immigrant

A federal officer in the United States has shot a Venezuelan man in the leg in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Officials say officers had tried to stop a car to arrest the man and opened fire after two people attacked one of them with a “snow shovel and broom handle”.

Protests broke out in the city after the incident.

Wednesday’s shooting comes exactly a week after a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer shot and killed local resident Renee Nicole Good in her car in Minneapolis during an immigration raid.

What happened?

In an X post on Wednesday, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) wrote that at 6:50pm (00:50 GMT on Thursday), federal law enforcement officers were stopping “an illegal alien from Venezuela who was released into the country by [former President] Joe Biden in 2022”.

The DHS added that the man had tried to evade the officers, crashing his car into another parked car and then fleeing on foot. It said one of the officers caught up with the immigrant on foot “when the subject began to resist and violently assault the officer”.

The department’s post said that while the immigrant and the officer were struggling on the ground, two people came out of a nearby apartment and began to strike the officer with a snow shovel and a broomstick. It further said, “The original subject got loose and began striking the officer with a shovel or broom stick.”

“Fearing for his life and safety as he was being ambushed by three individuals, the officer fired a defensive shot to defend his life. The initial subject was hit in the leg,” the DHS wrote.

It added that the immigrant and the two people who had come out of the apartment ran back inside the apartment and barricaded themselves in.

The immigrant and officer who was attacked were taken to hospital, and the other two people who attacked the officer are in custody, DHS wrote.

Who was Renee Nicole Good and what happened to her last week?

On the morning of January 7, Jonathan Ross, an ICE officer, fatally shot Good while she was in her car in Minneapolis.

Local officials said Good, 37, was acting as a legal observer during protests against US President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.

Legal observers are usually volunteers who attend protests to watch police-demonstrator interactions and record any confrontations or possible legal violations.

Good’s killing sparked outrage and protests in Minnesota and nationwide.

In a joint statement released after she was shot dead, Minneapolis City Council President Elliot Payne and council members wrote: “Renee was a resident of our city who was out caring for her neighbors this morning and her life was taken today at the hands of the federal government. Anyone who kills someone in our city deserves to be arrested, investigated, and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”

After Good was shot, the Republican Trump administration clashed with local authorities, including Democratic Governor Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey.

Trump and administration officials claimed that Good had deliberately hit the ICE officer with her SUV and he had shot her in self-defence.

US Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem described Good’s actions as “domestic terrorism”.

She said Good had refused to obey orders to get out of her car, “weaponise[d] her vehicle” and “attempted to run” over the officer. Minnesota officials disputed Noem’s account, citing videos showing Good trying to drive away.

Footage from the incident shows Good’s car slowly reversing and then trying to move forwards. As the car moves forwards, an agent is seen walking around in front of it. He opens fire while standing in front of the driver’s side of the SUV.

Speaking about the shooting on Wednesday, Trump told the Reuters news agency: “I don’t get into right or wrong. I know that it was a tough situation to be in. There was very little respect shown to the police, in this case, the ICE officers.”

What have local authorities said about the latest shooting?

Walz wrote in an X post on Wednesday that state investigators have been to the scene of the shooting.

“I know you’re angry. I’m angry. What Donald Trump wants is violence in the streets,” Walz wrote.

“But Minnesota will remain an island of decency, of justice, of community, and of peace. Don’t give him what he wants.”

In a series of posts on X on Wednesday, Frey wrote: “No matter what led up to this incident, the situation we are seeing in our city is not sustainable.”

He added that there are 600 local police officers working in Minneapolis, and the Trump administration has sent in 3,000 federal officers.

“I have seen conduct from ICE that is intolerable. And for anyone taking the bait tonight, stop. It is not helpful. We cannot respond to Donald Trump’s chaos with our own chaos.”

What is ICE doing in Minnesota?

The DHS launched Operation Metro Surge, which includes Minneapolis, in December. The Trump administration said the operation aims to root out and arrest criminals and undocumented immigrants.

The Trump administration escalated its immigration operation in Minneapolis on January 6. In an X post, ICE announced it planned to deploy 2,000 additional agents to the northern Midwestern city.

“A 100% chance of ICE in the Twin Cities – our largest operation to date,” the post said, referring to Minneapolis and the adjacent city of St Paul.

Todd Lyons, the acting director of ICE, told local news media that ICE is “surging to Minneapolis to root out fraud, arrest perpetrators and remove criminal illegal aliens”.

On Monday, the state of Minnesota filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration, arguing that the operation is an unconstitutional “federal invasion”.

The population of Minnesota is more than 5 million people, and according to numbers from the Migration Policy Institute from 2023, the number of undocumented immigrants in the state is 100,000.

Republicans have made disparaging remarks particularly targeting the state’s Somali population.

Noem said on Tuesday that Trump intends to end temporary deportation protections and work permits for some Somali nationals in the US.

“Country conditions in Somalia have improved to the point that it no longer meets the law’s requirement for Temporary Protected Status,” Noem said in a statement. “Further, allowing Somali nationals to remain temporarily in the United States is contrary to our national interests. We are putting Americans first.”

In December, ICE launched a raid in Columbus, Ohio, which also has a large Somali population. In late November, ICE agents were deployed in New Orleans, Louisiana. Similar raids were launched in Charlotte, North Carolina, the same month.

How many Venezuelan immigrants are in the US?

As of 2023, there were about 770,000 Venezuelan immigrants in the United States, making up just under 2 percent of the country’s 47.8 million foreign-born population, according to the Migration Policy Institute.

The institute estimated that in 2023, 486,000 Venezuelan immigrants were not authorised to be in the US, accounting for 4 percent of a total of 13.7 million unauthorised immigrants.

Since 2014, about 7.7 million Venezuelans, comprising 20 percent of the population, have left the country, mostly to seek better opportunities abroad as the economy has faltered and the government has cracked down on the political opposition. While the vast majority have moved to neighbouring countries, some have gone to the US.

On January 3, US forces abducted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, whom the Trump administration describes as a “narcoterrorist”. He currently faces charges related to weapons and drug trafficking in New York.

During a national address on January 3, Trump stated: “Maduro sent savage and murderous gangs, including the bloodthirsty prison gang, Tren de Aragua, to terrorise American communities nationwide.”

However, several US intelligence agencies have rejected the claim that Trump has repeatedly made that Maduro controls Tren de Aragua. In an April memo, the agencies said Maduro’s government “probably does not” cooperate with the gang or direct it to carry out operations in the US.

Jan. 14 (UPI) — The Trump administration has paused immigrant visa-processing services for citizens of 75 nations due to a likelihood that they will need public support.

The decision does not affect tourist, business, student, temporary work, exchange visitor, medical treatment, and crew and transit visas, officials said.

The State Department issued a memo on Wednesday saying it indefinitely will pause the immigrant visa processing Jan. 21 while assessing how the processing is done.

“The State Department will pause immigrant visa processing from 75 countries whose migrants take welfare from the American people at unacceptable rates,” the department said in a post on X.

“The freeze will remain active until the U.S. can ensure that new immigrants will not extract wealth from the American people.”

The visa-processing pause comes a day after Department of Homeland Services Sec. Kristin Noem said conditions in Somalia have improved to such an extent that the country no longer qualifies for temporary protected status, which ends for Somalian migrants March 17.

“Allowing Somali nationals to remain temporarily in the United States is contrary to our national interests,” Noem said. “We are putting Americans first.”

