Category Archives: US immigration

Judge re-ups demand that White House show efforts to retrieve Kilmar Ábrego García from El Salvador

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With seven-day pause expiring Wednesday, Paula Xinis says administration must provide sworn testimony by May

A federal judge on Wednesday again directed the Trump administration to provide information about its efforts so far, if any, to comply with her order to retrieve Kilmar Ábrego García from an El Salvador prison.

The US district judge Paula Xinis in Maryland temporarily halted her directive for information at the administration’s request last week. But with the seven-day pause expiring at 5pm, she set May deadlines for officials to provide sworn testimony on anything they have done to return Ábrego García to the US.

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Venezuelan detainees at Texas center spell out SOS with their bodies

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Men at Bluebonnet fear deportation to El Salvador under wartime law despite maintaining they do not have gang ties

Detainees at the Bluebonnet immigrant detention center in the small city of Anson, Texas, sent the outside world a message this week: SOS.

With a Reuters drone flying nearby, 31 men formed the letters in the dirt yard of the facility on Monday.

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Trump border pick accused of ‘cover-up’ over death of man beaten by US agents

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Former top official calls for Rodney Scott to be blocked from CBP role over handling of investigation into Anastasio Hernández Rojas’s death

Rodney Scott, Donald Trump’s nominee to lead Customs and Border Protection (CBP), has been accused by a former top official of orchestrating a “cover-up” over the death of a man detained while trying to enter the country from Mexico, according to a letter obtained by the Guardian.

Scott is a former US border patrol chief who has supported the president’s vow to build a wall along the border with Mexico and criticized Joe Biden’s handling of immigration policy. As commissioner of CBP, Scott would lead one of the largest federal law enforcement agencies, which encompasses the border patrol and staffs ports of entry across the United States.

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Trump to sign executive order requiring list of sanctuary cities and states

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Second executive order aims to ‘strengthen and unleash’ law enforcement to pursue ‘criminals’, White House says

Donald Trump was expected to sign two new executive orders on Monday afternoon related to immigration, according to the White House, including one targeting so-called “sanctuary cities” and another the administration says will strengthen law enforcement.

Speaking to reporters on Monday morning, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that one of the orders will aim to “strengthen and unleash America’s law enforcement to pursue criminals and protect innocent citizens”.

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Two suspects arrested for theft of Kristi Noem’s purse, Secret Service says

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Noem’s purse was nabbed on Easter Sunday and reportedly contained about $3,000 in cash, her keys and identification

Two suspects have been arrested in connection with the theft last week of the US homeland security secretary Kristi Noem’s purse as she ate at a Washington DC restaurant, officials said Sunday.

Noem’s purse was nabbed on Easter Sunday and reportedly contained about $3,000 in cash and her keys, driver’s license, passport and homeland security badge. The homeland security department said Noem had cash in her purse to pay for gifts, dinner and other activities for her family on Easter.

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Americans, including Republicans, losing faith in Trump, new polls reveal

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Trump scores poorly on economy and immigration as some fear he is ‘exceeding powers’ and focussed on wrong issues

Americans, including some Republicans, are losing faith in Donald Trump across a range of key issues, according to polling released this week. One survey found a majority describing the president’s second stint in the White House so far as “scary”.

Along with poor ratings on the economy and Trump’s immigration policy, a survey released on Saturday found that only 24% of Americans believe Trump has focussed on the right priorities as president.

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Trump officials deport two-year-old US citizen and mother of one-year-old girl

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Lawyers in both cases, one in Louisiana and another in Florida, say clients arrested at routine Ice check-ins

The Trump administration has removed a two-year-old US citizen from the country “with no meaningful process”, according to a federal judge, while in a different case the authorities deported the mother of a one-year-old girl, separating them indefinitely.

Lawyers in the two cases, the first in Louisiana and the second in Florida, say their clients were arrested at routine check-ins at Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) offices and were given virtually no opportunity to speak with them or family members.

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Democrats decry Wisconsin judge’s arrest as Republicans call to remove her

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Governor Tony Evers takes aim at White House’s ‘dangerous rhetoric’ as Republican Tony Wied demands Dugan resign

The FBI’s arrest of Wisconsin judge Hannah Dugan has triggered strong reactions from Republican and Democratic politicians, as the Trump administration veered closer to direct confrontation with the judiciary over its crackdown on immigration.

