline...Without immigrants, the working‐age population will fall by about 6 million in the next two decades. The total U.S. population would decline without any immigration by 2040.
    • (cbs) They feed us. Half of the 3 million work on farms are undocumented. (Hey, the UK is now rationing fresh vegetables, partly due to their own stupid Brexit disaster.)
    • Sectors of agriculture would close: A study commissioned by the dairy industry suggested that if the number of foreign-born workers is reduced by 50 percent, more than 3,500 dairy farms would close, leading to a big drop in milk production and a spike in prices of about 30 percent. The U.S. fruit, vegetable and meat industries are similarly at risk,- production would drop and consumers would likely see higher prices.
    • U.S. will soon require more than 800,000 people to fill the jobs necessary to take care of retiring baby boomers.
  • The costs of this decline are huge. The ratio of workers to retirees has plummeted since the 1960s, and the Social Security Trustees now estimate that Social Security will be short nearly 35 million workers to fund the system in the 2030s. It will have to cut benefits by at least 23 percent in 2034, if not earlier.
  • The present value cost of this worker shortage to U.S. retirees is about $24 trillion... The Federal Reserve Board of Governors expects that the decline in population growth will cause economic growth to decline throughout OECD member countries, including the United States, increasing the burden of the U.S. debt….”

Humanitarian Crisis – doesn’t anyone remember what happened during Trump’s first reign of terror?

  • Wrongful arrest: The US has a history of detaining and deporting American citizens or green card holders who can’t prove their legal status when stopped by police.
  • Separation of families: Do we remember the videos – sights and sounds – of kids being pulled from their families?  6.1 million US citizen children live in a mixed-status family, with one member—usually a parent—being undocumented. Children could be left without a parent, or functionally orphaned in families with two undocumented parents or in single-parent households.
  • Impoverishment of separated families: If one-third of the US-born children of undocumented residents remained in the United States following a mass deportation program, the cost of raising those children through their minority would be over $114 billion.

Overall analysis of Ken’s chapter by Vanessa Frank, Immigration Attorney.

“My take on the various aspects of Project 2025 which have to do with US Immigration policy (primarily Chapter 5, DHS): Overall, the mood of these proposals can be described as fearful, defensive, and isolationist. This chapter offers few constructive ideas, such as how immigrants might help spur growth, contribute to the economy or the arts, or how our nation might grow in power or security. Overall this Project is best described as MEAN in every sense of the word: small, miserly, and cruel. The bottom line is summarized at top of p. 152: Designate USCIS as Intelligence Community–adjacent, ensuring that it has access to national security and law enforcement databases. Nowhere is there mention of any positives, with the small exception of a single sentence which mentions the prioritization of “highly skilled immigrants.” Beyond that, all discussion of immigration issues is from a defensive posture, blocking, ending, precluding fraud and other malfeasance. There is no discussion of anyone “earning” a place in this country – just limits.

  • Points that come up throughout/things they LOVE:
    • Ending U-status
    • Mandating eVerify across the nation
    • Rooting all immigration-related laws/policies in terms of scarcity, as privileges to be hard-won, not benefits to be granted
    • Cut/eliminate as many existing programs which allow us to identify who is here and under what conditions as possible (such as DACA, TPS, Parole, etc), increasing the numbers of people residing here without any documentation at all
    • Eliminate any discretion – at state, local, or law enforcement level. Things are black/white and laws should be enforced strictly and to the letter in all cases
    • Increase use of “low-level temporary capacity (for example, tents)”
    • Designate USCIS as Intelligence Community–adjacent, ensuring that it has access to national security and law enforcement databases