Somali nationals who voluntarily leave the United States will be given a free plane ticket and $1,000.

The State Department also paused the processing of asylum cases by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and halted green card and citizenship applications for citizens of 19 initial nations, most of which are located in Africa.

The processing changes come amid reports of widespread fraud in Minnesota and other states in which federal and state programs are targeted, often by members of ethnic communities from specific countries, such as Somalia.

The Trump administration has said many migrants are draining taxpayer dollars and state and federal resources, including those engaged in fraud.

The administration has targeted Minnesota with increased immigration law enforcement and federal investigations of alleged fraud via 14 state-run aid programs for child care, child nutrition, autism, housing assistance and more.

Somalians, some of whom are U.S. citizens, account for 82 of 92 defendants in active investigations in Minnesota, according to the U.S. attorney’s office for that state.

The Department of Justice also is investigating claims of fraud in Ohio, California and other states.

The investigations and halting visa processing likely will cause many immigrant families to hesitate when considering filing for public assistance, Migration Policy Institute Associate Director Julia Gelatt said on Wednesday.

The State Department said the 75 nations subject to the visa-processing halt are: Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, Antigua and Barbuda, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bahamas, Bangladesh, Barbados, Belarus, Belize, Bhutan, Bosnia, Brazil, Burma, Cambodia and Cameroon.

Also, Cape Verde, Colombia, Cote d’Ivoire, Cuba, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Dominica, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Fiji, Gambia, Georgia, Ghana, Grenada, Guatemala, Guinea, Haiti, Iran, Iraq, Jamaica, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, and Lebanon.

Also, Liberia, Libya, Macedonia, Moldova, Mongolia, Montenegro, Morocco, Nepal, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Pakistan, Republic of the Congo, Russia, Rwanda, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, Tanzania, Thailand, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda, Uruguay, Uzbekistan and Yemen.

WASHINGTON — The State Department said Wednesday it will suspend the processing of immigrant visas for citizens of 75 countries whose nationals are deemed likely to require public assistance while living in the United States.

The State Department, led by Secretary Marco Rubio, said it had instructed consular officers to halt immigrant visa applications from the countries affected in accordance with a broader order issued in November that tightened rules around potential immigrants who might become “public charges” in the U.S.

The suspension, which will begin Jan. 21, will not apply to applicants seeking non-immigrant visas, or temporary tourist or business visas.

“The Trump administration is bringing an end to the abuse of America’s immigration system by those who would extract wealth from the American people,” the department said in a statement. “Immigrant visa processing from these 75 countries will be paused while the State Department reassess immigration processing procedures to prevent the entry of foreign nationals who would take welfare and public benefits.”

The statement did not identify which countries would be affected by the pause, but President Donald Trump’s administration has already severely restricted immigrant and non-immigrant visa processing for citizens of dozens of countries, many of them in Africa.

A U.S. official said the list included Russia, Iran and Somalia as well as Afghanistan, Brazil and Egypt, among others. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because the list had not been made public yet.

Lee writes for the Associated Press.

President Trump’s administration said Tuesday it will end temporary protected status for immigrants from Somalia, the latest move in the president’s mass deportation agenda.

The move affects hundreds of people who are a small subset of immigrants with TPS protections in the United States. It comes during Trump’s immigration crackdown in Minneapolis, where many native Somalis live and where street protests have intensified since a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent killed a U.S citizen who was demonstrating against federal presence in the city.

The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that affected Somalis must leave the U.S. by March 17, when existing protections, last extended by former President Biden, will expire.

“Temporary means temporary,” said Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, adding that the decision puts “Americans first.”

The Congressional Research Service last spring said the Somali TPS population was 705 out of nearly 1.3 million TPS immigrants. But Trump has rolled back protections across multiple countries in his second presidency.

Congress established the Temporary Protected Status program in 1990 to help foreign nationals attempting to leave unstable, threatening conditions in their home countries. It allows the executive branch to designate a country so that its citizens are eligible to enter the U.S. and receive status.

Somalia first received the designation under President George H.W. Bush amid a civil war in 1991. The status has been extended for decades, most recently by Biden in July 2024.

Noem insisted circumstances in Somalia “have improved to the point that it no longer meets the law’s requirement for Temporary Protected Status.”

Located in the horn of Africa, Somalia is one of the world’s poorest nations and has for decades been beset by chronic strife exacerbated by multiple natural disasters, including severe droughts.

The 2025 congressional report stated that Somalis had received more than two dozen extensions because of perpetual “insecurity and ongoing armed conflict that present serious threats to the safety of returnees.”

Trump has targeted Somali immigrants with racist rhetoric and accused those in Minneapolis of massively defrauding federal programs.

In December, Trump said he did not want Somalis in the U.S., saying they “come from hell” and “contribute nothing.” He made no distinction between citizens and non-citizens or offered any opinion on immigration status. He has had especially harsh words for Rep. Ilhan Omar, a Minnesota Democrat who emigrated from Somalia as a child. Trump has repeatedly suggested she should be deported, despite her being a U.S. citizen, and in his rant last fall he called her “garbage.”

Omar, who has been an outspoken critic of the ICE deployment in Minneapolis, has called Trump’s “obsession” with her and Somali-Americans “creepy and unhealthy.”

Barrow writes for the Associated Press.

Just days after the fatal shooting of a Minnesota woman by a federal immigration agent, the Trump administration’s immigration policy was a top focus of California gubernatorial candidates at two forums Saturday in Southern California.

The death of Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, inflamed the nation’s deep political divide and led to widespread protests in Los Angeles and across the country about President Trump’s combative immigration policies.

Former Assembly majority leader Ian Calderon, speaking at a labor forum featuring Democratic candidates in Los Angeles, said that federal agents aren’t above the law.

“You come into our state and you break one of our … laws, you’re going to be criminally charged. That’s it,” he said.

Federal officials said the deadly shooting was an act of self defense.

Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Dublin) noted that the president of the labor union that organized the candidate forum, David Huerta, was injured and arrested during the Trump administration’s raids on undocumented people in Los Angeles in June.

“Ms. Good should be alive today. David, that could have been you, the way they’re conducting themselves,” he said to Huerta, who was moderating the event. “You’re now lucky if all they did was drag you by the hair or throw you in an unmarked van, or deport a 6-year-old U.S. citizen battling stage four cancer.”

Roughly 40 miles south at a separate candidate forum featuring the top two Republicans in the race, GOP candidate and Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco said politicians who support so-called “sanctuary state” policies should be voted out of office.

“I wish it was the 1960s, 70s, and 80s — we’d take them behind the shed and beat … them,” he said.

“We’re in a church!” an audience member was heard yelling during a livestream of the event.

California Democratic leaders in 2017 passed a landmark “sanctuary state” law that limits cooperation between local and federal immigration officers, a policy that was a reaction to the first Trump administration’s efforts to ramp up deportations.

After the campaign to replace termed-out Gov. Gavin Newsom was largely obscured last year by natural disasters, immigration raids and the special election to redraw California’s congressional districts, the 2026 governor’s race is now in the spotlight.

Eight Democratic candidates appeared at a forum sponsored by SEIU United Service Workers West, which represents more than 45,000 janitors, security officers, airport service employees and other workers in California.

Many of the union’s members are immigrants, and a number of the candidates referred to their familial roots as they addressed the audience of about 250 people — with an additional 8,000 watching online.

