The spouses and parents of US service members have been reportedly detained or deported after the Trump administration ended protections for military families. The Associated Press believes the dozens of cases its investigation found are just the beginning.
Published On 6 Aug 20266 Aug 2026
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WASHINGTON — Immigration remains a stronger issue for President Trump than the economy or Iran among Republican voters, according to a new poll, even after three people were killed in encounters with Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents within a week in July.
But Trump’s immigration approach is unpopular among Americans overall, the new survey from the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found. Only 39% of U.S. adults approve of his performance on immigration, a decline from 49% at the beginning of his second term.
About 8 in 10 Republicans continue to approve of how Trump is handling immigration. That’s a slight decline from the beginning of his second term, when about 9 in 10 Republicans approved, but his support on the issue within his base has been mostly stable since last summer despite a chaotic year of immigration enforcement actions including several shooting deaths.
Republicans are also more likely to approve of how Trump is handling immigration than the economy or Iran. In just the last month, GOP voter approval of Trump’s handling of Iran dropped slightly in AP-NORC polling.
The poll found that about half of U.S. adults say Trump has “gone too far” on deporting immigrants living in the U.S. illegally. That number also has remained steady for more than a year, despite multiple immigration crackdowns that deployed federal law enforcement to large cities and at least 10 deaths involving encounters with immigration officers since the mass deportation campaign began. Republicans are much less likely to say Trump has overstepped in his immigration enforcement actions.
Overall, Trump’s popularity has fallen since he took office last year, but the findings highlight the relatively muted impact of the last year’s aggressive immigration enforcement on his public standing. That’s a contrast with views of his handling of Iran, where he’s seen more recent signs of slippage, even among supporters.
Americans remain divided on whether Trump has overstepped on immigration.
About half of U.S. adults say Trump has “gone too far” when it comes to restricting legal immigration, in line with the last time the question was asked in February. Roughly half — 47% — say Trump has exceeded his authority when it comes to deporting immigrants living in the U.S. illegally. In each case, about 3 in 10 say Trump’s actions have been “about right,” and closer to 2 in 10 say he hasn’t gone far enough.
Few Republicans — about 2 in 10 or fewer — say he’s “gone too far” on deporting immigrants in the country illegally or restricting legal immigration.
Most Americans, however, say he’s gone too far when it comes to using traffic stops to find and arrest immigrants living in the U.S. illegally — a practice that was at the center of two recent ICE shootings in Texas and Maine — and when it comes to sending federal immigration agents into U.S. cities. Republicans were also less likely to see these as oversteps.
James Leatherman, a 68-year-old Republican from San Antonio, is generally supportive of Trump’s handling of the presidency and backs him on immigration in particular.
“You cannot come in here illegally — you’re breaking the law,” he said.
More Americans disapprove than approve of the way ICE is enforcing immigration laws. About half of Americans “strongly” or “somewhat” disapprove of the agency’s approach, while roughly 3 in 10 “strongly” or “somewhat” approve. There’s a wide partisan split, though: About 6 in 10 Republicans approve of ICE’s approach, compared with about 2 in 10 independents and just 4% of Democrats.
Eric Coursen, 76, an independent from Chincoteague, Va., agrees with the president that there were problems with the immigration system that needed to be addressed. He said doesn’t believe in “open borders,” but he’s deeply opposed to how the administration has been enforcing immigration law.
“It’s like taking some bread when you’re hungry, and you take it, you’re going to shoot that person rather than just, you know, get them for theft?” he said. “It’s just overkill.”
About 3 in 10 U.S. adults, 32%, approve of how Trump is handling the economy. That’s down from 40% at the start of his second term, and marks a shift from his first presidential term when the economy was a relatively strong issue for Trump.
During Trump’s first term, his lowest approval on the economy was 40% in December 2017. Now, his rating is well below that.
Roughly 7 in 10 Republicans — 69% — approve of how Trump is handling the economy. That’s roughly in line with the share who approve of how he’s handing the presidency, but it’s slightly below the 78% who approved early in Trump’s second term.
Leatherman, despite his support for Trump, said he’s feeling the pinch of higher prices in his budget. “I almost have to go to the bank to get a loan before I go grocery shopping,” he said.
About 7 in 10 U.S. adults describe the nation’s economy as “very” or “somewhat” poor, in line with April. Republicans are more optimistic, with about 6 in 10 saying that the economy is doing well, compared with about 2 in 10 independents and roughly 1 in 10 Democrats.
Healthcare never has been a strong issue for Trump. Unlike with immigration and the economy, a clear majority of U.S. adults has disapproved of Trump’s performance on healthcare across both terms. That hasn’t changed in the new poll, which found that only about 3 in 10 Americans approve of how Trump is handling healthcare, in line with when the question was last asked in December.
He’s experienced a rebound on the issue among his own supporters since late last year, though. Roughly 71% of Republicans now approve, compared with 59% in the December poll.
That shift comes as Democrats kicked off 100 days until the midterm elections last week, with leaders saying they’ll focus on healthcare cuts, in addition to the cost of living and the war in Iran. Democrats and independents continue to overwhelmingly disapprove of Trump’s handling of healthcare.
The AP-NORC poll of 1,165 adults was conducted July 23-27 using a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for adults overall is plus or minus 3.7 percentage points. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus 6 points for Republicans overall and plus or minus 5.4 points for Democrats overall.
Thomson-Deveaux, Sanders and Catalini write for the Associated Press.
WASHINGTON — In its latest move to restrict the legal immigration system, the Trump administration announced a sweeping change Monday that could lead to the deportations of thousands of asylum seekers.
The change from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services allows asylum officers to bypass the need to interview certain applicants and instead refer them directly to immigration judges for removal proceedings.
The agency estimates that up to a third, or 444,000 of the more than 1.4 million asylum cases in its backlog, could be affected by the rule.
The administration framed the move as an effort to streamline the process and reduce the backlog of cases. The interim final rule takes effect Tuesday and is subject to a 60-day public comment period.
“For far too long the asylum system has been exploited for purposes of delay and work authorization, not legitimate claims of protection,” USCIS Director Joseph Edlow said in a news release.
“America’s asylum system exists to protect individuals who genuinely fear persecution and this rule will help ensure that resources are directed to the timely adjudication of those claims instead of to those seeking to use the system as a loophole,” Edlow added.
But advocates for immigrants said the change leaves asylum seekers who tried to follow the law vulnerable to deportation.
Migrants can apply for asylum two ways: affirmatively or defensively.
Those who entered the country legally, such as on a visa, and still have lawful status apply with USCIS and have their cases decided by an asylum officer. Those who crossed the border illegally or who are undocumented can apply after being placed into removal proceedings, where they make their case to an immigration judge.
Immigration courts are not an independent system — they are housed under the Department of Justice and judges are federal employees.
That shift is significant because the Trump administration has fired more than 100 immigration judges and replaced them with military lawyers and former prosecutors for the Department of Homeland Security. Many of the fired judges were appointed during the Biden administration or previously worked as lawyers representing immigrants.
In recent months, immigration courts have approved a dwindling percentage of asylum claims as judges face pressure to approve more deportations. After immigration agents began arresting people in courthouses, many immigrants grew wary of showing up for court proceedings, which has aided the increase in removal orders.
USCIS refers thousands of cases to immigration courts each year, federal data shows. During the first half of this fiscal year, the agency transferred 31,454 cases to immigration courts — a number that was already on track to be higher than the 2025 yearly total of 40,932. The highest yearly total was 61,729 cases in 2019, during Trump’s first presidency.
USCIS said the current policy, which requires an asylum officer to first interview an applicant before deciding whether to send the case to an immigration judge, “essentially allows an alien to get a second chance at asylum.”
Todd Schulte, president of the immigrant advocacy organization FWD.us, noted that the rule change comes just after the Trump administration terminated temporary legal protections for hundreds of thousands of Haitians and others, many of whom entered the U.S. legally and applied for asylum the “affirmative” way. On X, Schulte called the move “a terrible harbinger.”
ABBEY Clancy revealed her and Peter Crouch’s daughter Sophia Ruby was nearly arrested while going through airport security.
The model, 40, opened up about her recent family trip to New York with her kids Sophia, 15, Liberty, 11, Johnny, eight and Jack, seven.
But things took a surprise turn when US immigration grilled Sophia when she made a ill-timed joke about a “gun” while entering the US.
Speaking on the latest episode of their podcast The Therapy Crouch, Abbey said: “Sophia nearly got arrested at the airport, we’re landing in New York, it’s kind of security heavy… strict.
“Those immigration officers are not fun. You cannot crack a joke with them.
“Sophia renewed her passport since she last visited the US and she had to do her fingerprints.
