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      US refugee groups are staffing up as Trump’s return sows uncertainty

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      As a second Trump term looms, refugee and immigrant advocacy groups across the country are bracing for what’s to come. The president-elect has vowed to utilize the US military to conduct mass deportations of undocumented immigrants, and there’s no reason to believe he’ll do otherwise.During his first term from 2016 to 2020, Trump made several efforts to end asylum for immigrants and refugees fleeing their home countries, instituted a highly controversial “Muslim ban” and slashed the number of refugees allowed into the country to the lowest ever since Congress passed the Refugee Act in 1980. Back then, however, the Trump administration had some guardrails in judges who ruled against restrictive policies, as well as substantive legal challenges from organizations such as the ACLU, which prevented his administration from fully enacting all of his plans.For this upcoming presidency, Trump aims to be more successful. He will have a much more lenient and malleable landscape, as Republicans control both the House and the Senate, and there is a conservative majority in the supreme court. Tom Homan, whom Trump has selected as his “border czar”, has said that the public can expect “shock and awe” on Trump’s first day in office. Under the second Trump administration, the number of refugees entering the country could dwindle.As such, organizations are working to ensure that they will be able to protect and assist the individuals and families that their groups serve come January. Emily Laney, executive director of the Welcome Co-op, a non-profit in Atlanta, said that the organization came into existence during “the last time resettlement was facing uncertainty” during Trump’s first term in office. This time, they are continuing to build collective power by working together in hopes that they will be prepared for whatever comes.View image in fullscreenThe group, which helps refugees secure housing, is building its volunteer base and trying to encourage people to support families who are arriving and those already in the country. People can volunteer to help set up apartments for refugees, donating hygiene kits and advocating for immigrants and refugees.“My role as the executive director is to build the collaboration and make sure there’s as many opportunities to support newly arrived refugees with housing,” Laney said. “As long as refugees are coming, we are prepared to welcome them in Atlanta and we have the support.” This year, Welcome Co-op said, it has set up 725 apartments for more than 3,200 newcomers and provided clothing and shoes to more than 1,200 people.Since the 1970s, Georgia has “attracted tens of thousands of refugees and immigrants”, according to the UN Refugee Agency. Nearly 11% of Georgia’s population are immigrants and, under the Biden administration, the state settled the third-largest number of refugees. Still, both Biden’s and Trump’s administrations also deported large numbers of immigrants.Refugee Women’s Network (RWN), the only organization in Georgia that specifically serves refugee women, is preparing to aid as many women as possible, while retaining staff, no matter the change in administration, according to Sushma Barakoti, the group’s executive director. Currently, RWN is raising funds to sustain it through four years of the Trump administration.During Trump’s first administration, some refugee agencies were forced to undergo significant job cuts and, in some cases, totally shutter due to a lack of funding. Barakoti said that RWN was hoping that small grants and donations can make up enough funding so that the organization does not have to lay off staff in the event of dwindling numbers of refugees entering the country.She said that the organization had had an opportunity to frankly discuss the situation with supporters after the election.“We had over 200 people there,” she said. “We did talk about the uncertainty that the next administration brings to the refugee and immigrant programs. We almost reached our [fundraising] goal. But then we asked them to stay connected.“We need our supporters not only for donations, but also to take action to call their senators, their representatives, and advocate on behalf of the community that we serve to pressure the federal government. If the funding is going to be reduced, then we want them to also put pressure on their representatives and senators to pass bills.”Barakoti said that it was important for everyone, not just people who have direct connections to refugees, to understand what’s going on.“This is not just here in Atlanta. It’s going to affect all across the country where there’s so many needy families [who] are being resettled with refugees and immigrants,” she said. “I would like to ask people to be involved, be aware of what’s going on and be engaged through donations, through volunteering, through advocating, and be connected to these organizations so that they can be part of the movement.”Though nearby Tennessee does not take in the same number of refugees as Georgia, the state is home to one of the fastest-growing immigrant populations. Nashville, the state’s capital, partnered with US Citizenship and Immigration Services to create Pathway for New Americans, a program to help immigrants who aim to become US citizens.Still, Tennessee has regularly passed restrictive legislation targeted at new arrivals to the US, and independent non-profits and volunteer groups are the organizations that primarily help with resettlement. Their efforts, too, will probably have to change.Judith Clerjeune, of the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition (Tirrc), said that many of the people in the communities her organization assists view this moment as “challenging and frightening”.“Our goal right now is to be honest with people,” she said. “We don’t know exactly what is going to happen, but we do know the stated intentions of the upcoming administration. They have a published blueprint for what they want to do, and so we’re taking that very seriously and doing our due diligence to prepare and ensure that the community is not caught up.”Under the first Trump presidency, Clerjeune said, many things that happened were surprises. This time, they have a better idea of what to expect. Tirrc already has advocacy and provides immigrant and refugee resources, but under a second Trump administration those efforts will probably only increase in importance.The group is also providing materials and resources for local governments, students, immigrant families and others who may need access to critical services, like adequate translation resources, school enrollment, housing or workplace help or assistance with naturalization. They plan to provide “entry points” for state community partners and other supporters who want to take action.“We have a lot of folks who are interested in [how] they can help support community gaps or possibly be supported in working with families,” Clerjeune said. “And so we’re working with those communities to guide and direct people with entry points when you can support folks.” More

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      Five actions Biden can take to protect civil liberties before Trump’s presidency