“As the son of immigrants, thank you for everything you did for your children, your grandchildren, to give them that chance,” former U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra told two airport workers who asked the candidates questions about cuts to state services for immigrants.

“I will make sure you have the right to access the doctor you and your family need. I will make sure you have a right to have a home that will keep you safe and off the streets. I will make sure that I treat you the way I would treat my parents, because you worked hard the way they did.”

The Democrats broadly agreed on most of the pressing issues facing California, so they tried to differentiate themselves based on their records and their priorities.

Candidates for California’s next governor including Tony Thurmond, speaking at left, participate in the 2026 Gubernatorial Candidate Forum in Los Angeles on Saturday.

(Christina House/Los Angeles Times)

“I firmly believe that your campaign says something about who you will be when you lead. The fact that I don’t take corporate contributions is a point of pride for me, but it’s also my chance to tell you something about who I am and who I will fight for,” said former Rep. Katie Porter.

“Look, we’ve had celebrity governors. We’ve had governors who are kids of other governors, and we’ve had governors who look hot with slicked back hair and barn jackets. You know what? We haven’t had a governor in a skirt. I think it’s just about … time.”

Former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, seated next to Porter, deadpanned, “If you vote for me, I’ll wear a skirt, I promise.”

Villaraigosa frequently spoke about his roots in the labor movement, including a farmworker boycott when he was 15 years old.

“I’ve been fighting for immigrants my entire life. I have fought for you the entire time I’ve been in public life,” he said. “I know [you] are doing the work, working in our buildings, working at the airport, working at the stadiums. I’ve talked to you. I’ve worked with you. I’ve fought for you my entire life. I’m not a Johnny-come-lately to this unit.”

The candidates were not asked about a proposed ballot measure to tax the assets of billionaires that one of SEIU-USWW’s sister unions is trying to put on the November ballot. The controversial proposal has divided Democrats and prompted some of the state’s wealthiest residents to move out of the state, or at least threaten to do so.

But several of the candidates talked about closing tax loopholes and making sure the wealthy and businesses pay their fair share of taxes.

“We’re going to hold corporations and billionaires accountable. We’re going to be sure that we are returning power to the workers who know how to grow this economy,” said former state Controller Betty Yee.

State Supt. of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond highlighted his proposal to tax billionaires to fund affordable housing, healthcare and education.

“And then I’m going to give you, everyone in this room and California working people, a tax credit so you have more money in your pocket, a couple hundred dollars a month, every month, for the rising cost of gas and groceries,” he said.

Billionaire hedge fund founder Tom Steyer said closing corporate tax loopholes would result in $15 billion to $20 billion in new annual state revenue that he would spend on education and healthcare programs.

“When we look at where we’re going, it’s not about caring, because everyone on this stage cares. It’s not about values. It’s about results,” he said, pointing to his backing of successful ballot measures to close a corporate tax loophole, raise tobacco taxes, and stop oil-industry-backed efforts to roll back environmental law.

“I have beaten these special interests, every single time with the SEIU,” he said. “We’ve done it. We’ve been winning. We need to keep fighting together. We need to keep winning together.”

Republican gubernatorial candidates were not invited to the labor gathering. But two of the state’s top GOP contenders were among the five candidates who appeared Saturday afternoon at a “Patriots for Freedom” gubernatorial forum at Calvary Chapel WestGrove in Orange County. Immigration, federal enforcement and homelessness were also among the hot topics there.

Days after Bianco met with unhoused people on Skid Row in downtown Los Angeles and Newsom touted a 9% decrease in the number of unsheltered homeless people during his final state of the state address, Bianco said that he would make it a “crime” for anyone to utter the word “homeless,” arguing that those on the street are suffering from drug- and alcohol-induced psychosis, not a lack of shelter.

Former Fox News commentator Steve Hilton criticized the “attacks on our law enforcement offices, on our ICE agents who are doing their job protecting our country.”

“We are sick of it,” he said at the Garden Grove church while he also questioned the state’s decision to spend billions of dollars for healthcare for low-income undocumented individuals. State Democrats voted last year to halt the enrollment of additional undocumented adults in the state’s Medi-Cal program starting this year.

There were no stars in the October sky. No moon that 64-year-old Masuma Khan could see from the narrow window of the California City Immigration Processing Center.

“No planes,” she said, recalling her confinement.

Once a prison, the facility in the Mojave Desert, located 67 miles east of Bakersfield, reopened in April to hold people in removal proceedings, including Khan.

It was not the kind of place where she imagined ending up — not after living in the country for 28 years, caring for her daughter and surviving one of California’s deadliest wildfires, the Eaton fire.

Khan was fortunate not to have lost her west Altadena home to the Jan. 7 fire, which destroyed more than 9,000 structures and killed 19 people.

But in the months that followed, Khan faced another threat — deportation.

As fire recovery efforts were underway in Los Angeles, the Trump administration launched immigration raids in the city, hampering recovery efforts and creating more distress for immigrants after the fires.

Although Trump said the mass deportations would target criminals, news reports and court filings show the roundups ensnared immigrants with no criminal history, green card applicants, even American citizens.

Khan worried. She was in the process of adjusting her immigration status and was required to check in every year with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

An immigration attorney reassured her that there was no cause for concern: Her husband and daughter were citizens, she had no criminal record, and her case was still under review.

And so, on Oct. 6, Khan drove to downtown Los Angeles for her routine immigration check-in and found herself caught up in Trump’s deportation surge.

Eaton fire survivor Masuma Khan, 64, right, with her daughter Riya Khan and husband Isteak Khan after bring released in December.

(Gina Ferazzi/Los Angeles Times)

Khan was taken into custody by ICE agents and kept in a cold room for almost an entire day. She said agents denied her access to a lawyer and a phone until she signed deportation papers. Khan resisted but later signed.

She was placed in a van with other detainees and driven three hours north to the detention center in California City. She said there was no air conditioning in the van and she became nauseous and started to experience hypertension symptoms.

At the facility she was denied access to medications for high blood pressure, asthma, peripheral arterial disease, general anxiety and hypothyroidism, she said.

Khan, who is also prediabetic, said she struggled to maintain her health at the facility. Her blood pressure spiked and she began to experience stroke-like symptoms. Her legs swelled up and she became weak.

She said the facility was so cold that people often became ill, including staff. She and other women used socks as scarves, sleeves and mittens but were threatened with fines if they continued to misuse the garments.

She said she became sick and her vision got blurry without her prescribed eye drops. Her Halal meals shifted to a medical diet that included pork, which she cannot eat because she is Muslim.

Khan’s experience at the facility was similar to that of other detainees who filed a federal class-action lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security and ICE. They alleged inhumane conditions at the facility that included inadequate food, water and medical care, frigid cells and lack of access to medications and lawyers.

The California City Immigration Processing Center in Kern County, where Masuma Khan was held.

(Patrick T. Fallon/AFP/Getty Images)

In an email response, Tricia McLaughlin, a DHS spokesperson, said any claims about “subprime conditions at ICE detention facilities are false.”

“All detainees are provided with proper meals, certified by dietitians, medical treatment and have the opportunities to communicate with lawyers and family members.”

Khan said she spent most days in her cell crying.

“I missed my family, I missed everything,” she said “I was frustrated.”

She often thought of home: her husband and daughter, her small garden and the birds she fed daily with seeds and oranges from her balcony.

It would be weeks before she could see her family again, before she could gaze at the mountains and hear the symphony of wildlife.