READ MORE ON ABBEY CLANCY
“Sophia was like ‘why do I have to do fingerprints? Is that in case there are fingerprints on the gun?’
“They were like ‘sorry Miss, what did you say? What fingerprints on the gun?’ and then she was like ‘there’s guns here and you could have my fingerprints…’ and they were like ‘what? your fingerprints are on a gun?’.”
Abbey was then forced to intervene to explain that her daughter was just making an observation about how they catch criminals.
The mum-of-four continued: “I was like ‘no, my daughter is not saying her fingerprints are on a gun’, she’s saying ‘is that how you catch criminals, if fingerprints are on a gun?’”
But things went from bad to worse when a woman left a bag unattended next to Abbey in a queue, leaving security panicked.
Abbey said: “A lady left her bag and the queue spirals and everyone was going ‘whose is this?’
“At this point she was at the opposite end and I was right near the bag and I was thinking f***ing hell, so this poor woman got accused of leaving a bomb bag.
“She just left it at the end as she didn’t want to keep carrying it.
“So then we got our bags and the driver left us because we were taking too long and I just burst into tears.”
Just last week, Abbey and Peter were accused of boasting about their wealth after moving to Portugal while their £3m UK mansion is renovated.
Peter read out a question from a listener, which asked: “Have you completely relocated to Portugal or are you there while renovating your home?”
Abbey replied: “Obviously, we sold our house, we were looking for a new house, we thought we would try living in Portugal for a bit.
“We’ve absolutely loved it and you know it works perfectly for us because you know we can renovate our new place and all come back and it’ll be done.”
However, some fans thought they were boasting about their wealth and one commented bluntly: “Yeah when you have bagfulls of money, yeah try another country.”
“Bet they’re in Quinta do Lago as it’s very fancy,” added another.
The couple were previously criticised by fans for ‘flaunting’ their enviable £3 million mansion while hosting a lavish Asian-inspired banquet.
The pair were giving a tour of their luxury estate prior to hosting an extravagant dinner party with lavish catering provided by London’s Nobu.
The multi-million pound property featured its own luxury cinema room and a spacious home office for Peter and his trophies.
Fashion-savvy Abbey had her own walk-in wardrobe, while the outside area boasted a ‘magical’ and ‘peaceful’ garden complete with a high-tech BBQ and swimming pool.
One fan commented: “We get it, you’re loaded. Well done.”
A second added: “How they live, we don’t need to know.”
Travelers from overseas gather after their arrival at Narita International Airport in Narita, Japan. Photo by FRANCK ROBICHON / EPA
July 20 (Asia Today) — Japan plans to add about 230 immigration officers during the current fiscal year as it strengthens enforcement against unauthorized residency and employment, according to a Japanese media report Monday.
The Immigration Services Agency plans to recruit more than 200 immigration control officers and examiners, the Yomiuri Shimbun reported.
The government could approve revisions to the relevant enforcement ordinance at a Cabinet meeting as early as the end of July.
Adding personnel on this scale in the middle of a fiscal year, rather than through the regular hiring and budget process, is unusual.
The agency plans to add about 50 immigration control officers responsible for locating and investigating people who remain in Japan without authorization.
Many of the additional officers will be assigned to Ibaraki prefecture, where authorities plan to increase investigations into unauthorized employment.
Japan also plans to add about 180 immigration examiners.
The examiners will investigate employment outside the activities permitted under a person’s visa status and process a growing number of residency applications more quickly while maintaining stricter reviews.
The government also plans to strengthen screening at airports and seaports to identify travelers who may be at risk of overstaying their visas.
Japan had 68,488 unauthorized residents as of Jan. 1, down 6,375, or 8.5%, from 74,863 a year earlier, according to the Immigration Services Agency.
The total included 41,067 men and 27,421 women.
Despite the decline, the government concluded that more enforcement personnel were needed to prevent unauthorized employment and the misuse of residency classifications.
The government is expected to formally announce the staffing increase at a ministerial meeting this week on accepting foreign nationals and establishing an orderly, inclusive society.
An expert panel on immigration policy is also expected to be established by the end of July.
The panel is expected to discuss issues including the appropriate size of Japan’s foreign population and programs to teach foreign residents about Japanese culture and rules of daily life.
The initiative reflects Japan’s effort to accept foreign workers needed by its labor market while strengthening enforcement against unauthorized residency and employment.
South Korea faces similar challenges as its foreign population grows.
South Korea had 357,598 unauthorized foreign residents at the end of 2025, accounting for 12.8% of all foreign nationals staying in the country, according to Justice Ministry statistics cited in the report.
The total included 128,813 registered foreign residents, 226,028 short-term visitors and 2,757 people who had filed domestic residence reports.
South Korea had 2,783,247 foreign residents at the end of 2025, representing 5.44% of the population. The total included 594,047 people with employment-related residency status and 308,838 international students.
South Korea’s unauthorized foreign population was about 5.2 times Japan’s, although direct comparisons are limited because the two countries use different residency categories and statistical standards.
Both countries are relying more heavily on foreign labor as low birthrates and aging populations contribute to worker shortages.
The increase has also placed greater demands on the government agencies responsible for visa reviews, unauthorized employment investigations and settlement education.
— Reported by Asia Today; translated by UPI
© Asia Today. Unauthorized reproduction or redistribution prohibited.
Original Korean report: https://www.asiatoday.co.kr/kn/view.php?key=20260720010006942
Protesters are inviting soccer fans to join them in issuing referee-style red cards during the World Cup final.
A coalition of artists, community organizers and advocacy groups will be handing out tens of thousands of specially designed commemorative red cards to those headed to Sunday’s championship showdown between Argentina and Spain at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J.
In addition to the slogan “Unitas Mundi” — Latin for “unity of the world” — the mock referee cards direct people to a website explaining the coalition’s campaign and invite them to participate in a collective demonstration inside the stadium to denounce FIFA President Gianni Infantino and President Trump.
The action comes amid increased scrutiny around Infantino and Trump‘s relationship. Infantino has announced that Trump will join him at the final to present the trophy to the winner. He also awarded Trump the first-ever FIFA Peace Prize — created after the U.S. leader was not awarded the Nobel Peace Prize — in December.
And it was after Trump called Infantino to ask for a review of a red card issued to U.S. striker Folarin Balogun that the star forward’s suspension was delayed to allow him to play in the next game. The controversial move prompted an international uproar and accusations that Infantino has violated established rules around political neutrality.
FIFA has strict rules prohibiting political messaging on flags, banners and other items displayed by players and attendees in and around stadiums.
Organizers of the Final Red Card demonstration are also calling out the Trump administration’s immigration and mass deportation policies, which are back in the spotlight after three people were killed within a week during separate encounters with Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers. The fatalities include two people who were shot and killed by ICE officers in Houston and Maine during immigration operations, and another killed in a car crash while fleeing ICE officers in Florida.
At least 10 people have been killed during the Trump administration’s immigration crackdowns.
The coalition behind the campaign includes Contra-ICE, the arts collective that was also a part of the Flags in the Stands Super Bowl action that involved the “ICE OUT” rally towels. Partner organizations also include Make the Road New Jersey, 50501, People vs the Machines and South Asians for America, according to a press release.
WASHINGTON — When Markwayne Mullin took over as Homeland Security secretary from fired Kristi Noem, he pledged to get the department responsible for carrying out the Trump administration’s mass deportations policy out of the headlines.
But just months into Mullin’s time in office, the department is squarely in the center of controversy again after three people were killed in encounters with Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers in the span of less than a week.
The events are the first major test for Mullin, who promised a steady hand for a department roiled by his predecessor’s conduct and the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.
As he navigates the uptick in violence, he is being forced into a balancing act that has him juggling pressures from a White House eager to carry out mass deportations and his former colleagues in Congress seeking answers — all while attempting to ease tensions in American cities over the deaths.
“When he took his position, Secretary Mullin said that his goal was to get the department off the front page of the news,” Democratic Rep. Seth Magaziner said on the House floor Tuesday. Then, waving a newspaper, he said: “Well, you’re back on the goddamn front page now.”
Mullin, a former senator from Oklahoma, was a surprise pick to run the sprawling department after Noem was fired in the wake of two deadly shootings of American protesters at the hands of federal immigration officers in Minneapolis earlier this year.
As the secretary in charge of carrying out the administration’s mass deportations vision, Noem pushed an aggressive style of immigration enforcement where she was front and center, including most famously, a visit to a Salvadoran detention center. She was quick to speak publicly on controversial events, weighing in on both Minneapolis shootings with statements accusing the killed protesters of being agitators.
President Trump, who made mass deportations a central promise of his second administration, ultimately soured on Noem over a $200 million ad campaign and her handling of the Minneapolis operation.
