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      The chaos Elon Musk and Doge are leaving behind in Washington

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      Elon Musk formally exited his role in the Trump administration on Wednesday night, ending a contentious and generally unpopular run as a senior adviser to the president and de facto head of the so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge). Though he promised efficiency and modernization, Musk leaves behind a trail of uncertainty and reduced functionality.The timing of Musk’s departure lines up with the end of his 130-day term limit as a “special government employee” but also plays a part in an effort by the billionaire to signal a wider shift away from Washington as he faces backlash from the public and shareholders. Musk has recently made a show of refocusing his efforts on his tech companies in interviews, saying that he has spent too much time focused on politics and plans to reduce his political spending in the future.As Musk moves on, he consigns a mess of half-realized plans and gutted agencies to his acolytes installed in key positions across the federal government. His departure throws Doge’s already chaotic impact on the government into an even grayer limbo, with questions over how much power the nebulous taskforce will have without him and who, if anyone, might rebuild the programs and services it destroyed.Doge’s debrisMusk’s initial pitch for Doge was to save $2tn from the budget by rooting out rampant waste and fraud, as well as to conduct an overhaul of government software that would modernize how federal agencies operate. Doge so far has claimed to cut about $140bn from the budget – although its “wall of receipts” is notorious for containing errors that overestimate its savings. Donald Trump’s new tax bill, though not part of Doge and opposed by Musk, is also expected to add $2.3tn to the deficit, nullifying any savings Doge may have achieved. Its promises of a new, modernized software have frequently been limited to AI chatbots – some of which were already in the works under the Biden administration.The greater impact of Doge has instead been its dismantling of government services and humanitarian aid. Doge’s cuts have targeted a swath of agencies such as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Organization, which handles weather and natural disaster forecasting and plunged others such as the Department of Veterans Affairs into crises. Numerous smaller agencies, such as one that coordinates policy on homelessness, have been in effect shut down. Doge has brought several bureaus to their knees, with no clear plan of whether the staff Musk leaves behind will try to update or maintain their services or simply shut them off.In one early example of its cuts and the holes in government they have created, Doge targeted the government tech group that partnered with federal agencies to provide tech solutions, known as 18F.When Doge staffers entered the General Services Administration agency that housed the 18F Office, former employees have said they appeared to fundamentally misunderstand how the government operates and the challenges of creating public services.Former 18F director Lindsay Young, who is now part of a legal appeal that contends the firing of 18F violated legal requirements, is concerned that Doge’s cuts will have long-lasting effects on government functions.“In government, it’s just so much easier to tear things down than it is to build things up,” Young said.The mass layoffs at the Department of Health and Human Services represented a similar loss of institutional knowledge that Doge does not seem intent on replacing.Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond who has been tracking Doge’s cuts, used the agency’s tobacco unit as an example, which was severely affected by the cuts. “The loss of so much expertise, especially in the healthcare area will mean that more Americans will become sick or die earlier than they might have,” he said. “It also may take many years and great expenditure of resources to restore that experience and expertise.”Musk’s gutting of USAid, formerly the world’s largest single provider of humanitarian aid, is one of the starkest examples of the disarray and harm that Doge’s cuts have caused. The US canceled approximately 83% of USAid programs, imperiling services around the world aimed at humanitarian assistance and disease prevention. One pioneering program under USAid, Pepfar, which coordinates the US HIV/Aids response, has seen its services reduced worldwide and its staff left in confusion over what they can still do for people who relied on their organization. Doge’s cuts to the program have likewise threatened the rollout of a new anti-HIV drug that researchers have hailed as a “miracle” for its effectiveness.As Musk returns to Tesla and SpaceX, the agencies he laid waste to are left to pick up the pieces.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe Doge staffers still holding sway in governmentWhile Musk is returning to his tech empire, many of the former employees and inexperienced young engineers whom he hired to work for Doge are set to remain part of the government. One of the largest questions about what Doge’s future looks like is whether these staffers, some of whom gained near unfettered access to the government’s most sensitive data, will retain the same powers they enjoyed under Musk.Doge staffers, such as billionaire investor and Musk ally Antonio Gracias, have embedded themselves at key agencies such as the Social Security Administration and Federal Aviation Administration. They have worked as a sort of parallel government task force, operating with a lack of transparency as their attempts to access databases and migrate data has caused disarray and technical problems. Whether Trump and agency heads allow them to continue on with carte blanche remains unseen.Already at least two prominent Doge staffers have followed Musk to the exit. The billionaire’s longtime top lieutenant Steve Davis, who was running the day-to-day operations of Doge, left his role on Thursday. Spokesperson Katie Miller, wife of Trump’s deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller, also left the White House to work full-time for Musk, according to CNN.Some of Musk’s dictates have already been rolled back since he left Washington earlier this month, including a much-derided mandate that required federal employees to send a list of five things that they accomplished each week. The weekly email, which was initially introduced with the threat of being fired for non-compliance, was largely ignored and viewed by many as pointless busywork. On Wednesday, the Pentagon formally announced that it would halt the practice.Doge is not being left leaderless, however. Taking over for Musk, according to the Wall Street Journal, is Christian nationalist and key figure in the rightwing Project 2025 manifesto Russ Vought. A longtime believer that the president should have sweeping executive powers, Vought has said that he wants federal employees to be left “in trauma” and to slash federal funding.Musk has praised Doge’s work and pledged that it will continue without him, and as recently as this week is still removing veteran officials it disagrees with from federal agencies. Even at reduced numbers, Musk’s allies also still have access to immense amounts of sensitive and confidential data they are reportedly intending to use to surveil immigrants.What seems farther away than ever in the chaos, however, is Musk’s promise to make the government more efficient and better serve the public.“You don’t need that many people to decide to just cut things,” 18F’s Young said. “But if you actually want to build things, that takes thought. It takes effort.” More