‘Like an inferno’

The Eaton fire had been raging for hours in west Altadena when Khan and her husband were awakened by evacuation alerts on their phones at 3:30 a.m.

Khan got out of bed and from her bedroom window could see flames raging in the mountains.

Khan hadn’t seen anything like it. Four years before she arrived, the Kinneloa fire, sparked by a campfire, erupted in the same mountains. It fed on dry and flammable vegetation and was driven by Santa Ana winds. It was a destructive fire.

But the Eaton fire was different. Hurricane-force winds helped spread the embers and flames deep into the town’s heart — destroying homes, schools and countless structures.

A business and vehicle are a total loss as the Eaton fire rages along Lake Avenue in Altadena on January 8, 2025.

(Gina Ferazzi/Los Angeles Times)

Khan and her husband, Isteak, didn’t have time to grab much before fleeing in their car that evening.

“It was like an inferno,” Isteak Khan, 66, recalled. “You could see the embers flying everywhere. It was very chaotic.”

The couple drove about three miles south to a supermarket in Pasadena. For a month they lived at a hotel until they were allowed to return home.

When they got back the surrounding neighborhoods were in ruins: Trees were charred, cars were stripped down to metal frames and homes were gutted or left in ash.

The couple’s apartment still was standing but had suffered smoke damage and there was no electricity, no safe water to use. The couple depended on water bottles and showered at the homes of relatives.

Khan never thought she would experience such a disaster in the U.S. Then again, she didn’t journey here for her own reasons. She came to save her daughter.

‘Incredibly traumatized’

In August 1997, Khan was living in Bangladesh with her husband and their 9-year-old daughter, Riya. That month Riya had traveled with her grandparents to the U.S. to see relatives when she fell seriously ill. Doctors determined she was suffering from kidney failure and needed ongoing treatment including chemotherapy and peritoneal dialysis.

Khan traveled to the U.S. on a visitor’s visa to be with Riya. For more than a decade her daughter received treatment at the Children’s Hospital in Los Angeles.

Khan became her daughter’s primary caretaker and did not return to Bangladesh as her visa was expiring. Her husband joined her in 1999 after obtaining a visa. He and Riya eventually received green cards and became citizens.

The following year, as Khan looked for legal ways to adjust her immigration status, she met a man at a Bangladeshi grocery store who befriended her and offered to help her obtain a green card, according to court records. Little did Khan know that this man — who spoke her language and was well known in the Bangladeshi community — was a scammer, one of many who prey on South Asians migrating to the U.S.

At the time Khan did not speak, read or write English well, and this man told her he could file an asylum application on her behalf, for a fee amounting to several thousand dollars.

But Khan was unaware this man had filed the application for her using a false name and listed his own address for future correspondence from immigration authorities, according to court documents.

All this came to light when she showed up for an asylum hearing in Anaheim in 1999 and responded to the questions of an asylum officer who noticed the information did not match what was in the application.

The officer denied the application, and later she was unaware of a notice to appear before an immigration court, since it had been sent to the scammer’s address.

Her absence at the hearing prompted an immigration judge to order her to be deported. Khan did not find out about the court’s action until 2015, when her husband petitioned to adjust her status so she could obtain a green card.

After the petition was denied and her case was closed because of the deportation order, Khan hired an immigration attorney who sought to reopen the case. But a judge denied it, and her appeal also was rejected by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

In February 2020, Khan was detained by ICE but released and required to check in with immigration officials. That year she hired an immigration attorney who submitted paperwork to let her stay in the U.S. The application was pending when ICE took her into custody on Oct. 6.

McLaughlin, the DHS spokesperson, said there was no reason for the government to reconsider her case, since Khan had a final removal order since 1999 and had exhausted all appeals.

“She has no legal right to be in our country,” McLaughlin said. “DHS law enforcement lawfully arrested her on Oct. 6.”

Yet Khan caught a break in early November when a federal judge ordered her released. The judge ruled the government cannot detain Khan without giving her a hearing and explaining why it needs to detain her.

It was a victory for her legal team, made up of a law firm and two nonprofit groups — the South Asian Network and Public Counsel and Hoq Law APC.

Laboni Hoq, a chief attorney on the case, said the goal is to keep Khan out of detention while the team seeks to adjust her status.

“We’re feeling like she has a shot to pursue that process … given her long history in the country and that she is law-abiding and has met all the requirements to deal with her case through the court system and immigration system,” Hoq said.

Khan’s predicament has drawn the attention of numerous Southern California politicians, including U.S. Rep. Judy Chu and U.S. Sen. Adam Schiff. Much of it had to do with Khan’s 38-year-old daughter, Riya, who reached out to the lawmakers and also took to social media to bring her mother’s case to the public’s attention.

Still, it is unclear what will happen next.

As Khan’s legal fight proceeds, she must check in regularly with immigration authorities, as she did in downtown L.A. on Dec. 19, accompanied by Sen. Sasha Renée Pérez (D-Alhambra), who also became aware of her case from Riya’s efforts.

“She’s incredibly traumatized by what’s happened to her,” Pérez said of Khan. “She’s scared to even participate in the community events that we have during the holidays … it’s painful, it makes me angry, it makes me sad and I just wanted to be here with her.”

At their Altadena home one recent evening, the Khans sat in their living room. Riya said the hope was that the case will be reopened so her mother can obtain a green card.

“We’re going to stay together,” Isteak said.

Not far from Masuma, old “welcome home” balloons hovered. As she sat next to her daughter, she could express only two things: “I cannot leave this country. This is my home.”

Embattled Wisconsin Judge Hannah Dugan, who was convicted of obstruction last month for helping an immigrant evade federal officers, has sent her resignation letter to the governor.

The letter was sent Saturday. Republicans had been making plans to impeach her since her Dec. 19 conviction. A spokesperson for Gov. Tony Evers said his office received Dugan’s letter, and he would work to fill the vacancy without delay.

Dugan wrote that over the last decade she handled thousands of cases with “a commitment to treat all persons with dignity and respect, to act justly, deliberately and consistently, and to maintain a courtroom with the decorum and safety the public deserves.”

But she said the case against her is too big of a distraction.

“As you know, I am the subject of unprecedented federal legal proceedings, which are far from concluded but which present immense and complex challenges that threaten the independence of our judiciary. I am pursuing this fight for myself and for our independent judiciary,” Dugan said in her letter.

Last April, federal prosecutors accused Dugan of distracting federal officers trying to arrest a Mexican immigrant outside her courtroom and leading the man out through a private door. A federal jury convicted her of felony obstruction.

The case against Dugan was highlighted by President Trump as he pressed ahead with his sweeping immigration crackdown. Democrats insisted the administration was trying to make an example of Dugan to blunt judicial opposition to the operation.

Republican Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Robin Vos praised Dugan’s decision.

“I’m glad Dugan did the right thing by resigning and followed the clear direction from the Wisconsin Constitution,” Vos said.

Democrat Ann Jacobs, who is chair of the Wisconsin Elections Commission board, said she agreed with Dugan that Milwaukee should have a permanent judge in place while this fight plays out.

“Despite her situation, she is ever the champion of justice, wanting to remove the judiciary from a political battle over her fate. I’m sure this is terribly hard for her but she is true to her faith and her principles,” Jacobs said in a post on X.

On April 18, immigration officers went to the Milwaukee County courthouse after learning 31-year-old Eduardo Flores-Ruiz had reentered the country illegally and was scheduled to appear before Dugan for a hearing in a state battery case.

