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      Trump to address graduating students at the University of Alabama

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      Donald Trump will travel to heavily Republican Alabama on Thursday to speak to graduating students at the University of Alabama, where he is expected to draw some protesters despite enjoying a deep well of support in the state.The US president’s evening remarks in Tuscaloosa will be his first address to graduates in his second term and will come as he has been celebrating the first 100 days of his administration.The White House did not offer any details about Trump’s planned message.Alabama, where Trump won a commanding 64% of the vote in 2024, is where he has staged a number of his trademark large rallies over the past decade. It also is where Trump showed early signs of strength in his first presidential campaign when he began filling stadiums for his rallies.While the White House has described Trump’s speech as a commencement address, it is actually a special event that was created before graduation ceremonies that begin Friday. Graduating students have the option of attending the event, but it is not required.Former Crimson Tide football coach Nick Saban is also speaking at the event.“As President Trump marks 100 days in office, there is no better place for him to celebrate all the winning than in Tuscaloosa, Alabama,” said the state’s Republican governor, Kay Ivey.Trump’s presence has drawn criticism from the Alabama NAACP and the University of Alabama College Democrats.College Democrats are countering with their own rally, calling it “Tide Against Trump” – a play on the university’s nickname. The event will feature onetime presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke of Texas and former US senator Doug Jones, the last Democrat to hold statewide office in Alabama.The NAACP said Trump’s policies are hurting universities and students, particularly students of color.“The decision for students of color, and really all students, should be to skip his speech and spend that time reflecting on how to make America a more inclusive nation,” said Benard Simelton, president of the Alabama NAACP.Trump’s visit to Alabama is his second trip this week. He held a rally in Michigan on Tuesday to mark 100 days in office.Outside of weekend trips for personal visits, Trump has not made many official trips since taking office on 20 January. He usually speaks to the public from the impromptu news conferences he holds in the Oval Office and at other events at the White House.After his stop in Alabama, Trump is scheduled to travel to Florida for a long weekend at his Mar-a-Lago resort.Next month, he is scheduled to give the commencement address at the US military academy in West Point, New York. More

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      Democrats rally at US Capitol to decry ‘failure’ of Trump’s first 100 days

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      Dozens of Democratic lawmakers gathered on the steps of the Capitol on Wednesday to accuse Donald Trump of spending his first 100 days damaging the US economy and democracy with the help of “complicit” congressional Republicans.The speeches by party leaders served as a counterpoint to Trump’s insistence at a rally in Michigan the night before that he has “delivered the most profound change in Washington in nearly 100 years” with an administration focused on mass deportations of undocumented immigrants, the dismantling of parts of the federal government and the levying of tariffs on major US trading partners.Democrats, meanwhile, are still reeling from a disappointing performance in last November’s elections but believe that as the economy’s health shows signs of flagging and GOP lawmakers get to work on what is expected to be a significant piece of legislation to extend tax cuts while slashing the social safety net, they have an opportunity to regain voters’ trust.“Donald Trump’s first 100 days can be defined by one big F-word: failure. Failure on the economy, failure on lowering costs, failure on tariffs, failure on foreign policy, failure on preserving democracy, failure on helping middle-class families,” the top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer said from the Capitol steps.He went on to characterize Republican lawmakers, few of whom have broken publicly with the president since his 20 January inauguration, as “co-conspirators. They are complicit. They are aiding and abetting all of Donald Trump’s failures. They’re not standing up to him once they’re involved and they will shoulder the blame.”The party gathered hours after the release of economic data that showed the US economy shrank in the first three months of this year, which lawmakers said was evidence Trump had broken the promise of prosperity he made to American voters.“A hundred days into this presidency, we’ve gone from three years of solid growth in our economy to the steepest decline that we’ve seen since the pandemic. That’s the truth,” said the Delaware senator Lisa Blunt Rochester. “Groceries are up, retirement savings are down, that’s the truth. Outbreaks of measles and the avian flu, that’s the truth.”More than 1,300 days remain in Trump’s presidency, but Democrats are eyeing a resurgence in next November’s midterm elections. A return to a majority in the House is within reach, as the current GOP majority is just three votes, a historically low margin.Earlier in the day, the House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries said that the party can only do so much without controlling at least one chamber of Congress, but promised change as soon as they returned to the majority.“As Democrats, we will fight as hard as we can the next two years to stop bad things from happening. We will protect our system of free and fair elections, and then work hard to convince the American people to entrust us the majority next November,” Jeffries said at a speech at a Washington DC theater.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“At that point, we will be able to do much, much more for you,” Jeffries said, promising to “block any budget that goes after your social security, Medicare or Medicaid” and “hold the Trump administration accountable for its corrupt abuse of power”.Trump’s 100th day in office came not long after major polls showed his approval rating had dropped well belong 50%, fueled by concerns over his economic policies but also some wariness over his aggressive approach to immigration enforcement, which has seen high-profiles cases of foreigners being removed from the country on questionable grounds.Yet the Democrats have their own rebuilding to do. Recent surveys have indicated that voters are sour on the party, with a CNN poll released last month finding its approval rating has never been lower.The House Democratic caucus chair Pete Aguilar signaled that the party plans to put economic concerns at the heart of its pitch to voters as it eyes rebuilding legislative majorities in 2026.“We’re going to focus on making life more affordable, making life easier for everyday Americans in these next 100 days and at every turn, until we flip the House and we flip the Senate and we put a check on the Trump administration’s reckless economic policies,” Aguilar said. More

