Trump announced widespread border raids and mass deportations by Reuters

By Ted Hessen and Alexandra Ulmer

WASHINGTON/PIEDRAS NEGRAS, Mexico (Reuters) – President Donald Trump launched his sweeping immigration crackdown on Monday, declaring illegal immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border a national emergency, designating criminals as terrorists and taking steps to suspend citizenship for children in the U.S. illegally. Refugees.

Trump said in his inaugural speech that a series of executive orders to target foreign gang members in the U.S. would invoke the 1798 war law known as the Foreign Enemies Act, the last time the authority used the law to arrest non-citizens of Japan and Germany. , and of Italian descent in internment camps during World War II.

Shortly after his inauguration, US border officials announced that they had shut down outgoing President Joe Biden’s CBP One Entry Program, which allowed hundreds of thousands of immigrants to enter the US legally by scheduling an appointment on an application. Existing appointments are canceled, leaving the refugees confused and unsure of what to do.

Republicans recaptured the White House after Trump promised to tighten border security and deport large numbers of immigrants. Trump blamed Biden for the high levels of illegal immigration during the Democrat’s presidency. In June, Biden strengthened the policies and Mexico stepped up enforcement, and the number of migrants caught crossing illegally has dropped significantly.

Republicans have said large-scale deportations are necessary after millions of immigrants crossed illegally during Biden’s presidency. By the beginning of 2022, about 11 million immigrants had illegal or temporary status in the U.S., according to U.S. government estimates, a figure some analysts now put at 13 to 14 million.

“As commander in chief, I have no greater responsibility than to defend our country from attack and invasion, and that’s what I’m going to do,” Trump said in his speech.

Trump’s critics and immigration advocates say mass deportations could disrupt businesses, tear families apart and cost American taxpayers billions of dollars.

The American Civil Liberties Union said in a federal court filing on Monday that Trump’s decision to end the CBP One program has eliminated the only way to get asylum at the US-Mexico border, opening the way for civil rights groups to fight Trump’s agenda in court.

California and other Democratic-led states whose policies limit cooperation with federal immigration enforcement could clash with Trump.

Americans have been less welcoming of undocumented immigrants since Trump’s first term in office, but are wary of drastic measures such as the use of detention camps, a Reuters/Ipsos poll found in December.

BIDEN Admissions Program Closed.

In several Mexican border towns, immigrants have seen their appointments on Biden’s CBP One app since Trump took office. As of January 7, 280,000 people were logging into the app every day to book an appointment.

Migrants waiting in Ciudad Juárez had trouble finding short-term rentals, buying bus tickets and calling family members home.

Dayna del Valle, a 40-year-old Venezuelan, has spent eight months in Mexico waiting for Tuesday’s appointment. At the time, she was working in a nail salon, but her earnings were so small that she could not send any money back to her mother in Colombia, who had cancer and needed treatment for her blood pressure.

“I’m lost,” she said. “I don’t know what to do, I don’t know where to go.”

Denia Mendez, a Honduran woman in Piedras Negras – a Mexican city across from Eagle Pass, Texas – opened her email inbox 30 minutes after Trump became president. She stared at the email for several minutes, reading it over and over again, her eyes still open.

“They canceled my appointment,” she said. Several other refugees who had been laughing minutes earlier feeding potato chips to pigeons huddled around her phone, their faces suddenly burning.

Mendez’s 15-year-old daughter, Sophia, continued to try to log into the CBP One app.

“Son, they won’t let you into the app,” her mother told her softly.

Aimed at birth citizenship

The order focuses on so-called “birthright citizenship,” a Trump official said earlier in the day that would challenge the U.S. citizenship of children born to parents in the U.S. illegally. A text of the order was not immediately available. The right originates from an amendment to the US Constitution, and any move to limit it would almost certainly raise legal challenges.

The official said Trump would suspend the US refugee resettlement program for at least four months and order a security review to see if travelers from certain countries would be subject to travel bans.

For the first time in his address, Trump said he would bring back the “stay in Mexico” program, which forced non-Mexican asylum seekers to wait in Mexico for the outcome of US cases. Biden ended the program in 2021, saying immigrants are waiting in a crowded state.

“All illegal immigration will stop immediately, and we will begin the process of sending millions and millions of criminals back to where they came from,” he said.

Mexico’s president, foreign ministry and economy ministry did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Trump’s plans. Mexican President Claudia Schinbaum called for calm at a press conference on Monday, stressing that her government must see Trump’s details before reacting.