Mass deportation plans

Trump’s mass deportation plans hit riskier phase with legal immigrants, court fights

The new strategy, especially involving immigrants with green cards or American spouses, poses political test.

By Myah Ward

President Donald Trump’s immigration agenda has reached a turning point in recent days, as the administration expands the group of immigrants it has targeted for removal, quarrels with judges and wades into increasingly risky political territory.

Trump spent his first weeks in office emphasizing a mass deportation campaign aimed at criminals who are in the country illegally.

But late last week, immigration agents arrested a Lebanese doctor on a legal visa, despite a court order temporarily blocking her immediate removal. That followed the detention of German tourists, a former Columbia University graduate student with a green card and multiple immigrants who are married to U.S. citizens or have long lived in the United States.

And even as the administration targeted a group of Venezuelans this weekend who officials said are affiliated with the Tren de Aragua gang, they used an archaic, war-time law to round them up and then seemingly ignored a judge’s order to halt deportation flights.

The striking shift has captured the public’s attention and is likely to define Trump’s strategy in the months ahead as he looks to convey progress on his lagging promise to deport millions of undocumented immigrants. But the expanded list of targets — especially immigrants married to U.S. citizens — carries political risks on an issue that has long been a strength for the president.

“Public opinion varies dramatically depending on the kind of illegal immigrant you’re talking about,” said GOP pollster Whit Ayres, adding that some undocumented immigrants, including those who came to the country as children, tend to garner much more public sympathy in surveys than others.

A Washington Post-Ipsos poll last month found overwhelming support for deporting undocumented immigrants who have committed violent crimes, with a solid majority of Americans also backing the removal of those who have been accused of committing nonviolent offenses. But there’s a downturn in support when Americans are asked about deporting immigrants who have only broken immigration laws, those who have lived in the United States for more than a decade, and immigrants who arrived as children or are parents of children who are U.S. citizens.

“We can all get behind deporting violent criminals,” Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-N.Y.) told POLITICO. “But there’s a lot of moderate Republicans that are concerned that they may be jumping the shark, as they say — they may be going a little too far on some of these things.”

Trump tested the political limits of hardline immigration enforcement during his first term with his family separation policy that proved to be widely unpopular with voters. Democrats warned voters that his promised mass deportations effort in a second term would result in similarly unpopular measures — a message that failed to break through during the campaign.

Trump hasn’t crossed a red line like family separation yet, but it’s still early, said Barrett Marson, a GOP strategist in Arizona. Republicans are crediting Trump for a historic drop in border crossings and the arrests of criminals, and the question is whether moderates will give him a pass for collateral damage — and whether that matters politically to a president who only has one term left to serve.

“Trump couldn’t have been clearer that he wanted to deport everyone who was here illegally, whether they are a gardener, a gang member or a stay-at-home mother,” Marson said. “And since he isn’t running again … what does he care if he’s at 49 percent, 46 percent, or 40 percent?”

A woman from Peru was detained by ICE last month traveling back from her honeymoon in Puerto Rico with her husband, who voted for Trump. USA Today found that a number of other immigrants who have long resided in the country and are married to U.S. citizens were also swept up in the Trump administration’s increased enforcement efforts.

In another case, a kidney transplant specialist and professor at Brown University’s medical school, Rasha Alawieh, was deported from the United States late last week. She had a valid visa and a court order temporarily blocking her removal, but the Trump administration deported her anyway, claiming officials hadn’t received formal notification of the order before she was put on an Air France flight bound for Paris Friday night. Federal authorities said Monday that they deported the Lebanese doctor after finding “sympathetic photos and videos of prominent Hezbollah figures” in her phone.

And a story about German tourists has also grabbed headlines in Germany and the U.S., as a man and a woman who say they tried to enter the U.S. legally were sent to a crowded detention facility and eventually deported, in a case that took weeks to resolve.

There will likely be other cases that raise public opposition to the effort as the administration looks for ways to remove more immigrants. Trump has struggled to immediately deport immigrants in the large numbers he promised on the campaign trail because of constraints on resources — including detention capacity and a bogged down immigration court system.

As a result, he has looked for other ways to project action.

His administration has touted the arrests of people charged with or convicted of crimes, but others with no criminal record, U.S. citizen spouses and children, and people with valid deportation protections have been swept up in his increased enforcement. It has sparked fear in immigrant communities across the country, as lawyers are increasingly warning immigrants, even green card holders, to avoid travel.

“When you take a look at all of this, it’s like death by 1,000 cuts, and it will soon snowball into more and worse, and it will catch up to him electorally. There will be backlash,” said Beatriz Lopez, co-executive director of the Immigration Hub, an immigration advocacy group. “And the more that there are these high-profile cases, the more that it will hit the average American.”

Trump’s policies have also pushed the legal limits this month. The White House touted the removal of more than 100 Venezuelan nationals they say were members of the Tren de Aragua gang under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act, ignoring a judge’s order to turn the planes around. Administration officials celebrated the weekend deportations to El Salvador, as President Nayib Bukele posted grim video on X of scenes of soldiers leading tattooed men off an airplane, forcing them to bend toward the ground as they were frog-marched to waiting buses and had their heads shaved by hooded prison guards.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Monday reiterated that the administration “acted within the confines of the law,” and said the Department of Homeland Security was sure about the identities of the alleged gang members they deported to El Salvador, as questions emerge about how the administration is making these determinations and lawyers for some deportees say their clients had no gang affiliation and no final orders of removal from a U.S. immigration judge.

“Countless lives will be saved because of this action,” Leavitt said. “The president is proud to deliver on that promise.”