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      If leaders stay silent, the US won’t survive Trump’s next 100 days | Robert Reich

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      We have witnessed the first 100 days of the odious Trump regime.The US constitution is in peril. Civil and human rights are being trampled upon. The economy is in disarray.At this rate, we will not make it through the second 100 days.Federal judges in more than 120 cases so far have sought to stop Trump – judges appointed by Republicans as well as Democrats, some appointed by Trump himself – but the regime is either ignoring or appealing their orders. It has even arrested a municipal judge in Milwaukee amid a case involving an undocumented defendant.Recently, Judge J Harvie Wilkinson III of the court of appeals for the fourth circuit – an eminent conservative Reagan appointee who is revered by the Federalist Society – issued a scathing rebuke to the Trump regime. In response to its assertion that it can abduct residents of the US and put them into foreign prisons without due process, Wilkinson wrote:
      If today the Executive claims the right to deport without due process and in disregard of court orders, what assurance will there be tomorrow that it will not deport American citizens and then disclaim responsibility to bring them home? And what assurance shall there be that the Executive will not train its broad discretionary powers upon its political enemies? The threat, even if not the actuality, would always be present, and the Executive’s obligation to ‘take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed’ would lose its meaning.
      Wilkinson’s fears are already being realized. Ice recently deported three US citizens – aged two, four and seven – when their mothers were deported to Honduras. One of the children, who has stage 4 cancer, was sent out of the US without medication or consultation with doctors.Meanwhile, the regime continues to attack all the independent institutions in this country that have traditionally served as buffers against tyranny – universities, non-profits, lawyers and law firms, the media, science and researchers, libraries and museums, the civil service and independent agencies – threatening them with extermination or loss of funding if they do not submit to its oversight and demands.Trump has even instructed the Department of Justice to investigate ActBlue, the platform that handles the fundraising for almost all Democratic candidates and the issues Democrats support.Meanwhile, Trump is actively destroying the economy. His proposed tariffs are already raising prices. His attacks on the Fed chief, Jerome Powell, are causing tremors around the world.Trump wants total power, even at the cost of our democracy and economy.His polls are plummeting yet many Americans are still in denial. “He’s getting things done!” some say. “He’s tough and strong!”Every American with any shred of authority must loudly and boldly explain the danger we are in.A few Democratic members and progressives in Congress (Bernie Sanders, AOC, Cory Booker, Chris Van Hollen, Chris Murphy) have expressed outrage, but most seem oddly quiet. Granted, they have no direct power to stop what is occurring but they cannot and must not appear to acquiesce. They need to be heard, every day – protesting, demanding, resisting, refusing.Barack Obama has spoken up at least once, to his credit, but where is my old boss, Bill Clinton? Where is George W Bush? Where are their former vice-presidents – Al Gore and Dick Cheney? Where are their former cabinet members? They all must be heard, too.What about Republican members of Congress? Are none willing to stand up against what is occurring? And what of Republican governors and state legislators? If there were ever a time for courage and integrity, it is now. Their silence is inexcusable.Over 400 university presidents have finally issued a letter opposing “the unprecedented government overreach and political interference now endangering American higher education”. Good. Now they must speak out against the overreach endangering all of American democracy.Hundreds of law firms have joined a friend-of-the-court brief in support of the law firm Perkins Coie’s appeal of the regime’s demands. Fine. Now, they along with the American Bar Association and every major law school must sound the alarm about Trump’s vindictive and abusive use of the justice department.America’s religious leaders have a moral obligation to speak out. They have a spiritual duty to their congregations and to themselves to make their voices heard.The leaders of American business – starting with Jamie Dimon, the chair and CEO of JPMorgan Chase, who in normal times has assumed the role of spokesperson for American business – have been conspicuously silent. Of course they fear Trump’s retribution. Of course they hope for a huge tax cut. But these hardly excuse their seeming assent to the destruction of American democracy.We have witnessed what can happen in just the first 100 days. I’m not at all sure we can wait until the 2026 midterm elections and hope that Democrats take back at least one chamber of Congress. At the rate this regime is wreaking havoc, too much damage will have been done by then.The nation is tottering on the edge of dictatorship.We are no longer Democrats or Republicans. We are either patriots fighting the regime or we are complicit in its tyranny. There is no middle ground.Soon, I fear, the regime will openly defy the supreme court. Americans must be mobilized into such a huge wave of anger and disgust that members of the House are compelled to impeach Trump (for the third time) and enough senators are moved to finally convict him.Then this shameful chapter of American history will end.

      Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is a professor of public policy emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a Guardian US columnist. His newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com More

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      Trump warns ‘nothing will stop me’ at rally to celebrate 100 days in office

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      Donald Trump has celebrated his 100th day in office with a campaign-style rally in Michigan and an attack on “communist radical left judges” for trying to seize his power, warning: “Nothing will stop me.”The president also served up the chilling spectacle of a video of Venezuelan immigrants sent from the US to a notorious prison in El Salvador, accompanied by Hollywood-style music and roars of approval from the crowd.Trump’s choice of Michigan was a recognition not only of how the battleground state helped propel him to victory over Vice-President Kamala Harris in last November’s election, but its status as a potential beneficiary of a tariffs policy which, he claims, will revive US manufacturing.But the cavernous sports and expo centre in the city of Warren, near Detroit, was only half full for the rally, and a steady stream of people left before the end of his disjointed and meandering 89-minute address.“We’re here tonight in the heartland of our nation to celebrate the most successful first 100 days of any administration in the history of our country!” Trump declared. “In 100 days, we have delivered the most profound change in Washington in nearly 100 years.”The 45th and 47th president falsely accused the previous administration of engineering massive border invasion and allowing gangs, cartels and terrorists to infiltrate communities. “Democrats have vowed mass invasion and mass migration,” he said. “We are delivering mass deportation.”Trump defended his use of the Alien Enemies Act, a 1798 wartime authority that allows the president to detain or deport the citizens of an enemy nation, to expel foreign terrorist from the US as quickly as possible. Then he took aim at that courts that have blocked many of his moves during the first 100 days.“We cannot allow a handful of communist, radical-left judges to obstruct the enforcement of our laws and assume the duties that belong solely to the president of the United States,” Trump said, with evident frustration. “Judges are trying to take away the power given to the president to keep our country safe.“It’s not a good thing, but I hope for the sake of our country that the supreme court is going to save this, because we have to do something. These people are just looking to destroy our country. Nothing will stop me in the mission to keep America safe again.”In a darkly theatrical touch, Trump encouraged the crowd to watch big screens that showed mainly Venezuelan alleged gang members deported from the US arriving last month in El Salvador and having their heads shaved or being manhandled by guards.The video, originally shared by El Salvador’s authoritarian president Nayib Bukele, was accompanied by moody music reminiscent of a thriller. Once it was over the big screens offered the simple message, “100 days of greatness”, while the crowd cheered raucously and broke into chants of: “USA! USA! USA!”The arena was surrounded by banners that read, “Investing in America”, “Jobs! Jobs! Jobs!”, “The Golden Age”, “Buy American, Hire American” and “The American Dream is Back”. Trump’s supporters held signs with slogans such as: “Make America Great Again” and “Golden Age of America”. Michigan’s unemployment rate has risen for three straight months.One person behind the president waved a “Trump 2028”, banner even though he is constitutionally barred from serving a third term. At one point Margo Martin, a White House aide, joined the president on stage and asked: “Trump 2028, anybody?” The crowd roared.Before the rally, warm-up tracks included It’s A Man’s World by James Brown and Luciano Pavarotti, Nothing Compares 2 U by Sinéad O’Connor and YMCA by Village People. There were video clips of Elton John and the Who singing Pinball Wizard in the movie Tommy, and factory worker turned country singer Oliver Anthony performing Rich Men North of Richmond.View image in fullscreenYet despite the ostensible celebration of his election win and hugely consequential first 100 days, Trump spent much of the rally in campaign mode, fixated on past grudges and grievances.He mocked Biden’s mental acuity and even how he appears in a bathing suit, repeated the lie that he won the 2020 election and sought to discredit polling and news coverage unflattering to him. “When you watch the fake news you see fake polls,” he said, without evidence. “In legitimate polls I think we’re in the 60s, the 70s.”Trump defended his administration’s steep tariffs on cars and auto parts, hours after the White House announced it was softening them. He boasted of ending diversity, equity and inclusion “bullshit” across the federal government and private sector, and of making it official government policy that there are only two genders.He reiterated support for the beleaguered defence secretary Pete Hegseth, telling the crowd: “I have so much confidence in him. The fake news is after him, but he’s a tough cookie. They don’t know how tough he is.”Trump also heaped praise on his billionaire ally Elon Musk and his “department of government efficiency”, or Doge, and condemned the backlash against the Tesla and SpaceX entrepreneur: “It’s not fair what they’ve done to him. That is a disgrace.”The rally featured guest speeches by Brian Pannebecker, a retired car worker who pitched a book he is writing about his support of Trump, and White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller, who said earnestly: “Thank you, President Trump, for being the greatest president in American history.”Democrats take a different view. Ken Martin, chair of the Democratic National Committee, said: “Trump’s pathetic display tonight will do nothing to help the families he started screwing over 100 days ago.“Michiganders and the rest of the country see right through Trump, and as a result, he has the lowest 100-day approval rating in generations. If he’s not already terrified of what the ballot box will bring between now and the midterm elections, he should be.” More

