Report offers rare insight into the risks and challenges facing US deportees in Haiti

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Human Rights Watch released a report on Monday detailing the hardships faced by hundreds of people deported by the United States to gang-ravaged Haiti. The report is the first intimate look at the lives of deportees who have declined to speak at length with journalists because they fear for their safety. Gang violence is surging and hunger and poverty are deepening. The U.S. has deported more than 470 people to Haiti since July, including people who lost Temporary Protected Status, which had allowed them to live and work legally in the U.S. The main international airport in Port-au-Prince is considered too dangerous because of persistent gang violence, so deportation flights are landing in the northern city of Cap-Haitien. Mayor Michel Saint-Croix told Human Rights Watch that the city’s population has tripled to more than 1 million in the past two years as it receives deportees and Haitians fleeing violence elsewhere in the country. The deportees’ arrival has strained already limited resources. Haitian migration officials said the U.S. government has told them it planned to send as many as two deportation flights a week, each carrying about 200 people, according to the report. Deportees share details of their lives Human Rights Watch said it interviewed 44 deportees, as well as Haitian and international officials. Deportees said they went for hours without food or water and days without bathing or changing clothes while held at U.S. immigration detention facilities. The interviewees said their belongings, including official documents and money, were not returned to them when they arrived in Haiti. “All detainees are provided with 3 meals a day, clean water, clothing, bedding, showers, soap, and toiletries,” it said in a statement, also asserting that detainees have access to phones to talk with relatives and lawyers. “Certified dieticians evaluate meals. In fact, ICE has higher detention standards than most U.S. prisons that hold actual U.S. citizens.” It noted that deportees have included Haitians charged in the U.S. with crimes ranging from drug possession to sexual offenses. Human Rights Watch said it reviewed passenger manifests for two deportation flights in August. Neither contained information about the deportees’ immigration status or the grounds for their removal. Most of the 44 deportees interviewed said they had fled Haiti’s worsening security and humanitarian crises and settled in U.S. states, including Florida, New York, Indiana and Ohio. They found work in sectors such as construction, healthcare and manufacturing. Many said they were from Port-au-Prince or surrounding areas, where armed men control an estimated 70% of the capital. Others said they were from the Artibonite region, which is under assault by violent gangs. The deportees lived in the U.S. for anywhere from two to 14 years before being sent back to Haiti. Among them was a 38-year-old unidentified man who said he had lived in Florida since December 2019 and worked at the same hotel for more than six years. His wife and 5-year-old son, who is a U.S. citizen, remain in Florida, according to the report. “I worked so that he could grow up without the fear, violence, and uncertainty that I had known in Haiti,” the man was quoted as saying. He and several other deportees said they had Temporary Protected Status, although the rights group noted it could not independently verify those claims. A 47-year-old woman said she had lived in Miami with her husband, a U.S. citizen, and was arrested when she attended an interview to apply for permanent residence. “Once detained, most interviewees said authorities did not allow them to contact their lawyers or appear before an immigration judge, while many received little or no information about their pending asylum claims, the grounds for their detention, or how they could challenge their deportation,” Human Rights Watch said. Another deportee was a 24-year-old nursing assistant student who said she applied for asylum after fleeing Haiti in 2023 after gangs attacked her community.

AP Exclusive: ICE hides locations of thousands of detainees with final removal orders

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has stopped publicly revealing where it is holding thousands of detainees who are subject to final deportation orders, an unannounced move that has made it far more difficult for lawyers and relatives to find them, according to current and former officials familiar with the practice. ICE removed those detainees from its online detainee locator system on Sept. 15, according to three current and former ICE officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the change. Several lawyers contacted by The Associated Press confirmed their clients vanished from the system this week, and the American Immigration Lawyers Association warned its members about the situation Friday. The move represents a stark departure from previous practice and highlights the hardline nature of President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, leaving thousands of detainees exceedingly hard to trace and potentially unable to exercise all of their legal options. The practice, which applies to detainees who have received final orders of removal from an immigration court, could speed deportations by making last-minute legal challenges harder to pursue, immigration lawyers said. Nearly 16,000 people who were arrested and booked into ICE detention in July were subject to final removal orders, more than a third of the overall bookings, according to ICE data obtained by the Deportation Data Project based at U.C. Berkeley and UCLA. The practice does not apply to detainees held at a detention facility in Adelanto, California or at temporary holding facilities in Minneapolis, New York City or suburban Chicago, the sources said. Judges have ordered ICE to list detainees in those facilities in the online locator promptly upon their arrival, as part of litigation over their detention practices. Lawyers and relatives distressed by lack of information on detainees The effort to hide their locations adds to the ways in which the Trump administration has made life harder for detainees and their families as it has increased pressure on them to waive appeals and agree to deportation. ICE did not publicize the move and in a statement issued to the AP, the agency did not confirm or deny it. The statement said detainees with final removal orders were being prioritized for deportation, even as ICE faces a “historic number of injunctions” from courts stopping individual removals. Related Stories A former Nicaraguan paramilitary faces deportation after ICE detention A former Nicaraguan paramilitary faces deportation after ICE detention 3 MIN READ ICE arrests jumped to nearly 50,000 in July, the highest monthly total of Trump’s second term ICE arrests jumped to nearly 50,000 in July, the highest monthly total of Trump’s second term 2 MIN READ China presses the US for answers after a man dies hours after entering ICE custody China presses the US for answers after a man dies hours after entering ICE custody 2 MIN READ As a result of the change, lawyers and relatives lost track of their clients and loved ones without explanation, which is especially concerning because detainees are frequently moved to new facilities before deportation, said Greg Chen, senior director of government relations at the American Immigration Lawyers Association. “Families are freaking out because they think the person has been deported and they don’t know where the person might be,” he said. “On the attorney side, this has serious implications for the ability to contact their client. It certainly has implications about how it will interfere with the attorney-client relationship.” The Department of Homeland Security, ICE’s parent agency, has argued that people who are subject to final removal orders have received due process. That usually means an immigration judge has ordered their removal after a hearing, including cases when immigrants fail to show up, and the decision was affirmed on appeal or not appealed. Detainees with final removal orders still have options to appeal Still, those detainees have options to challenge their detention and removal, including seeking to reopen the case or by bringing what’s known as a habeas petition asking a judge to release them on constitutional grounds. Federal judges have granted thousands of rulings ordering that detainees be released or granted bond hearings. Sign up for the Ground Game Newsletter: Your guide to the biggest stories in politics, policy and U.S. elections. Email address Email address Sign up This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. ICE detention facilities held more than 65,000 people as of early July, the most recent available data. Around 30% of them likely have final removal orders, said Michelle Mendez, legal director at the National Immigration Project. More people have been issued final removal orders after failing to show up for hearings in recent months because the administration’s immigration courts have taken steps to make it harder to participate and to reopen such cases, she said. “To me, it’s just another iteration of disappearing people,” she said. “Why would we do that in the United States of America? It’s something we’d hear about in another country and be concerned about individual rights and due process.” Some with final removal orders also have legal protections against deportation to their countries of origin based on the likelihood they would be tortured or persecuted. Many of them are facing removal to third-party countries where they have no ties and their disappearance in ICE’s system will make legal challenges harder, lawyers said. Lawyers say clients have vanished from ICE locator system ICE initiated the online detainee locator system in 2010 to allow relatives, lawyers and the public to search for people in custody. Previously they had to call ICE regional offices or individual facilities to try to track them down. Many advocates and lawmakers have complained that the system updates too slowly and contains too much inaccurate or missing information, allowing ICE to shield the locations of detainees for days or weeks. Minors, people who have been held by U.S. Customs and Border Protection for less than 48 hours, and detainees who are being transported are not in the system, among others. But the exclusion of detainees with final removal orders has no apparent parallel, several immigration lawyers said. Atenas Burrola Estrada, a deputy program director with the Amica Center for Immigrant Rights, said that “every single one of our clients who has a final order has disappeared from the locator,” including 17 in all as of Monday. Among those disappeared from the locator system are eight Somali men being detained at the U.S. military base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, according to one of their attorneys, My Khanh Ngo, of the American Civil Liberties Union. She said the change could make it “nearly impossible” for people to challenge their removals in some cases. “If you can’t find your client, don’t know what’s happening to your client, you can’t get that information to the court to stop their removal,” she said. For more information, visit us at https://www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com/.

USCIS Forms Update Notice

Good afternoon, We recently updated the following USCIS form(s): Form I-485 Supplement J, Confirmation of Valid Job Offer or Request for Job Portability Under INA Section 204(j) 09/18/2026 03:20 PM EDT Edition Date: 09/18/26. You can find the edition date at the bottom of the page on the form and instructions. Form I-485 Supplement A, Supplement A to Form I-485, Adjustment of Status Under Section 245(i) 09/18/2026 03:13 PM EDT Edition Date: 09/18/26. You can find the edition date at the bottom of the page on the form and instructions. Form I-356, Request for Cancellation of Public Charge Bond 09/18/2026 02:54 PM EDT Edition Date: 09/18/26. You can find the edition date at the bottom of the page on the form and instructions. Form I-485, Application to Register Permanent Residence or Adjust Status 09/18/2026 02:46 PM EDT Edition Date: 09/18/26. You can find the edition date at the bottom of the page on the form and instructions. Form I-945, Public Charge Bond 09/18/2026 02:02 PM EDT Edition Date: 09/18/26. You can find the edition date at the bottom of the page on the form and instructions. For more information, please visit our Forms Updates page.

