It's Not Just About Deporting Unauthorized Immigrants. Trump is Undermining Legal Immigration as Well.
And as usual, the point is to create chaos, confusion, cost and cruelty.
Trump has famously promised to initiate the largest deportation program in U.S. history. He repeated this promise during his recent address to Congress. So far, mass deportations have not materialized — not that the feds aren’t working on it. Indeed, hundreds of people have already been sent to, for example, El Salvador (even people who are not Salvadorean) or, more insidiously, to Guantánamo.
But there are a number of smaller changes to U.S. immigration policies and procedures that may have flown under the radar for most people (apart from immigration nerds like me). Some of these changes would appear to constitute serious human rights violations, while others are meant only to create chaos, cost and confusion. Here are just a few, for your edification.
Requiring Applications to be Made on New Forms With No Notice
Recently, the form used by foreign nationals to apply for adjustment of status to permanent residence was revised. On March 3, 2025, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced that effective immediately, adjustment applications made on a prior version of the form would be rejected — even those that had already been mailed when the announcement was made. In some cases, this could lead to applicants missing a required filing deadline, with potentially drastic consequences.
Adjustment of status applicants are people present in the United States who qualify for permanent residence, for example because they are married to a U.S. citizen, or because a U.S. employer has sponsored them. Usually when immigration forms are updated, there is a grace period during which applications submitted using an earlier version of the form will still be accepted. Truncating a grace period with immediate effect is unprecedented. In some cases, the result will “only” be money and time lost. In other cases, some applicants may miss out on their eligibility to adjust status, potentially putting them at risk of deportation.
In all cases, the simple act of refusing to accept a form that was valid when it was mailed to the government serves to instill fear and uncertainty about what could happen next.
Note: this new policy also applies to a number of other immigration-related forms.
Arresting People at Immigration Interviews or Check-ins
Anecdotally, I have learned from immigration lawyers in various online chat groups about clients of theirs who have appeared at immigration offices for green card interviews (for example, spouses of U.S. citizens) and been arrested and detained. The justification? In some cases, the person is “undocumented” until the application is approved, even though the law makes an exception for certain spouses of U.S. citizens that allows them to apply for permanent residence even if they have fallen out of legal immigration status. So instead of allowing them to proceed with the application that would legalize their status, the government is arresting them just before the interview that would have legalized them. (Is this really the message the government wants to be sending to people trying to legalize their status the “right way”?)
Similarly, some foreign nationals who for various reasons are required to appear at an immigration office for a regular check-in have been arrested when complying. So if you don’t show up for a required immigration interview or check-in, the government can track you down so they can detain and deport you. And if you do show up, the government may arrest you on the spot so they can detain and deport you.
Implementing a Catch-22 Registration Requirement
In another “Catch-22” type of scenario, the Trump administration has decided to revive a registration requirement that, while still on the books, has been dormant for decades: a requirement that all immigrants who did not enter with a visa register with the federal government after their arrival, and carry proof of their registration with them.
The problem is that there is no process in place for undocumented immigrants to register. Another issue is that it is not entirely clear who is already considered to be “registered” by virtue of some kind of legal status they may have obtained that is not an actual “visa.” It is also worth noting that it is a civil violation, not a crime, to be in the United States without legal immigration status. But failure to register will be deemed a crime, and could subject a person to a fine and/or imprisonment. This is basically the Trump administration’s back-door method of criminalizing unauthorized presence in the United States, without having to bother with silly impediments like, say, Congress actually changing the law.
So again, foreign nationals are being presented with an impossible choice. If you comply with this new requirement and register with the government, you are giving the government the information they need to find you and arrest and potentially deport you. If you do not comply, you could be found guilty of a crime.