Our own page-by-page deep dive

  • (Pg. 133, 144) Reconnecting punitive functions such as ICE and CBP with USCIS. Their goal to dismantling DHS would essentially revert to the old Immigration and Naturalization Service when most of these agencies were housed under DOJ. Now this combination would be its own Cabinet-level department, a Border and Immigration Agency. The separation of USCIS (U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services – which adjudicates affirmative applications such as citizenship, green cards, DACA, TPS, and others) from ICE (Immigration and Custom Enforcement) and CBP (Customs and Border Protection) has been helpful in increasing people’s confidence in the system, it is reassuring to know that ICE and Border Patrol are wholly separate agencies and not likely to be involved in a person’s citizenship application.
  • (Pg. 133) Forcing a human care issue onto a law-enforcement focused agency. ORR (Office of Refugee Resettlement) which currently resides in Dept. of Health and Human Services would be moved to DHS. Bringing such an agency tasked with the various delicate jobs of caring for, housing, orienting asylum-seekers and unaccompanied children who come to USA into a law-enforcement-focused agency is not a good idea. 
  • (Pg. 135) Privatize Transportation Security Administration (TSA) FEMA’s National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) Historically, privatizing police/security forces and insurance has NOT a good thing. Re: NFIP, Private Flood Insurance and the National Flood Insurance Program. For the latter, the Congressional Research Service states “The role of the NFIP has historically been broader than just providing insurance…[it] also encompasses social goals to provide flood insurance in flood-prone areas to property owners who otherwise would not be able to obtain it, and to reduce government’s cost after floods.” (See e.g., private prison contractors) (p. 135)
  • (Pg. 135) Ken fears “woke” DHS employees: He complains that DHS “suffer(s) from the Left’s workness and weaponization against Americans whom the Left perceives as its political opponents,” painting DHS as partisan and labelling those who work for a US Gov’t agency as a threat to our own people. However, in reality, DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas has initiated an internal review of right-wing domestic extremists within its ranks after reports of more than “300 current or former DHS employees were members of the right-wing Oath Keepers group as of 2015 and Customs and Border Protection staff were working with conservative militia groups on the U.S.-Mexico border.“
  • (Pg. 135-138) Pick and choose who gets assistance: DHS would provide “states and localities with a limited federal emergency response,” obviously targeting sanctuary states like CA, where our state, and many county, city, and law enforcement agencies have various commitments to not share information with ICE (locally, our work to enforce the TRUST Act and the TRUTH Act – Buen Vecino leadership there). In order to receive federal disaster relief funds:
    • states, counties, cities, and other agencies would not be able to offer any aid to undocumented people. In practice, this would be intolerably cruel.
    • any agency which does not cooperate with ICE will be denied disaster relief funds.
    • any agency which does not use eVerify for its staff would not get disaster relief.
    • any state which will not share DMV and voter registration databases for criminal and immigration law enforcement will not get disaster relief.
  • (Pg. 136) Secretary of DHS should have “his own dedicated team or political appointees”
  • (Pg. 136) Act it ’til you make it! – Ken wants placement of “Actings” to avoid delays from Confirmation. In the last administration, various policies initiated by Acting Secretaries (notably Chad Wolf) were later discarded as he lacked the authority to make policy, as he was not Senate confirmed. This created greater chaos, as policies rapidly were instituted and then overturned. Creates uncertainty, chaos, delay, inefficiency, clogs the Court system as folks challenge directives from non-Senate confirmed leaders.
    • Cucinelli seeks to avoid this by proposing (necessary) legislation which would cut career civil servants from lines of succession, leap-frogging instead to the next available political appointee.
    • Further, he envisions legislation which would grant Acting Secretary the authority to finalize decisions, obviating the Chad Wolf problem. Such moves would indeed require legislation (at least), as the requirements of Senate confirmation are in the Constitution, and civil service rules have deep roots in federal legislation.
    • Query whether it is worth dignifying these ideas with discussion, since they are quite pie in the sky and the mere discussion of them as possibilities moves the Overton Window.
  • (Pg. 137) “Soft Closure” of offices – this sounds like consolidation of power (read: fascism); it can also read in the Reagan way: smaller government. Beware: the closure of “ineffective and problematic corners of the Department.”
  • (Pg. 138) Guest Worker authority: Bogus boogie monster.
    •  A) There are not that many guest workers admitted to USA annually, such that capping the program will drastically improve US people’s job prospects;
    • B) Only jobs with a demonstrated history of a lack of local workers even qualify for guest Worker programs, so by definition, there are no US workers available to do those jobs.
  • (Pg. 138) Stasi-adjacent: Combination of ICE and CBP into BSIA (Border Security and Immigration Agency) continues the idea of expanding border enforcement (currently having jurisdiction within 100 miles of any border) throughout the entire interior of the country. Ken also envisions linking this country-wide border enforcement force with intelligence services.
  • (Pg. 138) Public disclosure of border data, without White House approval = empowerment of law enforcement agencies over political or policy leaders.
  • (Pg. 139) CBP and DHS leadership want to travel via military transport, rather than civilian/commercial airlines to improve efficiency, again elevating leadership out of communication with civilians, lack of transparency, accountability, and tones of militarism here.
  • (Pg. 139) Immigrant roundup! More horses for CBP and pardons for those who abused migrants – an attempt to stir folks up about the treatment of migrants by mounted CBP a couple of years ago. Again, this is silly and dangerous. But best to ignore as a frivolous detail, keep eye on broader strategy – intimidation, fear, and lack of constructive ideas.
  • (Pg. 140) Detention centers – reduce state-by-state regulations of standards for human detention centers, allow use of “tents.”
  • (Pg. 140) Hey, a good idea! Realistic budget for costs of border protection – We need better tech, training, and support there.