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      The Guardian view on Canada’s Liberal election: Carney’s triumph is a rebuff to Trump | Editorial

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      Canada’s astounding election comeback by the Liberals will hearten many outside its borders as well as within. The governing party’s Lazarus moment was sparked by a man who was not on the ballot – though he took the chance to reiterate that the country should become the 51st US state, implying that voters could then elect him.By then it was already clear that Donald Trump’s threats had backfired. Monday’s result was a clear repudiation of his agenda. For two years, the Conservatives’ Pierre Poilievre looked like a dead cert as the next prime minister, assailing Justin Trudeau’s government on issues including the cost of living, housing and immigration. His party built a 25-point lead. But within four months, Mr Trudeau’s resignation, his warning that Mr Trump’s “51st state” remarks were no joke, and the imposition of swingeing US tariffs, transformed the contest. Mr Poilievre lost his seat. The Liberals are embarking on a fourth term, though this time perhaps as a minority, under Mr Trudeau’s replacement Mark Carney.Mr Trump made Canada’s political and economic sovereignty the central issue. Mr Carney, a member of Mr Trump’s despised global liberal elite, pitched himself as the man for a crisis: an experienced technocrat from outside politics who guided Canada’s central bank through the great recession, and the UK’s through Brexit.Both Mr Poilievre and Mr Trump said that the Conservative leader was not Maga material. But he certainly appeared Maga-adjacent, moving further right and building an energetic base by embracing culture wars and attacking “wokeism”, pledging “jail not bail” and promising to cut international aid and defund the national broadcaster.His defeat was effected primarily by other parties’ supporters resolving to unite around the Liberals. The leftwing New Democrats lost around two-thirds of their seats, including that of their leader Jagmeet Singh, who has resigned – though they have retained enough to ensure a progressive majority in parliament. The Bloc Québécois saw a smaller fall, as Mr Trump’s aggression overshadowed separatist aspirations. But Conservative support actually rose. For the first time in almost a century, Canada’s two main parties each got over 40% of the vote.Mr Carney has plenty to celebrate, but limited room for manoeuvre over difficult terrain: “President Trump is trying to break us so America can own us,” he warned in his victory speech. He knows that Mr Trump takes advantage of perceived weakness. But the US president also nurses grievances. Mr Carney has promised to work more closely with allies in Europe and Asia. His diplomatic experience and international contact book will help.The external economic threat and internal cost of living crisis are inseparable. This campaign, thanks to Mr Trump, put the nation centre stage. But as prime minister, Mr Carney will also need to address society, and tackle the kind of underlying problems that have led to the triumph of Mr Trump and like-minded politicians elsewhere. He has promised to double housebuilding and create hundreds of thousands of skilled jobs, and wants to eliminate internal trade barriers. Opponents may well retort that Liberals have had three terms to realise their vision.Other politicians should be cautious about drawing lessons from this very particular contest. Canada faces a unique threat from the US, though it has economic leverage as well as vulnerability. This is, nonetheless, a welcome rebuff to American bellicosity and rejection of rightwing populism.

      Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. More

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      Senate Democrats to mark Trump’s ‘100 days from hell’ with marathon speeches

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      Democratic senators will on Tuesday mark Donald Trump’s 100th day in office with marathon floor speeches intended to highlight his administration’s failures, seizing on his divisive tariff policy and attacks on the judiciary to argue he was not joking when he mulled governing as “a dictator”.Republicans, meanwhile, praised the president’s actions over the first 100 days, though the House speaker, Mike Johnson, acknowledged “some bumps along the road” he described as the necessary byproduct of the radical changes Trump campaigned on.The 100-day milestone has given Trump’s allies and enemies alike in Congress an opportunity to reflect on his presidency, which Democrats, confined to the minority in both the Senate and House of Representatives at least through next year, argue has accomplished little besides haphazardly dismantling important federal agencies and rendering precarious a previously robust economy.“Donald Trump’s first 100 days have been 100 days from hell,” said Chuck Schumer, the Democratic Senate minority leader.“Donald Trump is not governing like a president of a democratic republic. He’s acting like a king, a despot, a wannabe dictator. Remember that during the campaign, he indicated that he’d be a dictator just on day one. But everything we’ve seen so far shows he wants to be a dictator for much, much longer.”Democrats are looking to regain their popular support after underperforming in November, when voters nationwide sent Trump back to the White House with Republicans in full control of Congress.Earlier this month, New Jersey’s Cory Booker spent 25 hours on the Senate floor condemning Trump in a record-breaking speech, while on Sunday, Booker and the top House Democrat, Hakeem Jeffries, were out for more than 12 hours on the Capitol steps, condemning the GOP’s plans for a huge bill that will extend tax cuts and pay for mass deportations, potentially by cutting social safety net programs.The tactics have been compared to those of the civil rights and other protest movements, and on Tuesday, Schumer said Democrats would hold the Senate floor “until late tonight to mark these dismal 100 days by speaking the truth”.“What is the truth? The truth is this: no president in modern history has promised more on day one and delivered less by day 100 than Donald Trump. In record time, the president has turned a golden promise into an economic ticking timebomb. It’s getting worse every day, and he calls it progress.”Republicans have taken the opposite view of Trump’s record, promoting his moves to ban diversity initiatives in the government and elsewhere, crack down on transgender rights, block immigrants from crossing the border and attempt to step up deportations as “promises made, promises kept”.“We’re just getting started, and that’s one of the reasons that we’re so excited,” Johnson told reporters.But opinion surveys have found that Trump’s approval rating has sunk into the negative at a point earlier than his Democratic predecessor, Joe Biden, whose presidency wound up mired in public discontent. The plunge in popularity for a president who just over five months ago became the first Republican to win the popular vote in two decades is viewed as a consequence of his disruptive approach to implementing tariffs, and his administration’s attacks on a judiciary that has sought to temper some of his policies.“There’s some bumps along the road. I mean, we’re changing everything,” Johnson replied, when asked about the president’s approval ratings.“The last four years was an absolute unmitigated disaster, and we got to fix it all. So when you’re doing that, it’s disruptive in a way.” More

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      Denied, detained, deported: the people targeted in Trump’s immigration crackdown