Randomly Arresting People Who Look “Foreign”
Trump & Co. have said they are focusing their deportation efforts on undocumented “criminal aliens.” Never mind that labeling people “criminals” is a slippery slope, especially in light of recent legislation (the Laken Riley Act) that allows for the detention and deportation of foreign nationals who have merely been charged with a crime. Never mind that we’re not talking about Martians. And never mind that the Trump administration now considers all foreign nationals in the United States without authorization to be “criminals” — even though there is no provision in U.S. law that defines them as such. The truth is that people of all kinds — people never charged much less arrested or convicted of a crime, people who have legal immigration status, even people who are U.S. citizens — are being swept up in arbitrary arrests … on the streets, in the fields, at worksites and in their homes.
Revoking Temporary Protected Status From Venezuelans and Others
As many as 500,000 Haitians, 600,000 Venezuelans and thousands of people from Cuba and Nicaragua may lose their “temporary protected status” {TPS) in the United States. TPS is a type of humanitarian immigration status that can be extended to people from countries that the U.S. government deems unsafe due to war, natural disaster or some other extraordinary but temporary danger. Although a court order has temporarily halted the cancellation of TPS for Venezuelans, the administration’s intent has been made clear. Humanitarian protection that has previously been extended to vulnerable groups can be revoked, even if the dangers in the home country have not abated.
Planning to Revoke Humanitarian Immigration Relief Granted to Ukrainians
The Trump administration is also reported to be considering revoking the legal immigration status of up to 240,000 Ukrainians who were welcomed into the United States for humanitarian reasons during the Biden administration. This could put those Ukrainians on a fast track to deportation back to a country defending itself against Russia. In response to press reports about these plans, the White House denied that any decision had yet been made. But clearly they have been considering this.
Suspending Refugee Resettlement
One of Trump’s first acts upon taking office was to issue an executive order suspending the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program. Approximately 10,000 refugees from around the world who were literally about the board planes to the United States were stranded, including Afghans who had risked their lives by working for the U.S. government or military in Afghanistan. A few days later, the administration issued a stop work order that prohibited refugee resettlement agencies from providing services to refugees already in the United States. This has already led to staff layoffs at agencies, and to the cancellation of services to refugees in the United States, including cultural orientation, assistance with enrolling children in school, and more.
Using AI to Revoke Visas
The State Department is reportedly poised to start using Artificial Intelligence (AI) in an effort to potentially revoke visas from foreign students who purportedly support Hamas. Specifically, the government will be using AI to review tens of thousands of student visa holders’ social media accounts. It’s not clear how the government will decide if someone is “pro Hamas” but it will reportedly also be “check[ing] news reports of previous demonstrations against Israel’s policies.” One can only imagine how the use of AI to review posts made by foreign nationals on social media platforms could develop in the near future.
[Update: after I drafted this it was reported that a former Columbia University graduate student, who is a lawful permanent resident, was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement [ICE] at the direct request of the State Department. The student was reportedly a pro-Palestinian activist who had been involved in some of the demonstrations that took place at Columbia in the spring of 2024.]
Detaining Immigrant Families
The government plans to reopen a closed federal detention center in Dilley, Texas, in order to detain immigrant families. The facility’s owner, CoreCivic, expects to net approximately $180 million annually once the center is up and running again. Note that CoreCivic and other private prison companies were major donors to Trump’s campaign.
Called the South Texas Family Residential Center, the facility is actually a prison. I can attest to that through personal experience. Between 2014 and 2019, I made several week-long trips to Dilley to provide free legal services to asylum-seeking women and children who were held there. These were families, mostly from Central America, who typically had fled certain death in their home countries, or were protecting their children from forced conscription by criminal gangs. Upon arrival in the United States, they found to their surprise that rather than welcoming them, the U.S. government was putting them in prison camps. It wasn’t a pretty picture. My colleagues and I took to calling Dilley and similar facilities “baby jails”.
These are just a few examples of ways in which the Trump administration is sowing chaos and fear among immigrants, including foreign nationals who qualify for permanent residence or who were already accorded some kind of humanitarian immigration relief.
Think this doesn’t affect you? Think again. First they came for the immigrants….
Jesus fucking Christ.