Revealed: ICE lost count of miscarriages, while detaining a record number of pregnant women

CE is arresting a record number of pregnant women and teenagers – placing them in detention centers where they say it can be exceedingly difficult to access medical care. At the same time, the agency appears to have lost count of how many suffered a miscarriage. Government documents obtained by the Guardian show that the Trump administration placed more pregnant immigrants in detention last fall and winter than at any time over the previous year. ICE recorded 18 miscarriages during the first nine months of the Trump administration, the documents show, but the agency has no data on miscarriages after 3 October 2025. Meanwhile, detained pregnant women report that they are struggling to access routine and emergency medical care. In interviews with the Guardian and in testimonies shared by their attorneys, women who miscarried or were hospitalized for pregnancy complications said they did not receive follow-up care, despite experiencing ongoing pain and symptoms. Anabell, 35, said she didn’t know she was pregnant until she was arrested and told to take a pregnancy test during a medical examination at the Campbell county detention center in Kentucky. A month later, she started bleeding heavily – soaking through a new menstrual pad every 30 minutes. Chained to a hospital bed at a local ER, she was told she wasn’t pregnant anymore. Laura, 21, was in the second trimester of a high-risk pregnancy when she was sent to the Dilley detention center in Texas. Now, still detained and approaching her third trimester, she’s experiencing persistent abdominal pain and bleeding – and says she hasn’t been allowed to see an OB-GYN. Angie, 26, learned she was pregnant a few weeks after she was booked into the Mesa Verde detention center in California. A few weeks after that, she woke up to large amounts of brown fluid excreting from her body. The medical staff at the detention center told her the miscarriage wasn’t her fault, she said. A composite image showing printed-out white stickers with yellow, purple, pink, or red highlighter. View image in fullscreen Copies of several meal stickers affixed to Anabell’s food throughout March, shared by her lawyer, show that ICE was offering a modified diet. Photograph: National Immigrant Justice Center Although it is difficult to pinpoint the cause of a miscarriage, or to attribute a miscarriage solely to the conditions in detention, it is clear that detained women aren’t getting the medical care they need when they experience miscarriage symptoms, said Deborah Ottenheimer, an obstetrician-gynecologist and medical expert with Physicians for Human Rights. Women who miscarry and don’t receive proper treatment, including an ultrasound and other tests to ensure that their pregnancy tissue has been vacated from their body, could experience infection and other severe complications, Ottenheimer said. “These incarcerated women are not getting the prenatal visits that they’re supposed to get. They’re not getting high-risk prenatal visits if they need them. And if they do miscarry, the medical care they receive is minimal to none,” Ottenheimer said. Christina Davidson, the chief medical officer of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, said in July that “placing and holding pregnant patients in detention poses serious medical and mental health risks for both the pregnant patient and fetus”. Lapses in care at detention facilities, she added, could escalate treatable conditions into life-threatening emergencies. The Guardian filed a Freedom of Information Act request and then filed suit in collaboration with the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press to obtain data on the number of pregnant people in ICE detention. Eventually, ICE shared records tracking the number of pregnant, postpartum and nursing women who were in detention from October 2024 through mid-January 2026, but only provided data on miscarriages up to 3 October 2025. In internal documents provided to the Guardian, the agency said it did not have miscarriage data for subsequent months because of a change in its medical accounting system. In response to follow up questions about its tracking practices after 3 October 2025, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which oversees ICE, first said that the agency was tracking miscarriages in monthly reports. But later, the spokesperson confirmed what was in its internal documents – it does not have data on miscarriages from October 2025 through June 2026. DHS has never before acknowledged that it had lost count of miscarriages – not even when US senators asked the agency for the data. It is convenient for the administration that ICE cannot report how many women in its custody had miscarriages, said Faisal Al-Juburi, the co-chief executive of Raíces, a Texas-based humanitarian aid and immigration services non-profit. “When you don’t track something of that magnitude, then you don’t have to be confronted with the reality of what your policies have yielded.” To Anabell – an asylum seeker from Nicaragua who has birthed three children and miscarried once before – hardly anything about her last pregnancy had gone as normal. She was wondering why her period hadn’t come yet when she turned up for her mandated ICE check-in appointment on 25 February, she said. The visit went as normal until she was about to leave and an officer told her she couldn’t. The next few hours were a blur. She was taken to the Campbell county detention center in Newport, Kentucky. She underwent a medical examination, and was given one pregnancy test. Then another test. They both came back positive. “It was a surprise,” she said, speaking from the detention center on the phone. “All I could do was cry.” She wasn’t given a blood test to confirm a healthy pregnancy or prenatal vitamins, she said. Nor was she scheduled for an ultrasound. She did receive a special meal, labeled with a sticker that read: “Medical Diet - Pregnancy High Protein w/ PM Snack.” Usually, this meant an extra peanut butter sandwich and a small carton of milk. Over the next weeks, she was often nauseous and could hardly eat or sleep. She’d wake up to the cries and screams of the other detainees, or to the sound of officers yelling. About a month after she was arrested, she began to bleed – first a little, then a lot. “I told them I need to see a doctor,” she said, but an officer told her she’d have to wait. In an emergency medical request, she wrote, in Spanish: “This is URGENT, please. I am pregnant and have been bleeding since yesterday … I am scared for the baby.” Fellow detainees noticed she looked unnaturally pale and tried to get her help as well, she said. A day later, she was rushed to the ER. Shackled to a hospital bed and under the watch of three immigration officers, she was told she wasn’t pregnant anymore through a Spanish interpreter on the phone. ICE has repeatedly declined to release Anabell’s medical records to her and her lawyer. She didn’t even know which hospital she had been taken to, so her lawyer hunted down her hospital record by calling nearby medical facilities. The doctor’s notes said her pregnancy hormone levels were low, suggesting that she may have lost her pregnancy even before she started bleeding heavily. Still at Campbell, Anabell has continued to bleed, vomit and lose her hair in chunks. She has lost about 30lbs, and her skin is tender with rashes, she said. In hospital records she shared with the Guardian, the ER doctor wrote that she should return to the hospital if she experiences any new symptoms and that she should receive follow-up care at a women’s health clinic – but the medics at Campbell haven’t offered any check-ups. “I don’t know what is going to happen to me,” she said. Anabell said she met two other pregnant women in detention – including another who seemingly miscarried. The data ICE released to the Guardian shows that the agency has been increasingly detaining pregnant people since Donald Trump took office in January 2025. Amid high-profile, militarized immigration raids in Minneapolis, Chicago and other cities last autumn and winter – ICE held more pregnant individuals in detention than at any time over the previous year, according to the agency’s records. In October, there were at least 87 pregnant women and adolescents in detention and in November, there were 101. Most women of reproductive age who enter immigration detention receive pregnancy tests during an initial medical assessment, but not all of them do. Some detained women have said they were unable to access pregnancy tests, so ICE’s numbers could be an undercount. Records from ICE show that at least 18 women miscarried while in custody from January 2025 through September 2025. This is also very likely an undercount, according to experts on healthcare within the immigration system. Some women who experience miscarriages, especially early in pregnancy, don’t notice significant physical symptoms and therefore don’t seek or receive emergency medical care – so their pregnancy loss may not be tracked in ICE’s records. There are no updated data on miscarriages after 3 October 2025, ICE noted in internal agency documents, because the agency had ended its contract with the Veterans Affairs Financial Services Center (VA-FSC), which had been handling medical billing for the agency. Acentra Health, a private Virginia-based company, was contracted to replace the VA-FSC starting in October 2025 – but ICE’s medical claims processing has been delayed for months. Immigration attorneys and former DHS officials told the Guardian it was odd that ICE was only keeping track of miscarriages via its medical billing provider. Federal policy, outlined in a 2021 directive, instructs ICE to wholly avoid detaining pregnant, postpartum and nursing immigrants “unless release is prohibited by law or exceptional circumstances exist”. If ICE does detain a pregnant individual, the directive obligates officers to consistently monitor and document their health. Agents or contractors at detention centers are to send monthly updates on these detainees to the executive associate director of enforcement and removal operations. The ICE health service corps, which oversees healthcare in detention, is to continuously evaluate whether it is medically advisable to keep them detained. “In the very limited circumstances in which detention is necessary and appropriate, ICE must monitor individuals known to be pregnant, postpartum, or nursing detained in ICE custody for general health and wellbeing, including regular custody and medical reevaluation, to ensure appropriate pre- and/or postnatal and other medical and mental health care,” the directive states. A spokesperson for DHS said the agency is still adhering to the directive. “The 2021 directive is still in place,” said spokesperson Chandler Rebel. “Pregnant women receive regular prenatal visits, mental health services, nutritional support, and accommodations aligned with community standards of care.” He did not engage with the Guardian’s questions about reports that women were not receiving essential prenatal, postpartum and miscarriage care. Acentra did not respond directly to questions about whether it was keeping track of miscarriages on behalf of ICE. Instead, it directed the Guardian to a statement clarifying that there were delays in implementing ICE’s new claims processing due to government shutdowns. Court records as well as interviews with US congress members, immigration attorneys and pregnant detainees indicate that the administration has all but abandoned adherence to the directive. The Guardian reviewed case details of eight pregnant women and teens who complained of medical neglect at the Dilley detention center in Texas – the country’s only ICE facility that holds families as well as single adults. Several of them alleged that language barriers made it difficult to access medical care. One woman who was four months pregnant stopped trusting the medical staff after a nurse shouted at her because she couldn’t speak English, according to Raíces. A woman who was pregnant with severe anemia and asthma was unable to get prescribed treatment. A woman who was six months pregnant with a high viral load of hepatitis B was unable to access the antiviral medications she needed to lower the risk of transmitting the infection to her baby. People chanting, raising their fists, and holding signs as they march together. View image in fullscreen A protest against ICE detaining five-year-old Liam Ramos, on 28 January 2026 in Dilley, Texas. Photograph: Joel Angel Juarez/Getty Images Laura, the 21-year-old who remains detained at Dilley along with her two-year-old son, said she has a history of miscarriages. Two days before she was detained at a mandated ICE appointment, she had gone to the ER with symptoms of miscarriage and was diagnosed with a high-risk obstetric condition. After arriving at Dilley, a physician at the facility evaluated her and told her her condition requires a specialist. “Despite this clinical determination, facility administration has failed to approve or schedule the consultation for me,” she stated in a legal declaration that Raíces shared with the Guardian. She and her son should never have been detained in the first place, said Al-Juburi of Raíces. She was certified for a special visa for the victims of crime after a stray bullet struck her and her son last year. The 2021 directive instructs ICE to avoid detaining pregnant people “except in exceptional circumstances”. But in more than a dozen cases reviewed by the Guardian, attorneys said they did not receive any clear explanation from ICE officers or from the DHS as to how they met the criteria of “exceptional circumstances”. Many were asylum-seekers with scheduled immigration hearings, and dutifully attended mandated ICE appointments – showing that they posed no flight risk. “I have yet to encounter a pregnant or postpartum person who I believe meets the definition of extraordinary circumstances, as it’s used in other areas of the law,” said Sarah Decker, a senior attorney at the Robert and Ethel Kennedy Human Rights Center. Many of her clients are detained at the South Louisiana processing center in Basile, an all-women detention center with the highest number of pregnant detainees in the county, according to ICE data. Decker also raised doubts that ICE was unaware of how many women in its custody had experienced pregnancy complications or miscarried. “Many of the pregnant women that we’ve met at Basile have told us that they disclosed their pregnancy to ICE officers, that they had to advocate for access to prenatal care and access to a gynecologist, that they needed emergency care for complications,” she said. “So ICE is clearly aware and I think their desire to kind of obfuscate the access that people have to this data is intended to cover up the level of life-threatening medical neglect that’s happening in these facilities.” For more information, visit us at https://www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com/.