Dugan confronted agents outside her courtroom and directed them to the office of her boss, Milwaukee County Chief Judge Carl Ashley, because she told them their administrative warrant wasn’t sufficient grounds to arrest Flores-Ruiz.

After the agents left, she led Flores-Ruiz and his attorney out a private jury door. Agents spotted Flores-Ruiz in the corridor, followed him outside and arrested him after a foot chase. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security announced in November he had been deported.

Funk writes for the Associated Press.

For faith leaders supporting and ministering to anxious immigrants across the United States, 2025 was fraught with challenges and setbacks. For many in these religious circles, the coming year could be worse.

The essence of their fears: President Trump has become harsher with his contemptuous rhetoric and policy proposals, blaming immigrants for problems from crime to housing shortages and, in a social media post, demanding “REVERSE MIGRATION.”

Haitians who fled gang violence in their homeland, as well as Afghans allowed entry after assisting the U.S. in Afghanistan before the Taliban takeover, now fear that their refuge in America may end due to get-tough policy changes. Somali Americans, notably in Minnesota’s Twin Cities, worry about their future after Trump referred to them as “garbage.”

After Trump’s slurs, the chair of the Catholic bishops conference’s subcommittee on racial justice urged public officials to refrain from dehumanizing language.

“Each child of God has value and dignity,” said the bishop of Austin, Texas, Daniel Garcia. “Language that denigrates a person or community based on his or her ethnicity or country of origin is incompatible with this truth.”

Here’s a look at what lies ahead for these targeted immigrant communities, and the faith leaders supporting them.

Haitians in limbo

In 2024, Trump falsely accused Haitians in Springfield, Ohio, of eating their neighbors’ cats and dogs. It worsened fears about anti-immigrant sentiment in the mostly white, blue-collar city of about 59,000, where more than 15,000 Haitians live and work.

Thousands of them settled in Springfield in recent years under the Temporary Protected Status program.

Their prospects now seem dire. The TPS program, allowing many Haitians to remain legally in Springfield and elsewhere, expires in early February.

“It’s going to be an economic and humanitarian disaster,” said the Rev. Carl Ruby, pastor of Central Christian Church — one of several Springfield churches supporting the Haitians.

Ruby and Viles Dorsainvil, a leader of Springfield’s Haitian community, traveled recently to Washington to seek help from members of Congress.

“Every single legislator we’ve talked to has said nothing is going to happen legislatively. Trump’s rhetoric keeps getting harsher,” Ruby said. “It just doesn’t feel like anything is going our way.”

Many Haitians fear for their lives if they return to their gang-plagued homeland.

Faith communities have come together to support immigrants in the face of Trump’s crackdown, Ruby said.

“It’s increasing our resolve to oppose this,” he said. “There are more and more churches in Springfield saying we will provide sanctuary. … We will do whatever it takes to protect our members.”

Afghan refugees

Trump suspended the U.S. refugee program on the first day of his second term. Halting the program and its federal funding affected hundreds of faith-based organizations assisting refugees.

Among them was Lutheran Social Services of the National Capital Area, which serves the region around Washington, D.C., and lost 68% of its budget this year. The organization laid off two-thirds of its staff, shrinking from nearly 300 employees to 100.

Many of its employees and nearly two-thirds of its clients are Afghans. Many worked with the U.S. in Afghanistan and fled after the Taliban’s takeover from a U.S.-backed government in 2021.

The Trump administration announced new immigration restrictions after an Afghan national became the suspect in the Nov. 26 shooting of two National Guard members in Washington.

“It shook up our team. It was awful,” said Kristyn Peck, CEO of LSSNCA.

Peck said there is increased fear among Afghans on her staff and a false public narrative that Afghan immigrants are a threat.

“A whole group of people have now been targeted and blamed for this senseless act of violence,” she said.

She still finds reasons for hope.

“We continue to do the good work,” Peck said. “Even in challenging moments, we just continue to see people putting their faith into action.”

Volunteers have stepped up to provide services that employees no longer have funding to provide, including a program that helps Afghan women with English-language and job-skills training.

U.S.-based World Relief, a global Christian humanitarian organization overseen by the National Association of Evangelicals, has joined left-of-center religious groups decrying the new crackdown on Afghan refugees.

“When President Trump announces his intention to ‘permanently halt’ all migration from ‘Third World countries,’ he’s insulting the majority of the global Church,” declared World Relief CEO Myal Greene. “When his administration halts processing for all Afghans on account of the evil actions of one person, he risks abandoning tens of thousands of others who risked their lives alongside the U.S. military.”

Somalis targeted by Trump

In mid-December, imams and other leaders of Minnesota’s Somali community established a task force to tackle the fallout from major fraud scandals, a surge in immigration enforcement, and Trump’s contemptuous words toward the largest group of Somali refugees in the U.S.

“We’re not minimizing the crime, but we’re amplifying the successes,” said imam Yusuf Abdulle.

He directs the Islamic Association of North America, a network of more than three dozen mostly East African mosques. About half are in Minnesota, which, since the late 1990s, has been home to growing numbers of Somali refugees who are increasingly visible in local and U.S. politics.

“For unfortunate things like fraud or youth violence, every immigrant community has been through tough times,” Abdulle said. “For the number of years here, Somali is a very resilient, very successful community.”

Even though most Somalis in Minnesota are U.S. citizens or lawfully present, Abdulle said, many deserted local businesses and mosques when immigration enforcement surged.

The new task force includes more than two dozen faith and business leaders, as well as community organizers. Addressing their community’s fears is the first challenge, followed by increased advocacy ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.

“Every election year the rhetoric goes up. And so we want to push back against these hateful rhetorics, but also bring our community together,” said community leader Abdullahi Farah.

Faith leaders respond

In mid-November, U.S. Catholic bishops voted overwhelmingly to issue a “special message” decrying developments causing fear and anxiety among immigrants. It marked the first time in 12 years that the bishops invoked this urgent way of speaking collectively.

“We are concerned about the conditions in detention centers and the lack of access to pastoral care,” said the message. “We oppose the indiscriminate mass deportation of people. We pray for an end to dehumanizing rhetoric and violence, whether directed at immigrants or at law enforcement.”

The bishops thanked priests, nuns and lay Catholics accompanying and assisting immigrants.

“We urge all people of goodwill to continue and expand such efforts,” the message said.

The presiding bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, Yehiel Curry, issued a similar pastoral message last month thanking ELCA congregations for supporting immigrants amid “aggressive and indiscriminate immigration enforcement.”

“The racial profiling and harm to our immigrant neighbors show no signs of diminishing, so we will heed God’s call to show up alongside these neighbors,” Curry wrote.

HIAS, an international Jewish nonprofit serving refugees and asylum-seekers, has condemned recent Trump administration moves.

“As a Jewish organization, we also know all too well what it means for an entire community to be targeted because of the actions of one person,” HIAS said.

“We will always stand in solidarity with people seeking the opportunity to rebuild their lives in safety, including those being targeted now by harmful policies and hateful rhetoric in the Afghan American and Somali American communities.”

Crary, Dell’Orto, Henao and Stanley write for the Associated Press.

This is a column about lies. Big lies. Presidential lies. Dumb lies. The type of lies that have made life in the United States a daily dumpster fire of bad news. The kind of lies that would’ve made Frank Sinatra want to knock out a palooka.