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      Trump administration sets quota to arrest 3,000 people a day in anti-immigration agenda

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      The Trump administration has set aggressive new goals in its anti-immigration agenda, demanding that federal agents arrest 3,000 people a day – or more than a million in a year.The new target, tripling arrest figures from earlier this year, was delivered to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) leaders by Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff, and Kristi Noem, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) secretary, in a strained meeting last week.The intense meeting, first reported by Axios and confirmed by the Guardian, involved Ice officials from enforcement and removal operations (ERO) and homeland security investigations (HSI) – both separate offices within DHS. ERO is in charge of immigration enforcement, including arrests, detention and deportation, while HSI typically focuses on investigating transnational crime, such as drug trafficking, human smuggling and the spread of online child abuse.The 21 May meeting in Washington DC is the latest example of the increasing pressure being placed on officials nationwide to increase the number of arrests of immigrants, as the administration doubles down on its anti-immigration agenda.The latest phase of the crackdown includes new tactics, such as mandating federal law enforcement agents outside Ice to assist in arrests and transports, more deputizing of compliant state and local law enforcement agencies, and arresting people at locations that were once protected, like courthouses.“ This administration came into office with the illusion that they had been given a broad mandate to effectuate an aggressive immigration enforcement agenda, and they are doubling down now on that agenda,” said Nayna Gupta, policy director for the American Immigration Council. “ Public polling is showing decreasing support for Trump’s immigration agenda, as Americans wake up to the reality that mass deportation means arrests of our neighbors and friends, masked agents in our communities and people afraid to go to work and show up to school, in ways that undermine our local economies.”Helter-skelter action has led to citizens caught up in the dragnet, Ice skirting due process – to the chagrin of the supreme court and lower courts – over-crowding in detention centers, arrests based on ideology and officials deporting people to third countries.“The sweeping Ice raids and arrests are hitting families, longtime residents, children and communities in a way never seen before,” said Jesse Franzblau, associate director of policy for the National Immigrant Justice Center.As the number of people crossing the border into the US without authorization has plummeted even further than after the final Biden crackdown, operations in the US interior have increased.“Under Secretary Noem, we are delivering on President Trump’s and the American people’s mandate to arrest and deport criminal illegal aliens and make America safe,” Tricia McLaughlin, the homeland security assistant secretary, said in a statement.But even if the new target is fulfilled, it’s a far cry from Trump’s election campaign pledges to deport 15m to 20m people, which itself is more than the estimated 11m undocumented population.Agents with the FBI, HSI, Drug Enforcement Administration, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and other federal law enforcement agencies have been co-opted from normal priorities to carry out immigration enforcement work. Current and former federal officials told the Guardian there is concern that important non-immigration-related investigations are falling by the wayside as a result.There has also been a huge escalation by local police and sheriff’s departments assisting, deputized by Ice to perform federal immigration arrests under a program called 287(g).Ice has also been targeting unusual places.On Tuesday, Ice and several other federal law enforcement agencies arrested roughly 40 people on the Massachusetts islands of Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard. The US Coast Guard transported those apprehended, Ice said, angering some residents, local media reported.The agency has also been arresting people at courthouses throughout the country – a trend that has troubled advocates and policy analysts.“We’re seeing the Trump administration take the unprecedented step of arresting non-citizens who are following the government’s rules and procedures, and showing up for their court hearings,” said Gupta. “ They are desperate to reach a certain number of arrests per day. And the only way they can find non-citizens easily and quickly is to go to the courthouses, where they [immigrants] are doing exactly what they’re supposed to do.”On Wednesday, sources told the Guardian that officials had arrested people at two separate immigration courts in New York City. The outlet the City observed seven people arrested in a lower Manhattan court.Internal documents accessed by the Washington Post show Ice officers in more than 20 states have been instructed to arrest people at courthouses immediately after a judge orders them deported or after their criminal cases are dropped and they try to leave.The number of people held in detention by Ice reached 49,000 by 18 May, an increase of more than 10,000 since Trump took office, with the agency using local jails and federal prisons to hold immigrants, amid overcrowding.Austin Kocher, an assistant research professor at Syracuse University who closely tracks immigration detention data, said of the 3,000 daily arrest quota: “ The big question for me is: where are they going to put people?”Meanwhile, last month, the Trump administration ordered immigration judges to quickly dismiss cases by denying asylum seekers a hearing. The directive “has nothing to do with efficiency – it’s about slamming shut the courthouse door on people who have the right to seek asylum and a fair day in court”, Shayna Kessler, the director of the Advancing Universal Representation initiative at the Vera Institute of Justice, said.On Capitol Hill, the major spending bill passed by the House would balloon spending for immigration enforcement, at the US-Mexico border and in the interior, while cutting everyday services.“The administration is on a reckless spending spree, counting on Congress to bail them out for overspending hundreds of millions of dollars in private prison contracts with ties to top-level officials,” Franzblau said.He concluded: “It is beyond cruel to superfund Ice’s rampant violations of constitutional protections and expand the deadly immigration detention and enforcement apparatus.” More

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      Judge says Trump’s bid to deport Mahmoud Khalil is unconstitutional