  • (Pg. 141) Ken wants ICE to stop closing immigration cases. – not practical. Ever since there has been human law, there has been discretion in the application of those laws. We cannot prosecute everyone to the fullest extent of the law every single time. We do not have a cop at every stop-sign issuing traffic tickets. We need reform of immigration law which acknowledges both the push factors driving folks to migrate, and the pull factors attracting new people to our (aging) nation. There is no way to practically apply for entry to US from home countries.
  • (Pg. 141) Ken want to stop ignoring 287(g) – He wants folks with any record of “felonies, crimes of violence, DUI, previous removal or any other crime that is considered a national security or public safety threat” to be deported. Using “record” is vague and can lead to disastrous results. For example, a Ventura resident in his late 50’s, a father, grandfather and business owner who has been a lawful permanent resident since the age of 6 months, was almost was deported due to a dismissed case of drug possession that happened 30 years ago. Luckily Ventura County has an amazing Public Defenders office! There is much to discuss always in the simplification of people as “criminals,” but here the focus can be on the lack of any grace: once you have a conviction it is on your record forever (even now, expungements do not resolve a matter for immigration purposes) and anyone who is not a US Citizen is subject to this sort of enforcement, including long-time green card holders (“permanent residents”), DACA folks, TPS, asylees and refugees, and many many others.
  • (Pg. 141) Elimination of T and U Visas: Ken would like them to seek S-visa instead. Hard to find words for this, as over the past 25 years or so, only about 1 dozen S visas have issued. Federal law permits 10,000 U status/year and 5,000 T status/year. The availability of these visas has been widely credited with improving law enforcement outcomes as people are less reluctant to step forward to report and assist in investigation of serious crimes (murder, trafficking, rape, torture and peonage). No fraud has been identified. Victims of these crimes are some of the most vulnerable and those who choose to pursue this are some of the strongest and most honorable people I have met. Much more to say on this. Again, not likely to happen, ever. See also, p. 145, which I quote below (underline added), for a full insight into this team’s worldview:
    • “At a minimum, an enhanced regulatory agenda should include rules strengthening the integrity of the asylum system, parole reform, and U visa reform that prioritizes relief for victims of heinous crimes and ensures that we protect the truest and most deserving victims of crime.”
  • (Pg. 141) Improved guidance on detention and bond – good idea! We need more clarity. Not many people “disappear into the interior of the US where many commit crimes and many others disappear.” Not so much. All of the people who have been detained are also on an Immigration Court docket and so are trying to win their case to stay here. They tend to show up to hearings and other appointments. Lots of misinformation here.
  • (Pg. 142) Let Trump decide: Make changes to ICE by executive order, not congressional or regulatory action that is reviewable.
  • (Pg. 142) Shooting ourselves in the economy, American-style – part 1: Ken wants ICE to remove “violators anywhere in the US, without warrant,” not just within 100 miles of border, emphasizing speed of immigration enforcement over due process. In our area we have so many people whose only offense is to have entered USA without a visa and resided here ever since. They have been working, raising families, starting businesses, sending kids to college, becoming skilled tradespeople we all depend upon. They are the backbone of essential services like agricultural and health care and provide billions in taxes. Farms and dairies would close without their labor, with estimates that staples like milk could rise 90%. These are the people being targeted by these changes to ICE/CBP structure/authority/processes.
  • (Pg. 142) No more “Sensitive zones”: “All ICE memoranda identifying ‘sensitive zones’ where ICE personnel are prohibited from operating should be rescinded. Rely on the good judgment of officers in the field to avoid inappropriate situations” “Sensitive zones” are consistently mentioned in policy directives as places that law enforcement should avoid, due to overriding humanitarian or community concerns. Typically these “zones” include: schools, churches, hospitals and clinics. In the State of CA, we also include courthouses in this list. CLUE-VC’s leadership and members have long relied upon this sort of protection, calling upon folks to feel safe coming to church, dropping and picking up children from school, and taking care of their health. When CA tried to eliminate these zones in 1994 with Proposition 187, the law was both found to be federally unconstitutional, and leaders/experts in health, public safety, and education all decried the precipitous drop in attendance/participation of people fearful of immigration enforcement. CA Supreme Court blocks ICE from all state court houses for same reason – we want people to be able to participate in ordinary civic life for the good of EVERYONE.
  • (Pg. 143) Dis/misinformation! Lots of this in the Summary of USCIS under Biden. We most certainly do not have open borders, cases have been moving at a glacial rate, parole and temporary status program (which are not many nor large) help us get a handle on who is in the country and begin an important vetting process as well as assimilating people to this nation where they now reside. It is juvenile and nonsensical to imagine that we can simply identify and round up everyone who is “not supposed to be here” and deport them immediately. When dealing with human beings, there are always going to be delays, interruptions, etc. Best to have a system where we issue identification and work permits, etc. so that we know who is here and where they are. As for public benefits being a pull factor for new folks to come to USA, that is an old trope with no basis in fact. People do NOT decide to trek through the Darien Gap because they heard they might get unemployment benefits in the USA.
  • (Pg. 142) Denaturalization Unit – again, means-spirited, impractical, never succeeds. Much like voter fraud and trans kids destroying sports, this is a fiery topic without any numbers to back it up.
  • (Pg. 145) Fraud Unit to sign off an EVERY application: – HUGE overburdening of the system -making people return to have their fingerprints taken each time they file an application (some people file applications every year). They believe they can do this without any changes to law, or even following Admin Procedures Act, so these changes can be implemented immediately. Wowzer.