More on Ol’ Blue Eyes in a bit.

For now let me tell you about one victim of President Trump’s mountain of lies whose brush with the administration defined our 2025.

On June 7, Brayan Ramos-Brito drove east on Alondra Boulevard from Compton toward a Chevron in Paramount to buy some snacks. It was his day off. It also was the weekend when Trump unleashed his deportation Leviathan on Southern California in a campaign that hasn’t stopped.

Ramos-Brito, a cook, had no idea that was going on as traffic froze on Alondra in front of a Home Depot. A “stay-at-home type of guy,” he didn’t even vote in the 2024 election because “politics isn’t my thing.”

But as the slender 30-year-old sat in his car, he saw federal immigration agents who had gathered across the street from the Home Depot fire flash-bang grenades at protesters who were screaming at them to leave. That’s when the moment “got to me.”

Ramos-Britos, a U.S citizen, got out of his car to yell at la migra, accusing those who looked Latino of being a “disgrace.” He said one of them shoved him into a scrum of protesters. After that, “all I remember were knees and kicks” by agents before they dragged him on the pavement and into the back of a van.

For hours Ramos-Brito and others stayed zip-tied inside as “craziness” erupted outside. Hundreds more residents arrived, as did L.A. County sheriff’s deputies. Smoke from blazes set by the former and tear gas canisters tossed by the latter seeped inside the van — “we kept telling agents we couldn’t breath, but they just ignored us.”

Photos and footage from the Paramount protest went viral and sparked an even bigger rally the following day near downtown L.A. that devolved into torched Waymo cars and concrete blocks hurled at California Highway Patrol vehicles. Soon, Trump called up the National Guard and Marines to occupy the City of Angels under the pretense that anarchy now ruled here — even though protests were confined to pockets of the metropolis. Siccing the National Guard on cities is something Trump has since tried to replicate across the country in any place that has dared to push back against immigration sweeps.

Ramos-Brito spent two weeks in a detention facility in Santa Ana stuffed in a cell with undocumented immigrants facing deportation. He faced federal felony charges of assaulting a federal agent and was accused of being one of the Paramount protest’s ringleaders as well.

Prosecutors tried to scare him into pleading guilty with threats of years in prison. Despite having no money to hire a lawyer, he refused: “I wasn’t going to take the blame for something I didn’t do.”

Federal public defender Cuauhtémoc Ortega represented Ramos-Brito during a two-day September trial. Ortega screened video footage to the jury that proved his client’s version of what happened and easily caught federal agents contradicting each other and their own field reports.

The jury took about an hour to acquit Ramos-Brito on misdemeanor assault charges. He wants to move on — but the mendacity of the administration won’t let him.

The lies it used to try to railroad an innocent man turned out not to be an aberration but a playbook for Trump’s 2025.

The stretch of Alondra Boulevard in Paramount where a June 7 protest against immigration agents resulted in the arrest of 30-year-old Compton resident Brayan Ramos-Brito on allegations he assaulted one of them. A jury found him not guilty.

(Gary Coronado/For The Times)

Lies, of course, have fueled the president’s career from the days he was was a smarmy New York developer riding the coattails of his daddy. This year he and his apologists employed them like never before to try to consolidate their grip on all aspects of American life. They lied about the economy, about the contents of the Epstein files, about the efficacy of vaccines, the worth of diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, our supposed noninterventionist foreign policy and so much more.

Above all, or at least most malignantly, Trump and his crew lied about immigrants. The big lie. The lie they thought everyone would believe and thus would excuse all the other lies. They have lied about and maligned just about anyone they don’t see worthy of being a so-called “heritage American,” aka white.

Trump ran for reelection on a promise to focus on targeting “the worst of the worst” but has shrugged his shoulders as most of the people swept up in raids have no criminal record and are sometimes even citizens and permanent residents. He vowed that deporting people would improve the economy despite decades of studies showing the opposite. Trumpworld insists immigrants are destroying the United States — never mind that the commander in chief is the son of a Scotswoman and is married to a Slovenian while vice president JD Vance’s in-laws are from India.

The administration maintains unchecked migration is cultural suicide even as cabinet members sport last names — Kennedy, Rubio, Bondi, Loeffler — once seen by Americans of past generations as synonymous with invading hordes.

This is where Frank Sinatra comes in.

Over the Christmas weekend, White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller posted on social media that his family watched a Christmas special starring the Chairman of the Board and his fellow paisan, Dean Martin.

“Imagine watching that and thinking America needed infinity migrants from the third world,” Miller sneered. It didn’t matter that the crooners were proud children of Italian immigrants who arrived during a time where they were as demonized as Venezuelans and Somalis are now.

Take it from Sinatra himself.

In 1945 he released “The House I Live In,” a short film in which he tells a group of boys chasing one of their Jewish peers to embrace a diverse America. In 1991 as his Republican Party was launching an era of laws in California targeting illegal immigrants, Sinatra penned a Fourth of July essay for The Times opposing such hate.

“Who in the name of God are these people anyway, the ones who elevate themselves above others?” Sinatra wrote. “America is an immigrant country. Maybe not you and me, but those whose love made our lives possible, or their parents or grandparents.”

As 2025 went from one hell month to another, it really felt like Trumpworld’s lies would loom over the land for good. But as the year ends, it seems truth finally is peeking through the storm clouds, like the blue skies Sinatra sang about so beautifully.

Trump’s approval ratings have dropped greatly since his inauguration even among those who voted for him, with his deportation disaster playing a role. Judges and juries are beginning to swat away charges filed against people like Ramos-Brito like they were flies swarming around a dung pile. Under especial scrutiny is Border Patrol commander Gregory Bovino, the public face of Trump’s deportation ground game.

In November, U.S. District Judge Sara L. Ellis ruled the federal government had to stop using excessive force in Chicago after months of agents firing pepper balls and tear gas at the slightest perceived insult. Her decision reasoned that Bovino’s sworn testimony about a Chicago under siege by pro-immigrant activists was “not credible” because he provided “cute” answers when he wasn’t “outright lying.”

Among the victims of those lies: Scott Blackburn, who was arrested for allegedly assaulting Bovino during an immigration raid even though videos showed the migra man tackle Blackburn like they were playing sandlot football, and Cole Sheridan, whom Bovino claimed injured his groin while arresting him during a protest; federal prosecutors quickly dropped all charges against Sheridan when they realized there was a lack of evidence to back up Bovino’s story.

And then there is Ramos-Brito, who had to endure a federal trial that hinged on Bovino insisting he was guilty of assaulting a federal agent in Paramount. He shook his head in disgust when I told him about Bovino’s continued tall tales.

“Justice was served for me,” Ramos-Brito said, “but not for others. I got lucky.”

Brayan Ramos-Brito, 30, of Compton, was found not guilty of assaulting a federal agent during June’s immigration enforcement protests in Los Angeles County.

(Gary Coronado/For The Times)

We spoke in front of the Home Depot where the June 7 protest happened, where Trump’s year of immigration lies went into overdrive. The day laborers who used to gather there for years weren’t around. The gate where la migra and protesters faced off was closed.

Ramos-Brito still drives down that stretch of Alondra Boulevard for his snacks from the Chevron station that stands a block away from where his life forever was changed. It took him months to go public with his story. Scars remain on his ribs, back and shoulders.

“There’s times when little moments come through my head,” he acknowledged.