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      The Trump administration’s bid to deport Mahmoud Khalil, the Columbia University student and pro-Palestinian activist, is likely unconstitutional, a US judge has said.In a lengthy order issued Wednesday, Judge Michael Farbiarz wrote that the government’s primary justification for removing Khalil – that his beliefs may pose a threat to US foreign policy – could open the door to vague and arbitrary enforcement.Still, Farbiarz stopped short of ordering Khalil released from a Louisiana jail, finding his attorneys had not sufficiently responded to another charge brought by the government: that Khalil did not properly disclose certain personal details in his permanent residency application.The judge said he planned to issue an order shortly outlining next steps in the case.Khalil, a legal US resident, was detained by federal immigration agents on 8 March in the lobby of his university-owned apartment, the first arrest under Donald Trump’s widening crackdown on students who joined campus protests against Israel’s war in Gaza.He has been held for nearly 12 weeks at an immigration detention center in Jena, Louisiana, missing the birth of his first child and his recent graduation from Columbia University.Attorneys for Khalil argue his detention is part of a broader attempt by the Trump administration to suppress constitutionally protected free speech.In letters sent from the jail, Khalil has maintained that his arrest was “a direct consequence of exercising my right to free speech as I advocated for a free Palestine and an end to the genocide in Gaza”.The federal government has not accused Khalil of breaking any laws. Instead, they have submitted a memo signed by the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, arguing that Khalil’s presence in the US may pose a threat to US foreign policy interests.The government has offered the same justification to detain other pro-Palestinian activists, including another student at Columbia, Mohsen Mahdawi; a Tufts University student, Rümeysa Öztürk; and a Georgetown University scholar, Badar Khan Suri. All three have won their custody in recent weeks as they continue to fight their cases.In Khalil’s case, the government also said he withheld information from his residency application about his involvement in some organizations, including a United Nations agency that resettles Palestinian refugees and a Columbia protest group.The judge on Wednesday said attorneys for Khalil had not properly responded to those allegations, but would be permitted to address the issue in the future.Nico Perrino of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression called it a “mixed ruling” on Khalil’s motion for a preliminary injunction, because the judge wrote that he “is likely to succeed on his First Amendment claim, but likely to lose on a residency application issue. For that reason, the judge denied the request for a preliminary injunction, pending further briefing on the First Amendment issue.”Farbiarz’s ruling marked the first time a federal judge had weighed in on the constitutionality of Trump’s use of a law granting the US secretary of state the power to seek the deportation of any non-citizen whose presence in the country is deemed adverse to US foreign policy interests.The Newark, New Jersey-based judge said the law, known as section 1227, was vague because people would have no way of knowing what might get them deported.“An ordinary person would have had no real inkling that a Section 1227 removal could go forward in this way – without the Secretary first determining that there has been an impact on American relations with another country,” Farbiarz said in a 101-page ruling.Khalil and his supporters say his arrest and attempted deportation are violations of his right to freedom of speech under the US constitution’s first amendment. Farbiarz has blocked officials from deporting Khalil while his challenge to the constitutionality of his arrest plays out.He wrote that he would not rule for now on whether Khalil’s first amendment rights had been violated.In a statement, Khalil’s legal team said it would give Farbiarz the additional argument he sought as quickly as possible.“Every day Mahmoud spends languishing in an Ice detention facility in Jena, Louisiana, is an affront to justice, and we won’t stop working until he is free,” his lawyers said. More