  • (Pg. 145) Is it too late to send Melania’s father back? Ken wants to change of immigration law to favor “high-skilled” applicants and end the H.W. Bush diversity lottery (what did he know, anyway!). Cut off family immigration at the nuclear family (no siblings, and likely no adult children or married children). Limit immigration only to the “best and brightest.” Ending TPS, a program that recognizes that the wealthiest country in the world should not be deporting people back to nations which are broken by natural disasters, war, or other strife.
  • (Pg. 145) Shooting ourselves in the economy, American-style – part 2: USCIS should not be involved in what Ken terms to be “unlawful programs” including DACA, mass parole for Afghans, Ukrainians, Venezuelans, etc., which divert resources away from nuclear family and employment programs.
  • (Pg. 146) Make a hard game even harder – Part 1 – raise all fees at USCIS, “drastically limit” fee waivers, charge a fee for asylum applications
  • (Pg .146) Make a hard game even harder – Part 2 – anyone whose case is denied must leave US immediately. Currently many such people can re-file, extending their current status while they await a reconsideration.
  • (Pg .147) End the employee union of USCIS employees (again, reduction in career staff), and again emphasizing USCIS as a security-vetting agency, not a benefits agency
  • (Pg. 147) Make a hard game even harder – Part 3 – legislative proposals – ugh, a recitation of the old hits: Title 42, but not just for illness this time, it would be whenever CBP loses operational control (so, anytime they want); “build the wall,” more lines/security/chaos at ports and airports
  • (Pg. 148) Because this worked out so well before! – repeal of legislation which protects physical and legal security of child migrants; and more tents!
  • (Pg. 148) Make asylum impossible to get and call it “reform.”– Part 1: Ugh. Impractical. Illegal. No.
  • (Pg.149) “Other pathways” to make asylum impossible: back to the “remain in Mexico program,” make treaties with other nations to force them to receive asylum-seekers (most nations in Western Hemisphere are parties to the UN Agreement on Refugees and already have laws on their books; historically US intervention, lingering colonialism, and the deportation of gangs to Central America, along with old-fashioned corruption and mismanagement and lack of integrity have left those nations without solid legal systems for asylees to turn to)
  • (Pgs. 150-51) Ken repeats himself: summary of points discussed previously
  • (Pgs. 152) Will a second-term Trump finally get to shoot at migrants? Averting mass migration event = bar the gates, the Migrant Caravan is coming! Leadership can override any existing law (Title 8 IS the U.S. Immigration Law) in order to prevent folks coming in, whenever he deems it necessary to do so. The mind reels with possibilities: recission of various benefits here in US, police/military force at border or even into other countries, given that they also envision us signing “mutual” aid agreements with Mexico and Northern Triangle countries (Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador). Sounds bad.
  • (Pg. 162) Toadies in the Office of General Counsel – these are the lawyers who advise the Department regarding regulations and policies. Again, the group here proposes that a greater share of the leadership be political appointees, rather than career folks: “DHS’s mission is politically charged, and the legal function cannot be allowed to thwart the Administration’s agenda by providing stilted or erroneous legal positions and decision-making.”
  • (Pg. 164-5) Political appointee from the Deputy General Counsel’s office to oversee combined Civil Rights/Civil Liberties and the Privacy Office –
    • this means that the privacy protections of individuals involved with immigration matters will be guaranteed by a political appointee of the President;
    • further they propose hamstringing the power of these offices to investigate claims or publish reports, having them serve instead as a sort of switchboard to receive complaints and then forward them on to others, without any power or voice of their own.
    • Only US Citizens and Permanent Residents (green card holders) will be granted privacy protections. This would allow anyone who has applied for asylum, DACA, TPS, humanitarian parole, etc. etc. etc. to have their files shared across agencies (for example with ICE). This has been explicitly forbidden in many contexts (such as DACA, U-visas, etc.) up until now as the sharing of information has a chilling effect on people’s applying for immigration status.
  • (Pg. 165-66) Didn’t Mr. Rogers say “Eliminate the helpers?”: Eliminate the Ombudsman for immigration detention and the one for USCIS. These offices provide key services in helping the agencies work with individuals and advocates impartially to understand the processes and to clear up obstacles or problems. The Ombudsman office regularly meets with attorneys and others to understand how immigration services are doing and to work with USCIS and Detention to make improvements to efficiency. Ombudsman does NOT have power to approve any benefits (regardless of what P25 says to the contrary), they simple help keep the system running smoothly. These changes would require Congress to pass laws.
  • (Pg. 166-167) Moving the chairs:
    • Move ORR (Office of Refugee Relief) into DHS or supervise it to make sure it aligns with President’s directives (this is the agency that cares for and ensure safety of migrant children and asylum-seekers);
    • Funny how this didn’t get done in Trump’s term: Dept of Defense needs to build the wall;
    • DOJ needs to release the Immigration Judges and Board of Immigration Appeals folks to the newly formed Immigration Agency OR, at minimum bust the union of Immigration Judges (who advocated vociferously against Trump policies 2017-2020);
    • State Dept tasked with penalizing countries who do not block people from coming to USA and/or do not allow us to deport people back to those countries (more US intervention in other nations’ affairs);
    • HUD: only US Citizens and Permanent Residents in federally subsidized housing (no mixed-status families);
    • Dept of Education: loans only to US Citizens and Permanent Residents and also deny loans to any students at UC, CSU, or CA Community Colleges, on the basis that those schools allow undocumented students to pay in-state tuition so the whole school (or system of schools) will be cut-off from federal loans;
    • Labor: cut out lower wage workers from immigration eligibility; Treasury: have IRS share tax info of undocumented people; Intelligence: include immigration enforcement into Intelligence Community (End of Vanessa’s part!)

