logo
Rights groups sue Trump administration over migrants transferred to Guantanamo

Rights groups sue Trump administration over migrants transferred to Guantanamo

Middle East Eye15-02-2025
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), along with a slew of US-based rights organisations, is suing the Trump administration for preventing migrants transferred to Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba from speaking to lawyers.
'Our Constitution does not allow the government to hold people incommunicado, without any ability to speak to counsel or the outside world,' Eunice Cho, senior staff attorney with the ACLU's National Prison Project, said in a statement shared with Middle East Eye.
US President Donald Trump had ordered the military to prepare at least 30,000 beds at the US-run facility to accommodate the number of deportees that he said are 'violent criminals' who entered the country illegally and do not hold an immigration status.
'Some of them are so bad we don't even trust the countries to hold them because we don't want them coming back, so we're going to send them out to Guantanamo,' the president said.
But many say their family members who have not committed a crime have been taken away by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents.
New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch
Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters
One of them is Eucaris Carolina Gomez Lugo, a plaintiff in the ACLU case, who was shocked to see a photograph of her brother being held at Guantanamo, according to the lawsuit. The Trump administration has published several images of men in handcuffs being led onto military planes for deportation to the island prison.
Lugo learned that the government was alleging that he and other men being detained were Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang members, and she is now very concerned about his safety.
Aside from setting a quota for ICE agents to round up between 1,200-1,400 people daily, the Trump administration has provided virtually no information about those newly moved to Guantanamo, 'including how long they will be held there, under what authority and conditions, subject to what legal processes, or whether they will have any means of communicating with their families and attorneys,' the ACLU said in a statement.
'Detaining immigrants at Guantanamo Bay without access to legal counsel or basic due process protections is a grave violation of their rights and an alarming abuse of government power,' Rebecca Lightsey, co-executive director of American Gateways, said, according to the ACLU statement.
Rights groups also believe the Trump administration is putting on a very public show of force to placate its most hardline anti-immigration base and that it sets a dangerous precedent for the country.
'Guantanamo is a breeding ground for violence, abuse, and neglect. Our government is targeting [migrants] and unnecessarily moving them to a notoriously difficult-to-access offshore site for no reason other than political theatre,' Jennifer Babaie, director of advocacy and legal services at Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center in El Paso, Texas, said.
As of 2019, there were at least 11 million undocumented immigrants known to be in the US, according to the Migration Policy Institute. Experts believe that figure has risen to some 14 million since.
According to NBC, in order to fulfil Trump's pledge that 'millions and millions' of migrants will be deported, ICE would have to ship out over 2,700 people every single day to reach the one million mark in a year.
Trump vs Biden
So far, about 11,000 people have been deported in less than three weeks of the Trump administration being sworn in, whether it's to Guantanamo Bay or back to their countries of origin.
The crackdown appears to have deterred illegal border crossings.
'Illegal migrant encounters between the ports of entry are down nearly 87 percent,' White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said this week.
But according to figures from the Department of Homeland Security, no presidents have ever deported as many people as Barack Obama and Joe Biden, both Democrats whose time in office preceded the Trump administration.
More than four and a half million people were removed from the US during Biden's four-year term, when immigrant crossings surged as his party sought to distance itself from hawkish Republican rhetoric toward immigrants.
During Obama's two terms, 5.3 million people were removed, earning him the label 'Deporter-in-Chief.'
In Trump's first term, just over two million migrants were removed.
History
Migrants have been held at Guantanamo Bay before.
But according to Politifact, historically, the US has used the facility to hold migrants stopped at sea - mostly Haitians, and also Cubans in the 1990s.
The difference is that now, Trump is sending people who were detained on US soil.
The US has had rights over what is now its military base in Cuba since a treaty was signed between the two countries in 1903. It can be voided only by mutual agreement.
Guantanamo Bay is widely known for housing the detention centre which was set up in 2002 by former President George W Bush during the "war on terror" and was used to hold more than 800 Muslim men accused of being linked to militant groups like al-Qaeda.
There are 15 detainees remaining in the prison after the majority were released without charge.
Former President Barack Obama vowed to close the prison when he came into office, as did Joe Biden. However, the two Democratic presidents only managed to reduce the prison's population.
Trump has repeatedly vowed to keep the prison open. The prison became a symbol of American human rights abuses during the US-led "war on terror", with detainees being subject to a range of torture techniques, including waterboarding and sexual torture, according to rights groups.
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