Doctors say children of immigrants are missing healthcare

Four in 10 pediatricians reported kids in immigrant families are avoiding coming in for healthcare out of concerns around immigration status, according to a new survey published Tuesday. More than 1,600 pediatricians responded between April and June to the survey by American Academy of Pediatrics researchers. In the survey, pediatricians were asked whether over the past year, their patients or the families they care for avoided seeking medical care for their child due to concerns around the immigration status of a household member. They were also asked the same about sending kids to school and about applying for safety net programs such as Medicaid, the Children’s Health Insurance Program or food stamps. On average, pediatricians reported that about a quarter of their patients are in immigrant families. Forty percent of pediatricians reported those families avoided seeking medical care for their child out of concern for the patient or family’s immigration status. Thirty-one percent of the surveyed physicians reported immigrant families avoided applying for government programs. Just over a fifth reported that families had avoided sending their child to school. The American Academy of Pediatrics said the findings are likely an undercount and that more children are likely going without care. Stateline reported this month that many clinicians are seeing more advanced illnesses among kids of immigrants, as well as skipped preventive care and forgone surgeries amid immigration status fears. In the survey, answers varied across different service areas and subspecialities. For example, nearly 45% of pediatricians with subspecialities and almost half — 48% — of urban, inner city pediatricians said families retreated from seeking medical care for their child, versus 32% of rural pediatricians surveyed. In January of last year, the Trump administration rescinded Biden- and Obama-era restrictions on places where immigration agents generally could not arrest people, such as hospitals, clinics and schools. In 2024, a quarter of children nationwide were in immigrant families with one or both parents born in another country, with the percentages varying by state, the researchers noted. Healthcare professionals have also raised concerns about a new federal policy that goes into effect Friday. It broadens the discretion of immigration officers reviewing applications for green cards, certain visas or admissions into the U.S., allowing officers to consider enrollment in public benefits — such as housing and food assistance, Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program — as a “public charge,” which is grounds for inadmissibility under federal law. “Pediatricians have long spoken out against changes to the public charge policy because we know that it leaves families fearful of accessing programs and services that are critical for their health and well-being,” Dr. Sural Shah, chair of the academy’s Council on Immigrant Child and Family Health, said during a news conference on the policy last week. For more information, visit us at https://www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com/.

Latin American migrants deported by ICE to West Africa describe being stranded "on the other side of the world"

Monrovia, Liberia — None of the deported men and women placed in a three-story hotel in a remote, coastal area of this West African country are Liberian citizens. Many are not even from Africa. Instead, they hail from countries throughout Latin America — including Brazil, Colombia, Guatemala, Honduras and Venezuela — as well as other African countries, like Cameroon and Eritrea. They were deported to Liberia, Africa's oldest republic, last month by U.S. immigration officials as part of an intensifying tactic in President Trump's aggressive crackdown on illegal immigration: sending some deportees to far-flung places where they have no ties. CBS News tracked down the deportees in Liberia, becoming the first U.S. television network to speak to them in person. They described being in limbo and feeling stateless, unable to return to the U.S., where many have spouses and children, and scared of being persecuted if they go back to their homelands. untitled-449.jpg Honduran deportee Elvis Rodriguez Venturas speaks with CBS News' Camilo Montoya-Galvez. CBS News "I'm concerned," Honduran native Elvis Rodriguez Venturas told CBS News. "I feel far away, on the other side of the world." Rodriguez Venturas said his four children, two of whom are U.S. citizens, ask him every day when he's coming back to Texas, where he worked in construction. His wife is also in the U.S. Rodriguez Venturas entered the U.S. illegally, but his deportation to Honduras was barred by an immigration judge who found he could be harmed there. He said he had been using that protection to work in the U.S. legally before his detention. In fact, most of the deportees who agreed to be interviewed won legal protections in American immigration courts, preventing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement from deporting them to their home countries because of concerns they could be persecuted or tortured there. symbol 00:00 02:00 Read More But under the Trump administration's zero-tolerance posture to illegal immigration, those with such cases are being targeted for deportation to third countries, as they still lack a valid permanent immigration status, despite their limited legal protections. a18e7f09-047f-4fb2-af07-241ea85de368.jpg The six Latin American male deportees who agreed to talk with CBS News. CBS News The deportees said they were not notified by ICE that they would be removed to Liberia, or given the chance to challenge their deportation to West Africa. "Honestly, I had never heard of Liberia," Colombian immigrant Arin Garcia Yepes told CBS News. "I didn't even know it existed," said Rodriguez Venturas, the Honduran deportee. Brazilian immigrant Paola Ferreira Dos Santos, the only woman among the Latin American deportees in Liberia, said she only learned where she had been deported to when the deportation flight landed in Monrovia on Aug. 20. "I was the first to get off the plane, and they said, 'Welcome to Liberia. You're in Africa,'" the 21-year-old told CBS News in Portuguese. untitled-339.jpg CBS News' Camilo Montoya-Galvez at the main market in Monrovia, Liberia. CBS News While Trump administration officials often say their deportation blitz is primarily focused on hardened criminals they call the "worst of the worst," CBS News obtained the names of those sent to Liberia last month, and could not find a criminal charge or conviction for the vast majority, beyond immigration violations like entering the U.S. illegally. In a statement to CBS News, the Department of Homeland Security said those in the U.S. illegally could opt to self-deport and receive a $3,000 stipend the administration has been offering. "The Trump Administration is utilizing all lawful options to carry out the largest deportation operation in history, just as President Trump promised," the department added. The State Department has repeatedly declined to provide detailed information on the "third-country" deportation deals, saying in a statement that it had "no comment on the details of our diplomatic communications with other governments." "I could be in danger" Liberia is a relatively small country bordering the North Atlantic that is roughly the size of Tennessee and home to more than 5 million people. It was founded in the 19th century by freed American slaves. Its capital, Monrovia, is named after U.S. President James Monroe. In August, Liberia's government revealed it had agreed to receive up to 1,200 "third-country" deportees from the U.S., framing it as a humanitarian gesture. So far, it has only received one group of deportees under the agreement, the Aug. 20 flight that brought 15 non-Liberians to Liberia. The West African country joined more than 30 nations around the globe that have now agreed to such "third-country" deportations under pressure from the Trump administration. Many of the agreements have been brokered with African countries, including those beset by armed conflict, political crises and widespread poverty, like the Central African Republic and South Sudan. While the Liberian government has said the "third-country" deportees can claim asylum in Liberia, none of the ones interviewed by CBS News expressed interest in staying in the West African nation permanently, citing poverty, the different culture there and their lack of work visas. 9e1f1985-95e9-4fa4-8210-6227e241780c.jpg CBS News' Camilo Montoya-Galvez speaks with Venezuelan deportee Carlos Tellez Sanchez. CBS News Unlike some African countries, such as the small kingdom of Eswatini, Liberia is not detaining the deportees it receives from the U.S. While they've been told not to venture too far outside the hotel for their own safety, the deportees are technically free to leave. The United Nations' migration agency, the International Organization for Migration, has been providing the group with basic necessities. But many still feel trapped. Some are contemplating returning to their home countries or hoping that another third country agrees to welcome them. Venezuelan deportee Carlos Tellez Sanchez, who was selling cars and delivering food in the Dallas area before he was detained by ICE late last year, said he's stuck for now in Africa. His wife and their American-born baby remain in Texas. "Returning to Venezuela is not an option for me," he said. "I feel I could be in danger if I return to my home country." For more information, visit us at https://www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com/.