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      In less than two months, Donald Trump will take office, threatening several areas of American life and international policy. The president-elect has pledged to take aim at LGBTQ+ rights, specifically for transgender and gender-non-conforming people. He has promised to conduct mass deportations and raids as a part of a far-right approach to US immigration. And he is expected to roll back data collection practices on police misconduct and stifle any hope of passing police reform in Congress – specifically the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act.Trump will largely be able to roll out his agenda, outlined in the 900-plus-page Project 2025 document, as Republicans took control of Congress during the 2024 general election. Joe Biden’s actions in his remaining time in office could be a crucial buttress against the expected impacts of the next four years.Six experts spoke with the Guardian about what the US president could do in his remaining time to protect the most vulnerable people:1. LGBTQ+ rights: fulfill executive order initiatives and confirm judgesAmong Trump’s collection of anti-LGBTQ+ initiatives, his administration’s plans to redefine sex are of particular concern, said Elana Redfield, the federal policy director at the Williams Institute on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Law and Public Policy.  Sex would be redefined “in such a manner that actually eradicates trans people”, said Redfield, and would not allow for “self-identification”. “The definition of sex that they would propose is that sex is defined based on anatomical characteristics at birth and is unchangeable.” The definition of sex is “at the core of some of the biggest civil rights conversations we’re having in the LGBTQ+ context”, said Redfield. The Biden administration has interpreted the definition of “sex” to include sexual orientation and gender identity. But with Trump, redefining sex could rollback protections and cause issues for transgender people attempting to access federal programs such as social security benefits, especially as many programs ask for participants to enroll with a gender identification. A redefinition of sex could also result in people being investigated for fraud if their gender doesn’t match across all federal identification documents, said Redfield. Many of these questions around the federal government’s ability to define sex will face legal challenges. So Biden, in tandem with Democrats, should continue to confirm federal judges who will probably hear legal cases about gender, Redfield said. Congressional Democrats have managed to confirm several and are only 15 short of the 234 judicial confirmations needed to match the record set by Trump during his first term. Biden should also complete everything outlined in his Executive Order 14075, including checking in with federal agencies to make sure they are well equipped to handle increased needs from LGBTQ+ people amid Trump’s presidency. “For example,” Redfield said, “if everyone’s changing their passports right now, they need to make sure they have enough staffing for that.”2. Police reform: make sure data on policing is publicly availableThrough executive orders, Biden largely increased data collection on patterns and practices of police departments, said Patrice Willoughby, the chief of policy and legislative affairs at the NAACP. But such data, which tracks police actions including traffic stops, arrests and use of force, will probably come to a “complete stop” under Trump’s administration, likely to boost “the narrative of Black violence” cited by conservatives. Willoughby added that Trump will not provide an opportunity to continue reform efforts seen under Biden, especially given past comments supporting a “violent day” of policing to end perceived increases in crime. With his remaining term, Biden must make sure that data on policing is “available publicly for advocacy organizations, state and local governments” and disseminated so it does not “disappear during a second Trump presidency”. Additionally, the Biden administration should ensure that the “methodology of collecting data” is available to state and local municipalities so it can be “replicated across different ecosystems”, said Willoughby. “States and localities that are interested in police reform [can] have the path forward in order to continue to collect data and apply it in their individual communities.”It’s also important for Biden to direct federal agencies to use funding that has already been earmarked by Congress to address police reform, especially, she said, as conservatives will probably “claw back” funding allocated towards equity and communities of color.3. Immigration: close detention centers and slow rate of detentions Biden should close the estimated 200 US detention sites that will be used by Trump to carry out mass deportation and slow down the current rate of detention for undocumented people, said Naureen Shah, deputy director of government affairs at the ACLU.“When I think about the Trump presidency, I’m anticipating an avalanche of anti-immigrant action from day one, from within hours of inauguration,” said Shah. She added that Ice will probably conduct raids using state and local law enforcement, targeting of undocumented students and attacks on birthright citizenship. The biggest issue is that the Biden administration has left “intact the infrastructure for abuse”, Shah said, including the US detention sites that will be used during Trump’s mass deportation. “We urged the Biden administration early on to close detention facilities across the country,” she said. “We argued that they needed to close the facilities so that another administration couldn’t come in and fill them up.”But instead, the number of detentions has increased throughout the Biden administration, now reaching approximately 37,000 a day, said Shah, with Trump planning to increase that amount. Shah warned that Trump would now have “the empty beds to fill” because “the Biden administration left it all there”. Biden also left in place 287(g) agreements, which allow Ice to tap local law enforcement to identify and place immigrants in the deportation pipeline. Requests for the Biden administration to end said agreements have gone unfulfilled, said Shah.“At this point, we’re calling on the Biden administration to at least slow down the expansion that is planned of Ice detention and to close facilities run by abusive sheriffs and private prison companies,” Shah said, naming the Baker county detention center as a site that advocates have been flagging for years.4. Gaza: end arms sales to Israel Biden could withdraw US military assistance and arms sales as well as allowing for an “honest assessment of Israel’s conduct”, said Kenneth Roth, the former executive director of Human Rights Watch. “It’s not too late for Biden to invoke that leverage as US law requires and even in recognizing that Trump would probably reverse it, it still would be an extremely important statement,” Roth said. Allowing for a review of Israel’s actions, including the restriction of humanitarian aid and bombing shelters housing civilians, would make clear that such conduct “[are] war crimes”. “It would be more than just an important rebuke of how the Israeli government is fighting this war. It would help to lay the groundwork for potential international criminal charges,” Roth said, adding that Trump could later face charges for “aiding and abetting war crimes” if the war is still conducted in this manner. But such actions are unlikely. The Biden administration could have allowed the United Nations security council to insist on a ceasefire with “no political cost”, Roth said, comparing the moment to when Barack Obama allowed a security council resolution on the illegality of Israel’s West Bank settlements to go through before Trump’s inauguration in 2016. “[But] Biden wouldn’t do it. He vetoed it … [He] would not do the comparable thing, even though the stakes are much higher. “Biden has said all the right things. He’s pressed for a ceasefire, he’s urged greater attention to civilian casualties, he’s pressed for food and humanitarian aid to come into Gaza,” Roth said. “He’s done nothing to use his leverage to back up those pleas.”5. Education: broadly expand DEI effortsTrump’s plans to rescind diversity, inclusion and equity (DEI) efforts from the Biden administration could embolden states that are already targeting such initiatives in education, through anti-CRT (critical race theory) laws, which often restrict classroom material and curriculum on topics including race, sexual orientation and gender identity, said Jordan Nellums, a higher education senior policy associate at the Century Foundation, a progressive thinktank. “The problem that we’ve seen in some states like Texas is that now faculty are looking at their syllabi for classes and realizing that they can’t even use the word ‘race’ or any type of word that may indicate that there’s going to be a discussion on race in certain classes,” he said.With the Department of Education potentially being dismantled, it could also pause its work at making sure that students facing discrimination have a means of reporting it, specifically through the Office of Civil Rights within the education department. Education is largely a “state issue”, said Nellums, but the Biden administration could sign executive actions to mandate that agencies protect DEI efforts more broadly. In terms of student debt, an issue disproportionately affecting people of color and low-income people, Biden could also make sure that those who are eligible for student loan forgiveness, specifically with public servant loan forgiveness and individuals who were defrauded by their college, said Aissa Canchola-Bañez, policy director for the Student Borrower Protection Center. “The Biden-Harris administration has done so much great work in trying to  fix some of the programs that were broken under the last Trump administration, fixing the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program and fixing Income Driven Repayment program,” said Canchola-Bañez. But many people are still waiting to get debt relief due to bureaucratic backlogs, said Canchola-Bañez. “The Biden administration can also work to make sure that all those folks who were promised relief actually see it happen.” More