The Trump Administration ANTI-IMMIGRANT Civil and Human Rights Rollbacks

Source: https://civilrights.org/trump-rollbacks/

2017

  • Jan. 27 Muslim Ban – Trump signed an executive order that discriminated against Muslims and banned refugees.
  • Feb. 21 Department of Homeland Security issued a memo updating immigration enforcement guidance, massively expanding the number of people subject to detention and deportation. The guidance drastically increased the use of expedited removal and essentially eliminated the priorities for deportation.
  • March 6 Trump signed a revised executive order restricting travel to the United States by citizens of Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen and drastically cutting back refugee admissions.
  • March 16 The Trump administration released a budget blueprint that proposed a $54 billion increase in military spending that would come from $54 billion in direct cuts to non-defense programs. The blueprint also proposed spending $4.1 billion through 2018 on the beginnings of construction of a wall through communities on the U.S.-Mexico border.
  • June 15 The administration rescinded President Obama’s Deferred Action for Parents of Americans and Lawful Permanent Residents (DAPA) program, an initiative that – had it gone into effect – would have offered a pathway to citizenship for immigrant parents with children who are citizens or residents of the United States.
  • June 27 White House issued a Statement of Administration Policy supporting H.R. 3004, Kate’s Law, which The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights opposes. x
  • June 27  White House issued a Statement of Administration Policy supporting H.R. 3003, the No Sanctuary for Criminals Act, which The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights opposes. x
  • August 2 Trump announced his support of Republican-backed legislation that would slash legal immigration in half over a decade. Sept. 5 Sessions announced that the administration was rescinding the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.
  • Sept. 12 The White House issued a Statement of Administration Policy supporting H.R. 3697, the Criminal Alien Gang Member Removal Act, which The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights opposes. x
  • Sept. 22 Trump issued the third version of his Muslim ban which, unlike the previous versions, was of indefinite duration. Oct. 8  The White House released a list of hard-line immigration principles – a list of demands that included funding a border wall, deporting Central American children seeking sanctuary, and curbing grants to sanctuary cities, effectively stalling any possible bipartisan agreement on a bill to protect Dreamers.
  • Nov. 6  The Trump administration announced it will terminate the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) designation for Nicaragua. Nov. 20 The Trump administration announced it would terminate the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) designation in 18 months for approximately 59,000 Haitians living in the United States.
  • Dec. 12 The DOJ wrote to acting Census Bureau Director Ron Jarmin requesting a question about citizenship on the 2020 Census. It was an untimely and unnecessarily intrusive request that would destroy any chance for an accurate count, discard years of careful research, and increase costs significantly. 2018 Jan. 8 The administration announced it would terminate the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) designation for nearly 200,000 Salvadorans.