Following the Milwaukee county circuit judge’s arrest on Friday, over allegations that she helped a man evade US immigration officers at her courthouse, Republicans have called for her removal while Democrats regard her arrest as a reflection of the administration’s increasing disregard of judicial independence amid its push to deport immigrants on an enormous scale.

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Trump is jailing immigrant families again. A mother, father and teen tell of ‘anguish on a daily basis’

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Family incarceration has been revived after Biden – and Jade, Jason and Gabriela are speaking out about their distressing treatment in Texas

When Jade and her family first arrived at the detention facility in Karnes county, Texas, she wasn’t really sure what to think.

“I guess I was confused and scared,” said the 13-year-old. Her parents were doing their best to reassure her that everything would be OK, but she knew they were in danger of being deported.

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Judge orders bail hearing for detained student Mohsen Mahdawi next week

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Palestinian green-card holder was arrested by US immigration authorities in Vermont on 14 April

Mohsen Mahdawi, a Palestinian green-card holder and student at Columbia University who was detained by the Trump administration on 14 April, will have a hearing next week on his request for release on bail, a federal judge decided on Wednesday.

Judge Geoffrey W Crawford extended a temporary restraining order issued by a separate judge last week to keep Mahdawi in Vermont. Immigration authorities have sent other foreign students arrested for their pro-Palestinian views to detention centers in Louisiana and Texas, jurisdictions typically overseen by more conservative judges.

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‘National disgrace’: US lawmakers decry student detentions on visit to Ice jails

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Delegation visits jails where Mahmoud Khalil and Rümeysa Öztürk are being held and denounce ‘authoritarian’ Trump

Congressional lawmakers denounced the treatment of Mahmoud Khalil and Rümeysa Öztürk, the students being detained by US immigration authorities for their pro-Palestinian activism, as a “national disgrace” during a visit to the two facilities in Louisiana where each are being held.

“We stand firm with them in support of free speech,” the Louisiana congressman Troy Carter, who led the delegation, said during a press conference after the visits on Tuesday. “They are frightened, they’re concerned, they want to go home.”

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Nepali-speaking Bhutanese refugees in limbo after deportation from US

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Human rights experts voice alarm as refugees expelled by the US, not welcomed by Bhutan and rejected by Nepal

When Narayan Kumar Subedi received a call from his daughter in the United States three weeks ago, he expected to hear news of his two children’s life abroad, perhaps even plans for a long-awaited reunion. Instead, he was told his 36-year-old son Ashish, a Bhutanese refugee resettled in the US, was being deported.

Ashish had been caught in a domestic dispute that led to police involvement. After several days in detention without proper legal support, he was caught up in Donald Trump’s migration crackdown and deported to Bhutan.

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Senator says trip to El Salvador was to support Kilmar Ábrego García’s due process

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Chris Van Hollen says ‘if we deny constitutional rights of this one man, it threatens constitutional rights of everyone’

Senator Chris Van Hollen, who travelled to El Salvador last week to meet Kilmar Ábrego García, the man at the center of a wrongful deportation dispute, said on Sunday that his trip was to support Ábrego García’s right to due process because if that was denied then everyone’s constitutional rights were threatened in the US.

The White House has claimed Ábrego García was a member of the MS-13 gang though he has not been charged with any gang related crimes and the supreme court has ordered his return to the US be facilitated.

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Indonesian student detained by Ice after US secretly revokes his visa

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Aditya Wahyu Harsono, father of infant with special needs, surprised at work despite valid visa through June 2026

An Indonesian father of an infant with special needs, who was detained by federal agents at his hospital workplace in Minnesota after his student visa was secretly revoked, will remain in custody after an immigration judge ruled Thursday that his case can proceed.

Judge Sarah Mazzie denied a motion to dismiss the case against Aditya Wahyu Harsono on humanitarian grounds, according to his attorney. Harsono, 33, was arrested four days after his visa was revoked without notice. He is scheduled for another hearing on 1 May.