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      How millions of US children would be hurt by Trump’s mass deportation plan: ‘Deep harm is intentional’

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      Donald Trump confirmed on Monday his intentions to make mass deportations a hallmark of his second term.That such measures would drastically upend the lives of the US’s immigrant communities is widely understood. But sweeping anti-immigrant policies would also be detrimental to American citizens – most notably the nearly 20 million US-born children of immigrant parents.“Mass deportations will be profoundly harmful to US citizen children,” said Andrew Craycroft, staff attorney at the Immigrant Legal Resource Center in San Francisco.In 2022, one in four US children had at least one immigrant parent, and more than 4 million US citizens under age 18 lived with an undocumented parent.“These are millions of US citizen children who were born here, who have grown up going to your elementary schools and playing on your little league baseball teams, who are facing a very real danger of losing their parents,” said Kelly Albinak Kribs, co-director of the Technical Assistance Program at the Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights.And while the mechanics by which the president-elect would actually execute his sweeping anti-immigrant agenda remain murky, there is little doubt that creating a climate of fear for immigrant communities is one of his administration’s top priorities – and one that will cause irreparable psychological damage to millions of US citizens.Deporting the parents of US-citizen children didn’t begin with Trump. However, past administrations took precautions to limit the trauma it caused, advocates and legal experts say.The Obama administration barred Ice raids from taking place in schools, childcare centers, hospitals and places of worship. Before that, the Bush administration required Ice to notify schools and child protective services in advance of a large-scale raid.Trump’s policies, on the other hand, appear to traumatize children by design to curb unwanted immigration. “Under Trump, previously and in the future, deep harm to children is absolutely intentional and in many ways is the entire point,” said Wendy Cervantes, director of immigration and immigrant families at the Center for Law and Social Policy.Trump’s “zero tolerance” policy at the southern border separated at least 5,000 foreign-born children and hundreds of US citizen children from their parents. He also ramped-up interior enforcement measures, such as targeted worksite raids. In 2019, Cervantes visited towns in central Mississippi where Ice agents had arrested nearly 700 undocumented poultry plant workers, many of whom had US-born children attending nearby public schools.View image in fullscreen“The kids could see their parents being marched into white vans, handcuffed, as they were leaving school,” Cervantes said. “It was like a nightmare. And those kids, to this day, are still requiring a lot of mental health support.”Come January, Americans should anticipate a return to “draconian measures” such as family separation, said Kribs. Trump has also indicated desires to go after immigrants with legal status, expand the circumstances that allow for denaturalization and pursue unlawful measures that explicitly target the US-born children of immigrants like ending birthright citizenship.But how Trump would execute his more radical ambitions, including militarized mass deportations, is unclear.Such an operation would take a high degree of coordination, both between US agencies and with foreign governments, to pull off. A country like Mexico may accommodate receiving a few hundred people, “but it’s a completely different issue to talk about hundreds of thousands of people being sent back”, said Nando Sigona, professor of international migration and forced displacement at the University of Birmingham.It would also be expensive. According to Debu Gandhi, senior director for immigration policy at the Center for American Progress, deporting workers would accelerate inflation, shrink the food supply, slow efforts to build affordable housing and squander taxpayer dollars in efforts to “deport mothers of US citizen children who [pose] no security threat”, Gandhi said.And then there’s the question of public opinion.Backlash again Trump’s 2018 family separation policies was widespread across the political spectrum, explained Lee Gelernt, an attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union who led the lawsuit against “zero tolerance”. “If a second Trump administration does extreme things, we hope and expect the public will push back,” he said. “In his first term, I think they believed they had dehumanized the immigrant population to such an extent that the public would not push back even when little babies were torn away, but there was enormous pushback across the political and ideological spectrum.”Whether or not mass deportations occur, citizen children of immigrants will be adversely impacted by living in a constant state of fear.Research shows that the threat of parental separation alone can cause PTSD and toxic stress in young children. Under the coming administration, that stress will be especially pronounced in mixed-status families, where one or more parent lacks legal status. “It’s easiest to start with people who are wholly unprotected,” said Kribs.Anti-immigrant policies can also have a chilling effect by which immigrant parents, fearing arrest and separation, keep their citizen children home from school, refrain from signing up for benefits such as food stamps or health insurance, and avoid taking their citizen children to the doctor, said Sigona.View image in fullscreenMisinformation exacerbates immigrant parents’ fears that engaging with public services could jeopardize their status or their chances of acquiring permanent residency. The repercussions can be dangerous. “There were parents telling us about how they were making decisions about whether or not to take their kids to the emergency room in the middle of the night,” Cervantes said.Other citizen children may lose contact with the US entirely. If a parent facing deportation chooses to keep their family together, a citizen child will have to leave the US and resettle elsewhere – often in an unfamiliar country that their parent fled for reasons of safety or security.Existing guidance urges Ice agents to detain the parents of citizen children near their children’s residence, arrange for visitation rights, and give them time to make childcare arrangements – but this isn’t binding. “Broadly speaking, these citizen children don’t have the right to have their parent remain with them,” Craycroft said.“Children simply don’t have the same rights as adults,” echoed Cervantes, describing the discrepancy as one of the immigrant system’s biggest flaws.Knowing this, immigrant and child welfare advocates are prepared to have all hands on deck to combat what they see as an imminent crisis for millions of citizen children.“We are facing these next four years clear-eyed and ready to meet the challenge,” said the Young Center’s Kribs. “But there’s going to be a lot of heartbreak along the way.” More

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      ‘This is not his first rodeo’: will federal courts be able to rein in Trump?

