I feel safer now
-
The Trump administration is stripping protections of some asylum applicants who filed as far back as 2019.
NPR has learned that dozens of immigrants across the U.S. have received letters in the mail notifying them that their asylum cases have been dismissed by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), a branch of the Department of Homeland Security.
The reason, according to the letters: These asylum-seekers, many of whom entered between 2019 and 2022, did not receive a mandatory screening, known as a "credible fear" interview, at the border.
The interview is conducted by an asylum officer once someone has been detained or has arrived in the United States. It is meant as an opportunity for a person to describe any fear of persecution they may face if they are returned to their home country.
The U.S. didn't have enough asylum officers to do credible fear interviews for every person crossing the border, given the huge influx of border-crossers starting with the COVID-19 pandemic, at the end of the first Trump administration and during the Biden administration, experts told NPR. Now it appears that the new Trump administration is dismissing applications, effectively making people start over on a process they began years ago.
This round of asylum case dismissals is the latest effort by the Trump administration to strip protections from those who have been in the U.S. for years. In the past few months, the administration has limited the ways in which people can seek asylum, has made the process more expensive and is now reviewing already filed claims and dismissing them if parts of the complex application are missing. But as officials expand the scope of whom they are arresting, detaining and deporting, lawyers fear their clients who have been waiting years for their asylum interviews may get caught up in the effort to conduct mass deportations.
-
I don't believe in 'open borders' or what's the point in having a sovereign nation state. Yeah, I'm probably being idealistic and naive, but bear with me.
This administration is doing it wrong, although I'm not naive enough to believe, as has been pointed out to me in a a different post, that they have a sound theory or any sound method.
It seems they have ulterior motives and the only 'reason' I can see behind these is the creation of and reinforcement of authoritarianism.
-
Well, that is the definition of colonialism. It draws arbitrary lines at the behest of imperial powers. This is no less true of the US, as it is of the UK, as it is France, as it is of... you name it.
Btw, this why a genocide is committed against a people, not a nation.
I listened to Diana Spencer carefully, not only because I admired her so much, but because she was a living exemplar of an ancient amount cultural knowledge.
You can notice in her most famous interview (in fact, her only public interview) that she referred to the the U.K. as, "this country."
My concerns are shared by many, though. If you are going to, de facto, have nation states, you will have borders by definition. What are the implications of having borders, if the borders have no real meaning.
Having watched three administrations in a row mangle border policy, this most recent being the worst, all my naive illusions about national sovereignty and identity amount to nothing more than a migraine headache.
-
Local green card holder, mother, US resident for 33 years, with health issues, is "arrested" at Boston's Logan airport after a family vacation to Mexico, hospitalized twice, detained for 10 days with no information given to her family and is finally released on her own after dark and in the rain with no phone at an ICE office near me.
Border Patrol Agent told husband, "if she dies we'll notify her next of kin."
-
Well, dumb question, but what do you think about this, rf?
I know it's harder when it hits close to home.
I think the whole thing is terrifying but I don't want to be terrified. I feel emotionally detached. I feel numb.
I don't know whether I feel this way because I'm resisting being terrified (probably doubtful) or because I'm refusing to occupy my mind with this to the detriment of meeting challenges I happen to have in a transitional time in my life.
Although I feel detached, I am very concerned.
You can tell from my posts, I'm not hesitant to speak out when I feel strongly and want to do so.
Though, I think a person's brain can withstand the stress of a finite number of horrible topics.
There seem to be more and more horrible current events with each passing day.
I notice this problem is getting worse. I'm hope something will counterbalance it and the sooner the better.
I saw a CNN story that said Trump is forming "specialized units" of the National Guard in DC.
Yikes.
-
It's horrifying. And getting worse and it's happening everywhere. So when it's in my neighborhood it seems even more real.
-
An Arkansas man, who was detained for a month by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) after authorities mistook his bottle of perfume for opium, is seeking to have his visa status restored after the charges were dropped.
Kapil Raghu, an Indian national married to an American woman and working towards American citizenship, was detained on 3 May after police officers in Benton, a suburb of Little Rock, pulled him over for having a non-moving traffic violation, according to his attorney, Mike Laux.
During the traffic stop, police found a small perfume bottle in his car labeled “Opium” and arrested Raghu for possessing narcotics, even though he told them the bottle contained perfume and the word “opium” referred to the scent. The bodycam video obtained by local network THV11 shows police accusing Raghu of having an illegal substance in his vehicle.
“You got a vial of opium that was in your center console,” an officer told Raghu. “Go and take a seat.”
“I was not doing anything wrong when he pulled me over. I was following all regulations,” said Raghu, who told the Saline Courier that he was making a food delivery when he was stopped.
Ashley Mays, Raghu’s wife, arrived at the scene and said: “I’m confused on why he’s going to jail.”
The Arkansas State Crime Lab concluded that the substance in the bottle was perfume, not opium, but still Raghu spent three days in the Saline county jail, where authorities found an “administrative/legal error” showing his visa status had expired, according to his attorney.
Ice officers took Raghu into custody and sent him to a federal immigration facility in Louisiana, where he was detained for 30 days.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/oct/03/arkansas-arrest-ysl-opium-perfume-immigration-visa
-
Local reporting from the Daily Herald.
A family-run Palatine cafe is closing because of a drop in customers due to immigration enforcement in the area, the owners said.
Chappie's Cafe, 754 W. Euclid Ave., will serve its last meal Nov. 2.
The business has seen great success despite opening four years ago during COVID, said Judith Martinez, who owns the cafe with her husband, Omar Garcia.
But things began to change about three to four weeks ago, when federal agents arrived and started to approach customers, she said. Two masked agents encountered customers while they were eating breakfast and asked to see their papers but took no one into custody.
Agents visited about a week later. This time, Martinez locked the front door when she saw them driving around the parking lot.
They then confronted her in the back of the store.
“Right away, they told me, ‘Who are you? I need to see your papers. I need to see your passport. I need to see your legal status,’” she said.
There were two cars parked in the back, without license plates, she said.
“I was afraid and I was nervous, but I'm a U.S. citizen,” said Martinez, who was born in Mexico but later came to the United States and was naturalized.
Her husband is also an immigrant but is here legally, she said.
She kept asking the agents why they were there, but they avoided her questions and soon left.
Beside the looming threat of federal agents keeping customers away, food costs have risen sharply, making the decision to close easier.
Local reporting from the Daily Herald.