DHS voter probe may break state laws and wrongly implicate U.S. citizens, whistleblower alleges

NEW YORK — A last-ditch Trump administration effort to hunt for noncitizen voters ahead of November’s elections is requiring federal employees to misrepresent themselves on voter lookup tools in a way that likely violates state laws, according to a federal whistleblower's statement released Monday. The Department of Homeland Security probe known as the “Unlawful Voter Initiative” also asks employees to create federal law enforcement records about voters based on unreliable data, the account warns. That could potentially wrongly implicate U.S. citizens in official documentation that could spur further investigation. The anonymous, nearly 30-page disclosure was published Monday by Democratic Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York and Democratic Sen. Alex Padilla of California, the ranking member of a Senate committee overseeing federal elections. It features screenshots and transcripts of a DHS training for a group of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services staffers, whom it says were forced in late August to drop their other work, complete a less than two-hour training and begin running DHS-provided lists of individuals through state voter registration systems to find “unlawful voters.” The whistleblower contends that agents have been asked to review 40 individuals per day, giving them about 12 minutes to determine whether each person is a legal voter and create federal records of anyone who is not. Padilla and Schumer said Monday the initiative was an example of President Donald Trump attempting to interfere in elections and that the short timelines would impede officials from conducting proper investigations. They noted that the data DHS has on voters can be unreliable and differ from state records, making any federal findings based on that data potentially problematic. “We just got more proof of Trump’s vile schemes to rig our elections,” Schumer told reporters in a news conference. “The lengths Trump will go to cheat, lie and steal in this upcoming election are simply beyond the pale.” The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Trump administration has been targeting noncitizen voting to allege it could be a source of significant fraud during the midterm elections, even as research shows voting by people who are not citizens is extremely rare. Trump has been pushing for the U.S. Postal Service to send mail ballots only to voters verified as U.S. citizens, and his Justice Department has sued to force the release of detailed voter data in 30 states and the District of Columbia, though it has not yet succeeded in those cases. The whistleblower report details an effort by the federal government to work around a lack of data from the states by directing Citizenship and Immigration Services employees to pose as individual voters to access their state voter records. Some states, such as Virginia, explicitly limit their voter lookup tools to individuals who attest under penalty of law that they are looking up their own records. In other states, like California, personally identifiable information such as a driver’s license number or partial Social Security number is needed to look up individual voter records. The whistleblower said that when officers raised concerns about liability for searching the tools against state guidance, agency leaders told them to proceed with the searches anyway. Schumer and Padilla on Sunday sent a letter to DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin requesting more information about the initiative and demanding that it be stopped. DHS didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. But earlier this month, when an immigrant rights group sued the administration to block the agency from using federal databases that it alleged were being used to target naturalized citizens, a DHS spokesperson told The Associated Press it is “laser focused on prosecuting and removing aliens who vote and preventing the dilution of the votes of U.S. citizens.” “The department accessed publicly available data from states’ voter rolls and cross referenced them with known illegal aliens in our systems,” the spokesperson said at the time. “It’s not rocket science; it’s an easy step to secure our elections.” The New York Times first reported on the DHS initiative in early September. For more information, visit us at https://www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com/.

States and cities sue Trump administration over policy restricting green card benefits

A coalition of 22 states and the District of Columbia sued the Trump administration on Monday over a new policy that would allow individual immigration officers to deny green cards based on use of public benefits. The new policy changes a long-established “public charge” rule, which dates back to the Immigration Act of 1882, established to ensure that newcomers to the country would be able to provide for themselves without relying on governmental benefits. During his first term, the Trump administration attempted to impose a similar policy that likewise widened the number of categories immigration officers could consider, including Medicaid, food stamps and housing vouchers. That policy was also met with legal challenges and subsequently reversed by Joe Biden’s administration. “Hardworking families should not be forced to go without the support they need because they fear asking for assistance will get them deported,” said New York attorney general Letitia James in a statement. “This rule preys on that fear and counts on families forfeiting the food assistance, health care coverage, and other public benefits to which they are legally entitled. My office fought this exact policy once before and won, and we are leading the nation to ensure the Trump administration cannot inflict this harm on families again.” The new change is more expansive than the previous attempt. This time, it does not specify which safety nets should be considered and allows immigration officers to consider government benefits that are applied for on behalf of family members, including children who are US citizens. Many immigrants without green cards are already ineligible for public benefits programs despite paying into them. However, US citizen children are legally eligible for such benefits, regardless of their parents’ status. Historically, however, immigration officers did not include the use of benefits like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (Snap) or Medicaid in their assessment. The new policy would reverse that practice, decreasing the number of federal programs that are available to non-green card-holding immigrants. “Congress never intended for the public charge ground to be weaponized against immigrants and their family members who merely use supplemental or temporary amounts of public assistance to which they are lawfully entitled. Yet that is exactly what Defendants now seek to do through the final rule challenged here,” the coalition wrote in their filing. The states’ filing argues that the impact of the policy change could be disastrous, noting that states would lose billions from the federal government because of the reduced use of Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (Chip). They also said citizens who live with noncitizens might avoid signing up for benefits, which would have both financial and health impacts. The states’ suit was brought by New York, California, Illinois, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, Nevada, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, Wisconsin and the District of Columbia. New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani is leading a coalition of cities, including Chicago, Seattle, San Francisco, Santa Clara county in California and King county in Washington, filing a similar lawsuit. “The new public charge rule seeks to push immigrant families away from the programs that have kept people fed and healthy for decades,” Mamdani said in a statement. “New Yorkers will be afraid to see a doctor or ask for help they are legally entitled to. That fear will not stop at the families that the federal government is targeting. Families who remain fully eligible for benefits will feel a chilling effect, and all New Yorkers will pay for it.” For more information, visit us at https://www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com/.

USCIS Forms Update Notice

Good afternoon, We recently updated the following USCIS form(s): Form G-1055, Fee Schedule 09/09/2026 10:28 AM EDT Edition Date: 09/09/26. You can find the edition date at the bottom of the page of Form G-1055, Fee Schedule. Form I-129, Petition for a Nonimmigrant Worker 09/09/2026 09:01 AM EDT Edition Date: 09/09/26. Starting Nov. 9, 2026, we will accept only the 09/09/26 edition. Until then, you can also use the 02/27/26 edition. You can find the edition date at the bottom of the page on the form and instructions. For more information, please visit our Forms Updates page.

Revealed: attorneys rally to free children held in US immigration custody

An army of attorneys is rallying to free hundreds of children from immigration custody, where they have been stranded indefinitely by the Trump administration without their parents or loved ones, the Guardian can reveal. The effort is a counter strike to what critics see as unprecedented moves by federal officials to ride roughshod over children’s rights and increase deportations – while in the meantime corralling them in conditions that can allegedly lead to psychological harm. About 1,900 kids who arrived in the US unaccompanied by a parent or guardian were under the federal government’s control across the country as of the end of August. From babies to teenagers, children have spent an average of 183 days – roughly six months – in shelters or long-term foster care, according to the government’s own data, despite many of them having family members in the United States anxiously awaiting their release as their legal cases proceed through the immigration system. Now, more than 50 legal organizations, firms and law offices have mobilized to join a mission they are calling the Children’s Due Process Project, where lawyers working pro bono head to federal courts to argue case-by-case that these kids are being detained unlawfully. The immediate goal is to use highly effective habeas corpus petitions to force federal officials to justify their actions in keeping the children in their custody or let them go, the Guardian has exclusively learned. “This is the most immediate way to help the kids who are currently being harmed,” said Becky Wolozin, senior attorney at the California-based National Center for Youth Law. Her group is co-managing the project, which started quietly this summer and has built up over recent months. Other managing organizations include the Acacia Center for Justice in Washington DC, The Door, a New York-based comprehensive youth development organization, and the Immigration and Human Rights Clinic at Loyola University Chicago School of Law. Attorneys are deploying petitions for a writ of habeas corpus for each child concerned – the legal procedure that allows any person to argue in court that they are being detained or confined without a valid reason – which have rarely been used or needed for immigrant kids in the US who have a vetted, willing person to receive and care for them, known as a sponsor, until now. The aggressive move is needed, the advocates argue, to fight against what has become a crisis of seemingly interminable stays in facilities affiliated with the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR), the agency tasked with ensuring the welfare of children who came to the US unaccompanied. At the same time, the administration defunded these kids’ existing attorneys last month and has scheduled accelerated immigration hearings where government lawyers are arguing for their abrupt removal from the US, before they can receive legal protections from other agencies. White silhouette of a child against a dark collage of a courtroom and judge’s gavel Inside the New York court where children face deportation without access to attorneys Read more “That’s the race that we’re in, is can we help children get to their families before they get chewed up and spit out by the child detention system?” Wolozin said. A spokesperson for the administration for children and families at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the parent agency of ORR, responded to a request for comment from the Guardian with a statement. “The standards that ORR currently follows closely mirror those of the US foster care system. Once a sponsor completes their application, ORR releases children as quickly, or faster, than the US foster system. ORR is not slow, we are just more careful, as we should be: children’s lives are at stake,” the statement said in part. US law says that unaccompanied immigrant children should “be promptly placed in the least restrictive setting that is in the best interest of the child”, which is typically with a family member already living in the US. But during Donald Trump’s second term, officials have devised new restrictions that make it harder – and in some states, effectively impossible – for children to go home to the sponsors waiting for them. They have also undone privacy protections for sponsors who are undocumented, allowing ORR to collaborate with immigration enforcement at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the parent agency of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and have even had parents detained at appointments that are part of the sponsorship process. “ORR has increased safety vetting measures for individuals applying to take custody of one or more children who arrived at the border alone. ORR is taking these advanced measures to ensure the safety of unaccompanied minors following investigations revealing that criminal smuggling organizations play a role in every case related to the entry of Unaccompanied Alien Children into the US,” the government’s statement said. Unaccompanied children often rely on a sophisticated smuggling network hired to get them safely to the US from their home countries, though that has little bearing on their situation – beyond potential financial debts owed to the smugglers – once they arrive stateside. By the end of July, at least 65 kids with continuing immigration court proceedings had been held by ORR for over a year, according to data researchers at the New York-based immigration data insights platform bklg.org who shared details with the Guardian. “There’s just attempts from every single angle to harm the children that are in federal custody. And I think because they’re in federal custody, the government has more access to them,” said Beth Baltimore, interim managing director of the legal services center at The Door, implying that when children are in ORR facilities, the Trump administration is able to exert more control over their futures. She added: “It’s really devastating to see the cruelty that’s taking place everywhere. This is not something that has happened en masse for children during other administrations.” Often called shelters, experts describe ORR’s facilities as the equivalent of detention for children. “Children are not allowed to leave. They have no contact with people outside of the place where they live. And so they eat, sleep, go to school, do activities all within one sort of small campus. In some cases, it’s a single building. And that’s their whole life,” Wolozin said. Kids “are being held against their will”, explained Ryan Matlow, a clinical associate professor at the California-based Stanford Medicine at Stanford University, which “create[s] the conditions for trauma and a lasting post traumatic stress response”. Trusted adults at the large, congregate shelters are hard to find for the children, as even well-meaning staffers “answer to ORR – and DHS by extension”, Wolozin said, talking about the agency’s new policies of information sharing with immigration enforcement. She remembers kids telling her how the walls to their rooms wouldn’t reach the ceilings of some large shelters. “You’re essentially sleeping in a cubicle, and there was constant noise.” Meanwhile, in Texas and Florida, the facilities are unlicensed. One former ORR shelter in Brownsville, Texas, now closed, was infamously housed in a repurposed Walmart Supercenter. To free the kids stuck in these conditions, attorneys with the Children’s Due Process Project are filing habeas petitions – often when sponsors have already gone through government security vetting, but the child is kept in federal custody anyway. Habeas petitions have become an increasingly regular practice for adults and families stuck in immigration custody in recent months, with widespread success in the federal district courts, which are part of the independent judiciary branch while immigration courts come under the Department of Justice. Attorneys are starting to see some fresh success with kids now, too. “Judges are basically asking, like, ‘What are you doing? This child should be with their family,’” Wolozin said. For more information, visit us at https://www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com/.