Mullin promised a different approach, while still pledging to deliver on the president’s priorities. His first trip as secretary was not to promote immigration enforcement but to observe hurricane recovery efforts in North Carolina. Noem frequently went out on immigration raids with her officers — Mullin has not.
Since he became secretary and in the aftermath of the Minneapolis violence, the administration has also moved away from high-profile and unpopular immigration operations in American cities to a quieter approach to enforcement that has largely shifted media attention away from the crackdown. Under Mullin, Immigration and Customs Enforcement is also retreating from a plan to use warehouses to detain migrants.
But immigration arrests continue under Mullin and often with little fanfare: ICE arrested 10,000 people over a five-day period in late June, averaging out to about to 2,000 arrests per day. And legal pathways to immigration have also faced new restrictions.
Trump, during Mullin’s tenure, has hailed the secretary as “so incredible,” and “amazing,” lauding him for giving up his Senate seat to run DHS.
For months, it appeared as though Mullin’s change in approach was taking hold. While advocates and civil rights activists accused the department of mistreating immigrants under his leadership, Mullin’s less confrontational approach seemed to keep the department out of the spotlight.
But the events of the past week have posed a new challenge for Mullin as he walks a tightrope between his softer approach and the president’s demands.
“Trying to deal with competing policy objectives is a challenge for any Cabinet secretary, but Mullin has this worse than most,” said Tom Warrick, a former counterterrorism official at Homeland Security who’s now at the Atlantic Council.
“In the case of Homeland Security, the White House wants both to meet their immigration quotas at the same time that they keep public trust, and how you do that — even with the funding that Mullin has — is a really difficult challenge.”
ICE officers in Houston and Maine shot and killed individuals in their cars during immigration operations. In Florida, a man fleeing ICE officers was killed in a car crash.
Mullin has not spoken publicly about the deaths while the department’s public affairs office has released only brief statements following each.
Behind the scenes, Mullin, who frequently talks about how he shares his cellphone number with members of Congress and encourages them to call him directly, has talked with lawmakers and shared information, including talking with both senators from Maine.
And after the second shooting death in Maine, as criticism surged from both protesters and Mullin’s former colleagues in Congress, ICE was ordered to suspend most vehicle stops.
That decision infuriated Trump’s supporters.
Conservative influencer Nick Sorter called it a “TOTAL CAPITULATION to the left,” in a post on X. Conservative activist Mike Davis accused Mullin of heeding the advice of Maine Sen. Susan Collins, who said she’d suggested the vehicle stop pause to the secretary.
A day later, Trump appeared to contradict the guidance to ICE, saying in a social media post “we must be strong, tough and smart and we CANNOT give up one of ICE’s most important and effective Crime Fighting tools, THE TRAFFIC STOP!”
Mullin then reposted Trump’s words, adding that people in the country would be “arrested and deported wherever they are.” He later said on X that he and the president are “on the same page.”
It was not immediately clear whether vehicle stops were back on.
But it showed the friction between Mullin’s attempts to maintain calm and the president’s demands that illegal immigrants, which the administration has in many instances portrayed as criminals, be arrested in large numbers.
Democrats have slammed the new secretary, saying that they see little change at the department.
“Secretary Mullin, if he wants to, and if he has the backing of the White House, he has the ability to get ICE under control and make them follow the law,” said Rep. Joaquin Castro, a Democrat from Texas. “So either he has no interest in doing that, or the White House is not backing him up, or the agents are simply out of control.”
Republican lawmakers have come to Mullin’s defense.
“I think the Secretary has lived up to what he’s wanted to do to try to change the atmosphere over there,” said Rep. Andrew Garbarino of New York, who as chair of the congressional Homeland Security Committee has requested a bipartisan briefing on ICE’s use of force policies from DHS.
“I don’t think anybody is celebrating that ICE is back in the headlines,” Garbarino said.
Santana writes for the Associated Press. AP writer Lisa Mascaro contributed to this report.
Two men have been shot dead by ICE agents in separate incidents in Maine and in Texas – raising questions about the tactics used by immigration officers and bringing back a big political problem for President Donald Trump.
BBC’s North America Editor Sarah Smith explains the backlash the president is facing on one of the biggest issues he ran his election campaign on.
Video produced by Cai Pigliucci, filmed by Ian Druce, edited by Meiying Wu
WASHINGTON — The Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency should continue vehicle stops after recent fatal shootings, President Trump said on Wednesday, seeming to oppose a new suspension of the practice used as part of his immigration crackdown.
ICE is “doing a GREAT job, one that has to be done,” Trump wrote on his social media site.
The Republican president said that to remove criminals he claims were let into the country under the previous Democratic administration “we must be strong, tough, and smart, and we CANNOT give up one of ICE’s most important and effective Crime Fighting tools, THE TRAFFIC STOP!” Trump said, “Once we do, we are playing right into the criminal’s hands.”
Trump administration officials have told Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers to suspend most vehicle stops after two deadly shootings within a week, people familiar with the decision said Tuesday.
The suspension was ordered after an ICE officer shot and killed a Colombian driver Monday in Maine and a week after another officer shot and killed a motorist in Houston, renewing criticism of the agency’s enforcement tactics that were widely condemned last winter after the killings of Alex Pretti and Renee Good in Minnesota.
In Florida on Tuesday, a third man in roughly a week died during an encounter with immigration officers. This time, a 28-year-old man was killed after he was hit by a tractor trailer while running from immigration and other federal officers, authorities said.
It’s a narrative that has been repeated again and again since the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown began, with federal officers confronting drivers and then saying they opened fire when the drivers’ vehicles became a danger. That’s despite decades of warnings from policing experts that shooting into moving cars presents a danger of its own and should almost always be avoided.
At least 10 people have been killed during immigration operations since the start of the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign. At least four of those deaths involved people in vehicles, including the one last week in Houston, a trend so troubling that U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, said Tuesday that she had urged Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin “to cease all non-urgent vehicle stops.”
John Sandweg, who was acting director at ICE, which is part of DHS, during President Obama’s Democratic administration, estimated recently that there have been roughly 18 traffic stop shootings during the Trump immigration crackdown.
The office of Maine Sen. Angus King, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, was told by DHS that ICE was suspending traffic stops, office spokesperson Matthew Felling said.
ICE, which has been under pressure to beef up arrest and deportation numbers, often says people it’s trying to arrest are increasingly resistant to leaving their homes. ICE officers blame immigration advocates who advise immigrants to stay in their homes unless ICE produces a warrant signed by an independent judge instead of the administrative warrants the agency generally uses that are signed by another ICE officer. So, ICE officers say, they’re forced to find other areas in which to make arrests.
Hundreds of people in Maine protested Tuesday over the fatal shooting of Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, a 25-year-old Colombian national. Advocacy groups said Guerrero, who had a wife and a young daughter, was authorized to work in the United States.
DHS said Monday that an officer, “fearing for public safety,” shot and killed Durán Guerrero while officers were watching the home of someone they believed was in the U.S. illegally and facing a final order of removal from the country. It said in a post on X that when ICE tried to stop a car driven by someone who came from the home, the person attempted to flee in the vehicle and the officer fired.
That was a shift from how King earlier described the encounter, when he said Mullin told him the officer opened fire after the man tried to use his vehicle as a weapon. King said Mullin told him the officers were trying to serve an arrest warrant but not for the man who was shot.
In a scathing post on X, outgoing Colombian President Gustavo Petro called the shooting a targeted killing “at the hands of the U.S. government.”
Petro, who has openly quarreled with Trump, urged Trump to provide an explanation and accused ICE officers of treating Durán Guerrero as “an inferior being without rights.”
In Wednesday’s social media post, Trump told ICE to be “judicious, fair and smart, and go back and do your very important job.”
Maine’s congressional delegation on Tuesday demanded a “comprehensive, transparent, and expedited investigation.”
Photos showed bullet holes in Durán Guerrero’s car windshield, but the officers involved in the shooting didn’t have body cameras, leaving many questions. Among them are how close the officer was to the vehicle when shooting, whether officers told Durán Guerrero to stop and why ICE believes he had put the public in danger.
Border czar Tom Homan told reporters Tuesday that the investigation needs to play out and that officers will be held accountable if they are found to have acted inappropriately or illegally.
Maine’s attorney general’s office, which said it is working with federal agencies to investigate, said initial statements suggest the driver was trying to flee in the direction of the officer, whose name hasn’t been released and who was placed on leave.
Collins said Mullin told her the DHS inspector general is investigating in cooperation with the FBI.
Democrats seeking to unseat Collins in November have sought to connect her with ICE’s methods, which have drawn public scrutiny and derision. Collins later said in a statement that although ICE needs to improve, eliminating the agency would make the nation less safe.
Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat who is vying for Collins’ seat, called the ICE officers at the shooting “thugs” during a vigil Tuesday in Lewiston.
Superville, Whittle, Brook, Santana and Sisak write for the Associated Press.
The fatal shooting of a Houston man by a federal immigration officer Tuesday marks at least the eighth death during the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement campaign, and the first fatality amid a newly intensified push by the administration to carry out its mass deportations agenda.
Department of Homeland Security officials said in a statement that Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a Mexican national, ignored commands while trying to evade arrest during an enforcement operation. They say he attempted to ram his car into an agent, who opened fire in self-defense.
Araujo’s family said he was on his way to work at a construction job. He died on the way to the hospital.
The fatal shooting drew immediate criticism from immigrants rights groups and some Democrats who called for an independent investigation and for all footage, communication and evidence to be preserved.
Video footage in several previous shootings has contradicted the accounts of federal officers. No immigration officers have been charged in those fatal encounters.
A fatal late-night traffic stop in Texas in March 2025 marked the earliest deadly shooting by federal officers during the nationwide immigration crackdown. It took almost a year for records in the fatal shooting of the 23-year-old U.S. citizen to be disclosed.
A Homeland Security Investigations team was conducting an immigration enforcement operation with local police when agents stopped Ruben Ray Martinez, who was on his way from San Antonio to South Padre Island. Family members said he had just turned 23 and was with his best friend on his way to celebrate.
DHS officials said Martinez was told to exit the vehicle, but he refused and instead “intentionally ran over” an agent. Another agent fired shots through the open driver’s window, striking Martinez, who died at a hospital. The HSI agent was treated for an undisclosed knee injury.
Martinez’s mother said she was contacted by investigators with the Texas Rangers who told her there was video that contradicted the account given by federal agents. Federal and state authorities have declined to comment on potential discrepancies.
A Border Patrol officer shot and killed Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old nurse, during a Jan. 24 protest against the Metro Surge immigration operation in Minneapolis.
Federal authorities immediately described Pretti, a U.S. citizen, as an armed agitator who was a threat to officers. But bystander video showed Pretti was on the ground and had been holding a cellphone during the interaction with officers.
The video showed an officer appearing to pull a gun from Pretti’s waistband and step away before the first shot was fired by another officer, followed by more shots. Pretti had a permit to possess a firearm.
State and local officials pushed back against the federal officials’ initial characterizations of Pretti, with Gov. Tim Walz calling the comments “despicable.”
Renee Good, a U.S. citizen, was repeatedly shot by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer in Minneapolis on Jan. 7. Videos show she was turning the wheels of her car away from an officer, Jonathan Ross, when he opened fire. Trump administration officials have repeatedly defended Ross, claiming his life was at risk from the moving vehicle.
Good’s death caused a firestorm across the country. The U.S. Justice Department said it wouldn’t share information on the shooting with state authorities.
State and local officials subsequently sued to try to stop the immigration sweeps. Protesters with whistles trailed officers who, in response, deployed tear gas and other chemical irritants.
ICE agents fatally shot Silverio Villegas González during a traffic stop Sept. 12 in suburban Chicago. Relatives said the 38-year-old line cook from Mexico had dropped off a child at daycare that morning.
At the time, DHS officials said agents were pursuing a man with a history of reckless driving who was in the country illegally. They alleged Villegas González evaded arrest and dragged an officer with his vehicle.
Homeland Security said the officer opened fire fearing for his life and was hospitalized with “serious injuries.” However, local police videos showed the agent walking around and dismissing his injuries as “nothing major.”
DHS has said the death remains under investigation.
Authorities were arresting dozens of farmworkers July 10 at Glass House Farms in Camarillo when Jaime Alanis fell from the roof of a greenhouse and broke his neck. The 57-year-old laborer from Mexico died at a hospital two days later.
Relatives said Alanis had spent a decade working at the farm. During the raid, Alanis called family to say he was hiding. Officials said he fell about 30 feet from the greenhouse roof.
Homeland Security said Alanis was never in custody and was not being chased by immigration authorities.
A man fleeing from immigration officers outside a Home Depot store in Monrovia died after being hit by an SUV as he tried to cross a freeway on Aug. 14.
Monrovia police said ICE agents were conducting enforcement operations when the man was hit while running across the eastbound lanes of the 210 Freeway.
The man, identified by the National Day Laborer Organizing Network as Carlos Roberto Montoya Valdez, 52, of Guatemala, died at a hospital.
Homeland Security said Montoya Valdez wasn’t being pursued by immigration authorities when he ran.
A pickup truck fatally struck Josué Castro Rivera on a highway in Norfolk, Va., as he tried to escape authorities during a traffic stop on Oct. 23.
Castro Rivera, 24, of Honduras, was heading to a gardening job with three passengers when ICE officers pulled over the vehicle, according to his brother, Henry Castro.
State and federal authorities said Castro Rivera ran away on foot and was hit by a pickup truck on Interstate 264.
Homeland Security said Castro Rivera’s vehicle was stopped as part of a “targeted, intelligence-based” operation and that Castro Rivera had “resisted heavily and fled.”
Bynum and Lauer write for the Associated Press. Bynum reported from Savannah, Ga. Lauer reported from Philadelphia. AP reporters Ed White in Detroit; Sophia Tareen in Chicago; and Michael Biesecker in Washington contributed to this report.
WASHINGTON — Over the past year and a half, the Trump administration has turned repeatedly to the Supreme Court for clearance on its sweeping immigration enforcement plans. While the administration lost its bid this week to do away with birthright citizenship by executive order, its strategy has, in large part, been a success.
In a White House news release listing 60 actions the administration has taken as part of its America First agenda to restrict immigration, the first four actions were decisions by the Supreme Court.
After the court ruled in June that President Trump can, without judicial review, end temporary legal protections for hundreds of thousands of immigrants, his administration celebrated the ruling as a “major victory for American sovereignty.”
The list of accomplishments also noted that the high court had granted immigration officers greater leeway to remove green card holders who are accused but not convicted of crimes; allowed the administration to limit how many people can apply for asylum; and gave it the green light to continue deporting immigrants to third-party countries where they have no connection.
The decisions raise significant consequences for immigrants who have made their lives in the U.S., and stand to reshape public views over the country’s historic position as a place of refuge. The administration has not only tried to restrict illegal immigration, it has also targeted people residing in the country legally and stepped up efforts to drive them out.
The court’s term that ended last week is the most robust judicial affirmation of executive power over immigration in the court’s history, said Muzaffar Chishti, a senior fellow at the Migration Policy Institute, a nonpartisan think tank. Chishti said the rulings signify that future presidents could continue to change immigration policies at their discretion.
“The biggest impact is that we have now fully understood the power of the presidency, especially in immigration matters,” Chishti said. “Where there is any discretion left to the president or the executive, this Supreme Court has widened the limits of that authority.”
One of Trump’s earliest wins since returning to the White House came last September, when the Supreme Court affirmed that immigration agents can stop anyone they suspect of being in the country illegally on the basis of their perceived race and ethnicity, job or the language they speak.
Afterward, federal officials launched enforcement operations in Chicago, North Carolina and Minneapolis, using increasingly aggressive tactics until two U.S. citizens were shot and killed by immigration agents in January and the administration shifted course.
The Supreme Court’s rulings have landed with particular force in South Florida, which is home to the largest share of Venezuelan immigrants in the country.
The end of Temporary Protected Status — a program intended to protect people in the event of a natural disaster — heightened concerns about deportation to a country that is reeling after twin earthquakes from June 24. More than 100 Venezuelans deported from the U.S. hours before the disaster are among those missing.
Some Florida Republicans called on the administration to renew the legal protections for Venezuelans in the U.S.
“Congress specifically included earthquakes in the TPS statute for moments exactly like this,” said Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar (R-Fla.). “I urge the Administration to redesignate TPS for Venezuelans already in the United States because sending them back after this catastrophe is simply not the right thing to do.”
The White House did not respond to a request seeking comment on whether Trump would authorize humanitarian relief for Venezuelan immigrants.
Immigrants from El Salvador are now holding their breath for an upcoming decision on their TPS designation, which is set to expire Sept. 9.
About 1.3 million people from 17 countries were enrolled in the program when Trump took office last year. The administration has already terminated TPS for many of them, and the Supreme Court’s decision last week, which concerned Haitians and Syrians, clears the way for federal officials to continue.
“The implication of this is that at least most of the claims that have been litigated to challenge this administration’s illegal war on TPS are now foreclosed,” said Ahilan Arulanantham, co-director of the Center for Immigration Law and Policy at UCLA, who presented arguments for the Syria case.
