Immigration & Border Security

Sept. 3 (UPI) — Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez rejected allegations Thursday that his government had forewarning of the influx of more than 70,000 migrants into the disputed territory of Ceuta, a tiny Spanish enclave on the north African coast.

“It’s absurd to think that the government knew and did nothing,” Sánchez told lawmakers in Parliament in Madrid.

“We have examined all of the messages, statements and verbal reports from the state security apparatus. I can assure you that none of them went any further than a description of the data or routine reporting, and that absolutely none of them predicted the probability or the scale of what ended up occurring,” said Sánchez.

Sánchez’s comments came after tens of thousands of people and opposition parties took to the streets to protest his government’s handling of the July 30-31 border crossing.

The Opposition People’s Party called for Sanchez’ resignation, accusing the government of deception and a whitewash.

The developments followed reports that Spanish officials were advised a ruling by a Spanish court could see the number of arrivals by sea increase because it had been misinterpreted by many migrants as meaning they would permitted to remain in Ceuta if they swam from Morocco.

Saying the government had “nothing to hide,” Sanchez vowed to publish all the information and reports that officials had access to.

All but about 10,000 of the migrants have since returned to Morocco but the matter has snowballed into a serious domestic and diplomatic issue for the government that has impacted ties with Rabat and its EU neighbors amid allegations Morocco, which claims Ceuta as Moroccan, had done nothing to stop the mass crossings and may have encouraged it.

Sánchez said Thursday that he would seek assistance from Brussels, including requesting the EU border agency Frontex to set up a permanent operation in Ceuta and the establishment of a special Europol task force to monitor illegal migration into the enclave.

He said he would also ask for assistance to secure the border of Melilla, another coastal Spanish territory about 180 miles southeast of Ceuta.

Sánchez doubled down of his rejection of those claims, repeating statements made Monday in which he said there was no evidence Morocco was behind the inlflux.

“Lots of people think that the Moroccan authorities provoked this crisis. Up to this point, no one has provided any definitive proof to the government that would allow us to conclude that this mass border crossing… was planned or executed by the Moroccan authorities,” said Sánchez who stressed that the matter was still under investigation.

The crisis strained relations with Italy which temporarily sealed its border with Spain on July 31 and saw Foreign Minister Manuel Albares summon the Italian ambassador after Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani accused Madrid of running a immigration policy that “encourages human trafficking.”

Sánchez responded by noting that Ceuta is not part of Europe’s common travel area, that Italy more allowed illegal migrants to enter than Spain and criticized Spain’s EU partners for offering “very little support” to Madrid.

The Department of Homeland Security said Milo Yiannopoulos, a British citizen, was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents at the New Orleans International Airport on Friday. He was deported to the United Kingdom that same day. File Photo by John Angelillo/UPI | License Photo

Aug. 29 (UPI) — Far-right political commentator Milo Yiannopoulos was deported to the United Kingdom, immigration officials said Saturday.

The Department of Homeland Security said Yiannopoulos, a British citizen, was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents at the New Orleans International Airport on Friday.

He was deported “back to his home country” that same night, a DHS spokesperson said in a statement to the BBC.

Yiannopoulos entered the United States legally in May 2019 but “chose to overstay his welcome in violation of our nation’s laws,” DHS said in a statement on X.

“Yiannopoulos was issued a final order of removal by an Immigration Judge on July 22, after failing to show up for his immigration hearing,” the statement added.

Yiannopoulos was an editor for Breitbart News and interned for former U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.

In 2024, he worked on the presidential bid of rapper Ye, formerly known as Kanye West.

Yiannopoulos is a vocal supporter of immigration enforcement.

“California needs ICE checkpoints at supermarket entrances, gas stations, strip malls, intersections and government buildings, with on the spot deportation for anyone who can’t prove they are in the US legally,” he wrote on X last year.

In 2025, he said “We have got to deport millions and millions of people.”

“Without that, nothing else matters,” he added in a social media post.

An Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer walks back to his vehicle after checking the documentation of a construction worker during a random stop in Minneapolis, Minn., on January 9. File Photo by Craig Lassig/UPI | License Photo

Aug. 28 (UPI) — A federal appeals court on Friday ruled against a policy by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement that greatly expanded detention for migrants living in the country for years.