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      Family of four-year-old who would ‘die within days’ fighting deportation from US to Mexico

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      The family of a four-year-old girl who is receiving life-saving treatment in the United States are fighting against deportation, as her medical team warns she will likely die “within days” if forced to return to Mexico.Deysi Vargas, her husband and their daughter – whom lawyers identified by the pseudonym Sofia – came to the US in 2023, receiving permission to enter the US on humanitarian grounds to seek medical care. Sofia suffers from short bowel syndrome, requiring specialized care that includes IV treatments for 14 hours a day. She has seen significant improvement since arriving in the US and obtaining care at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, her mother said.But in April, Donald Trump’s administration terminated the family’s legal status and ordered them to self-deport, which would have grave consequences for Sofia.“Sofia’s doctors have been clear she will die within days,” Gina Amato, the directing attorney of Public Counsel’s Immigrants’ Rights Project, which is representing the family. “Deporting this family under these conditions is not only unlawful – it constitutes a moral failure that violates the basic tents of humanity and decency.”View image in fullscreenThe family’s attorney has sought to have the administration reverse its decision and restore humanitarian parole, a temporary status granted to people on urgent humanitarian grounds, citing Sofia’s dire need for care. The family has not received a response.The legal status the family previously received saved Sofia’s life, her mother said at a press conference on Wednesday, as her curly-haired daughter sat nearby, feet dangling off a chair while she played with stickers. Sofia was born with her condition and, while in Mexico, was hospitalized constantly and did not improve, Vargas said.“Now with the help she’s received in the United States, my daughter has an opportunity to get out of the hospital, know the world and live like a normal girl of four years,” she said through a translator.Sofia currently receives nutrition intravenously as well as through a feeding tube, Amato said, but that treatment is not available abroad because the equipment cannot be taken outside the US. While her condition has significantly improved, Sofia cannot yet survive without the treatment she receives from the hospital, her mother said.Humanitarian parole was made for people like Vargas and Sofia, the family’s lawyer, Rebecca Brown, said, adding that she came to the US legally – applying to enter the country and waiting until her application was approved before entering. If the government conducted an individualized assessment, as required by law, they would see the need for Sofia to remain in the US, Brown said.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionAmato argued the case was a symbol of “the recklessness of this administration’s deportation policies”.“To suddenly yank away that welcome mat, take away Sofia’s lifesaving care and quite literally risk her life is a cruel betrayal of our nation’s values and an affront to our shared humanity,” Amato said, adding that the government’s policies are endangering many immigrants seeking refuge. “These are people coming to us for protection and instead we’re sending them to die.” More