The concern among advocates took on greater urgency after The New York Times and other outlets reported on Thursdaythat immigration officials, seeking to reach a goal of 2,000 arrests per day, had detained more than 10,000 people in less than a week.
Arnulfo De La Cruz, who leads a California union representing thousands of home care workers with temporary protected status, said he is alarmed by the Supreme Court’s many immigration rulings.
“We’re getting into really dangerous territory with, in some ways, the Supreme Court almost legislating the priorities of the administration,” said De La Cruz, who is president of SEIU California and SEIU Local 2015. “That’s the responsibility of Congress.”
In a blow to a centerpiece of the administration’s immigration agenda, the divided Supreme Court upheld birthright citizenship — that, with few exceptions, a person born in U.S. soil is citizen.
Stephen Yale-Loehr, a retired Cornell University immigration law professor, called the ruling one setback among Trump’s largely successful restructuring of how the U.S. treats immigrants. He pointed to a tracker led by a Stanford University law professor that lists more than 700 immigration policy actions by the Trump administration so far.
“Despite this seemingly historic loss, the Trump administration is winning its war on immigrants,” Yale-Loehr said.
And now some Republicans, including Trump, are saying Congress should lead the attack on birthright citizenship.
“You can’t have the kinds of immigration programs other countries have when you can just have a baby here, and now that child is an American citizen,” said Stephen Miller, a Trump aide who is behind much of his immigration agenda.
But Chishti, of the Migration Policy Institute, said in reality, “Congress can’t do anything — it was left powerless by the Supreme Court.”
Other conservatives called on the administration to lean on the considerable authority it already has.
Dale Wilcox, executive director of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, a hard-line restrictionist group, said the birthright decision “makes it all the more urgent to step up enforcement to the maximum possible extent.”
Democrats, meanwhile, cheered the win while acknowledging that their fight against the administration’s immigration policies continues.
“We cannot rest,” said Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.). “Because this is certainly not the end of Trump’s attacks on our Constitution, our democracy, and the notion of what it means to be American.”
More immigration-related cases are among those in the Supreme Court’s docket starting in October and could offer further expansions of executive power.
One case concerns more than 50,000 petitions filed in federal courts in hopes of obtaining the release of detained immigrants. Those petitions ballooned after the administration began limiting the ability of many immigrants to seek release through bond hearings in immigration court.
The administration is expected to put up a fierce defense.
SEATTLE — James Wilson, one of just six men who signed both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, never could have imagined how grand the country he was founding would become. But he knew how it could get there.
Wilson envisioned a steady stream of foreigners coming to America every year, reinvigorating the energy and vitality the nation needed if it were to survive, much less thrive. Which is why Wilson, who moved to the colonies from Scotland at 22, argued against barriers on immigration that would “deprive the government of the talents, virtue and abilities of such foreigners as might chose to remove to this country.”
What Wilson had in mind, then, is something such as the U.S. national soccer team, which gathered to train Saturday morning, on the country’s 250th birthday.
Six of the 26 players on the team, which will face Belgium in a World Cup elimination game Monday, are foreign-born. Five others were born to immigrant parents and two others have immigrant grandparents or great-grandparents. Nearly half have dual nationality.
U.S. coach Mauricio Pochettino jumps into the arms of his players after their World Cup win over Paraguay at SoFi Stadium on June 12.
(Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times)
Yet they all play with the U.S. flag stitched over their hearts. What could be more American than that?
“It is special,” U.S. captain Tim Ream said of having the team together on Independence Day. “Obviously, doubly special because it’s during a World Cup and triple special because it’s here in the U.S. “As a group, with all our different backgrounds, it’s a true representation of what America is. It’s a melting pot of, of people, of personalities, of characters.”
And it’s led by a country-music-listening Argentine coach, Mauricio Pochettino, who first learned to throw a baseball last week so he could perform first-pitch duties at a Seattle Mariners’ game. (He threw a strike.)
“That sort of stuff can only happen in America,” said striker Folarin Balogun, who grew up in England with Nigerian parents but plays for the U.S. because he was born in Brooklyn, qualifying for birthright citizenship through the 14th Amendment to the constitution Wilson helped write.
It would be hard for the U.S. soccer team to more closely resemble the architects who founded the country, nor the vision those architects had for their creation.
Eight the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence and eight of the 55 framers of the Constitution were immigrants. That’s about the same percentage of immigrants on this summer’s World Cup roster. Another 20 of the Founding Fathers were the sons of immigrants; again, the same percentage as the national team.
“That is the U.S. experience of taking different people from all over the world, the immigrant experience, and mixing it into something that the world has never seen,” said Adam Sawyer, a co-founder of Relevant Research, a Baltimore firm which provides support to immigration researchers and organizations.
“One in seven Americans was foreign-born. Our soccer team is like one in four. I always think of soccer [as] leading society and it’s pulling us with it,” continued Sawyer, who recently published an analysis of the role global migration has played on World Cup success. “Our sporting teams push us forward towards further integration.”
The signers of the Declaration of Independence never foresaw a World Cup, much less an American World Cup team. But they did see immigration as such a fundamental strength, they used America’s founding document to condemn King George III for endeavoring “to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners.”
Without that naturalization, Christian Pulisic might not be playing for the U.S.; in fact, he might not even be in the U.S. His paternal grandfather Mate immigrated from the former Yugoslavia in search of opportunity and was later naturalized as a U.S. citizen. The paternal ancestors of goalkeeper Matt Turner became naturalized citizens after fleeing to the U.S. to escape religious persecution in Lithuania and midfielder Cristian Roldan’s parents escaped civil wars in El Salvador and Guatemala, then gained permanent residency through President Reagan’s amnesty program.
“This soccer team is reflecting America at its best,” said Faisal Al-Juburi, co-chief executive of RAICES, a Texas-based humanitarian aid and immigration services nonprofit. “Its global roots, its shared purpose, its one jersey.”
Soccer in the U.S. has long been an immigrant sport. In the years after World War II, when soccer was still an amateur and semi-pro game, the best teams in the country had names such as the Philadelphia Ukrainian Nationals, New York German-Hungarian SC and the Los Angeles Danes. Joe Gaetjens, one of the country’s first stars and the man who scored the goal that beat England in the 1950 World Cup, was a Haitian immigrant.
In recent years, however, the national team has begun recruiting dual-nationals from overseas, among them World Cup midfielder Malik Tillman, who was born to a U.S. serviceman in Germany, and Antonee Robinson, who was born in England to a naturalized U.S. citizen father, and Sergiño Dest, a Dutch native whose father is Surinamese American.
“It is definitely a team that embraces their diverse backgrounds, and that’s quite meaningful, especially now,” said Al-Juburi, the son of Iraqi immigrants. “This notion that we are stronger with impenetrable walls that divide us is definitely not reflected in this team. It credits a lot of its success to its immigrant roots.
“And I think that’s incredibly powerful to see that and to see a nation cheering and getting behind that diversity. It is a reminder that we are stronger from that coexistence.”
But Al-Juburi doesn’t see the result as a melting pot, which burns away the unique flavors and characteristics of each ingredient. For him, it’s more a gumbo in which every ingredient changes and improves the mix.
U.S. players huddle seconds before playing Bosnia-Herzegovina during a World Cup knockout round match at Levi’s Stadium on Wednesday.
(Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times)
“You’re looking at lineage from Nigeria, from Guatemala, from El Salvador, from Mexico, from Liberia, Jamaica, Croatia,” he said. “All these disparate ingredients work together so beautifully and in such a balanced way.”
And when that team succeeds, as the U.S. has this summer, it not only underscores the wisdom of the Founding Fathers, but it offers a lesson for today as well.
“This team contains a different picture of inclusion really mattering, just by being exactly who they are,” said Jules Boykoff, a political science professor at the University of Portland (Ore.) and a former U.S. youth international. “They don’t have to say anything. They just have to be who they are and do their best on the pitch.”
Spain’s immigration scheme sees more than a million applications, with Latin Americans leading the numbers at 67 percent.
Published On 2 Jul 20262 Jul 2026
Almost 1.2 million undocumented migrants have sought legal status in Spain under a scheme that has defied a growing European crackdown on irregular immigration.
The government of Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, a standard-bearer of more open immigration policies, launched the vast plan in April while European neighbours toughen measures in response to pressure from ascendant far-right parties.
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A total of 1,174,978 applications were submitted between mid-April and June 30 when the window closed, with more than 600,000 already being processed, Secretary of State for Migration Pilar Cancela told a news conference in Madrid on Thursday.
Latin America accounted for 67 percent of the submissions, with Colombia alone representing 25.9 percent of the total. African nationalities followed with 22.9 percent.