2018

  • Jan. 8 The administration announced it would terminate the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) designation for nearly 200,000 Salvadorans.
  • Jan. 17 The administration announced its decision to bar citizens from Haiti from receiving H2-A and H2-B visas.
  • March 26 Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross announced that he had directed the Census Bureau to add an untested and unnecessary question to the 2020 Census form, which would ask the citizenship status of every person in America.
  • April 6 Attorney General Sessions announced that he had notified all U.S. Attorney’s offices along the southwest border of a new “zero tolerance” policy toward people trying to enter the country – a policy that quickly, and inhumanely, separated hundreds of children from their families.
  • April 10 A federal official announced that the Department of Justice was halting the Legal Orientation Program, which offers legal assistance to immigrants.
  • April 26 The Trump administration announced it would terminate the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) designation in 12 months for approximately 9,000 Nepalese immigrants.
  • May 4 The Trump administration announced it would terminate the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) designation in 18 months for approximately 57,000 Honduran immigrants.
  • June 11 Attorney General Sessions ruled that fear of domestic or gang violence was not grounds for asylum in the United States.
  • June 11 U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) Director L. Francis Cissna announced the creation of a denaturalization task force in a push to strip naturalized citizens of their citizenship.
  • June 27 The White House issued a Statement of Administration Policy supporting H.R. 6139, the Border Security and Immigration Reform Act, which The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights opposes. x
  • July 26 The Trump administration failed to meet a court-ordered deadline to reunite children and families separated at the border.
  • Sept. 6 The Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Health and Human Services announced a proposal to withdraw from the Flores Settlement Agreement. The Flores Agreement is a set of protections for underage migrant children in government custody.
  • Oct. 10 The Department of Homeland Security’s proposed ‘public charge’ rule was published in the Federal Register. Under the rule, immigrants who apply for a green card or visa could be deemed a ‘public charge’ and turned away if they earn below 250 percent of the federal poverty line and use any of a wide range of public programs.
  • Oct. 15 Trump vetoed a resolution, passed by both chambers of Congress, that would have terminated his declaration of a national emergency on the southern border with Mexico.
  • Oct. 30 Axios reported that Trump intends to sign an executive order to end birthright citizenship. In a tweet the following day, Trump said “it will be ended one way or the other.”
  • Nov. 5 The Department of Justice filed a petition with the U.S. Supreme Court to circumvent three separate U.S. Courts of Appeals on litigation concerning the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.
  • Nov. 8 The Department of Homeland Security and Department of Justice announced an interim final rule to block people from claiming asylum if they enter the United States outside legal ports of entry.
  • Dec. 14 BuzzFeed News reported that the Department of Housing and Urban Development was quietly advising lenders to deny DACA recipients Federal Housing Administration (FHA) loans.

2019

  • Jan. 25 The Department of Homeland Security began implementing the Migrant Protection Protocols – also known as the Remain in Mexico policy – which forces Central Americans seeking asylum to return to Mexico, for an indefinite amount of time, while their claims are processed.
  • Feb. 15 Trump announced that he would declare a national emergency on the southern border – an attempt to end-run the Congress in order to build a harmful and wasteful border wall.
  • Feb. 26 The White House issued a Statement of Administration Policy opposing H.J. Res. 46, a resolution terminating the national emergency on the southern border declared by President Trump, which The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights supports. On September 25, the White House issued a statement opposing the Senate’s companion resolution.
  • April 17 The Department of Housing and Urban Development proposed a rule (eventually published on May 10) seeking to restrict housing assistance for families with mixed-citizenship status. The agency’s own analysis showed that the proposal could lead to 55,000 children becoming temporarily homeless.
  • June 3 The White House issued a Statement of Administration Policy opposing H.R. 6, the American Dream and Promise Act, which The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights supports.