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      A week after Donald Trump entered the White House for the first time in January 2017, he signed executive order 13769, known as the Muslim travel ban, barring entry to the US for refugees and immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries.Mayhem ensued. Protests erupted in airports. Panic spread around the world.Within 24 hours it was blocked.“There is imminent danger that there will be substantial and irreparable injury to refugees and other individuals from nations subject to the order,” a federal district judge ruled.That was the start of an epic tug-of-war between Trump’s new presidency and the courts. Judges from Hawaii to Maryland stepped in to halt the ban, prompting its architect, the far-right immigration hardliner Stephen Miller to accuse them of “judicial usurpation of power”.The order had to be written three times before it could satisfy even the increasingly rightwing US supreme court, losing 18 months in the process.In nine weeks’ time Miller will be back in the White House as deputy chief of staff for policy, carrying with him an even more extreme plan for the largest domestic deportation effort in US history. The billion-dollar question is, will the courts let him this time?“The second Trump administration is going to pose the federal judiciary with huge challenges,” said Lia Epperson, a constitutional law professor at American University. “Trump is going for extreme measures, and that will test the balance of power between branches of government over issues like immigration, free speech, and many more.”View image in fullscreenTrump has already made clear, through his own policy agenda and in the gargantuan roadmap to a second term produced by his allies, Project 2025, that he intends to be more aggressive and radical this time. His flurry of cabinet and key federal agency appointments underline the point.Matt Gaetz, the president-elect’s choice for US attorney general, has provoked fears that the justice department will be weaponised to go after Trump’s political enemies. The choices of the hardline South Dakota governor, Kristi Noem, for homeland security secretary and the Fox News host Pete Hegseth for defense secretary give heft to Trump’s intention to use emergency powers and the US military to implement the mass deportations.“He is creating a cabinet of loyalists who will be in lock step with his agenda,” Epperson said.Trump will arrive back in the Oval Office emboldened by the gift that the supreme court bestowed on him earlier this year: broad immunity from criminal prosecution for any of his official acts. The protection, awarded in a July ruling, could have some unexpected consequences.At its most dystopian, Trump might read the justices’ edict as giving him carte blanche to defy their very own orders.“One of the things we don’t know yet is what would happen if Trump defied judicial orders from the supreme court, claiming the immunity granted to him by the very same justices,” said Professor Rachel Moran of Texas A&M University school of law.Another major shift in Trump’s favour is that during his first term he managed to push the federal judiciary drastically to the right. The 6-to-3 supermajority of the supreme court was forged by Trump’s appointments of Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett.The lower courts were also transformed by the 242 judges who he assigned to district, appeals and other federal courts. If Trump keeps up that frenetic pace over the next four years he will succeed in appointing more than half of all federal judges.Among his first-term appointments were 54 appeals court judges – second only to supreme court justices in the power they wield. And of those, Trump placed no fewer than 10 judges on the 29-strong ninth circuit court of appeals in San Francisco, which is traditionally seen as a liberal bastion.That in itself could be significant over the next four years. During Trump’s first term, the ninth circuit was by far the most popular route through which to challenge the administration.Now, though, the court will be less attractive to those seeking to rein Trump in, given the stamp he has already put on its ideological balance.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionMeanwhile, Biden is scrambling to complete as many judicial approvals as he can before he leaves office, and has already confirmed 215. That will restore some equilibrium, but it will not erase the fact that Trump will begin his second term facing a far more friendly judiciary than in his first.“The proportion of appointees who might be sympathetic to his administration has grown, and that means they are likely to be a less effective check on his power,” Moran said.‘He knows how to do it, and is better prepared’It wasn’t just the Muslim travel ban that got embroiled in the courts during Trump 1.0. Several of his signature policies, including family separation of undocumented migrants at the Mexican border and inserting a citizenship question in the US census, were stymied.A study by the non-partisan thinktank the Institute for Policy Integrity, comparing how successive administrations fared when they introduced major new rules, found that the Trump administration was challenged legally at a far higher rate than any previous administration going back to Bill Clinton in the 1990s. When cases got to court, Trump’s record was even more abysmal.He lost 57% of the time. That was dramatically worse than Barack Obama’s average across his two terms – 31%.“The process of getting new rules out was flawed in many cases, as was the supporting analysis – so when they showed up in court they were getting dinged a lot,” said Don Goodson, the institute’s deputy director.The travel ban got such a beating in federal courts in part because Trump’s White House showed a disdain for basic procedural guardrails designed to ensure that the government acts in rational and beneficial ways. Miller and Steve Bannon, Trump’s then chief strategist – “my two Steves” as he affectionately dubbed them – overruled experts in the Department of Homeland Security and ignored the oOffice of legal counsel, which is normally routinely consulted.A similar dismissive attitude was shown across the Trump administration towards basic requirements set out in the Administrative Procedure Act, such as the need to give the public a chance to comment on all policy proposals. Those guardrails are still in place, which carries a warning for Trump and team.Should they show as much disregard for the rules as they did last time, they are likely to suffer another bloody nose. On the other hand, Trump now has the benefit of experience.“This is not his first rodeo. He knows how to do it, and is better prepared,” Epperson said.Epperson sits on the national board of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which was at the forefront of the fight against the Muslim travel ban. The ACLU filed 434 actions against the first Trump administration, and is already gearing up to be similarly adversarial come January.“Litigation is going to be critical,” Epperson said. “Will there be 100% wins in cases protecting civil rights and liberties? No. But will there be a good chance that the courts serve as one of several lines of defense? Yes.” More

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      ACLU files lawsuit to gain information about Trump mass deportation plans