After Colombia, the most represented countries were Morocco at 13.3 percent, Venezuela with 11.8 percent and Peru at 8.8 percent.
An overwhelming majority of applicants were young, with eight out of 10 younger than 45 years old, while 57 percent of the total were males against 43 percent for females.
The application total does not necessarily indicate how many people will normalise their situation. According to government projections in April, there are about 500,000 potential beneficiaries.
Applicants must prove they have a clean criminal record and spent at least five consecutive months in Spain before January 1.
The authorities have three months to process their paperwork and decide whether to issue a work and residence permit valid only in Spain.
Sanchez has touted the benefits of immigration and the vast regularisation scheme for sectors such as construction that need to boost their workforce.
“Without immigration, Spain would lose 19 percent of its GDP by 2050,” Sanchez said on Tuesday during a presentation on migration. “And what does that mean in business terms? It means, for example, that 90,000 bars would have to close, that 50,000 primary and secondary classrooms would find themselves without students, and that around 220,000 farms would disappear.”
Without immigration, he added, Spain would be “poorer, emptier, weaker and without the resources to fund its welfare state”.
“Spain has never moved forward by building walls,” the prime minister said. “The only decent thing to do is extend a hand, not turn our backs on immigration.”
Spanish business leaders have welcomed the move, but the conservative and far-right opposition are furious about a policy they say will encourage more irregular immigration. Santiago Abascal, the leader of the far-right Vox party, slammed the scheme, calling it an “invasion”.
“More than a million strangers now competing with Spaniards for jobs, housing, daycare places, hospital beds, and social assistance. It’s an invasion. And it’s a betrayal,” Abascal said on X.
Kevin Starr, professor of planning and development and faculty master of Embassy Residential College at USC, is the author of “The Dream Endures: California Through the Great Depression,” to be published by Oxford University Press.
The California dream, according to the latest Times’ poll: National Guardsmen patrol the border with Mexico, bayonets at the ready. Every resident, citizen and non-citizen alike, carries a tamper-proof identi ty card (You can’t leave home without it). Countless times a day, the card is shown to bureaucrat or police officer to prove citizenship. The 14th Amendment, guaranteeing citizenship to the U.S.-born, is abrogated. Truant officers, lists in hand, enter classrooms and pull undocumented children from behind their desks, trundling them into vans for shipment to relocation centers. At hospitals nearby, emergency-room doctorsturn away the sick or injured who do not possess the identity card.
Every now and then, the people of California surrender themselves to a recurrent paranoid delusion that is virtually a badge of Californian identity. Now is such a time. And the combination of a paranoid-delusional populace and demagogic politicians has engendered among Californians a mean-spiritedness, a detachment from reality–and worse, a fear of freedom itself.
It happened in Los Angeles on Oct. 24, 1871, when a mob, which included some of the city’s best citizens, tortured and hanged 17 Chinese men from downtown lampposts, among them a teen-age boy, then looted the Chinese quarter.
It happened in the 1930s, in the midst of the mother of all Depressions, to Dust Bowl migrants. In February, 1936, the city of Los Angeles declared both the federal and state constitutions null and void, dispatched 126 police officers to seal off all California’s land borders from entry by migrants–all American citizens–who could not prove their net worth.
It happened most sweepingly in 1942, when American citizens of Japanese descent were shipped off to what were euphemistically called relocation centers.
It happened in June, 1943, when thousands of young servicemen wandered the streets of Los Angeles, beating up young Mexican males, stripping them of their zoot suits, blaming them, implicitly and explicitly, for the fact that they, the Anglos, had to go off to war while the Mexican youths were able to stay home and jitterbug.
As Yogi Berra would say, “It’s deja vu all over again.” Just as Californians once believed that the Chinese, the Japanese, the Dust Bowlers, or Mexican youths in zoot suits were the cause of their ills, they now believe, with the full force of mass psychosis, that illegal immigrants–read: illegal Mexicans–constitute the gravest threat to our way of life, in a close third to the economy and crime, to which illegal immigration is intimately linked.
Think of it! Mexican illegals responsible for bloated bureaucracy. Mexican illegals responsible for special-interest-dominated politicians. Mexican illegals responsible for a soaring divorce rate, the breakdown of the family, AIDS, venereal disease, declining standards in culture and education, anti-female violence in rap music, drugs, child abuse, spousal batterings, the loss of religion and personal morality, deferred maintenance of the infrastructure, teen-aged pregnancies, the Inquisition of political correctness, slovenliness in personal dress–or whatever other symptom one might choose to signify the decline of California as a culture.
To say all this is not to deny that California faces a terrible array of problems, including illegal immigrants. As Delmore Schwartz once pointed out, even paranoids have enemies. Illegal immigrants are a drain on the public sector. The underground economy–with its exploitative wages, lack of benefits, forged and perjured documents–corrupts employer and employee alike.
Furthermore, in an economy partly dependent upon illegal immigration, citizenship is devalued. What previous generations struggled for across a lifetime–the chance to live and work in America–is stolen by means of false papers. The ghetto existence of illegal immigrants reinforces an unfortunate tendency in the legal immigrant community not to learn English, not to assimilate, on some level, the language, legal and institutional structures, heritage and historical identities of the United States of America.
As bad as these problems are, however, they are not the whole picture. The state’s current malaise cannot be blamed on the young busboy, far from home, washing dishes late into the night in an upscale restaurant on the Westside. Indeed, in the vast majority of instances, Mexican illegals are doing the work that others–even those on welfare–will not do, yet needs to be done.
How did we lose faith in the premise of America and California, which is freedom and an open society, personal liberty, courage, fairness and, whenever possible, generosity to others who also wish something better for themselves? Why are we talking about bayonets on the border when, every day, there are tens of thousands of legal crossings between Mexico and California crucial to the survival of our economy? Why are we scapegoating obliquely, perhaps, yet with loathsome effectiveness, the fact of Mexican immigration to America, an immigration that was absolutely necessary for the creation of modern California?
Mexican labor built the interurban electrics that made possible modern Los Angeles and its hinterlands. Mexican labor played the major role in the creation of the agricultural economy that still remains the leading component of California’s domestic product.
Californians had it easy in that long arc of prosperity extending from World War II through the ‘80s? When it was taken away–when California began to suffer like the Rust Belt or rural New England or Appalachia–they turned around and blamed the weakest, especially an underclass approaching non-personhood.
Paranoia is intrinsically self-destructive. Paranoids not only blame others; they do damage to themselves. And so it is not surprising that the current paranoid-delusional mind-set, not content with soldiers on the border and identity cards, with kids yanked from classrooms and the sick denied treatment, now seeks to sink the North American Free Trade Agreement. True, the treaty requires some amending, but to kill the entire idea of economic cooperation with Mexico on the ground that Mexico will hijack our economy is to betray in an instant how far our self-esteem has sunk, how far we have devolved into paranoia. We want it both ways: to see the Mexicans as, on the one hand, illegals enervating our social system; and, on the other, to see them back on their own turf, capable of stealing our industrial base.
What a horrible hypocrisy for California to simultaneously exploit and berate those who come only for a better life.
NEW YORK — President Trump said he is nominating Lance Schroyer, a former Oklahoma state trooper, as the next director of Immigration and Customs and Enforcement.
On his social media platform Saturday, Trump described Schroyer, a former Marine, as “a proven leader” with “real operational experience.”
Schroyer hails from the same state as the new Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, a former congressman. Earlier this month, Mullin brought Schroyer on stage at a National Sheriffs’ Assn. event, calling him a “good friend of mine” and noting the department had recently hired him.
Mullin quickly praised Schroyer in a statement highlighting the former trooper’s 29-year career and his work with federal and state partners on a U.S. immigration enforcement program.
“President Trump made a great pick, and I’m confident Lance’s strong leadership and firsthand experience will empower the men and women of ICE to deport criminal illegal aliens, secure the homeland, and protect the American people,” Mullin said Saturday.
If confirmed, Schroyer will lead ICE at a time when the public mood has soured on Trump’s immigration crackdown, which sent surges of federal immigration officers into many U.S. cities. Those raids sent tensions soaring and prompted clashes between protesters and federal agents, including the fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis this year.
Trump returned to the White House on a promise of mass deportations, and ICE has been a central executor of that vision. The agency is undergoing massive growth from a onetime injection of $75 billion last year, which has allowed for the hiring of 12,000 officers and increased detention capacity.
Mullin, who started in his role in March, has promised to keep his department out of the headlines and has indicated a softer tone on immigration, although he aligns with the president’s priorities on mass deportations.
Claire Trickler-McNulty, a former senior ICE official, said prior confirmed ICE directors have often been attorneys, though some state and local law enforcement officials have also been nominated. She said his background in Oklahoma suggests Mullin probably influenced the pick.