Under the Trump administration, ICE has changed its policies to treat people with extensive ties to the United States as still “seeking admission.”

That policy shift allows the agency to subject people who have lived in the country for years to mandatory detention without bond.

On Friday, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the policy, marking the eighth time ICE has been rejected over this same issue in federal appeals court.

In more than 13,000 cases challenging the policy, judges have ruled against ICE more than 90% of the time, Politico reported.

The federal panel said ICE’s policy is incongruent with the law, which is to be applied differently depending on how recently a specific person entered the country.

“Contrary to the Government’s view, the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 (‘IIRIRA’) retained two tracks for detention even though it overhauled the procedures for removing noncitizens from the United States,” the court wrote in its decision.

“Before IIRIRA, noncitizens arriving in the United States were subject to ‘exclusion’ and those already in the country were subject to ‘deportation’ — the former were held in mandatory detention while the latter were afforded bond.”

The appeals court also ruled that ICE’s policy violates the Constitution’s Due Process Clause.

“The Supreme Court has recognized the Fifth Amendment’s ‘Due Process Clause applies to all ‘persons’ within the United States, including aliens, whether their presence here is lawful, unlawful, temporary, or permanent.'”

The court added: “Because Petitioners here have lived in the United States for decades, they have ‘established connections’ in the country and are entitled to due process rights beyond those provided to noncitizens at the border.”

Aug. 28 (UPI) — Far-right political commentator Milo Yiannopoulos was detained Friday in Louisiana for overstaying his visa, immigration officials said.

The Department of Homeland Security said Yiannopoulos, a British citizen, was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents at the New Orleans International Airport.

Yiannopoulos entered the United States legally in May 2019 but “chose to overstay his welcome in violation of our nation’s laws,” DHS said in a statement on X.

“Yiannopoulos was issued a final order of removal by an Immigration Judge on July 22, after failing to show up for his immigration hearing,” the statement added. “He will remain in ICE custody pending removal.”

Yiannopoulos was an editor for Breitbart News and interned for former U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.

In 2024, he worked on the presidential bid of rapper Ye, formerly known as Kanye West.

Yiannopoulos is a vocal supporter of immigration enforcement.

“California needs ICE checkpoints at supermarket entrances, gas stations, strip malls, intersections and government buildings, with on the spot deportation for anyone who can’t prove they are in the US legally,” he wrote on X last year.

On Friday night, online records showed Yiannopoulos was “in ICE custody” but did not indicate where he was being held.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers stand by as they check the documentation of a construction worker during a random stop in Minneapolis on Jan. 9 ICE has awarded a $16.7 million no-bid contract to Compliant Technologies for 6,000 shock gloves to be used to detain people by force. File Photo by Craig Lassig/UPI | License Photo

Aug. 28 (UPI) — U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has awarded a $16.7 million no-bid contract to Compliant Technologies for 6,000 shock gloves to be used to detain people by force.

The agency is ordering the product Generated Low Output Voltage Emitter, or GLOVE, a glove that delivers an electrical current when contacting a person’s skin. The gloves cost $2,495 each, the contract published on a federal database on Thursday reads.

ICE said it “requires a non-lethal, de-escalation device” to “diffuse situations or high-stress environments where physical altercations are likely.”

Along with the gloves, the contract also grants ICE support and equipment services from Compliant Technologies.

“This technology is vital to meeting mission demands, ensuring officer safety, and achieving the President’s public safety and immigration enforcement priorities,” the contract reads.

Compliant Technologies is a Kentucky-based company. Its instruction manual says that users should “always give the subject(s) a reasonable opportunity to comply before force is used.”

A group largely consisting of Democratic senators is opposing the use of the gloves, penning a letter to ICE’s acting Director David Venturella on Thursday.

“Over the past year, ICE personnel have been involved in numerous well-documented incidents of excessive force and civil rights violations,” the letter reads. “These incidents have shown the American people that ICE personnel are not adequately trained or accountable for their interactions with civilians.”

The incidents of excessive force referred to in the letter include the killings of U.S. citizens, including Renee Good and Alex Pretti within weeks of each other in the Minneapolis metropolitan area earlier this year.

“The American people have made it clear that ICE must de-escalate its immigration enforcement operations,” the letter reads.