Trump $103,000 H-1B Charge Tests Bounds of Fee-Setting Authority

The latest Trump effort to impose new costs for skilled foreign workers makes unprecedented use of statutory fee-setting powers, aiming to recoup immigration system expenses far beyond the H-1B visa program. The Department of Homeland Security this week proposed a $103,265 charge for hiring new specialty occupation H-1B workers, citing authority under the Immigration and Nationality Act to set fees offsetting costs of services. But those provisions have never been used to add such steep pricetags on immigration benefits or to collect revenue for other agencies that have their own congressional funding and applicant fees. Whether US Citizenship and Immigration Services, which administers the H-1B program, can charge fees on behalf of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, US Customs and Border Protection, the Department of Labor, and other entities will be central to litigation over the proposal, attorneys said. “I am not optimistic that the DHS will prevail in said litigation,” said Leon Fresco, a partner at Holland & Knight. DHS proposed the fee after a federal judge vacated a 2025 White House proclamation that slapped a six-figure charge on H-1B workers hired from outside the US, finding it an illegal tax. The new fee would impact an even wider swath of candidates for the program and apply to recent US college graduates who were spared the $100,000 charge under the proclamation. USCIS said the fee would offset expenses incurred across multiple agencies “that otherwise must be funded by taxpayers.” Although the new fee relies on different statutory authority than the proclamation and will proceed through the formal rulemaking process, attorneys and legal experts said it’s no less vulnerable to legal challenge. Offsetting Costs The INA directs DHS to review its application fees every two years for various immigration and foreign worker benefits. The agency most recently updated fees for immigration services, including the H-1B program, in 2024, hiking petition fees for those specialty occupation workers to $780 — on top of a $215 charge to register for the annual visa lottery. Since then, Congress authorized more than $150 billion in new funding for ICE and other Homeland Security subagencies last year, and added another $70 billion to back the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in June. Still, DHS relies on the same statutory provision of earlier fee rules, Section 286(m) of the INA, to argue it’s permitted to set fees reflecting the full range of federal activities connected to the immigration system, even work unrelated in any way to the H-1B program. “We haven’t seen that before,” said Shev Dalal-Dheini, director of government relations at the American Immigration Lawyers Association. “ICE, CBP, DOL have their own appropriated funding for this work.” It’s an “aggressive” interpretation of fee-setting provisions of the statute, said Jason Levy, counsel at Grossman Hammond Young. “It creates real problems, I think, for their interpretation of the main authorities they’re using,” said Levy, a former senior counsel at the DHS Office of General Counsel. “They’re going to have to contend with some really tough challenges.” While the rule may be unprecedented use of fee authority, that doesn’t mean it’s outside the bounds of the agency’s power to recoup costs, said George Fishman, a senior fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies, a think tank that advocates for restricting migration levels. “It’s a foregone conclusion in my mind at least that it will be enjoined by some lower court,” said Fishman, a former acting chief counsel at USCIS. “I could see the Supreme Court going either way.” Tax Powers The White House’s $100,000 fee proclamation last year made novel use of the president’s authority to restrict entry of foreign nationals in the US under Section 212(f) of the INA, a provision that was also used to impose a travel ban currently targeting 39 countries. In multiple suits, groups challenging that fee argued it was arbitrary and exceeded the executive’s powers. They also claimed it wielded tax authority exclusive to Congress, an argument that found traction with a Boston judge in June after the US Supreme Court ruled against President Donald Trump’s global tariffs regime on similar grounds. The administration is appealing that decision. Fresco, a former deputy assistant attorney general in the Department of Justice’s Office of Immigration Litigation, said the government’s work defending the latest fee proposal in court will be made even tougher by factors like the history of the previous H-1B charge under 212(f). Statements from Trump officials — among them Vice President J.D. Vance — also provide opportunities for plaintiffs to claim the fee is pretextual, he said. “They’re saying the purpose of the fee is to have employers hire Americans,” Fresco said. Critics of the DHS proposal also predicted it will suffer from the same flaw as the White House proclamation — that it’s a tax without permission from Congress. That doesn’t change because the fee is being proposed through the formal rulemaking process, said Greg Siskind, a partner at Siskind Susser LLP. “Fees have to be connected to the actual service that’s being provided by a federal agency, otherwise it’s a tax,” he said. For more information, visit us at https://www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com/.

DHS Proposes Additional H-1B Fee

WASHINGTON— The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is proposing to establish a $103,265 fee for all H-1B cap-subject petitions, including those eligible for the advanced degree exemption. The proposed fee would be paid at the time of filing and would be imposed in addition to all other applicable fees or payments. The proposed fee would generate revenue to recover a portion of the federal government’s costs for administering the lawful immigration system. These costs include adjudication of immigration benefits, fraud detection and national security vetting, systems modernization, records and fee collection operations, immigration court operations, consular visa processing, labor standards enforcement, and interagency coordination. DHS estimates the proposed fee would generate approximately $8.8 billion annually, based on a projected annual volume of 85,000 H-1B cap-subject petitions. “The proposed H‑1B fee is intended to recover the costs incurred across the federal government to adjudicate, vet, and support lawful immigration programs that otherwise must be funded by taxpayers,” said U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services spokesperson Zach Kahler. Under the proposed rule, the additional fee would not apply to H-1B petitions that are not subject to the cap, such as petitions filed by certain nonprofit research organizations, governmental research organizations, and institutions of higher education. The number of cap-subject H-1B visas (or grants of status) issued annually is limited to 65,000, with an additional 20,000 for aliens who have earned a master’s or higher degree from a U.S. institution of higher education. For more information, visit us at https://www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com/.

Fourth Circuit upholds injunction barring immigration arrests at some houses of worship