What finally convinced him to speak up was think about others out there like him. He now realizes speaking out against Trump’s lies is the only way to stop him for good.

“Whoever is going through the same that I did, keep fighting,” Ramos-Brito said softly. “They should look at my experience to give them hope.”

WASHINGTON — More than a quarter of federal immigration judges in California have been fired, retired or quit since the start of the Trump administration.

The reduction follows a trend in immigration courts nationwide and constitutes, critics say, an attack on the rule of law that will lead to yet more delays in an overburdened court system.

The reduction in immigration judges has come as the administration scaled up efforts to deport immigrants living in the U.S. illegally. Trump administration officials have described the immigration court process, in which proceedings can take years amid a backlog of millions of cases, as an impediment to their goals.

Nationwide, there were 735 immigration judges last fiscal year, according to the Executive Office for Immigration Review, the arm of the Justice Department that houses immigration courts. At least 97 have been fired since President Trump took office and about the same number have resigned or retired, according to the union representing immigration judges.

California has lost at least 35 immigration judges since January, according to Mobile Pathways, a Berkeley-based organization that analyzes immigration court data. That’s down from 132. The steepest drop occurred at the San Francisco Immigration Court, which has lost more than half its bench.

“A noncitizen might win their case, might lose their case, but the key question is, did they receive a hearing?” said Emmett Soper, who worked at the Justice Department before becoming an immigration judge in Virginia in 2017. “Up until this administration, I had always been confident that I was working in a system that, despite its flaws, was fundamentally fair.”

The administration intends to fill some judge positions, and in new immigration judge job listings in Los Angeles, San Francisco and elsewhere seeks candidates who want to be a “deportation judge” and “restore integrity and honor to our Nation’s Immigration Court system.”

The immigration judges union called the job listings “insulting.”

Trump wrote on Truth Social in April that he was elected to “remove criminals from our Country, but the Courts don’t seem to want me to do that.”

“We cannot give everyone a trial, because to do so would take, without exaggeration, 200 years,” he added.

The National Assn. of Immigration Judges said it expects a wave of additional retirements at the end of this month.

“My biggest concern is for the people whose lives are left in limbo. What can they count on when the ground is literally shifting every moment that they’re here?” said Amber George, who was fired last month from the San Francisco Immigration Court. “Our government institutions are losing their legitimacy.”

Because immigration courts operate under the Justice Department, their priorities typically shift from one presidential administration to the next, but the extreme changes taking place have renewed longtime calls for immigration courts to become independent of the executive branch.

The Trump administration recently added 36 judges; 25 of them are military lawyers serving in temporary positions.

This summer, the Pentagon authorized up to 600 military lawyers to work for the Department of Justice. That took place after the department changed the requirements for temporary immigration judges, removing the need for immigration law experience.

The Department of Justice did not respond to specific questions, but said judges must be impartial and that the agency is obligated to take action against those who demonstrate systemic bias.

Former judges say that, because terminations have happened with no advance notice, remaining court staff have often scrambled to get up to speed on reassigned cases.

Ousted judges described a pattern: In the afternoon, sometimes while presiding over a hearing, they receive a short email stating that they are being terminated pursuant to Article II of the Constitution. Their names are swiftly removed from the Justice Department website.

Jeremiah Johnson is one of five judges terminated recently from the San Francisco Immigration Court.

Johnson said he worries the Trump administration is circumventing immigration courts by making conditions so unbearable that immigrants decide to drop their cases.

The number of detained immigrants has climbed to record levels since January, with more than 65,000 in custody. Immigrants and lawyers say the conditions are inhumane, alleging medical neglect, punitive solitary confinement and obstructed access to legal counsel. Requests by immigrants for voluntary departure, which avoids formal deportation, have surged in recent months.

Many of those arrests have happened at courthouses, causing immigrants to avoid their legal claims out of fear of being detained and forcing judges to order them removed in absentia.

“Those are ways to get people to leave the United States without seeing a judge, without due process that Congress has provided,” Johnson said. “It’s a dismantling of the court system.”

A sign posted outside the San Francisco Immigration Court in October protests enforcement actions by immigration agents. The court has lost more than half of its immigration judges.

(Jeff Chiu / Associated Press)

The judges in San Francisco’s Immigration Court have historically had higher asylum approval rates than the national average. Johnson said grant rates depend on a variety of circumstances, including whether a person is detained or has legal representation, their country of origin and whether they are adults or children.

In November, the military judges serving in immigration courts heard 286 cases and issued rulings in 110, according to Mobile Pathways. The military judges issued deportation orders in 78% of the cases — more often than other immigration judges that month, who ordered deportations in 63% of cases.

“They’re probably following directions — and the military is very good at following directions — and it’s clear what their directions are that are given by this administration,” said Mobile Pathways co-founder Bartlomiej Skorupa. He cautioned that 110 cases are a small sample size and that trends will become clearer in the coming months.

Former immigration judges and their advocates say that appointing people with no immigration experience and little training makes for a steep learning curve and the possibility of due process violations.

“There are multiple concerns here: that they’re temporary, which could expose them to greater pressure to decide cases in a certain way; and also they lack experience in immigration law, which is an extremely complex area of practice,” said Ingrid Eagly, an immigration law professor at UCLA.

Immigration courts have a backlog of more than 3 million cases. Anam Petit, who served as an immigration judge in Virginia until September, said the administration’s emphasis on speedy case completions has to be balanced against the constitutional right to a fair hearing.

“There are not enough judges to hear those cases, and this administration [is] taking it upon themselves to fire a lot of experienced and trained judges who can hear those cases and can mitigate that backlog,” she said.

Complementary bills introduced in the U.S. Senate and House this month by Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) and Rep. Juan Vargas (D-San Diego) would prevent the appointment of military lawyers as temporary immigration judges and impose a two-year limit of service.

“The Trump administration’s willingness to fire experienced immigration judges and hire inexperienced or temporary ‘deportation judges,’ especially in places like California, has fundamentally impacted the landscape of our justice system,” Schiff said in a statement announcing the bill.

The bills have little chance in the Republican-controlled Congress but illustrate how significantly Democrats — especially in California — oppose the administration’s changes to immigration courts.

Former Immigration Judge Tania Nemer, a dual citizen of Lebanon and the U.S., sued the Justice Department and Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi this month, alleging that she was illegally terminated in February because of her gender, ethnic background and political affiliation. In 2023, Nemer ran for judicial office in Ohio as a Democrat.

Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi, seen here at the White House in October, has dismissed complaints by a former immigration judge who alleged she was fired without cause.

(Evan Vucci / Associated Press)

Bondi addressed the lawsuit in a Cabinet meeting.

“Most recently, yesterday, I was sued by an immigration judge who we fired,” she said Dec. 2. “One of the reasons she said she was a woman. Last I checked, I was a woman as well.”

Other former judges have challenged their terminations through the federal Merit Systems Protection Board.

Johnson, of San Francisco, is one of those. He filed his appeal this month, claiming that he was not given cause for termination.

“My goal is to be reinstated,” he said. “My colleagues on the bench, our court was vibrant. It was a good place to work, despite all the pressures.”

What comes next is a mystery, but I’d like to share a note of appreciation as 2025 fades into history.

If you came to Greater Los Angeles from Mexico, by way of Calexico, Feliz Navidad.

If you once lived in Syria, and settled in Hesperia, welcome.

If you were born in what once was Bombay, but raised a family in L.A., happy new year.