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      Donald Trump retook the White House vowing to stage “the largest deportation operation in American history”. As previewed, the administration set about further militarizing the US-Mexico border and targeting people requesting asylum and refugees while conducting raids and deportations in undocumented communities, detaining and deporting immigrants and spreading fear.Critics are outraged, if not surprised. But few expected the new legal chapter that unfolded next: a multipronged crackdown on certain people seen as opponents of the US president’s ideological agenda. This extraordinary assault has come in the context of wider attacks on higher education, the courts and the constitution.Here are some of the most high-profile individual cases that have captured the world’s attention so far because of their extreme and legally dubious nature, mostly involving documented people targeted by the Trump administration in the course of its swift and unlawful power grab.Students and academics hunted and ‘disappeared’In recent weeks, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) teams suddenly began arresting and detaining foreign-born students and academics on visas or green cards. In most cases the government has cited their roles in pro-Palestinian campus protests over Israel’s war in Gaza following the 7 October 2023 attack. Claims that they “support Hamas” are invoked as justification for wanting to deport them, even though they have not been charged with any crimes. Those taken include:Mahmoud KhalilA recent graduate student of Columbia University in New York, Mahmoud Khalil, 30, is a Palestinian green-card holder who was a leader during protests last year. He was arrested without due process in front of his pregnant wife and has been in a detention center in Louisiana since mid-March, denied release to attend the birth. He told an immigration judge that he and hundreds of other detainees were being denied rights the court itself had claimed to prioritize: “Due process and fundamental fairness.”View image in fullscreenThe government is using obscure immigration law to make extraordinary claims in cases like Khalil’s that it can summarily detain and deport people for constitutionally protected free speech if they are deemed adverse to US foreign policy. A far-right group has claimed credit for flagging his and others’ names for scrutiny by the authorities.Rümeysa ÖztürkView image in fullscreenUS immigration officials encircled and grabbed the Tufts University PhD student near Boston and bustled her into an unmarked car, shown in onlooker video. Öztürk, a Fulbright scholar and Turkish national on a visa, had co-written an op-ed in the student newspaper, criticizing Tufts’ response to Israel’s military assault on Gaza and Palestinians. She was rushed into detention in Louisiana in apparent defiance of a court order. Öztürk, 30, says she has been neglected and abused there in “unsafe and inhumane conditions”.Mohsen MahdawiView image in fullscreenMahdawi, a Palestinian green-card holder and student at Columbia University, was apprehended by Ice in Colchester, Vermont, on 14 April, as first reported by the Intercept.He was prominent in the protests at Columbia last year. During his apprehension he was put into an unmarked car outside a federal office where he was attending an interview to become a naturalized US citizen. The administration’s arcane justification is that his activism could “potentially undermine” the Middle East peace process, citing a provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA). He is detained in Vermont. Democratic lawmakers have visited Khalil, Öztürk and Mahdawi but failed to secure their release.Yunseo ChungView image in fullscreenAnother Columbia student, Chung, 21, sued the administration for trying to deport her, and has gone into hiding. She is a pro-Palestinian campaigner and was arrested by the New York police in March while protesting, as first reported by the New York Times. She said a government official told her lawyer they wanted to remove her from the country and her residency status was being revoked. Chung was born in South Korea and has been in the US since she was seven.Alireza DoroudiView image in fullscreenThe Democrats on campus group at the University of Alabama said of the arrest of Doroudi, 32, an Iranian studying mechanical engineering: “Donald Trump, Tom Homan [Trump’s “border czar”], and Ice have struck a cold, vicious dagger through the heart of UA’s international community.”He was taken to the same Louisiana federal detention center as Khalil. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has said he was a threat to national security, without providing details, and the state department had revoked his visa, while an immigration judge refused to release him.Badar Khan SuriView image in fullscreenMore than 370 alumni of Washington DC-based Georgetown University joined 65 current students there in signing on to a letter opposing immigration authorities’ detention of Dr Badar Khan Suri, a senior postdoctoral fellow at the institution’s Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding (ACMCU).The authorities revoked his student visa, alleging the Indian citizen’s father-in-law was an adviser to Hamas officials more than a decade ago – and claiming he was “deportable” because of his posts on social media in support of Palestine. He was taken to Louisiana and then detention in Texas and was given court dates in May.View image in fullscreenKseniia PetrovaThe Harvard Medical School research scientist was stopped at Boston’s Logan airport by US authorities on her way back from France in February, over what appeared to be an irregularity in customs paperwork related to frog embryo samples. She was told her visa was being revoked and she was being deported to her native Russia.When Petrova, 30, said