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      The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has filed a lawsuit against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) seeking more information about how the agency might carry out Donald Trump’s plans for a mass deportation program.The US president-elect has vowed to deport millions of undocumented immigrants upon taking office, a threat that he has doubled down on since winning the presidential race earlier this month. On Monday, Trump confirmed a report that he intended to declare a national emergency to activate military resources as part of the mass deportation operation.The new lawsuit comes after the ACLU Foundation of Southern California (ACLU SoCal) filed a Freedom of Information Act (Foia) request seeking details on how Ice’s privately chartered flights might be expanded to expedite deportations. According to the ACLU, Ice failed to respond to the Foia request, which was filed in August.“For months, the ACLU has been preparing for the possibility of a mass detention and deportation program, and Foia litigation has been a central part of our roadmap,” said Kyle Virgien, senior staff attorney at the ACLU’s national prison project. “A second Trump administration underscores the urgency of our litigation.”According to the ACLU, planes chartered by the Ice Air Operations network assisted in the deportation of more than 140,000 people last year, and immigrant rights’ advocates fear that the program could be vastly expanded to further Trump’s agenda.“Little is known about how President-elect Trump would carry out its mass deportation agenda, but what we do know is that this proposal has already instilled fear among immigrant communities,” said Eva Bitran, director of immigrants’ rights at ACLU SoCal. “The public has a right to know how its taxpayer dollars could be used to fund deportation flights that would tear apart not only families, but also our communities.”The lawsuit demands that Ice turn over documents outlining any air transportation-related contracts, the ground transportation used to move noncitizens and the air fields that the agency has access to.“The Freedom of Information Act requires federal agencies to disclose information requested by the public,” said Sophie Mancall-Bitel, a partner at Mayer Brown LLP, which joined the lawsuit. “It’s more important than ever that we understand what federal resources could be used to forcibly remove people from the United States.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionTrump’s transition team did not immediately respond to news of the lawsuit. More

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      Trump confirms he will utilize US military to conduct mass deportations

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      Donald Trump said on Monday that his administration would declare a national emergency and use the US military to carry out mass deportations of undocumented immigrants.In an early morning social media post, Trump responded “TRUE!!!” to a post by Tom Fitton, the president of the conservative group Judicial Watch, who wrote on 8 November that the next administration “will use military assets to reverse the Biden invasion through a mass deportation program”.Since his decisive victory, Trump has said he intends to make good on his campaign promise to execute mass deportations, beginning on the first day of his presidency. But many aspects of what he has described as the “largest deportation program in American history” remain unclear.Trump has previously suggested he would rely on wartime powers, military troops and sympathetic state and local leaders. Such a sprawling campaign – and the use of military personnel to carry it out – is almost certain to draw legal challenges and pushback from Democratic leaders, some of whom have already said they would refuse to cooperate with Trump’s deportation agenda.Through personnel announcements, the president-elect has put together a team of loyalists and hardliners to implement a second-term immigration crackdown.Tom Homan, the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement in his first administration, was named “border czar” with a wide-ranging remit. In a short social media post announcing the position, Trump said Homan would be “in charge of all Deportation of Illegal Aliens back to their Country of Origin”.Also returning for a second term is Stephen Miller, a chief defender of the last administration’s most controversial immigration policies, including the use of family separation as a means of deterrence. Miller was named White House deputy chief of staff for policy and a homeland security adviser, giving him far-reaching influence over immigration policy.Rounding out the team, he nominated the South Dakota governor, Kristi Noem, a loyalist with a long record as an immigration hardliner, to be his next secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.Experts and advocates say a deportation campaign on the scale Trump has outlined would raise legal and logistical challenges, not to mention the soaring costs and infrastructure needed to detail and deport millions of people, many of whom have lived in the country for at least a decade, contribute to the workforce and share a household with US citizen family members.Trump and Miller have described plans to federalize state national guard personnel and deploy them for immigration enforcement, including sending troops from friendly Republican-governed states into neighboring states with governors who decline to participate. Miller has also advocated for building large-scale detention “camps” and tents.In his first post-election interview, Trump told NBC News that he had “no choice” but to implement a mass deportation plan, regardless of cost.“It’s not a question of a price tag,” he said. “It’s not – really, we have no choice. When people have killed and murdered, when drug lords have destroyed countries, and now they’re going to go back to those countries because they’re not staying here. There is no price tag.”According to an estimate by the American Immigration Council, deporting 1 million people a year would cost more than $960bn over a decade.Trump at various points claimed he would deport at least 15 million – and even as many as 20 million – people who are in the US illegally, but the figure is unverified.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThere were an estimated 11 million people living in the United States without authorization as of 2022, according to an analysis by Pew Research. Migration to the US border reached record levels in 2022 and 2023 before dropping dramatically in 2024, following stepped-up enforcement by Mexico and an asylum clampdown by the Biden administration.It is unclear who the Trump administration would target for deportation. His campaign trail rhetoric often failed to distinguish between immigrants who have lawful status and those in the country illegally. And throughout the campaign, Trump claimed that immigrants crossing the US southern border in recent years were driving up crime, even though violent crime is down across the country and studies show immigrants commit crimes at lower rates than US citizens.During the campaign, Trump’s team repeatedly refused to rule out deporting Dreamers, young adults brought to the US as children, hundreds of thousands of whom are allowed to live and work in the US under an Obama-era program known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (Daca).Questions remain about how the raids would be conducted and where people would be detained. Civil liberties advocates have already raised concerns about people with lawful status or even US citizens being swept up in a sprawling dragnet.Meanwhile, advocates have pushed back against Trump’s assertion that he enters office with a mandate to carry out mass raids. They point to data that has found most people do not support mass deportations, especially when respondents are informed about the potential impacts on the economy, the workforce and American families.“The term strategy is clear, foment fear, panic and chaos into our communities, because as bullies, this is what they thrive on,” Greisa Martínez Rosas, the executive director of United We Dream Action, a network of groups that advocate for Dreamers said during a post-election debrief. She added: “Trump may be re-elected, but he does not have a mandate to come into and rip apart our communities.” More

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      Haitian immigrants flee Springfield, Ohio, in droves after Trump election win