RICHMOND, Va. (CN) — The Fourth Circuit upheld Tuesday an injunction barring immigration officials from adopting a relaxed policy on enforcement actions in places of worship. The injunction, sought by groups of Quakers, Sikhs and the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, came after the U.S. Department of Homeland Security rescinded a longstanding policy of limiting immigration enforcement actions at or near houses of worship in January 2025. The injunction, granted by a Maryland-based federal judge, requires the department to revert to prior guidelines articulated in 2021 under Joe Biden. “This is an important victory for religious liberty,” Selden Smith, the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of Religious Society of Friends presiding clerk, said in a statement. “Our Quaker form of worship, in which all ministry emerges from the congregation, is strengthened by the presence of immigrants and threatened by the prospect of ICE raids.” The 2025 decision, announced in a memorandum from then-acting Secretary of Homeland Security Benjamine Huffman, instructed immigration officials to use discretion and common sense when deciding whether to conduct enforcement actions in sensitive areas. The groups argue the threat of arrest or harassment by federal agents has made some members fearful of attending worship services, infringing on their right to religious liberty. The Quakers, formerly known as the Religious Society of Friends, further claim the presence of armed law enforcement officers near meetinghouses violates their pacifist beliefs. Senior U.S. Circuit Judge Barbara Keenan agreed with the lower court that the new policy likely violates the plaintiffs’ rights under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and their First Amendment right to expressive association. “It reasonably can be predicted that many immigrants will decide not to attend the plaintiffs’ houses of worship because of the new policy,” the Barack Obama appointee said. The 2021 policy issued by then-Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas required agents to seek approval from their agency before taking an enforcement action near a house of worship except in circumstances including threats to national security or the pursuit of a personally observed border-crosser. The policy also instructed agents to avoid taking enforcement actions near places of worship to the fullest extent possible. The government spent much of its appeal arguing the groups lacked the standing required for injunctive relief. “Under the District Court’s reasoning, religious communities would have standing — and suffer constitutional injury — whenever the government takes any action that incidentally reduces attendance at their services, from the enforcement of criminal laws resulting in the arrest of congregants to economic policies that prompt individuals to work rather than worship,” the government wrote in its brief. “That result is plainly untenable.” The government argued the plaintiffs couldn’t prove the Huffman memorandum, rather than President Donald Trump’s other immigration enforcement initiatives, caused declines in attendance. Keenan ruled the plaintiffs need not show the Huffman memorandum was the sole reason for the decline in attendance. “The present plaintiffs showed that they already have experienced a decline in immigrant attendance at their houses of worship after issuance of the 2025 policy, and that immigrants, as well as other congregants, have stated that they are less likely to attend future services because of this policy,” Keenan said. Keenan cited the Supreme Court’s 2019 ruling in Department of Commerce v. New York. The Supreme Court ruled against the Trump administration, which sought to add a question to the 2020 census asking whether respondents are United States citizens. A group of states, counties and cities challenged the question on the theory that it would reduce participation and lead to an inaccurate population count. The high court rejected the government’s argument that the contentions were too speculative because they relied on third parties’ independent action. The majority held the plaintiffs provided enough evidence that noncitizen households have historically responded to the census at lower rates, making a decline in participation predictable because of the citizenship question. “The government’s argument in the present case about the predictable effect of the 2025 policy is even weaker than its losing argument in Department of Commerce,” Keenan said. The government also attacked redressability, arguing the injunction won’t cure the purported injuries because immigration officials can still conduct enforcement actions inside houses of worship under the 2021 guidance, albeit with more hurdles. Keenan held the plaintiffs cleared what she defined as a low bar of redressability. “As a matter of logic, at least some of the immigrants, who report they will not visit houses of worship because of the new directive articulated in the 2025 policy, will return to the plaintiffs’ houses of worship if DHS reinstates its old policy limiting enforcement actions at those locations,” Keenan said. Beyond standing, the government also disputed that the Huffman memorandum violates the plaintiffs’ rights under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. “The Huffman memorandum treats houses of worship the same as other common locations,” the government said. “It does not bar anyone from attending church, and plaintiffs’ parishioners’ alleged fear of immigration enforcement at plaintiffs’ houses of worship is no more than the incidental result of neutral and generally applicable government action.” Keenan disagreed with the assertion that the Huffman memorandum, which states “criminals will no longer be able to hide in America’s schools and churches to avoid arrest,” doesn’t aim to increase enforcement actions at places of worship. “The evidence showed that this increased threat of immigration enforcement at the plaintiffs’ houses of worship has resulted in substantial pressure on the plaintiffs to violate numerous beliefs,” Keenan said. The lower court declined to issue a nationwide injunction, instead limiting the ruling to the churches, meetinghouses and gurdwaras operated by the plaintiffs, including Quaker societies in Philadelphia, Baltimore and New York. U.S. Circuit Judge Pamela Harris, another Obama appointee, completed the panel. The government did not respond to a request for comment. “Religious freedom is not conditional, and it protects us when we gather to worship within a church, meeting house, temple or other house of worship,” Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, which represented the plaintiffs, said in a statement. “This decision reaffirms that the Trump-Vance administration cannot force people of faith to abandon their ministries or make people worship under the constant threat of indiscriminate enforcement activities.” For more information, visit us at https://www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com/.

University Groups File Immigration Lawsuit To Block Student Rule

University groups and labor unions have filed a lawsuit to block an immigration rule limiting F-1 and J-1 visa holders to fixed four-year periods. The final rule, published in July 2026, limits how long students can study in the United States without obtaining new permission from the U.S. government by eliminating the previous policy known as “duration of status.” Today, international students are admitted for a time to pursue a course of study, meaning they can generally stay in the United States after entering as an undergraduate, going on to a master’s and then a Ph.D., without relying on new government approvals. The new rule is part of the Trump administration’s policy to restrict all categories of legal immigration and certain temporary visa categories. The lawsuit seeks to overturn the rule before it is implemented. PROMOTED Economists and educators say the administration’s final rule will reduce international student enrollment, weaken American universities’ finances and deprive companies of talent. President Trump has spoken about the benefits of international students to America, but that’s not reflected in the rule. At U.S. universities, international students account for 80% of full-time graduate students in computer and information sciences, 75% in electrical and computer engineering, 62% in mathematics, and statistics and a majority in industrial engineering, civil engineering and mechanical engineering, according to National Science Foundation data. MORE FOR YOU ‘I Want Things To Always Be Right Between Us,’ Natalie Harp Reportedly Wrote To Trump Democratic Socialist Angie Nixon Scores Major Upset In Florida Senate Primary Northern Lights Could Be Visible From These 9 States Wednesday Frase By Forbes The plaintiffs in the case are the Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration; NAFSA: Association of International Educators; Association of Independent Colleges and Universities in Massachusetts; American Federation of Teachers; Graduate Labor Organization, AFT Local 6516; The NewsGuild-CWA; International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers of America; and United Auto Workers Local 2322. Dana McSherry and Paul Hughes of McDermott Will & Emery are counsel for the plaintiffs. The case was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts. “The rule will severely undermine the contributions international students make to U.S. campuses, economies and national security,” said Fanta Aw, executive director and CEO of NAFSA: Association of International Educators, in a statement. CEO: C-suite news, analysis, and advice for top decision makers right to your inbox. Email Address Sign Up By signing up, you agree to receive this newsletter, other updates about Forbes and its affiliates’ offerings, our Terms of Service (including resolving disputes on an individual basis via arbitration), and you acknowledge our Privacy Statement. Forbes is protected by reCAPTCHA, and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. “We are going to court to protect international students and scholars and to defend our member institutions’ ability to educate, train, and retain them,” said Miriam Feldblum, president and CEO of the Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, in a statement. The video player is currently playing an ad. Immigration Lawsuit Filed To Block Duration Of Status Final Rule In a complaint and preliminary injunction motion filed on Tuesday, Aug. 18, plaintiffs ask for summary judgment and vacatur of the final rule. They argue the plaintiffs are likely to succeed and that the court should set aside the final rule. “For more than four decades, ‘duration of status’ has been the cornerstone of the United States’ framework for admitting international students, as well as exchange visitors and representatives of foreign media,” the plaintiffs argue in their complaint. “Under this proven system, F, J, and I nonimmigrants