she feared political persecution there because she had criticized the invasion of Ukraine, she was taken away and also ended up in an overcrowded detention facility in Louisiana. Her colleagues say her expertise is “irreplaceable” and Petrova said foreign scientists like her “enrich” America.Student visas revoked, then restored amid chaosMore than 1,400 international students from at least 200 colleges across the US had their “legal status changed” by the state department, including the revoking of visas, in what the specialist publication Inside Higher Education called “an explosion of visa terminations”.Amid scant information and rising panic, the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, lambasted protesters and campus activists as “lunatics”. Some were cited for pro-Palestinian views, others concluded they must have been targeted because of minor crimes or offenses, such as a speeding ticket. Some could find no explanation. Then in the face of multiple court challenges, the administration in late April reversed course and restored legal statuses that had been rescinded en masse, but said it was developing a new policy. Uncertainty prevails.The legal rollercoaster came too late for this high-profile case:Felipe Zapata VelásquezView image in fullscreenThe family of the University of Florida student Felipe Zapata Velásquez, 27, said he was “undergoing a physical and emotional recovery process” in his native Colombia after police arrested him in Gainesville in March for traffic offenses and turned him over to Ice. He agreed to be deported, to avoid lengthy detention and legal battles. The Democratic congressman Maxwell Frost accused authorities of “kidnapping” Velásquez.Removed by (admitted) mistakeKilmar Ábrego GarcíaView image in fullscreenThe Salvadorian man was removed to El Salvador by mistake, which the Trump administration admitted. But it is essentially defying a US supreme court order to “facilitate” his return to his home and family in Maryland. Ábrego García was undocumented but had protected status against being deported to El Salvador. He was flown there anyway, without a hearing, to a brutal mega-prison, then later transferred to another facility. The administration accuses him of being a violent gangster and has abandoned him, infuriating a federal judge repeatedly and prompting warnings of a constitutional crisis.He has not been charged with any crimes but was swept up with hundreds of Venezuelans deported there. He has begged to speak to his wife, Jennifer Vasquez Sura, who insists he is not a criminal. The sheet metalworkers union chief, Michael Coleman, described Ábrego García as an “apprentice working hard to pursue the American dream” and said he was not a gang member. Trump said he was eyeing Salvadorian prisons for US citizens.Deported to a third country, without due processThe US deported more than 230 Venezuelan men to the mega-prison in El Salvador without so much as a hearing in mid-March despite an infuriated federal judge trying to halt the flights, then blocking others. Donald Trump took extraordinary action to avoid due process by invoking the 1798 Alien Enemies Act (AEA), a law meant only to be used in wartime, prompting court challenges led by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). John Roberts, the US chief justice, rebuked the president when he threatened the judge. The justices, by a majority, did not stop Trump from using the AEA but the bench unanimously reaffirmed the right to due process and said individuals must be able to bring habeas corpus challenges.Most of the men are reportedly not violent criminals or members of violent gangs, as the Trump administration asserts, according to a New York Times investigation.Many appear to have been accused of being members of the transnational Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua partly on the basis of their tattoos, with their families speaking out, including:Andry José Hernández RomeroView image in fullscreenHernández, a 31-year-old makeup artist and hairdresser, entered California last year to attend an asylum appointment, telling the authorities he was under threat in Venezuela as a gay man. But he was detained and accused of being in Tren de Aragua because of his tattoos, then suddenly deported under Trump, deemed a “security threat”.Jerce Reyes Barriosskip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe former professional footballer, 36, has been accused of gang membership by the DHS, seemingly because of his tattoos, including one of a crown sitting atop a soccer ball with a rosary and the word “dios”.“He chose this tattoo because it is similar to the logo for his favourite soccer team, Real Madrid,” his lawyer, Linette Tobin, said, adding that her client fled Venezuela after protesting against the government and being tortured.Francisco Javier García CasiqueView image in fullscreenRelatives were shocked when they spotted Francisco Javier García Casique, 24, in a propaganda video from El Salvador showing scores of Venezuelan prisoners being frog-marched off planes and into custody there. He is a barber in his home town of Maracay and is completely innocent of gang involvement, the family said, adding that Francisco and his brother Sebastián have matching tattoos quoting the Bible.Migrants seeking asylum removed to PanamaA US military plane took off from California in February carrying more than 100 immigrants from countries as far flung as Afghanistan, Iran, Uzbekistan, China, Sri Lanka, Turkey and Pakistan, dumping them in Panama. They were shackled and deported to a third country without due process because their countries of origin refuse to accept them back from the US. Shocking scenes unfolded of the people locked in a hotel in Panama City, signaling and writing on the windows pleading for help.The people, including children, were then moved and held at a facility deep in