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JD Vance had ‘exchange of opinions’ with senior cardinal, Vatican says

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US vice-president, who is a Catholic convert, discusses immigration and international wars with secretary of state

The US vice-president, JD Vance, had “an exchange of opinions” with the Vatican’s secretary of state over current international conflicts and immigration when they met on Saturday, the Vatican has said.

The Vatican issued a statement after Vance, a Catholic convert, met Cardinal Pietro Parolin and the foreign minister, Archbishop Paul Gallagher. There was no indication he met Pope Francis, who has resumed some official duties during his recovery from pneumonia.

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ACLU urges US supreme court to block ‘imminent’ deportations of Venezuelans

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Emergency filing says group of men could be deported on Friday or Saturday without court-ordered judicial review

The American Civil Liberties Union asked the US supreme court to block what the group called the imminent deportation of a new group of Venezuelan men detained in Texas without the judicial review previously ordered by the court.

In an emergency Friday court filing, ACLU lawyers said dozens of Venezuelan men held in Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Bluebonnet detention center in Texas were given notices indicating they were classified as members of the Tren de Aragua gang and would be deported under the Alien Enemies Act, and were told “that the removals are imminent and will happen tonight or tomorrow”.

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Detained Turkish student must be transferred from Louisiana for hearing, judge rules

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Rumeysa Ozturk was taken by immigration officials over what her lawyers say was apparent retaliation for op-ed

A federal judge on Friday ordered that a Turkish Tufts University student detained by immigration authorities in Louisiana to be brought to Vermont by 1 May for a hearing over what her lawyers say was apparent retaliation for an op-ed piece she co-wrote in the student newspaper.

US district judge William Sessions said he would hear Rumeysa Ozturk’s request to be released from detention. Her lawyers had requested that she be released immediately, or at least brought back to Vermont.

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Senate Democrat meets Ábrego García in El Salvador as legal battles continue – US politics live

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Visit by Maryland’s Chris Van Hollen comes as a federal appeals court rules against the Trump’s administration’s efforts to block return to the US

Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog. My name is Tom Ambrose and I’ll be bringing you all the latest news over the next few hours.

We start with news that Maryland senator Chris Van Hollen met in El Salvador with Kilmar Ábrego García, a man who was sent there by the Trump administration in March despite an immigration court order preventing his deportation.

James Comer, the chair of the House oversight committee, and Elise Stefanik, chair of the House Republican leadership, have launched an investigation into Harvard University, accusing the university of a “lack of compliance with civil rights laws”.

Elon Musk’s SpaceX and two partners have emerged as frontrunners to win a crucial part of Donald Trump’s “Golden Dome” missile defense shield.

The supreme court said it will hear arguments next month over Donald Trump’s bid to restrict automatic birthright citizenship.

In their unanimous opinion issued today, a US appeals court warned the Trump administration that battles against the judiciary could undermine public confidence.

After weeks of strong rhetoric, the president told reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday that he thought trade deals could be finished in the “next three or four weeks”.

Trump on Thursday extended a government-wide federal hiring freeze that was set to expire this weekend.

The Washington DC headquarters for the Department of Housing and Urban Development may soon be up for sale.

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Maryland senator meets Kilmar Ábrego García in El Salvador amid battle over US return

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Chris Van Hollen posts photo on X but does not provide update on status of man wrongly deported from US

The Maryland senator Chris Van Hollen met in El Salvador with Kilmar Ábrego García, a man who was sent there by the Trump administration in March despite an immigration court order preventing his deportation.

Van Hollen posted a photo of the meeting on X, saying he also called Ábrego García’s wife “to pass along his message of love”.

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Video shows Ice agents smashing car window to detain asylum seeker

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Lawyer says officials were looking for someone else while taking Juan Francisco Mendez in Massachusetts on Monday

A Massachusetts family is demanding answers from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice), complaining its agents smashed a car window with a large hammer and detained a man whom they say had applied for asylum.

A lawyer for the family also claims agents were not looking for the man in the car, Juan Francisco Mendez, when they grabbed him on Monday in New Bedford while he was driving to a dental appointment. He is now believed to have been taken into Ice detention.

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