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      Trump administration orders US embassies to stop student visa interviews

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      The Trump administration has ordered US embassies worldwide to immediately stop scheduling visa interviews for foreign students as it prepares to implement comprehensive social media screening for all international applicants.A Tuesday state department cable instructs consular sections to pause adding “any additional student or exchange visitor (F, M, and J) visa appointment capacity until further guidance is issued” within days.The directive, first reported by Politico and now confirmed by the Guardian, could severely delay visa processing and hurt universities – many of which Donald Trump accuses of having far-left ideologies – that rely heavily on foreign students for revenue.“The department is conducting a review of existing operations and processes for screening and vetting of student and exchange visitor visa applicants,” the cable reads. Officials plan to issue guidance on “expanded social media vetting for all such applicants”.The freeze is a further escalation from current screening measures, which have primarily targeted students who participated in pro-Palestinian campus protests. Since March, consular officers have been required to conduct mandatory social media reviews looking for evidence of support for “terrorist activity or a terrorist organization” which could be as broad as showing support for the Palestinian cause, according to a cable obtained by the Guardian at the time. That directive required officers to take screenshots of “potentially derogatory” content for permanent records, even if posts were later deleted.The new expansion would apply social media vetting to all student visa applicants, not just those flagged for activism. Under the screening process, consular officers would examine applicants’ posts, shares, and comments across platforms such as Instagram, X, and TikTok for content they deem to be threatening to national security, which has since been tied in to the Trump administration’s stance on combating antisemitism.Rubio told senators last week that his department has revoked visas numbering “probably in the thousands at this point”, up from more than 300 reported in March. “I don’t know the latest count, but we probably have more to do,” he said.There are more than one million foreign students in the United States, contributing nearly $43.8bn to the US economy and supporting more than 378,000 jobs in 2023 to 2024, according to NAFSA. The visa freeze threatens to compound existing challenges facing higher education institutions already experiencing declining international enrollment.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe state department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. More

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      US police officer resigns after wrongfully arresting undocumented teen