Markwayne Mullin, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security attends an event Thursday in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, D.C. U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, which falls under the department, arrested nearly 50,000 people in July. Photo by Bonnie Cash/UPI | License Photo

Aug. 26 (UPI) — U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested nearly 50,000 people in July, an average of more than 1,500 people a day, according to newly released government data.

This sets a new monthly record for ICE in President Donald Trump‘s second term. ICE provided the information to the Deportation Data Project based at UC Berkeley and UCLA.

“The way people are being detained is far less flashy, but we are continuing to see arrests,” Melissa Shepard, director of legal services at immigrant services group ImmDef, told The Guardian. “It’s just on a quieter scale instead of, you know, 10, 12 officers making one arrest, you have a handful of officers pulling someone over.”

Markwayne Mullin took over as secretary of U.S. Homeland Security in March, succeeding Kristi Noem, and said he would fulfill Trump’s deportation goals without constant headlines.

“What we’re seeing is an expansion in all of the different ways that ICE is detaining people,” Graeme Blair, co-director of the Deportation Data Projection, told NPR. “They’re arresting people at airports, at ICE check-ins, at immigration courthouses, and this is the result of that.”

The 49,571 people detained in July mark the highest total since October 2022. A record number of those arrested had no criminal history, making up 51% of detainees, The Guardian said.

The number of those removed from the United States also hit a record high in July — nearly 34,000 people.

More than half the arrests were in Texas, Florida, Georgia and California. The prior three states take part in the 287(g) program, in which state and local police can do parts of ICE’s job in the field under ICE supervision. California and a number of other states, including New York, Maine and Vermont, ban 287(g) agreements.

Congress recently approved a $70 billion surge in funding for the Department of Homeland Security, including ICE, helping fuel these numbers. The figures also include the first arrests made after the Supreme Court allowed Trump to revoke Temporary Protected Status for Haitian immigrants last month.

Aug. 25 (UPI) — Colombian President Abelardo De la Espriella ordered police and immigration authorities to begin to identify and deport migrants without legal status, starting in Barranquilla, the president’s office said.

De la Espriella issued the order during a security council meeting in the Caribbean city, where he announced measures to combat homicide, extortion, drug trafficking and other crimes, according to an official statement.

“The order to Migration is clear: coordinated operations with the police must begin in Barranquilla to find illegal immigrants,” De la Espriella said.

The president said authorities would first target foreign nationals committing crimes and then those who have not regularized their immigration status in Colombia.

“This is a presidential order that must begin to be carried out this week,” he said. “I will not accept illegal immigrants, regardless of where they come from, who are committing crimes in Colombia. They will leave, and we will deport them.”

De la Espriella said the measure was a political and administrative decision by his government. However, the announcement did not include a decree, an enforcement protocol or a deportation target.

The government also has not explained whether the order changes existing legal standards or seeks to intensify enforcement already carried out by Colombia’s immigration authority.

Deportations and expulsions were already part of Colombia’s immigration policy. Between August 2022 and June, Migration Colombia documented 3,389 deportations and 2,576 expulsions — a total of 5,965 people.

The leading reasons for deportation during that period were remaining in the country without legal status, with 1,380 cases, and entering or leaving the country illegally, with 1,315, according to Migration Colombia.

Other cases involved fraudulent documents, false statements, unauthorized activities, court orders and threats to national security or public order. The immigration authority said deportations and expulsions require individual administrative proceedings.

The decision fulfills a campaign promise. In June, when he was still a candidate, De la Espriella said foreign nationals who entered Colombia legally would receive guarantees, while those who violated immigration rules would be returned to their home countries, El Colombiano reported.

Colombia is home to more than 2.8 million Venezuelans, the country’s largest foreign population. Migration Colombia had registered 2,831,561 Venezuelan nationals intending to settle in Colombia as of Aug. 31, 2025, according to an official report.

The Association of Venezuelans in Barranquilla called on authorities to respect due process and the right to a defense during the new operations.

“Anyone who commits a crime must answer to the justice system, regardless of whether they are Colombian, Venezuelan or any other nationality,” the organization said. However, it warned that “irregular immigration status is not synonymous with criminality,” according to Caracol Radio.