  • June 10  Acting Secretary of Homeland Security Kevin McAleenan announced that immigration hardliner Ken Cuccinelli was the new acting director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Five months later, the new acting Secretary of Homeland Security, Chad Wolf, named Cuccinelli to be the Senior Official Performing the Duties of the Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security. A federal judge and the Government Accountability Office, respectively, said that Cuccinelli’s appointments were illegal.
  • June 12 Trump asserted executive privilege to block congressional access to documents related to the addition of an untested citizenship question to the 2020 Census.
  • June 21 It was reported that Trump had directed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents to conduct a mass roundup of migrant families. The following day, the president announced that the raids were delayed, but has continued to threaten them
  • July 15 The administration moved to end asylum protections for most Central American migrants – deeming anyone who passes through another country ineligible for asylum at the U.S. southern border.
  • July 23 The Trump administration published a notice in the Federal Register that expands expedited removals to a wider range of undocumented immigrants. The move threatens same-day deportation for anyone who cannot immediately show they have been in the United States continuously for two years without a hearing, oversight, review, or appeal. It also threatens to trigger massive racial profiling and roundups for immigrants and citizens in the United States.
  • Aug. 7 Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raided seven food processing plants in Mississippi and arrested 680 undocumented immigrants – representing the largest workplace raid in more than a decade. The raids – part of this administration’s dangerous, anti-immigrant agenda – left some children parentless and locked out of their homes after school.
  • Aug. 12 The administration announced its final “public charge” rule, which makes it more difficult for immigrants who come to the United States legally to stay as permanent residents if they have used (or are viewed as likely to use) public benefits.
  • Aug. 16 U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services sent letters, first reported in the Boston area, stating that the agency will no longer consider most deferrals of deportation for people with a serious medical condition – asking people in extreme medical need to leave the country within 33 days.
  • Aug. 19 The Department of Justice filed a brief with the U.S. Supreme Court arguing that the Trump administration acted lawfully when it rescinded the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program in September 2017.
  • Aug. 21 Acting Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan announced that the administration was moving forward with new rules aimed at ending the decades-old Flores settlement agreement that ensures constitutional protections for children in immigrant detention facilities. Without the protections of Flores, the government can hold immigrant children indefinitely, and in prison-like conditions, with no hope for a timely release and no mandate for appropriate care of traumatized children.
  • Aug. 23 The San Francisco Chronicle reported that Attorney General Barr promoted six judges to the Board of Immigration Appeals, which sets binding policy for deportation cases. All six of the judges have high rates of denying immigrants’ asylum claims, and four of them fill seats that the Trump administration created in 2018.
  • Aug. 28 The Trump administration announced that some children born to U.S. military members and government employees working overseas wouldn’t automatically be considered U.S. citizens.
  • Sept. 3 The Trump administration announced that it would divert $3.6 billion of funding for military construction projects to fund the president’s harmful and wasteful wall along the southern border.
  • Sept. 11 Multiple reports confirmed that the Trump administration would not grant Temporary Protected Status (TPS) to Bahamians impacted by Hurricane Dorian. The denial of protected status follows the Trump administration’s termination of the TPS designation for several other countries.
  • Sept. 23 Acting Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan announced that the administration would soon end a federal immigration policy (commonly referred to as “catch and release”) that allows migrant families seeking asylum in the United States to remain in this country while their asylum applications are pending.
  • Oct. 4 Trump signed a proclamation to deny visas to legal immigrants who are unable to prove they will have health care coverage or the ability to pay for it within 30 days of their arrival to the United States.
  • Oct. 22 A Department of Justice proposal published in the Federal Register proposed to begin collecting DNA samples from immigrants crossing the border, creating an enormous database of asylum-seekers and other migrants.
  • Oct. 25 U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced a new policy to narrow who can qualify for waivers of fees associated with applications for green cards, U.S. citizenship, work permits, and other benefits.
  • Oct. 25 Attorney General William Barr issued two decisions, made through his certification power, that will limit immigrants’ options to fight deportation. 