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      A Georgia police officer resigned from his job on Friday after erroneously pulling over a teenager, causing her to spend more than two weeks in a federal immigration jail, and leaving her facing deportation.The officer, Leslie O’Neal, was employed at the police department in Dalton, a small city more than an hour north of Atlanta.His arrest of college student Ximena Arias-Cristobal not only led to a domino effect that could lead to her deportation – it also engendered anger and criticism, especially given the circumstances of her immigration-related detention.Though Dalton’s municipal government did not provide any information about why O’Neal resigned, his wife posted his resignation letter on Facebook, which said he believed the local police department did not adequately defend him.“The department’s silence in the face of widespread defamation has not only made my position personally untenable but has also created an environment where I can no longer effectively carry out my duties within the city of Dalton without fear of further backlash from the community,” O’Neal wrote in the letter.On 5 May, O’Neal pulled Arias-Cristobal over in Dalton. The officer accused her of improperly making a false turn – but those charges were later dropped after the police force admitted to mistaking her car for another.The damage, though, was done by the time Arias-Cristobal’s charges were dismissed. The 19-year-old – who is undocumented and was driving with a Mexican license – was brought to the US from Mexico in 2007, when she was just four.The timing of her having been taken to the US barely missed the deadline for her to qualify for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (Daca), a program initiated during Barack Obama’s presidency that provided children in her situation some protections from deportation.After O’Neal arrested her, local authorities contacted Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice), the federal agency that detains and deports immigrants. Ice agents then transferred her to an immigration jail in the state.“I cannot go to jail,” Arias-Cristobal said during the arrest, according to dash-cam footage. “I have my finals next week. My family depends on this.”Arias-Cristobal’s plight captured national attention, with many supporting her and calling for her release. Others – including the far-right Georgia congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene – agitated for Arias-Cristobal to be deported.“In Mexico, today, there’s over 1.6 million United States of America citizens, living and thriving in Mexico, and I’m sure she and her family will be able to do the same,” Greene said during an interview with Tennessee’s Local 3 News. “But it’s important for our nation, for our sovereignty, for us to uphold the law. And this is what we have to do.”The White House’s attempts to engage in “mass deportations” during Donald Trump’s second presidency has led to an increase in arrests throughout the country. Immigration enforcement operations have been aided by local jurisdictions that partner with Ice, under what are known as 287(g) contracts. These contracts deputize local officials to carry out immigration enforcement arrests, collaborating closely with Ice.The Whitfield county sheriff’s office, which runs the local jail for people arrested in Dalton, has a 287(g) contract with Ice.Additionally, a law signed last year by Georgia’s governor, Brian Kemp, requires local law enforcement, in the entire state, to apply to enter into 287(g) contracts with Ice. Immigration advocacy organizations have called that law “disastrous”.The Georgia Latino Alliance for Human Rights, for instance, said it would lead to “racial profiling, terrorize immigrant communities and waste local resources”.Arias-Cristobal’s father, José Arias-Tovar, had also been detained by Ice weeks earlier after another traffic stop for speeding. He bonded out of Ice detention on 16 May. Five days later, Arias-Cristobal paid a $1,500 bond, leading to her release. She was home with her family by Thursday evening.“We’re going to keep working on her case to try to keep her here permanently,” Arias-Cristobal’s attorney, Dustin Baxter, told local TV station WSB-TV.Arias-Cristobal’s arrest has prompted some to rally for her release, whether in person or online. Her advocates have criticized Ice and the local police department for how they have handled her case.A GoFundMe campaign launched for her legal defense has raised more than $90,000.The jail where Arias-Cristobal was detained before she bonded out is known as the Stewart detention center. It is a run privately in Lumpkin, Georgia, by CoreCivic under a contract with Ice and for years has been accused of violating rights and maintaining horrific conditions. More

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      US judge orders Trump administration to return wrongly deported gay man