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      From a tiny office behind a Haitian grocery store on Springfield’s South Limestone Street, Margery Koveleski has spent years helping local Haitians overcome bureaucratic red tape to make their lives in the Ohio city a little bit easier.But Koveleski – whose family is Haitian – has noticed a major change recently.Haitians are now coming to her to figure out how to leave.“Some folks don’t have credit cards or access to the internet, and they want to buy a bus ticket or a plane ticket, so we help them book a flight,” she told the Guardian recently. “People are leaving.”Koveleski, leaders in Springfield’s Haitian community, and others have relayed reports of Haitians fleeing the city of 60,000 people in recent days for fear of being rounded up and deported after Donald Trump’s victory in the 5 November presidential election.“The owner of one store is wondering if he should move back to New York or to Chicago – he says his business is way down,” Koveleski remarked.Trump has repeatedly said he would end immigrants’ temporary protected status (TPS) – the provision through which many Haitians are legally allowed to live and work in the US – and deport Haitians from Springfield once in office.For many, the threats are real.A sheriff in Sidney, a town 40 miles (64km) north-west of Springfield that is home to several dozen Haitian immigrants, allegedly told local police in September to “get a hold of these people and arrest them”.“Bring them – I’ll figure out if they’re legal,” he said, referencing Haitian immigrants in the area.As Jacob Payen, a co-founder of the Haitian Community Alliance who runs a business that includes helping Haitians in Springfield to file tax returns, said: “People are fully aware of the election result, and that is why they are leaving; they are afraid of a mass deportation.“Several of my customers have left. One guy with his family went to New Jersey; others have gone to Boston. I know three families that have gone to Canada.”Some are thought to have moved to nearby cities such as Dayton, where they believe they would be less visible to law enforcement. Others who had temporary asylum in Brazil are pondering going back to the South American country, community leaders say.Springfield’s Haitian community has been in the spotlight since Trump falsely accused immigrants here of eating pets during a presidential debate in September. Since then, the city has seen false bomb threats and marches by neo-Nazi groups after having experienced a revival in recent years in large part because of Haitians who took jobs in local produce packaging and machining factories that many previously there found undesirable.Unofficial results from the presidential election found that Trump beat Harris by fewer than 150 votes in Springfield despite his making false claims about immigrants in the Ohio city a cornerstone of his anti-immigration election campaign.A policy that has been around since 1990, the TPS program currently sees more than 800,000 immigrants who have fled conflict or humanitarian emergencies in 16 countries to live and work legally in the US for a limited time. About 300,000 Haitians fleeing widespread violence in the Caribbean country have been authorized to remain in the US through TPS until at least 3 February 2026.But while it once enjoyed support from both sides of the political aisle, Trump’s first term saw a California court rule in 2020 that his administration could end TPS for citizens of Haiti and three other countries.TPS is granted – and often renewed – by the secretary of homeland security. On Tuesday, reports emerged that Trump had chosen to give the post to the South Dakota governor, Kristi Noem, who has deployed state national guard troops to the US-Mexico border several times in recent years.Trump’s deportation threats are happening at a time when Haiti is experiencing renewed violence from politically connected gangs. The country’s main airport in Port-au-Prince has been closed periodically and was shuttered again on Tuesday after gunfire hit a commercial passenger airplane flying in from the US. That was the second time since October that gunfire had hit an aircraft over Haiti.Though Trump may ultimately succeed in ending TPS for some immigrants, some legal experts believe that is unlikely to happen during the early days of his administration after his second presidency begins on 20 January.“There’s a fear among the Haitian community that TPS is going to end on 20 January, and I don’t think that is very likely for a number of reasons,” said Katie Kersh, a senior attorney at the non-profit law firm Advocates for Basic Legal Equality.“The strain any deportation effort would place on an already stretched immigration court system would be significant.”Even if the program was ended, Kersh says, current law allows for a court hearing that could take months or years to take place. Similarly, immigrants who have asylum applications filed also have an opportunity to have that application heard.By ending TPS, Trump could in fact make the issue of undocumented immigration even worse.“TPS provides employment authorization and a right to reside in the US, so when a TPS grant ends, the people who have it immediately lose employment authorization unless another status which provides it is available to them,” said Ahilan Arulanantham of UCLA’s School of Law, who was among several lawyers to successfully challenge an earlier attempt by Trump to end TPS for Haitians as well as others in 2018.“That effect occurs regardless of whether they later face deportation.”For companies in Springfield and in nearby communities that depend on Haitian labor, Trump’s comments could prove damaging. The Haitians who filled thousands of jobs at area packaging and auto plants have helped rejuvenate once-blighted neighborhoods and contributed to the local economy in myriad ways.While many food products lining the shelves of Springfield’s Caribbean stores are imported, many items – bread from Florida and pinto beans from Nebraska – are American. Chicken, beef and eggs served at Haitian restaurants are regularly sourced from local farms.Recently, a Haitian community organization bought a former fire station it hopes to turn into a facility for English language classes, drivers’ education and a meeting spot.“I pay thousands of dollars in income and property taxes every year,” said Payen, “and – because I work with Haitians to file their taxes – I see their W-2s and so on. If these people leave, that money is gone from the city and the local economy.”Curiously, some Haitians, who do not have the right to vote unless they are citizens, have blamed prominent Democrats such as Bill and Hillary Clinton for destroying their country after a devastating 2010 earthquake killed about a quarter of a million people – and displaced in excess of a million more.Their Clinton Foundation, which ran dozens of projects in the country, had helped raise billions of dollars to assist with reconstruction efforts. But many Haitians believe the funds were siphoned off, which the Clintons deny.Huge numbers of US guns have been trafficked to Haiti in recent years – a fact that is not lost on some in the Springfield community, according to Koveleski.“They don’t have any faith in the Democratic party,” she said. “Some believe that if Donald Trump says, ‘leave Haiti alone,’ he’s going to leave us alone.” More

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      ‘Democrats presented no alternative’: US voters on Trump’s win and where Harris went wrong