UAE and US working to 'get chips moving' after AI deal
UAE and US working to 'get chips moving' after AI deal

The National

time36 minutes ago

  • The National

UAE and US working to 'get chips moving' after AI deal

After this week's debut of the White House's Artificial Intelligence Action Plan, the UAE is ready to expedite its AI partnership with the US. This follows President Donald Trump's visit to Abu Dhabi in May, when he announced the US-UAE AI Acceleration Partnership, which included plans for a 5GW UAE-US AI Campus. Those plans allow for the UAE to obtain powerful CPUs and GPUs from the US which are necessary to build up AI infrastructure. Once completed, part of the campus, dubbed Stargate UAE, will be among the largest AI data centres in the world. Security guarantees to protect the UAE AI technology from falling into the wrong hands were are major aspect of the deal. Also bolstering the deal, Mr Trump's much-anticipated AI plan, unveiled on Wednesday, seeks to reduce regulatory barriers in place to build up AI infrastructure in the US, while pushing for increasing the prevalence of US AI technology around the world. That bodes well for the UAE, and other countries with similar AI aspirations. It's also a sharp contrast to the former president Joe Biden's policies. His administration sought tighter export controls on US chips to prevent them from being used in China. 'The UAE welcomes President Trump's AI Action Plan and is ready to fast track our strategic AI partnership with the US,' Yousef Al Otaiba, UAE Minister of State and ambassador to the US, said on Wednesday. 'As a trusted partner, we are working closely with leading US companies to adopt and scale American technology in the UAE and beyond.' Some pundits aren't sold however, and they're trying to exert influence to slow the US-UAE AI Acceleration Partnership. In an opinion article in The Washington Post, Christopher Chivvis and Sam Winter-Levy from the Carnegie Endowment, a US-based think tank, expressed concern about China somehow getting access to the US AI technology, among other things. 'To now approve the offshoring of the data centres that will house so many of the resulting chips to another conflict-prone region would be a major unforced error – one that will prove difficult to reverse,' they wrote. The UAE has addressed this by committing to a $1.4 trillion investment framework for AI infrastructure in the US. Regardless, the Wall Street Journal also reported that some in the White House have sought to take a closer look at the recently announced UAE deal, amid concerns about US technology diffusion. But last week, the White House cryptocurrency and artificial intelligence adviser beat back those concerns, and reaffirmed the US partnership with the UAE. 'These are countries that are long-standing partners and allies of the US going back many years,' White House AI chief David Sacks said during a round-table discussion at the Pennsylvania Energy and AI Summit, referring to the UAE. Mr Sacks added that the Trump administration thought that if US technology wasn't used in AI projects around the world, China-owned Huawei would step in to fill the vacuum. 'We don't want to create demand for Huawei,' he explained, also describing some of the chip smuggling scenarios that have become prevalent in media reports as quixotic. He said the newest standard data centres technology hardware is approximately 2.4m tall, with servers weighing 1,600kg, and that it's 'very easy to see' if they're being transported. 'I know that our Gulf State partners would honour our security agreement,' he said just hours before President Trump appeared at the event in Pennsylvania. 'This is ultimately a trust-but-verify situation, and all we have to do is send an inspector to a data centre and they can count the racks,' Mr Sacks explained, reiterating that he felt the scenarios of AI hardware smuggling were 'blown wildly out of proportion.' Meanwhile, there's no indication from the White House or Department of Commerce, which is ultimately responsible for allowing the export of US technology, that criticism of the UAE deal is gaining traction. In a statement to The National, the UAE ambassador expressed continued optimism about the AI plans with the US announced back in May. 'Signed just 60 days ago in Abu Dhabi, the UAE-US investment and Ai partnership will deliver enormous benefits to both countries,' Mr Al Otaiba said. 'High level teams have been actively engaging to advance the agreement, to get chips moving and to accelerate technology co-operation.'