may remain in the country for the length of their program, not some arbitrary fixed end date. This flexible approach has allowed the United States to stay competitive in the global marketplace for academic talent, and rescues universities and immigration officials from thickets of red tape.” The plaintiffs state that the final rule “dismantles that framework, replacing duration of status with a rigid system of fixed admission periods arbitrarily capped at four years,” requiring “discretionary extensions of stay from an already overwhelmed federal immigration bureaucracy with no certainty that an extension necessary to complete the degree program they have invested in attaining will be granted.” In its replies to comments in the Federal Register, DHS demonstrated the lack of certainty students should have about the ability to extend their stay beyond four years, writing, “Students who demonstrate continued academic progress and meet F-1 eligibility criteria may apply for an extension of status to complete their programs, consistent with the realities of U.S. higher education.” (Emphasis added.) DHS stated students “may apply for an extension,” but does not promise or provide regulatory language to indicate that they have a high probability of receiving one. “The Final Rule takes a wrecking ball to many other provisions as well: it prohibits graduate students from changing academic programs, bars all students from pursuing degrees at the same or lower educational level after completing a prior degree, restricts transfers and program changes for undergraduates, and halves the post-completion grace period for F-1 students from 60 to 30 days,” according to the complaint. The plaintiffs state that the changes will be “catastrophic for universities, international students and scholars, and the Nation as a whole.” The new rule “will discourage foreign students and other nonimmigrants from coming to the United States, repelled by the intolerable prospect of losing lawful immigration status partway through their studies.” The complaint details the economic and other losses they expect the final rule to cause. They point to National Foundation for American Policy research by University of North Florida economics professor Madeline Zavodny that found, on average, for every one international undergraduate student enrolled at a public university, two additional U.S. students enroll as well. The complaint cites NFAP research that concluded approximately one-quarter of U.S. billion-dollar companies have at least one founder who entered as an international student. The plaintiffs also point to NAFSA research that found every three international students enrolled creates an additional U.S. job. “Commenters warned that if the predicted decline in enrollment—or anything close to it—in fact occurred, the consequences would be catastrophic for institutions of higher education and the Nation as a whole,” according to the complaint. “NAFSA and many other commenters noted that a study by three immigration experts (the “Clemens study”) estimated that within 10 years of eliminating duration of status, the economic costs of eliminating duration of status would reach $72-145 billion annually, dwarfing the total costs DHS quantified in the Proposed Rule (and the Final Rule). NAFSA referenced another study by the same experts predicting that, because of the importance of STEM international students to the U.S. economy, eliminating duration of status would contribute (alongside other policy changes) to lost productivity growth amounting to $220–439 billion per year by year 10.” The studies referenced in the comment were by Michael Clemens, Amy Nice and Jeremy Neufeld. DHS “acknowledge[d] that the rule may adversely affect U.S. competitiveness” but asserted that “DHS does not intend for the rule to cause significant impacts on enrollment,” according to the plaintiffs’ memorandum in support of its legal action. It cites case law to argue that it is “irrelevant” whether DHS intended to reduce enrollment significantly. The plaintiffs, citing earlier court decisions, state that “An agency … cannot simply state it ‘believes’ something to be true—against the weight of all the evidence before it—without further support.” An agency also “cannot ignore evidence that undercuts its judgment; and it may not minimize such evidence without adequate explanation.” The Arguments In The Immigration Lawsuit Plaintiffs argue the final rule and the changes it enacts are “arbitrary and capricious,” making it unlawful under the Administrative Procedure Act. “They rest on purported justifications—national security concerns and preventing abuse of the system—that derive from scattered anecdotes and minuscule portions of the affected nonimmigrant population,” according to the complaint. “Simply put, DHS has failed to identify any concrete, systemic problem with the existing duration of status system that would justify a complete regulatory overhaul affecting more than two million nonimmigrants annually and likely to cost the Nation’s economy tens of billions of dollars each year.” The plaintiffs assert that DHS’s cost-benefit analysis is “fundamentally defective” because the agency acknowledged billions of dollars in costs but identified no quantified costs over ten years. It instead described “the purported benefits of the rulemaking only qualitatively—likely because those supposed benefits, which are based on nothing more than anecdote and make little sense even on their own terms, would be dwarfed by even the acknowledged costs of the Final Rule.” The plaintiffs make a strong argument in noting, “DHS also refused to quantify—and therefore largely disregarded altogether—the greatest harm of the Final Rule: the foreseeable decline in international student enrollment.” The complaint notes the administration received almost 22,000 comments. “Yet DHS’s responses to these comments were consistently conclusory, circular, and nonresponsive. That is, rather than the meaningful engagement with the regulated public and deliberative process mandated by the Administrative Procedure Act, DHS here appears to have engaged in an exercise of close-minded justification of a preordained result, batting away reams and reams of public commentary explaining why that result was misguided. But the APA demands more.” The plaintiffs cite DHS’s use of anecdotes that ignore the limited scope of its examples and its unwillingness to implement less disruptive alternatives. “The National Foundation for American Policy likewise noted that DHS’s reference to a small subset of nonimmigrants—’2,100 aliens [which] would equal 0.067% of the estimated 3.1 million people who may have entered the United States as F-1 students on visas between 2000 and 2010’—is unreliable, particularly where ‘DHS does not allege these 2,100 students have violated the law but only ‘the spirit of the law,’” according to the complaint. NFAP’s comment to the rule noted DHS could address longer-term students, to the extent they are an area of concern, by reviewing or requiring extensions for those in the United States for 8 or 10 years. NFAP noted this would address the issue DHS raised without burdening the other 99% of international students. “Regarding DHS’s reliance on visa overstay rates to argue that eliminating duration of status was necessary, numerous commenters noted that the overstay rates of F, J, and I non-immigrants are low to begin with and that ‘DHS itself found that with more time to update records, the apparent ‘overstay’ numbers dropped dramatically; by 42% over a 15-month update period for F, J, M visas,’” according to the complaint. The complaint notes, “Commenters also pointed out that DHS’s anecdotal examples were illogical. For instance, with respect to national security, the National Foundation for American Policy contended that ‘DHS’s argument is not credible’ as ‘[i]f individuals represent national security concerns, hoping that they apply for an extension after four years so that an immigration officer can review their application is a woeful or even absurd security measure. Under DHS’s reasoning, if the proposed rule is finalized, all a national security threat needs to do to avoid scrutiny is to complete their academic program quickly enough to prevent the need to file for an extension.’” NFAP provided several alternatives that DHS could have considered to address national security concerns. These alternatives included using intelligence to engage in enhanced surveillance or verification of individuals it identifies as a concern, including checking the activities and academic progress of such individuals every 6 months. DHS can conduct interviews or liaise with campus personnel on an ongoing basis to ensure that concerns about individuals or countries of interest are addressed. DHS could develop a new interagency task force that includes the FBI to gather information on international students and exchange visitors for counterintelligence and counterespionage purposes, or to address other national security issues. “These alternatives—and there are additional alternatives—would be more effective and are more plausible for addressing national security or fraud concerns than DHS relying on an adjudicator or other immigration specialist to review the academic progress of an international student or exchange visitor only if they request an extension of stay, which would likely be four years after individuals enter the United States,” noted the NFAP comment. Other commenters echoed this point. “As another commenter put it: ‘a true threat actor could easily plan their activities within a 4-year window or file an extension with perfectly clean paperwork. Meanwhile, thousands of innocent students would be treated as potential threats by default,’” according to the complaint. “And one commenting college remarked: ‘It seems irrational that an F-1 visa holder seeking to harm U.S. national security would suddenly become a more significant danger after the four-year cap as opposed to posing a danger immediately upon entry.’” The plaintiffs criticized DHS’s approach to comments. “In short, commenters addressed the few data points and anecdotes DHS offered to justify the Proposed Rule, and showed that each was lacking.” “In response to all these points, DHS asserts simply that it broadly ‘disagrees with the general premise of these comments,’” according to plaintiffs. “DHS notes that it ‘provided specific examples of fraud, national security concerns, and nonimmigrant students remaining in the United States for lengthy periods of time under the D/S framework,’ but does not discuss commenters’ points that these anecdotes and data points are unsupportive. Again, DHS entirely failed to consider aspects of commenters’ objections and provide a reasoned and reasonable response.’” A judge will need to issue a decision on the immigration lawsuit quickly if the rule is to be blocked before its effective date of Sept. 15. For more information, visit us at https://www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com/.