I’m spreading a bit of holiday cheer because for immigrants, on the whole, this has been a horrible year.

Under federal orders in 2025, Los Angeles and other cities have been invaded and workplaces raided.

Immigrants have been chased, protesters maced.

Livelihoods have been aborted, loved ones deported.

With all the put-downs and name-calling by the man at the top, you’d never guess his mother was an immigrant and his three wives have included two immigrants.

President Trump referred to Somalis as garbage, and he wondered why the U.S. can’t bring in more people from Scandinavia and fewer from “filthy, dirty and disgusting” countries.

Not to be outdone, Homeland Security chief Kristi Noem proposed a travel ban on countries that are “flooding our nation with killers, leeches and entitlement junkies.”

The president’s shtick is to rail mostly against those who are in the country without legal standing and particularly those with criminal records. But his tone and language don’t always make such distinctions.

The point is to divide, lay blame and raise suspicion, which is why legal residents — including Pasadena Mayor Victor Gordo — have told me they carry their passports at all times.

In fact, thousands of people with legal status have been booted out of the country, and millions more are at risk of the same fate.

In a more evolved political culture, it would be simpler to stipulate that there are costs and benefits to immigration, that it’s human nature to flee hardship in pursuit of better opportunities wherever they might be, and that it’s possible to enact laws that serve the needs of immigrants and the industries that rely on them.

But 2025 was the year in which the nation was led in another direction, and it was the year in which it became ever more comforting and even liberating to call California home.

The state is a deeply flawed enterprise, with its staggering gaps in wealth and income, its homelessness catastrophe, housing affordability crisis and racial divides. And California is not politically monolithic, no matter how blue. It’s got millions of Trump supporters, many of whom applauded the roundups.

But there’s an understanding, even in largely conservative regions, that immigrants with papers and without are a crucial part of the muscle and brainpower that help drive the world’s fourth-largest economy.

That’s why some of the state’s Republican lawmakers asked Trump to back off when he first sent masked posses on roundups, stifling the construction, agriculture and hospitality sectors of the economy.

When the raids began, I called a gardener I had written about years ago after he was shot in the chest during a robbery attempt. He had insisted on leaving the hospital emergency room and going back to work immediately, with the bullet still embedded in his chest. A client had hired him to complete a landscaping job by Christmas, as a present to his wife, and the gardener was determined to deliver.

When I checked in with the gardener in June, he told me he was lying low because even though he has a work permit, he didn’t feel safe because Trump had vowed to end temporary protected status for some immigrants.

“People look Latino, and they get arrested,” he told me.

He said his daughter, whom I’d met two decades ago when I delivered $2,000 donated to the family by readers, was going to demonstrate in his name. I met up with her at the “No Kings” rally in El Segundo, where she told me why she wanted to protest:

“To show my face for those who can’t speak and to say we’re not all criminals, we’re all sticking together, we have each other’s backs,” she said.

Mass deportations would rip a $275-million hole in the state’s economy, critically affecting agriculture and healthcare among other industries, according to a report from UC Merced and the Bay Area Council Economic Institute.

“Deportations tend to raise unemployment among U.S.-born and documented workers through reduced consumption and disruptions in complementary occupations,” says a UCLA Anderson report.

Californians understand these realities because they’re not hypothetical or theoretical — they’re a part of daily life and commerce. Nearly three-quarters of the state’s residents believe that immigrants benefit California “because of their hard work and job skills,” says the Public Policy Institute of California.

I’m a California native whose grandparents were from Spain and Italy, but the state has changed dramatically in my lifetime, and I don’t think I ever really saw it clearly or understood it until I was asked in 2009 to address the freshman convocation at Cal State Northridge. The demographics were similar to today’s — more than half Latino, 1 in 5 white, 10% Asian and 5% Black. And roughly two-thirds were first-generation college students.

I looked out on thousands of young people about to find their way and make their mark, and the students were flanked by a sprinkling of proud parents and grandparents, many of whose stories of sacrifice and yearning began in other countries.

That is part of the lifeblood of the state’s culture, cuisine, commerce and sense of possibility, and those students are now our teachers, nurses, physicians, engineers, entrepreneurs and tech whizzes.

If you left Taipei and settled in Monterey, said goodbye to Dubai and packed up for Ojai, traded Havana for Fontana or Morelia for Visalia, thank you.

And happy new year.

steve.lopez@latimes.com

MILWAUKEE — A jury found a Wisconsin judge accused of helping a Mexican immigrant dodge federal authorities guilty of obstruction Thursday, marking a victory for President Trump as he continues his sweeping immigration crackdown across the country.

Federal prosecutors charged Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan with obstruction, a felony, and concealing an individual to prevent arrest, a misdemeanor, in April. The jury acquitted her on the concealment count, but she still faces up to five years in prison on the obstruction count.

The jury returned the verdicts after deliberating for six hours. Dugan faces up to five years in prison when she’s sentenced, but no date had been set as of late Thursday evening.

The case inflamed tensions over Trump’s immigration crackdown, with his administration branding Dugan an activist judge and Democrats countering that the administration was trying to make an example of Dugan to blunt judicial opposition to the operation.

Dugan and her attorneys left the courtroom, ducked into a side conference room and closed the door without speaking to reporters. Steve Biskupic, her lead attorney, later told reporters that he was disappointed with the ruling and didn’t understand how the jury could have reached a split verdict since the elements of both charges were virtually the same.

U.S. Atty. Brad Schimel denied the case was political and urged people to accept the verdict peacefully. He said courthouse arrests are safer because people are screened for weapons and it isn’t unfair for law enforcement to arrest wanted people in courthouses.

“Some have sought to make this about a larger political battle,” Schimel said. “While this case is serious for all involved, it is ultimately about a single day, a single bad day, in a public courthouse. The defendant is certainly not evil. Nor is she a martyr for some greater cause.”

U.S. Deputy Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche praised the verdict on X, saying nobody is above the law, even judges.

According to court filings that include an FBI affidavit and a federal grand jury indictment, immigration authorities traveled to the Milwaukee County courthouse on April 18 after learning 31-year-old Eduardo Flores-Ruiz had reentered the country illegally and was scheduled to appear before Dugan for a hearing in a state battery case.

Dugan learned that agents were in the corridor outside her courtroom waiting for Flores-Ruiz. She left the courtroom to confront them, falsely telling them their administrative warrant for Flores-Ruiz wasn’t sufficient grounds to arrest him and directing them to go to the chief judge’s office.

While the agents were gone, she addressed Flores-Ruiz’s case off the record, told his attorney that he could attend his next hearing via Zoom and led Flores-Ruiz and the attorney out a private jury door. Agents spotted Flores-Ruiz in the corridor, followed him outside and arrested him after a foot chase. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security announced in November he had been deported.

Prosecutors worked during Dugan’s trial to show that she directed agents to the chief judge’s office to create an opening for Flores-Ruiz to escape.

An FBI agent who led the investigation testified that after agents left the corridor, she immediately moved Flores-Ruiz’s case to the top of her docket, told him that he could appear for his next hearing via Zoom and led him out the private door.

Prosecutors also played audio recordings from her courtroom in which she can be heard telling her court reporter that she’d take “the heat” for leading Flores-Ruiz out the back.

Her attorneys countered that she was trying to follow courthouse protocols that called for court employees to report any immigration agents to their supervisors and she didn’t intentionally try to obstruct the arrest team.

Richmond writes for the Associated Press.