“I think probably given the attention on ICE, he wants to feel like he has somebody he can trust in there,” she said in an interview.
John Torres, another senior ICE official, said Schroyer faces an uphill climb toward Senate confirmation, but his experience being at the state and local level instead of the federal level might help.
“He won’t have any of that baggage, where they’re going to turn around and say, ‘Oh, well, he worked for this administration or that,’” Torres said.
Schroyer’s nomination comes after former ICE Director Todd Lyons resigned at the end of May. David Venturella, a former executive at a private prison operator, has been serving as the acting head of the agency. Venturella is expected to stay on as the acting director until Schroyer is confirmed, according to a Homeland Security official speaking on condition of anonymity.
ICE has not had a Senate-confirmed director since the Obama administration, a result of polarizing politics around the agency and immigration policy.
Swenson writes for the Associated Press. AP writers Elliot Spagat and Rebecca Santana contributed to this report.
FORT WORTH, Texas — A demonstrator who shot and wounded a police officer outside a Texas immigration center last July 4 was sentenced to 100 years in federal prison Tuesday, while other protesters accused of having links to antifa were given multiple decades in federal prison.
Benjamin Song was convicted of attempted murder last March after prosecutors say he opened fire and wounded a police officer at the Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado.
The seven other protesters sentenced Tuesday received prison terms ranging from 30 to 70 years.
“Our issue with this case has always been this isn’t a bunch of terrorists. This is a bunch of kids and young adults who really have a really big heart and really wanted their voice to be heard,” Philip Hayes, Song’s attorney, said outside the federal courthouse in Fort Worth. “It was never intended that anybody get hurt. It was never intended that any shots would be fired.”
He said his client would appeal the sentencing.
“Song, aside from this day, has had an impeccable life. A former Marine. A good student,” Hayes said. “He had a lot of good qualities that were just ignored. The judge went ahead and gave as much as he could.”
One of the defendants, Daniel Sanchez Estrada, was convicted of corruptly concealing a document and conspiracy to conceal documents. Others pleaded guilty to providing material support to terrorists rather than take their case to trial.
Prosecutors say the eight are members of antifa, a decentralized anti-fascist organization that has become a target of the Trump administration. They have denied any affiliation and maintain they attended the demonstration to show support for immigrants inside the detention center.
President Donald Trump last fall signed an executive order designating antifa a domestic terrorist organization, even though there is no domestic equivalent to the State Department’s list of foreign terror organizations.
Critics warn the case could have wide-reaching impact on protests given that organizations operating within the U.S. are supposed to be protected by First Amendment free-speech rights.
Short for “anti-fascists,” antifa is not a single organization but rather an umbrella term for far-left militant groups that confront or resist neo-Nazis and white supremacists at demonstrations.
Last week, federal prosecutors charged 15 people with impeding the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in Minnesota. They claimed the demonstrators were members of antifa who conspired against the federal government to block arrests and deportations by setting up blockades around government buildings and throwing chunks of ice at federal vehicles, among other actions.
Stengle and Marcelo write for the Associated Press. Marcelo reported from New York.
MINNEAPOLIS — A federal judge has blocked an attempt by the Trump administration to subpoena Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and other state officials, calling it an effort to “harass and retaliate against them.”
In a ruling unsealed Monday, U.S. District Judge Patrick Schlitz found the “dominant purpose” of the subpoenas was to “coerce Minnesota officials into assisting the federal government with enforcing civil immigration law and to harass and retaliate against them for failing to do so.”
The subpoenas were served in January as part of an investigation into whether Walz and other officials obstructed or impeded law enforcement during a sweeping immigration operation in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area.
The subpoenas, which seek records, were sent to the offices of Walz, Atty. Gen. Keith Ellison, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, St. Paul Mayor Kaohly Her and officials in Ramsey and Hennepin counties.
The judge ruled that there appeared to be “extremely weak to nonexistent” connections between the information sought in the subpoenas and any possible criminal violation. The subpoenas seek materials “that largely if not entirely relate to constitutionally protected conduct,” the judge wrote, noting that Minnesota has the legal right not to devote its resources to enforcing federal immigration law.
The Justice Department “is not conducting a criminal investigation,” the judge wrote, “but is instead using the grand jury process for other (unlawful) purposes.”
The evidence that the subpoenas were issued for unlawful reasons is overwhelming, the judge said, arguing that the Justice Department “has struggled — without success — to identify a single plausible investigatory justification” for them.
Walz, in a statement, called the ruling “a victory for the rule of law and our democracy.”
“The U.S. Justice Department is pursuing criminal investigations into the President’s political opponents,” said Walz, the 2024 Democratic nominee for vice president. “This case was just one example of that, but we are seeing daily reminders of this administration’s lawlessness — in Minnesota and around the country. We all must continue to seek justice and uphold the rule of law.”
Ellison said “it should disturb every American that Donald Trump is weaponizing the criminal justice system against people he disagrees with.”
The subpoenas are “a politically motivated retaliation against our city for lawfully standing up to ICE and fighting for our residents,” Her said in a statement, referring to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Frey said the investigation was “never about justice, law, and order, but the absence of it.”
“Subpoenaing political opponents because they spoke on behalf of their constituents violates the core tenets of our democracy and human decency,” he said.
Frey also observed that criticizing government action is not a crime.
“One of the defining strengths of our democracy is the ability to challenge those in power without fear of retribution. Elected officials have both the right and the responsibility to speak honestly about how government decisions affect the people they serve,” he said.
Bauer and Richer write for the Associated Press. AP writer Eric Tucker in Washington contributed to this report.
Federal prosecutors announced charges Tuesday against 15 people who are accused of impeding federal agents during the Trump administration’s massive immigration surge in Minnesota earlier this year.
The investigation targeted two “Minneapolis-based antifa groups” whose members were trained in “surveillance, operational planning and rapid mobilization against law enforcement,” Minnesota U.S. Atty. Daniel N. Rosen said at a press conference.
The charges come as the Trump administration has escalated its attacks on “antifa,” an umbrella term for a diffuse movement of militant left-wing activists, which President Trump has described as a domestic terror group.
Rosen said some of those arrested identified as “antifa” while deploying a range of tactics to disrupt the immigration crackdown, such as “stalking” federal agents and using blocks of ice to slow their convoys. He declined to say whether any federal agents were injured as a result of their actions.
“Whether or not they actually, at the end of the day, cause bodily harm is not the measure of whether or not they committed a serious federal crime,” Rosen told reporters.
Twelve people were arrested Tuesday, two remain at large and one is already in custody, Rosen added. The names and specific charges of those arrested were not immediately available.
The charges come months after the administration’s “Operation Metro Surge” brought thousands of federal agents to the Twin Cities, setting off mass protests and leading to the fatal shooting of two U.S. citizens.
During the surge, convoys of agents in unmarked SUVs traveled through neighborhoods, at times banging down doors, waiting outside schools and demanding residents produce proof of citizenship.
Primarily organized through anonymous neighborhood messaging threads, a sprawling network of outraged Minnesotans quickly formed, with ordinary citizens and activists using whistles and car horns to call attention to the masked, heavily armed agents.
At the time, border czar Tom Homan indicated that federal authorities were probing “the organization and funding of the attacks on ICE.”
“They’ll be held accountable,” Homan said. “Justice is coming.”
Last September, Trump signed an order classifying antifa as a domestic terror organization and directing federal agencies to “investigate, disrupt, and dismantle” its affiliates and funders.
Democrats and several First Amendment groups have raised issue with the designation. While the federal government may designate foreign terror groups, there is no formal mechanism to apply the same label to domestic groups.
Trump has long invoked the term against a range of political opponents, including peaceful protesters without anarchist leanings.
Offenhartz writes for The Associated Press.
WASHINGTON — Dozens of House Democrats are asking the new director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement to roll back a policy that they say hinders their ability to speak with detainees during oversight visits.
The new policy requires that lawmakers identify detainees by name at least two business days before a visit and provide a signed consent form from each detainee. It’s the latest point of conflict in an ongoing battle over when and how lawmakers can inspect immigration facilities.
In a letter Thursday to acting ICE Director David Venturella, Rep. Mike Levin (D-San Juan Capistrano) and 77 other members of Congress, including two dozen from California, argued that they need to conduct constant oversight of immigration facilities because of historic levels of reports regarding the mistreatment of detainees, deaths in custody and substandard facility conditions.
“This Administration has enabled a revolving door of arbitrary policies, directives, and guidance on member access to facilities or on communication with detainees designed to hinder any productive oversight,” they wrote.
The letter was written in response to the new policy, which was outlined in a memo last month.