the dense jungle that separates Panama from Colombia. They were later reportedly freed and were seeking asylum from other countries, their futures uncertain. One of those deported from the US was:Artemis GhasemzadehView image in fullscreenGhasemzadeh, 27, a migrant from Iran, wrote “Help us” in lipstick on a window of the hotel in Panama City, as a desperate way of alerting New York Times reporters on the street to her and fellow detainees’ plight. She had thought that, especially as a convert from Islam to Christianity who faces danger in Iran as a result, that she would be offered freedom in the US, she told the newspaper while still in custody. She is possibly still in Panama trying to get a foothold.Americans questioned and threatenedAmir MakledView image in fullscreenMakled, a Detroit-born attorney, was questioned at the airport on returning from vacation. He was flagged to a terrorism response team, kept behind and pressured to hand over his phone, then give up some of its contents. The Lebanese American represents a pro-Palestinian student protester who was arrested at the University of Michigan. Experts said the incident was evidence of a weakening of fourth amendment constitutional protections at the border against “unreasonable search and seizure”.Nicole MicheroniView image in fullscreenThis Massachusetts immigration lawyer, a US-born American citizen, spoke out after receiving an email from the Trump administration telling her “it is time for you to leave the United States”. She said it was “probably, hopefully, sent to me in error. But it’s a little concerning these are going out to US citizens.” She told NBC she thought it was a scare tactic.Adam PeñaThis San Diego-based US citizen now carries his American passport and birth certificate everywhere with him and thinks he was sent one of the “time for you to leave” letters in error but because he represents clients in Ice detention locally. “I do believe this email was sent intentionally to immigration advocates around the country to instill fear and intimidation,” he told NBC news.Americans removedChildren who are seven, four and two and are US citizens were removed from the US in late April when their mothers were deported to Honduras. DHS said the two women chose to take their children with them but one of their lawyers told the Guardian that they were denied any opportunity to coordinate the care and custody of their children before being put on deportation flights from Louisiana. A federal judge said it was “illegal and unconstitutional” to thus remove a US citizen “with no meaningful process”.Visitors detainedJasmine Mooney, CanadaView image in fullscreenCanadian Jasmine Mooney was shackled and ended up in Ice detention in the US for two weeks over an alleged work visa irregularity while on one of her frequent visits to California. She spoke out about the harsh conditions and the information black hole and how outraged she was that so many other detainees she met, who helped her, are stranded without access to the kind of resources that ultimately got her out.Rebecca Burke, UKView image in fullscreenThe British graphic artist was stopped at the border when she headed from Seattle to Canada as a backpacker and, because of a visa mix-up, she became one of 32,809 people to be arrested by Ice during the first 50 days of Trump’s presidency. Almost three weeks of grueling detention conditions later, she smuggled out her poignant drawings of fellow detainees when she was released.Jessica Brösche, GermanyThe German tourist and tattoo artist, 29, from Berlin was detained by US immigration authorities and deported back to Germany after spending more than six weeks in US detention, including what she described as eight days in solitary confinement. Her family compared her ordeal to “a horror film”.Fabian Schmidt, GermanyView image in fullscreenThe 34-year-old German national and US green-card holder was apprehended and allegedly “violently interrogated” by US border officials as he was returning to New Hampshire from a trip to Luxembourg. His family said he was held for hours at Boston’s Logan airport, stripped naked and put in a cold shower, then later deprived of food and medicine, and collapsed. His case is being investigated and as of mid-April he was in Ice detention in Rhode Island.Sent back‘Jonathan’A man with a US work visa provided his anonymous account to the Guardian of being denied entry into the US after a trip to his native Australia to scatter his sister’s ashes. He was pulled aside on arrival in Houston, Texas, and accused, variously, of selling drugs and having improper paperwork. After being detained for over a day he was put on a flight back to Australia even though he has worked on the US east coast for five years, where he lived with his girlfriend.Denied entry – for criticizing Trump?Alvin Gibbs, Marc Carrey and Stefan Häublein of band UK SubsView image in fullscreenMembers of the punk rock band UK Subs said they were denied entry and detained in the US on their way to play a gig in Los Angeles, after being questioned about visas. Bassist Alvin Gibbs said: “I can’t help but wonder whether my frequent, and less than flattering, public comments regarding their president [Trump] and his administration played a role.” He and the two band mates were kept in harsh conditions for 24 hours then deported back to the UK.French scientistA French scientist, who has not been publicly named, was denied entry to the US after immigration officers at an airport searched his phone and found messages in which he had expressed criticism of the Trump administration, according to a French government minister. The researcher was on his way to a conference in Texas.“Freedom of opinion, free research, and academic freedom are values ​​that we will continue to proudly uphold,” Philippe Baptiste, France’s minister of higher education and research, told Le Monde. More