2020

  • Jan. 13 The Washington Post reported that the Trump administration would divert $7.2 billion of funding from the Pentagon to fund the president’s harmful and wasteful wall along the southern border.
  • Jan. 31 The Trump administration announced an expansion of its Muslim ban, which will expand restrictions on additional countries including Myanmar (also known as Burma), Eritrea, Kyrgyzstan, Nigeria, Sudan, and Tanzania.
  • Feb. 14 The Trump administration announced the deployment of law enforcement tactical units from the southern border as part of an arrest operation in sanctuary cities across the country. This includes the deployment of members of the elite tactical unit known as BORTAC, which acts as a Border Patrol SWAT team.
  • Feb. 25 The Department of Justice sided with the plaintiff, Students for Fair Admissions, to oppose race-based affirmative action at Harvard University in a friend-of-the-court brief filed in the First Circuit Court of Appeals.
  • Feb. 26 The Department of Homeland Security expanded two pilot programs, the Humanitarian Asylum Review Process (HARP) for Mexican nationals and Prompt Asylum Claim Review (PACR), that fast-track the asylum process for migrants at the U.S. border. The American Civil Liberties Union argues that both programs deny asylum seekers due process since it is nearly impossible for the migrants to access legal help.
  • Feb. 26 The Department of Justice created a Denaturalization Section in its immigration office to prioritize stripping citizenship rights from naturalized immigrants who commit certain crimes.
  • Feb. 28 The Department of Justice proposed regulations increasing fees for immigrants and requiring asylum seekers to pay a $50 fee to have their cases heard in court. Fees for permanent residence permits would increase by $990, to a total of $2,750, and the cost for naturalization of new citizens would increase by $445, to $1,170.
  • March 6 The Department of Justice issued a rule saying that DNA data samples from migrants taken into federal custody after trying to cross the U.S. border can be stored and shared among federal agencies.
  • March 10 The White House issued a Statement of Administration Policy opposing H.R. 2486, the National Origin-Based Antidiscrimination for Nonimmigrants (NO BAN) Act, which The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights supports.
  • March 20 The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention imposed a 30-day restriction on all nonessential travel into the United States from Mexico and Canada – an effort, led by Stephen Miller, to use public health laws to reduce immigration.
  • April 20 The Trump administration extended its March 2020 CDC rule on border restrictions until May 20, 2020. April 22 Trump signed an executive order to temporarily ban the issuance of green cards to people seeking permanent residency in the United States – a move that was viewed as a shameless manipulation of the pandemic to justify the administration’s xenophobic policies.
  • May 19 The Trump administration announced the indefinite extension of its CDC order that allows federal authorities at the border to immediately return migrants to their home countries.
  • May 29  Trump issued a presidential proclamation aimed at restricting the entry of graduate students and researchers from China. June 15 A 161-page regulation from the Departments of Homeland Security and Justice was published in the Federal Register that would make it exceedingly difficult for migrants to claim asylum in the United States.
  • June 19 Trump issued a proclamation to expand and extend his April 22 order that suspends some immigration from outside the United States. The new proclamation extends the initial green card ban in the April proclamation until December 31, 2020, and includes additional significant restrictions on several categories of temporary guest worker visas.
  • July 8 The Departments of Homeland Security and Justice issued a proposed rule that would bar asylum seekers from countries with disease outbreaks. The proposal does not say whether it would only apply during a global pandemic, but instead would depend on determinations made by the Attorney General and Homeland Security secretary in consultation with the Department of Health and Human Services.
  • July 21 Trump signed a memorandum attempting to ban undocumented immigrants from counting toward congressional apportionment following the 2020 Census.
  • July 28 Acting Secretary of Homeland Security Chad Wolf issued a memorandum to drastically curtail the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program while the agency decides whether to rescind the program completely. The memo is in response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in June 2020 that found the administration violated the Administrative Procedure Act when it rescinded the program in September 2017.
  • Sept. 8 A whistleblower complaint from a Department of Homeland Security official alleged that top DHS officials, including Chad Wolf and Ken Cuccinelli, directed analysts to downplay threats from violent white supremacy and Russian election interference.
  • Sept. 22 The Trump administration asked the U.S. Supreme Court to schedule oral arguments in a case related to Trump’s July 2020 memorandum attempting to ban undocumented immigrants from counting toward congressional apportionment following the 2020 Census. On September 10, a three-judge district court had barred the administration from implementing the memo.
  • Sept. 30 The State Department told Congress that it would allow only 15,000 refugees to resettle in the United States in the 2021 fiscal year, which began the following day. Nov. 13 U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced a revised naturalization civics exam that will create unfair and unnecessary obstacles to lawful permanent residents pursuing U.S. citizenship.
  • Nov. 24 CNN reported that the Justice Department’s Executive Office for Immigration Review was ordering some immigrants facing deportation to file to stay in the United States – rushing the process and increasing the likelihood of deportation. The orders appeared to be signed by supervisory judges, not judges assigned to the cases.
  • Dec. 11 The Departments of Homeland Security and Justice finalized a sweeping new rule that creates additional bars to asylum eligibility and limits who can qualify for protection. People who claim they will face persecution based on gender or gang violence, for example, would generally not qualify for asylum under these new rules.
  • Dec. 12 Justice Department lawyers acknowledged that the expulsion of 66 unaccompanied migrant children (without a court hearing or asylum interview) by U.S. border officials represented a contravention of a November district court ruling.
  • Dec. 16 The Department of Justice finalized a rule that strips the Executive Office for Immigration review of its ability to make a reasoned decision on a fully developed record and blocks people in immigration proceedings from mounting an effective appeal.
  • Jan. 12 A letter from the Office of the Inspector General at the Department of Commerce outlined whistleblower complaints that Census Bureau Director Dr. Steven Dillingham ordered staff to prioritize the unconstitutional and premature production of a technical report that would include data on documented and undocumented immigrants in the United States – a directive motivated by partisan objectives. Dr. Dillingham resigned six days later following demands from civil rights organizations and members of Congress that he step down.

Resources

  • (cmsny.org) How Trump’s Mass Deportation Plan Would Hurt the United States
  • (cmsny.org) Mass Deportations Would Impoverish US Families and Create Immense Social Costs
  • (cbs) These U.S. industries can’t work without illegal immigrants
  • (KQED) Deportation Threats Worry Farmworkers — and Farm Owners
  • (Niskanen Center) Project 2025: Unveiling the far right’s plan to demolish immigration in a second Trump term
  • (nymag.com) Republicans Will Regret Calling for Mass Deportations
  • (carolinaforward.org) The Devastating Economic Impact of Massive Deportation
  • (newsnationnow.com) Trump wants to mass deport migrants, but that could crush economy
  • (WaPo) Democrats press Homeland Security on domestic extremism in workforce – Reports of Oath Keepers in the agency and Border Patrol officers collaborating with militias continue to concern Congress
  • (independent.co.uk) Most voters say Brexit to blame for food shortages, poll reveals – Exclusive: 57% say Brexit behind gaps on supermarket shelves, as shortages hit school meals