Egypt presidency forced Al-Azhar to delete statement condemning Israel's starvation of Gaza
Egypt presidency forced Al-Azhar to delete statement condemning Israel's starvation of Gaza

Middle East Eye

time41 minutes ago

  • Middle East Eye

Egypt presidency forced Al-Azhar to delete statement condemning Israel's starvation of Gaza

Egypt's presidency pressured Ahmed al-Tayeb, the grand imam of Al-Azhar, the world's foremost Islamic institution, to withdraw a statement condemning Israel's "genocidal starvation" of Gaza, sources told Middle East Eye. The Cairo-based Al-Azhar said on Wednesday that it had deleted a strongly worded call to action over the starvation of Palestinians in Gaza, citing its potential impact on ceasefire negotiations. In a statement, the institution said it "took the initiative to withdraw its statement with courage and responsibility before God when it realised that this statement could impact the ongoing negotiations regarding a humanitarian truce in Gaza to save innocent lives". "Al-Azhar has prioritised the interests of preventing the daily bloodshed in Gaza, hoping that the negotiations will lead to an immediate halt to the bloodshed and provide the most basic necessities of life, of which the oppressed Palestinian people have been deprived," the statement said. But two sources close to Al-Azhar and the Egyptian presidency confirmed to Middle East Eye that the statement was removed shortly after it was published on Tuesday following a request from President Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi's office. The sources spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to speak to the press. The reason for the withdrawal was that the statement referred to the complicy of third states in what Al-Azhar described as "fully fledged genocide" in Gaza. Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi (R) greets the grand imam of al-Azhar, Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, on the first day of the Eid al-Adha holiday on 24 September 2015 in Cairo (AFP)

Columbia University to pay $220m, undertake major reforms in bid to restore federal funding
Columbia University to pay $220m, undertake major reforms in bid to restore federal funding

Middle East Eye

time2 hours ago

  • Middle East Eye

Columbia University to pay $220m, undertake major reforms in bid to restore federal funding

Columbia University announced on Wednesday that it would pay more than $220m to the Trump administration to restore federal research funding it lost after being accused of not doing enough to combat antisemitism on campus. The agreement, months in the making, will see Columbia pay a $200 million settlement to the federal government over three years, and $21 million to settle alleged civil rights violations against Jewish employees. The agreement will also have the senior vice provost conduct a "thorough review" of the Center for Palestine Studies, the Institute for Israel and Jewish Studies, the Middle Eastern, South Asian and African Studies, the Middle East Institute, the global hubs in Tel Aviv and Amman, the School of International and Public Affairs, the Middle East policy major and other programmes focused on the Middle East. In addition, the university is not allowed to maintain programmes that "promote unlawful efforts to achieve race-based outcomes, quotas, diversity targets or similar efforts", which could threaten several departments and fellowships. The university will also be prohibited from implementing affirmative action in its admissions policies. New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters The agreement also asks Columbia to reduce its dependence on international students, and asks for the university to provide, upon request, "all disciplinary actions involving student visa-holders resulting in expulsions or suspensions and arrest records" that the university is aware of. Claire Shipman, acting president of Columbia University, said in a statement: "This agreement resolves multiple federal agency investigations and protects Columbia's academic mission, research enterprise and independence." Shipman said the agreement would allow billions of dollars in federal research funding to resume, and that the university would retain control over its academic and operational decisions since the federal government would not dictate what it teaches, who teaches, or which students they could admit. Shipman also said the university did "not agree with the government's conclusion that it violated Title VI of the Civil Rights Act" but did not deny the "very serious and painful challenges our institution has faced with antisemitism". She denied the university had capitulated to President Donald Trump's administration's demands. The university and the federal government are also appointing a monitor to ensure they both stick to their agreements. The new monitor, Bart M Schwartz, is the co-founder and chairman of an organisation that sponsored an event in June about "helping Israel heal and rebuild". Schwartz will provide a report every six months. The agreement also sees the establishment of a whistle-blower hotline for the university to raise complaints to. Demands The Trump administration froze $400m in federal grants in March over its claims that the Ivy League institution failed to tackle antisemitism on campus. Shipman said it also placed the majority of $1.3bn a year in federal funding on hold. Columbia University suspends or expels almost 80 students for pro-Palestine protest Read More » It also issued nine demands to the university, including adopting the controversial International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, which academics and members of the Jewish community have criticised as conflating criticism of Israel with antisemitism. The university pushed back on some of the administration's demands in March, such as putting the renowned Middle Eastern, South Asian and African Studies (MESAAS) department under academic receivership. Instead, they put MESAAS under review. They did not abolish the University Judicial Board. Instead, it was moved under the Office of the Provost. They agreed to some demands, such as a mask ban on campus. Ahead of its deal on Wednesday, Columbia suspended or expelled almost 80 students for pro-Palestine protests. The suspensions will last between one and three years and will require students to write an apology letter if they wish to return to the university.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store