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      A federal judge ordered the Trump administration late Friday night to facilitate the return of a Guatemalan man it deported to Mexico, in spite of his fears of being harmed there, and who has since been returned to Guatemala.The man, who is gay, had applied for asylum in the US last year after he was attacked twice in homophobic acts of violence in Guatemala. He was protected from being returned to his home country under a US immigration judge’s order at the time, but the Trump administration put him on a bus and sent him to Mexico instead.The US district judge Brian Murphy found the man’s deportation likely “lacked any semblance of due process”. In a declaration to the court, the man, identified by his initials OCG in legal filings, said that since he was returned to Guatemala two months ago, “I have been living in hiding, in constant panic and constant fear”.An earlier court proceeding determined that OCG risked persecution or torture if returned to Guatemala, but he also feared returning to Mexico. He presented evidence of being raped and held for ransom there while seeking asylum in the US.“No one has ever suggested that OCG poses any sort of security threat,” Murphy wrote in his order. “In general, this case presents no special facts or legal circumstances, only the banal horror of a man being wrongfully loaded onto a bus and sent back to a country where he was allegedly just raped and kidnapped.”Murphy’s order adds to a string of findings by federal courts against recent Trump administration deportations.Last week, Murphy, a Biden appointee, found that the Trump administration had violated an order he issued barring government officials from deporting people to countries not their own without first giving them sufficient time to object.In a hearing, the homeland security department said that seven immigrants had been deported Tuesday on a flight to a third country, but they refused to say where the men were going. It was later revealed that the men were told they were being sent to South Sudan.In that case, Murphy said that the government had given the seven men little more than 24 hours’ notice that they were being removed from the US, which he called “plainly insufficient”, and could result in a finding of criminal contempt.Other cases that have been spotlighted for rapid deportations include that of Kilmar Ábrego García, who was sent to El Salvador. The US supreme court ordered the government to “facilitate” Ábrego García’s return, but the White House has said it is not within its power to do so.That case sparked a legal joust over the supreme court’s practicable meaning of “facilitate”.In his ruling, Murphy noted the dispute over the use of the verb, saying that returning OCG to the US is not that complicated.“The Court notes that ‘facilitate’ in this context should carry less baggage than in several other notable cases,” he wrote. “OCG is not held by any foreign government. Defendants have declined to make any argument that facilitating his return would be costly, burdensome, or otherwise impede the government’s objectives.”The Associated Press contributed reporting More

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      US citizen detained by immigration officials who dismissed his Real ID as fake

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      Authorities wrestled a US-born citizen to the ground, cuffed him and dismissed his so-called Real ID as “fake” during an arrest operation targeting undocumented people on Wednesday under the direction of the Trump administration, according to a viral video and reporting by Telemundo.Leonardo Garcia Venegas, 25, was at his construction job in Foley, Alabama, when officials arrived to arrest workers there. Garcia Venegas – who was born in Florida to Mexican parents – began filming the arrests with his mobile phone before officials reportedly knocked the device out of his hand and tried to arrest him as well.Video of the arrest shows three officials wrestling him to the ground, while he yells: “I’m a citizen!”According to an interview with the Spanish-language US news outlet Telemundo, officials took out his wallet, removed his ID – which complies with higher federal security standards for state-issued driver’s licenses as well as identification – and told him that it was fake.“They cuffed me,” he said. “They put the cuffs on quite hard.”Four people at the job site were arrested, including Garcia Venegas’s brother, who is undocumented.Officials removed the cuffs from Garcia Venegas hours later – after he gave them his social security number, verifying his US citizenship.“I feel really sad, honestly, and I feel a bit nervous for everything that’s happening,” said Garcia Venegas, referring to the Trump administration’s ongoing immigration-related crackdown.His cousin, also a US citizen, told Telemundo they both went through the process of acquiring the Real ID, undergoing “the protocols the administration is asking for”.“I feel sad because, even though we were born here, that doesn’t matter any more,” the cousin said. She added: “To have our skin color has, apparently, become a crime. And it has become a crime deserving of this type of treatment – as if we were real criminals.”In a statement to NBC News, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) accused Garcia Venegas of having “interfered” with the arrest during the operation.“Anyone who actively obstructs law enforcement in the performance of their sworn duties, including US citizens, will of course face consequences which include arrest,” the DHS’s statement to NBC said.It is unclear whether the officials who cuffed Garcia Venegas were local officials, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) agents or other members of federal law enforcement.Since Trump came into office, various federal agencies, including the Drug Enforcement Administration, the FBI and others, have been tasked with carrying out immigration enforcement operations. Some local police and sheriff’s departments have also been deputized to carry out federal immigration arrests.As the White House attempts to carry out a promise of “mass deportations” that vaulted Donald Trump to victory in November’s presidential election, a number of US citizens have been caught up in its dragnet.Some, such as Garcia Venegas, have been detained by officials, then released. But others, including children, have been deported.Although rare, the deportation of US citizens has also happened during prior administrations. More