Trump Officials Now Restricting All Legal Immigration Categories

The Trump administration is restricting all legal immigration categories in an effort to reduce the flow of immigrants to America. The restrictions include freezes by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and State Department officials refusing to process applications abroad. The policies affect U.S. citizens sponsoring spouses, children and other family members to join them in America, as well as employers seeking workers. Analysts note the U.S. economy requires more workers to grow, but the administration's actions reduce the labor supply. Led by White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, the chief architect of Donald Trump's immigration agenda, the policies are having a significant impact. "The Trump administration's policies will reduce legal immigration to the United States by an estimated 33% to 50%, or by 1.5 million to 2.4 million legal immigrants, by the end of Donald Trump's four-year term," according to a January 2026 National Foundation for American Policy analysis. An earlier NFAP report factored in labor contraction due to other immigration policies, including on deportation and ending Temporary Protected Status, and concluded, "Due to fewer workers in the labor force, the Trump administration's immigration policies would lead to a potential labor loss to the U.S. economy of approximately 19 million worker years by 2028 and 102 million worker years by 2035. The policies would reduce the projected cumulative goods and services produced in America by $1.9 trillion, or $5,612 per person, from 2025 to 2028, and by $12.1 trillion, or $34,369 per person, from 2025 to 2035." The analysis found the policies would also reduce economic growth by approximately one-third and increase the federal debt. Immigration Restrictions Cut Across Categories The Trump administration's policies affect all immigration categories. Trump officials have refused to process cases for approximately 55,000 Diversity Visas, a category the administration sought to eliminate during Donald Trump's first term. Instead of trying again to change or abolish the category through legislation, officials have barred anyone from entering or adjusting status as a Diversity Visa winner. Then-DHS Secretary Kristi Noem justified suspending the category by citing a shooter at Brown University who gained permanent residence in the Diversity Visa lottery eight years earlier. The individual killed two people at Brown, an MIT professor and himself. The Washington Post editorialized, "Taken together, the Trump policy seems to be: wait for something bad to happen, and then restrict as much immigration as possible." Applicants enter the lottery from countries underrepresented in other immigration categories. Israel, Australia, Finland, France and Japan are among the places with citizens eligible for the FY 2026 Diversity Visa lottery. Despite lawsuits, it appears the administration will run out the clock and nullify the category. "Selectees who do not receive visas or status by September 30, 2026, will derive no further benefit from their DV-2026 registration," according to the State Department. The Trump administration also has stopped all refugees from entering the United States except white people from South Africa. Allowing only white people to become refugees is a development even Trump's fiercest critics failed to predict before Trump's second term. NFAP estimates that by freezing and then reducing annual refugee admission levels to well below the 125,000 ceiling established in the last year of the Biden administration, the Trump administration reduced projected legal immigration by about 470,000 over four years. The most significant impact of a Dec. 16 proclamation will be on the individuals affected, employers that wish to hire them, U.S. citizens who want to sponsor close relatives for immigration and U.S. universities hoping to enroll these individuals as students. Under the proclamation, nationals of 39 countries cannot enter the United States, to varying degrees, on immigrant or temporary visas. The 39 countries include Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation, Zimbabwe, Venezuela, Afghanistan and Haiti. On January 14, 2026, the administration announced, "The State Department will pause immigrant visa processing from 75 countries whose migrants take welfare from the American people at unacceptable rates. The freeze will remain active until the U.S. can ensure that new immigrants will not extract wealth from the American people." There is overlap between the 75 countries on the "freeze" list and the 39 countries in the Dec. 16 proclamation, totaling 93 countries across the two lists. According to the NFAP analysis, 481,460 individuals from the 93 countries received permanent residence in FY 2023, including 206,550 as spouses, children or parents in the Immediate Relatives of U.S. Citizens category. In June, a federal judge vacated the USCIS policy of holding and declining to adjudicate applications from many countries and categories, including asylum, in Dorcas International Institute of Rhode Island v. USCIS. In July, a federal district court also denied the Trump administration's motion to stay the ruling. More in Politics A NATO commander says training Ukrainian soldiers is showing his forces that skills neglected after the Cold War matter again Business Insider 97 Forty-five Reapers lost as Iran's defenses expose a costly weakness TechRadar 696 House Republican on USS Abraham Lincoln concerns: ‘I don’t make much of it’ The Hill 673 Candle Light Inn trivago Ad Three class action lawsuits have upcoming motions or hearings challenging the policies. Red Eagle Law v. Edlow in the Northern District of California challenges the USCIS policy of holding and refusing to process applications for individuals from numerous countries. Curtis Morrison of Red Eagle Law notes in an interview that the Dorcas decision enjoins the USCIS holds, but the government has appealed that order. Judge Charles R. Breyer took the hearing off the calendar and will decide on the briefs, said Morrison. Medani et al. v Trump, also in the Northern District of California, challenges the Diversity Visa category suspension and holds. A hearing is set for August 27 with Judge Edward J. Davila. Syed et al. v Trump in the California Central District challenges the 75-country suspension. A hearing is set for September 21 with Judge John A. Kronstadt. Red Eagle Law is lead counsel on the three class actions. The government failed to respond to Red Eagle Law's motions for preliminary injunction and to certify the class by the August 10 deadline in Syed et al. v Trump. Judge Kronstadt wrote, "Consequently, on or before August 19, 2026, Defendants shall file any oppositions or notice of non-opposition to the Motions. If no oppositions are filed by that deadline, the Motions will be deemed unopposed." Using The Public Charge Rule To Restrict Immigration In July 2026, Trump officials published a final rule on "public charge." DHS rescinded the 2022 public charge ground of inadmissibility in favor of granting government officials greater freedom to deny individuals permanent residence in the United States. As a result, U.S. citizens will likely be blocked from sponsoring a spouse, child, parent or sibling based on speculation of future earnings or public benefits use. This will happen even though family-based immigrants experience rapid earnings growth and are typically ineligible for federal means-tested benefits for their first five years in the U.S. or longer. "Real earnings increased by 76% over 12 years for immigrants from countries where family sponsorship is the primary method of immigrating to the United States," according to an NFAP study by economist Mark Regets. "The public charge rule would provide even more discretion to officers to deny adjustment of status applications in light of the USCIS memo that indicates that adjustment of status requires extraordinary discretion," according to an analysis by immigration attorneys Cyrus Mehta and Damira Zhanatova. "The Trump administration has been open about disfavoring immigration to the U.S., whether legal or illegal. The new public charge rule provides the Trump administration another powerful tool to restrict legal immigration to the U.S." In a new Board of Immigration Appeals decision, the Trump administration has stated that individuals will no longer be allowed to leave the country on advance parole and reenter the United States with lawful admission. This could prevent a DACA recipient from marrying a U.S. citizen and gaining permanent residence after leaving on advance parole and returning with a lawful entry, notes Charles Kuck of Kuck Baxter. In an effort to meet arrest quotas, Immigration and Customs Enforcement is arresting people with pending applications, including individuals sponsored for permanent residence by their U.S. spouse. Miriam Jordan of the New York Times reported on a Russian-born woman with a green card application pending after applying for asylum and marrying an American citizen. ICE arrested her off a domestic flight and placed her in detention. "Trump 2.0 is actively choosing to persecute a U.S. citizen and his future-citizen spouse, while diverting law enforcement resources away from actual lawbreakers," said Doug Rand, a former DHS official, in a statement. Employer-sponsored immigrants are also facing new problems. A proposed rule may price many H-1B visa holders and employment-based immigrants out of the U.S. labor market by changing prevailing wage levels. A rule placed on the regulatory agenda to change labor certification could make it more difficult for employment-based immigrants to obtain permanent residence by expanding employer obligations for PERM or permanent labor certification. Trump officials have significantly reduced legal immigration in 2026 and will continue to do so in 2027 and 2028. American citizens barred from living in the United States with close family members, including spouses, will bear the brunt of the policies, along with the economy. "What amazes me about Trump's mass deportation agenda is how much of the focus and financial resources are really on eliminating legal immigration," said Curtis Morrison of Red Eagle Law. "And they're not embarrassed about that." This article was originally published on Forbes.com View comments (79) Terms and Privacy PolicyYour Privacy ChoicesCA Privacy NoticeAbout Our Ads Up next The Independent Follow Trump has this to worry about if Congress flips in the midterm elections John Bowden Tue, August 18, 2026 at 3:14 PM PDT 5 min read Add Yahoo as a preferred source to see more of our stories on Google. Add Yahoo on Google 793 Key takeawaysPowered by Yahoo Scout. Yahoo is using AI to generate key points from this article. This means the info may not always match what’s in the article. Reporting mistakes helps us improve the experience. Donald Trump fears Democrats regaining power in Congress, which could lead to a third impeachment effort and the reshaping of government. See more Donald Trump has told voters his greatest fear: Should Democrats return to power in both chambers of Congress next year, he'll face a third impeachment effort, watch Democrats pack the Supreme Court and see his enemies end the legislative filibuster. What prominent Democrats on the Hill are promising, however, is something more akin to a death by a thousand cuts, as the constraints of Congress close around him. November's midterms are increasingly looking like they'll result in the worst possible outcome for Republicans: The destruction of two congressional majorities, including a hard-fought Senate majority that the GOP won with a crushing victory in the 2024 election cycle and election analysts, at the time, warned could require a multi-cycle effort by Democrats to undo. The 2026 map shifted quickly under Republicans' feet, however, driven by retirements, the interference of the president, and the recruitment of formidable Democratic candidates in red-purple states like Texas and Alaska. Just listen to Sen. Jim Justice, a conservative Republican, who warned his party in comments to reporters this week that the ongoing war with Iran was doing more damage to Republicans than they realized. "This situation in Iran is causing repercussions like you can't imagine," Justice told reporters on Monday, according to Punchbowl News. He added that his party was "scared to death about the midterms". But while the president warns of the expansion of a massive progressive effort to reshape government if his party loses, Democrats on key committees say that there are better ways to rein in Trump's more radical urges while still leaving open the possibility of taking positive action to reverse some of the reshaping that has already occurred, thanks to the efforts of Elon Musk's DOGE and the Trumpification of the Department of Justice. Rep. Grace Meng, a New York congresswoman and the senior Democrat on the Justice subcommittee of the powerful Appropriations panel, told The Independent that under a Democratic speaker, her committee and the chamber's Oversight panel would work together to halt efforts like the planned DoJ "anti-weaponization" fund, and the use of the Justice Department as the president's personal "criminal defense firm". "Oversight and appropriations go hand in hand," said Meng. "The process on the appropriations committee is not the most exciting necessarily, but we've been able to hold them accountable, and sometimes with our bipartisan Republican House colleagues." Meng said that the Appropriations process could be used to re-establish oversight on many parts of the administration which saw those guardrails eroded or removed over the course of 2025 and early 2026. Rep. Grace Meng said that Democrats can use the appropriations process to rein in Donald Trump (Getty) Rep. Grace Meng said that Democrats can use the appropriations process to rein in Donald Trump (Getty) "We will, for example, make sure that we are ramping up oversight for agencies like ICE," said the congresswoman. "It's not my subcommittee, but it's also part of the appropriations process." "There are a lot of ways, not necessarily the most sexy ways and the most exciting, but this is an effective way that we can hold them accountable." And the congresswoman predicted that Republicans would show more of an appetite to work with Democrats come January, especially if the president's approval ratings continue to slide, including among GOP voters. She cautioned, however, that GOP support, like the bipartisan opposition that emerged against the anti-weaponization fund, came with an asterisk attached. More in Politics Judge swapped in Trump's defamation case against BBC "I think it depends on, quite frankly, the way that let's say an amendment or a rider is written," said Meng. "Like the language that we use, so that it's not something that sounds like it's only targeting President Trump, but that would apply to all presidents in the future." On the issue of the actual investigations Democrats plan to launch, the list of targets is long. Among the most prominent are the Trump family's crypto schemes and the other lucrative financial dealings that caused his family's net worth to explode in 2025, the pardons issued by Trump after he took office for a second time, and the Trump administration's handling of the Epstein case — including the transfer of Ghislaine Maxwell to a lower-security facility around the time she spoke with Todd Blanche, the new attorney general. Plenty of other potential targets could follow. Democrats are still working to prevent Trump and Todd Blanche, his attorney general, from implementing a fund that could benefit January 6 rioters (AFP/Getty) Democrats are still working to prevent Trump and Todd Blanche, his attorney general, from implementing a fund that could benefit January 6 rioters (AFP/Getty) Jamie Raskin, a Maryland Democrat, served on the Oversight panel during Trump's first term and is now set to clash with Blanche on the Judiciary panel (Reuters) Jamie Raskin, a Maryland Democrat, served on the Oversight panel during Trump's first term and is now set to clash with Blanche on the Judiciary panel (Reuters) Democrats will likely find the Justice Department unwilling to enforce subpoenas they issue for administration officials or Trumpworld allies, but at the same time the White House and broader administration are unlikely to abandon the Hill entirely. Meng and Rep. Jamie Raskin, a Maryland Democrat serving as ranking member on the Judiciary Committee, both pointed to the firings of Trump Cabinet officials after appearances in congressional hearings as proof that their party could conduct effective oversight of the administration even if the DoJ wasn't, as Meng put it, a "willing partner". Raskin, who formerly served on the Oversight panel during Trump 1.0, is now one of the leading Democratic voices in the House against the potential DoJ fund to reward January 6 rioters. "Even in the minority, we have been playing offense against the Administration on a daily basis. The House Judiciary Committee has conducted oversight hearings with two cabinet secretaries—Attorney General Bondi and Secretary Noem. Both were fired shortly after Judiciary Committee Democrats powerfully exposed and condemned the corruption and lawlessness pervading the work of these two cabinet officials," Raskin told The Independent in an emailed statement. "Our efforts in this Congress will continue and expand next Congress. We already have a strong team of investigators and experienced counsel engaged in this work, and that capacity will expand significantly in the Majority." For more information, visit us at https://www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com/.