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      “It’s like being sucked into a tsunami,” said Vivian Glover, a Kamala Harris voter from South Carolina, about the realisation that Donald Trump had been re-elected as president.“The contrast between the two campaigns couldn’t have been more stark. On the one hand an intelligent, highly qualified public servant with a unifying message, and the opponent someone who epitomizes corruption, immorality, dishonesty, incompetence, racism, misogyny, tyranny and has clearly indicated his willingness to embrace authoritarianism.”View image in fullscreen“This election felt like a chance for real change, and I was inspired by the idea of having a female president,” said Sydney, 40, a teacher from New York. “I believed in her vision for a more inclusive and just America, and it’s difficult to let go of that hope.”Despite Sydney’s disappointment, Trump’s decisive victory and remarkable political comeback did not surprise her. “I think the biggest issue for a lot of Americans is simply the economy,” she said.Glover and Sydney were among many hundreds of US voters who shared with the Guardian via an online callout and follow-up interviews how they felt about the outcome of the presidential election, what had decided their vote and what their hopes and fears were for Trump’s second presidential term.Among those who had voted Republican, many said they had expected a Trump win, and that the polls had never properly reflected the atmosphere on the streets of their communities. They had voted for Trump, many said, because they felt he would handle the economy and international geopolitics better than Harris would have done, and because they wanted a crackdown on illegal immigration.Various Trump voters, among them young first-time voters, women and citizens with immigration backgrounds, said they had voted for the billionaire this time because they saw a vote for Trump as a “vote against woke” and against what they saw as leftwing extremism, a vote for “common sense”, and as a vote against “biased” media, which they felt had unfairly persecuted Trump for years and could no longer be trusted.Scores of Trump voters expressed outrage about Democrats including Harris and Hillary Clinton likening Trump to Hitler and calling him a fascist.Some male respondents said they had voted for Trump because they were tired of men being “vilified”, unfairly called “misogynist” and “blamed for everything”.Although Trump was far from perfect, many supporters said, his second term would hopefully lead to more peace globally, economic stability and an improvement to their financial situation, more secure borders, and a return to meritocracy and “family values”.Of those who said they had voted for the Harris-Walz ticket, many were shocked by the election result and had expected a Democratic victory, citing extremely tight polls and Harris’s perceived strong pull among younger people and women.Various Democratic voters blamed Trump’s landslide victory on a lack of education among his supporters, as well as on social media platforms such as X and YouTube, where the “manosphere” has become highly effective at undermining progressives, their policies and campaigns.Becky Boudreau-Schultz, 50, a receptionist and the mother of a teenage boy from Mason, Michigan, felt the Democrats had underestimated the sway of these platforms.Trump, she said, “put on a show” that sought to tap people’s fears about immigration and loss of independence.“His followers eat that up. Kamala ran on civility but, obviously, that is not America’s mood. Mainstream media seemed to warn people of Trump’s horrible potential but his supporters weren’t and aren’t watching.”Instead, she felt, voters were turning to “social media echo chambers that masquerade as actual news sources”.Many Democratic voters were highly critical of the Harris campaign, which, scores felt, had been out of touch with the average voter, did not sufficiently connect with concerns of young men and ethnic minorities, and had failed to address Americans’ most pressing worries. It had been a mistake, many said, that the campaign had centered on vague, abstract slogans such as “saving democracy” and “not going back”.“What I’m reading and watching suggests the Harris team and many others misjudged much of the electorate,” said Judith, a retired Harris voter from Vermont.“The population needed more attention on food prices, gas prices. Hearing how robust the economy is does not buy their groceries. The Hispanic and Black populations feared their job security would be threatened by allowing more immigrants into this country. These things mattered more than Trump’s reputation and criminal record. I get it, sadly.”View image in fullscreen“We lost it because we’re not speaking to the issues that Americans are so concerned about,” said 77-year-old Bill Shlala, from New Jersey, a Democrat who has voted Republican in some races over the years, and who worked in special education.“We’re not talking about, how do I not lose my house to medical bills? How do I afford to send my child to college? Joe Biden has attempted to correct that a little bit, especially with outreach to unions, but we became the party of the elites.“The Republicans and the extremists understand the angst of the American people, and they’re calling on that angst without any real plan. But then we presented no alternative.”Many Harris voters felt that the vice-president had not been a good candidate, but mostly reckoned that it had been too late to find another one, citing Biden’s late decision to pull out of the race.“Harris had an impossible job with minimal time to reach voters,” said Carla, 71, a retired professional in the legal sector from Ohio.“Biden should have never run for re-election. There would have been a different outcome if Democrats had had the time to run primary elections and pick a strong candidate.”Various people suggested that Tim Walz, the Minnesota governor, had been a poor running mate. Others defended Harris.View image in fullscreen“I feel Kamala Harris did an excellent job of campaigning,” said 81-year-old Pat, from Colorado, who holds a college degree in journalism and is retired. “But too many felt that ‘they were better off four years ago than now’.”Pat is now plagued by concerns about Trump firing experienced federal workers, deporting immigrants, exposing pregnant women to severe health risks, ignoring climate change and rolling back support for Ukraine.“I’m appalled. I’ll never understand why someone as vulgar and unhinged as Trump is so popular with voters, including my sons in Missouri,” she said. “I can only hope that his bark is worse than his bite regarding democracy, immigration and abortion.”Jack, a 19-year-old college student from Minnesota, was among a string of Democrats who said they had only reluctantly turned out for Harris, citing a lack of clear policy and the party’s move to the right on some issues, such as immigration.“This was my first election, and I voted for Kamala with minimal enthusiasm,” he said.“I don’t think Kamala was the right candidate, but this [loss] is owed to the complete strategic failure of the Dems in focusing on getting votes of independents and moderate Republicans. A [moderate] Democrat will lose to a real Republican every time.”View image in fullscreenHe was “not at all surprised that Trump won”, as the economy had “not improved for the average American on the ground”, he said.“I also believe this nation is too fundamentally misogynistic to elect a female president. We can elect a rapist before we can elect a woman.”“I completely reject the accusation that men like me voted for Trump because of misogyny,” said a male professional with Hispanic roots in his mid-40s from Florida who wanted to stay anonymous.“My wife and I did not vote for Trump because we could not live with a female president, but because we wanted Trump to be our president. We think he’ll do great things for our country and the world, and as a family with grandfathers on both sides who fought the Nazis in [the second world war], we are outraged by claims that Trump voters are fascists.“We are decent citizens who are very active in our community. We just want less crime, secure borders, a strong economy driven by entrepreneurial growth not state handouts, affordable prices, and fairness in the labor market. We believe President Trump will deliver on those.”Although he felt “vindicated” by the election result, he and his wife remained “afraid to come out publicly as Trump supporters”, he said. “We fear social and professional repercussions. That’s why the polls keep getting it wrong.