In the letter, Levin and the other members wrote that detainees have a hard time accessing the visitation form because it is at times unavailable at a detention center’s law library. They said it limits their ability to speak broadly with detainees, particularly those from vulnerable populations, such as the elderly.
Detainees previously used a sign-up sheet to meet with members of Congress or just started talking to detainees they encountered during facility tours.
In the memo outlining ICE’s new policy, then-acting director Todd Lyons said the increased visits by members of Congress have become a burden and a time suck. Homeland Security didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment, but previously said that the policy doesn’t prevent lawmakers from speaking with detainees.
Levin said the increase in visits was necessary because the agency slashed staffing of its oversight offices. The letter notes that for next fiscal year, the president requested additional cuts to the Homeland Security Office of Inspector General.
“These actions, coupled with the constant changes to policies surrounding member access to facilities, reveal a clear attack on the levers that ensure government transparency at every level,” the members wrote.
Democratic House members sued the Trump administration last July after they were repeatedly denied access to immigrant detention facilities in California and across the country.
Homeland Security officials previously implemented a policy requiring lawmakers to give seven days’ notice before a visit, but that policy was temporarily blocked in federal court.
This week, lawyers said a Belizean man who helped organize hunger strikes at the Adelanto ICE Processing Center was moved to facilities out of state and scheduled to be deported after he spoke to three members of Congress about conditions at the detention center in San Bernardino County.
Ariana Grande was crystal clear in the White House’s comments section on TikTok.
The “We Can’t Be Friends” hitmaker didn’t mince words on Thursday when she commented on a White House TikTok: “Please do not ever use my music in relation to this barbaric, inhumane, heinous nonsense. F— ice,” she wrote in her comment.
The TikTok in question, posted by the White House on Tuesday, promoted the administration’s crackdown on immigration and featured Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers handcuffing various people to the tune of the Grammy-winner’s song “Bye.”
“Bye-bye 👋 President Trump has delivered the most secure border in history,” the caption on the video read. Grande’s comment has since been deleted or hidden from the video’s replies, and the sound on the TikTok has been disabled.
White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson responded to Grande’s comment in an emailed statement to The Times, writing, “We’ll say this one last time: what’s actually barbaric, inhumane, and heinous are the criminal illegal aliens who have injured and murdered innocent American citizens.”
Grande joins a slew of prominent musicians and artists who have told the Trump administration to cease using their tunes to promote his agenda.
On the 2024 presidential campaign trail, Beyoncé endorsed former Vice President Kamala Harris, who used Queen Bey’s song “Freedom” as a rally anthem. When a spokesman for Trump used the same song in a social media post, the mega star’s team responded swiftly with a cease-and-desist.
During a 2024 Montana rally, Trump’s team played a video clip using “My Heart Will Go On,” the theme song from the 1997 film “Titanic.” Celine Dion’s management team and record label responded with a statement shooting down the song’s use: “In no way is this use authorized, and Celine Dion does not endorse this or any similar use. … And really, THAT song?”
And then, of course, when Trump used Bruce Springsteen’s “Born in the U.S.A.” on the 2016 campaign trail without the artist’s permission, the American rocker responded by endorsing Hillary Clinton and calling Trump a “moron.”
Add to the list Nancy Sinatra, who posted that Trump’s nod to Frank Sinatra’s song “My Way” was “sacrilege”; the Smiths’ former guitarist Johnny Marr, who said, “Consider this s— shut right down right now,” when the band’s song was used at a 2023 Trump rally; Sabrina Carpenter, who slammed the use of her song in a video, calling it “evil”; and many, many, many more.
Pope Leo has traveled to the Canary Islands as the final stop of his week long visit to Spain, placing migration and human dignity at the center of his international message. The Canary Islands have become one of Europe’s most important migration gateways, with thousands of people risking dangerous Atlantic crossings from Africa in search of safety, opportunity, or asylum.
The visit comes amid growing global debate over migration policies, border security, and humanitarian responsibilities. During his Spain tour, Leo has repeatedly argued that the treatment of migrants represents a moral test for governments and societies.
His stop in the Canary Islands includes meetings with migrants, humanitarian organizations, and local groups assisting new arrivals, as well as a memorial tribute to those who lost their lives attempting the journey.
Located off the northwest coast of Africa, the Canary Islands have emerged as a major entry point for migrants seeking access to Europe.
As Mediterranean routes have become increasingly difficult or heavily monitored, many migrants have turned to the Atlantic route despite its extreme dangers. The journey often involves overcrowded boats, harsh weather conditions, and long periods at sea.
The rising number of arrivals has transformed the islands into a focal point of European migration debates, exposing tensions between humanitarian obligations and border management concerns.
The pope’s visit is consistent with his broader emphasis on human rights, social justice, and international responsibility.
Throughout his papacy, Leo has framed migration not merely as a political issue but as a question of human dignity. His criticism of the international community’s response reflects concerns that many governments are prioritizing deterrence and border enforcement over humanitarian protection.
By meeting migrants directly, Leo is attempting to shift attention from statistics and policy disputes toward the personal experiences of those undertaking dangerous journeys.
Spain has largely adopted a more welcoming position toward migrants compared with several European countries that have tightened immigration policies.
The government’s efforts to regularize the status of hundreds of thousands of undocumented migrants reflect a belief that legal integration can strengthen social cohesion and economic participation.
However, implementation challenges remain significant. Many migrants continue to face lengthy bureaucratic processes, uncertainty regarding legal status, and difficulties accessing employment and social services.
At the same time, migration has become an increasingly contentious political issue, with critics arguing that more permissive policies could encourage additional arrivals.
Migration remains one of the most divisive issues across Europe.
Governments face competing pressures to maintain border security, address labor shortages, uphold humanitarian commitments, and respond to domestic political concerns. Rising support for nationalist and far right parties in several countries has further intensified the debate.
Against this backdrop, Pope Leo’s intervention highlights the widening gap between humanitarian advocates and political leaders who favor stricter migration controls.
His visit also underscores the role religious institutions continue to play in shaping discussions about ethics, responsibility, and international solidarity.
The significance of Pope Leo’s Canary Islands visit extends beyond Spain’s migration challenges.
The trip represents an effort to place human rights concerns at the center of a debate increasingly dominated by security, border control, and political polarization. By choosing one of Europe’s most visible migration entry points, Leo is drawing attention to the human consequences of global inequality, conflict, and displacement.
The visit also reflects a growing tension between moral leadership and political realities. While many governments acknowledge humanitarian responsibilities, they face domestic pressures that often push policy in the opposite direction.
Leo’s message is therefore unlikely to change migration policy overnight. However, it may strengthen the position of humanitarian organizations and advocates who argue that migration should be addressed through a combination of legal pathways, international cooperation, and human rights protections rather than deterrence alone.
Migration pressures on Europe are unlikely to diminish in the near future.
Conflict, economic instability, climate related challenges, and demographic trends will continue to drive movement across borders. As a result, countries will face increasing pressure to develop sustainable migration frameworks that balance security concerns with humanitarian obligations.
Pope Leo is expected to remain one of the most prominent global voices advocating for migrants and refugees. His Canary Islands visit may become a defining symbol of his broader effort to place human dignity at the center of international policymaking.
The larger challenge for Europe will be determining whether political leaders can translate humanitarian principles into workable migration policies amid growing public and political divisions.
With information from Reuters.
WASHINGTON — President Trump signed a bill into law on Wednesday that gives his immigration and deportation agenda a nearly $70 billion boost for the rest of his time in the White House.
The bill provides $38 billion for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and $26 billion for the Border Patrol. An additional $5 billion would cover unforeseen costs, according to the White House.
Trump signed the legislation in the Oval Office a day after House Republicans pushed the measure through by a 214-212 vote over the objections of Democrats. His signature ended a nearly six-month fight over Department of Homeland Security funding that began with shooting deaths of deaths of two U.S. citizens, Alex Pretti and Renee Good, in January during federal immigration enforcement operations in Minneapolis.
Democrats began demanding changes to immigration enforcement after the shootings, creating an impasse — and resulting in the longest agency in history — that ultimately led Republicans to go it alone on the funding.
The agencies will be funded through the next three years. The new law front-loads routine annual funding, ensuring a virtually uninterrupted flow of money as the Trump administration seeks to deport some 1 million people per year.
The legislation had become sidetracked over $1 billion for White House security, including for Trump’s new ballroom, and a $1.8 billion fund to compensate his allies who claim to be victims of political prosecution. Both proposals became politically toxic and were scrapped.
The bill as passed focused exclusively on immigration enforcement, a topic that Republicans have treated as a defining issue between the two major political parties and one the GOP hopes will carry it to victory in November’s midterm elections.
Superville and Binkley write for the Associated Press.