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionView image in fullscreen“I voted for Trump and consider myself a moderate,” said Hayden Duke, 45, a teacher from Maryland. “I’ve voted for all parties in the past.“I couldn’t be happier that we have rejected the Biden-Harris wokeness, weakness and lack of common sense which have destroyed our economy and allowed wars to take place all over the world. I have been called a Nazi, a fascist, a nationalist and more by supporters of Harris. Normal people are so tired of being lectured by these suffocating moral guardians, looking down on us and speaking down to us and shoving their viewpoints on everyone else.“This crowd has likened Trump to Hitler – but Hitler killed [millions of] Jews and others, Trump hasn’t killed a single person. They say Kamala Harris lost because of misogyny, but I’m ready for a female president. I voted for [would-be Republican presidential candidate] Elizabeth Dole all the way back in 2000.”Had Harris chosen the, in Duke’s view, the more broadly appealing Pennsylvania governor, Josh Shapiro, as her running mate, Duke felt she might have won Pennsylvania and possibly the election – an opinion that was shared by various people.Others took the opposite view. “The Democrats refused to listen to the public on Gaza which I think lost them support,” said Tom, 28, a higher education professional from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, who “had a feeling” Trump would win. Having voted “unenthusiastically” for Biden in 2020, he did not vote at all in 2024.“I think the assassination attempt on Trump really solidified and unified his base, while the Democrats have gotten deeply fractured over Gaza and didn’t have strong messaging,” he said.“I don’t think that Kamala Harris ran a strong campaign. It was unclear what her values and policies actually were, other than ‘I am not Trump.’ I do not think that is enough for many people, but that’s what Harris was banking on – people rejecting Trump again. What was the Harris plan for healthcare? I don’t think she did enough to differentiate herself from Biden.”Tom was among a number of people who said they were actively looking into moving abroad now. “This Trump term is going to be terrible,” he said. “I want to finish my master’s degree and then look into moving to another country.”“This election proves that centrist, pro-war Democrats weren’t the answer,” said Margarito Morales, 40, from Austin, Texas, who works in tech and said he had voted for Harris. “Biden won the popular vote with over 80m votes, and now Trump won it with much fewer votes.”View image in fullscreenMany younger people, Morales felt, chose to abstain or to vote for Jill Stein in the absence of strong leftist policies that would have excited them, such as universal healthcare, student loan forgiveness or lowering the cost of going to college.“The Democrats went with the status quo, and it isn’t working. People didn’t feel inspired. People with immigrant parents did not know what may happen to their families under the Democrats,” he said, citing the party’s recent moves to tighten border restrictions.Several people who got in touch said they had backed Trump for the first time in 2024, despite having concerns about him and his Maga movement.A 25-year-old mechanic from Iowa who wanted to stay anonymous “disliked both candidates in 2020 – their policies, personalities, and campaigns.“This year,” he said, “I voted for Donald Trump.”A key point in his decision had been his financial stability, which has been crumbling over the past few years, he said.“I believe Donald Trump’s administration will do a better job helping the American people financially and improving international stability. I do, however, have concerns for young adults who are pro-choice, and those in the trans community whose rights may be under attack under the new presidency.”Milly, in her 40s, from Washington state, was another first-time Trump voter. “I voted for Obama twice, but the liberal movement in America has lost me, because it completely changed,” she said.“The DEI [diversity, equity and inclusion] movement has completely radicalized itself, from initially wanting to push back against actual sexual and racial discrimination to pursuing an absurd, deeply unfair equality-of-outcome agenda. These extremists are alienating so many people with pretty liberal views.”Being pro-choice, Milly said she was planning on lobbying the Republican party to soften its stance on harsh abortion bans in some states.“I still identify as a liberal, but I’m a liberal with limits: society’s norms can’t be overhauled entirely just to suit tiny minorities and extreme political fringe movements. I hope Donald Trump will bring common sense and realism back into American political discourse.”Jacqueline, 63, a retired photographer and writer from Arizona who described herself as disabled, fears that the new reality under Trump may become unsurvivable for people like herself who depend on the social security net, which she believes the new administration wants to get rid of.“We’re talking about social security for the elderly, for disability, for veterans, death benefits for widows, food stamps. I live in a very poor area. People can’t feed their families without food stamps. People like me, my neighbors, this whole community, many people that voted for them, will have no way to survive.”Another huge worry of hers is Trump’s possible environmental policy. “Climate change affects everything, and if we don’t fix that, nothing else matters. He’s going to reverse everything that the Biden administration has set up to mitigate climate change and to make the transition to renewable energy.”Jacqueline also struggles to wrap her head around the new reality that America now has a president with a criminal conviction.“If you’re a felon, you can’t get a good job, you have to put that on every job application, that label follows you around. But you can be president of the United States. It’s literally insane.”Josh, an engineer in his 50s from Pennsylvania, has an answer for people who cannot understand why more than 74 million Americans were not put off by Trump’s criminal record.“The people calling Trump ‘a convicted felon’ need to understand: many people like me voted for Trump not despite this kangaroo court conviction, but because of it. His trial was a shameful persecution of a political opponent by a Democratic prosecution. It fired me up.”JT, 28, a full-time employee from Texas, was one of various people who said they considered Trump “the lesser evil”, and voted Trump in 2020 and 2024, despite disliking the available candidates in both elections.“I voted for Trump based on two reasons,” he said. “I feel I was better off economically when he was in charge. And I’m originally from California, and watched as the Democratic party’s rule there made it so much harder for people like me to get ahead.”Alongside exploding prices, high taxes, and higher crime and homelessness rates, he pointed to California having become “way too focused on identity politics.“Harris is from California, and I don’t want the USA to become like California. I’m a mixed-race person of colour and have never liked identity politics. I don’t care about race or gender or orientation; I want results.”He wants stronger borders and immigration enforcement, considering it “insulting” that people like his foreign-born family had to wait for years in difficult circumstances before being able to immigrate legally while others cross the border illegally.“Harris fixated on democracy being in danger and abortion, ignoring the two huge concerns of economy and immigration,” he said.“I have a ton of concerns about Trump, mostly about his personality and lack of morals, his weird tirades and personal attacks. He outright lies, a lot. But as long as he is able to improve the economy like in 2016 and improve on the immigration issue, I’ll consider it a win.”View image in fullscreenElizabeth McCutchon, 61, a psychiatric nurse practitioner and mother of five, voted for Harris, but is married to a Republican.“The mistake of the Democrats has been to keep asking the question, ‘How could you?’ rather than, ‘What did we not understand about American voters?’” she said.“There are some Harris voters who are now saying they will have nothing to do with people who voted for Trump. I think this sort of behavior will be used by Trump voters to demonstrate how out of touch Harris voters are.“I don’t think Trump will provide the change that his voters were promised. But he is different than the status quo.” More