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Associated Press
09-07-2025
- Politics
- Associated Press
Appeals court overturns right-wing influencer's conviction for spreading 2016 election falsehoods
NEW YORK (AP) — A federal appeals court on Wednesday overturned a self-styled right-wing propagandist's conviction for spreading falsehoods on social media in an effort to suppress Democratic turnout in the 2016 presidential election. The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan ordered a lower court to enter a judgment of acquittal for Douglass Mackey, finding that trial evidence failed to prove the government's claim that the Florida man conspired with others to influence the election. Mackey, 36, was convicted in March 2023 in federal court in Brooklyn on a charge of conspiracy against rights after posting false memes that said supporters of Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton could vote for her by text message or social media post. He was sentenced to seven months in federal prison. 'HALLELUJAH!' Mackey wrote on X after the 2nd Circuit's decision was posted Wednesday. In follow up messages, he thanked God, his family, wife, lawyers and supporters, and threatened legal action over his conviction. One of Mackey's lawyers on his appeal was Yaakov Roth, who is now principal deputy assistant U.S. attorney general in charge of the Justice Department's Civil Division. The federal prosecutors' office in Brooklyn that brought the case declined to comment. In charging Mackey, prosecutors alleged that he conspired with others between September and November of 2016 to post memes, such as a photo of a woman standing in front of an 'African Americans for Hillary' sign. 'Avoid the Line. Vote from Home,' the tweet said. 'Text 'Hillary' to 59925.' About 5,000 people followed the meme's instructions, according to trial testimony. Nearly all of them received an automated response indicating that the social media posts were not associated with the Clinton campaign, and there was 'no evidence at trial that Mackey's tweets tricked anyone into failing properly to vote,' the 2nd Circuit found. Mackey, who had 58,000 followers at the time, posted under the alias Ricky Vaughn, the name of Charlie Sheen's character in the movie 'Major League.' In overturning Mackey's conviction, a three-judge 2nd Circuit panel wrote, 'the mere fact' that he 'posted the memes, even assuming that he did so with the intent to injure other citizens in the exercise of their right to vote, is not enough, standing alone, to prove a violation' of the conspiracy law. 'The government was obligated to show that Mackey knowingly entered into an agreement with other people to pursue that objective,' Chief Judge Debra Ann Livingston and Judges Reena Raggi and Beth Robinson wrote. 'This the government failed to do.' Livingston and Raggi were appointed by President George W. Bush, a Republican. Robinson was appointed by President Joe Biden, a Democrat. At Mackey's sentencing, the trial judge, Ann M. Donnelly, said that he had been 'one of the leading members' of a conspiracy that was 'nothing short of an assault on our democracy.' The 2nd Circuit disagreed, ruling that the prosecution's primary evidence of a conspiracy was flimsy at best. At Mackey's trial, prosecutors showed messages exchanged in private Twitter groups that they said proved an intent to interfere with people exercising their right to vote. However, the three-judge panel ruled that prosecutors 'failed to offer sufficient evidence that Mackey even viewed — let alone participated in — any of these exchanges.' 'In the absence of such evidence, the government's remaining circumstantial evidence cannot alone establish Mackey's knowing agreement,' the judges wrote.
Yahoo
09-07-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Trump's Justice Department wants to denaturalize citizens. Can he do that?
A recently unveiled memo from the Department of Justice indicates Donald Trump's administration plans to 'maximally pursue' denaturalization of American citizens, marking a radical expansion of the president's anti-immigration agenda. According to the June 11 memo, the Justice Department's civil division will 'prioritize and maximally pursue denaturalization proceedings in all cases permitted by law and supported by the evidence.' The agency intends to take action against citizens who it believes 'pose a potential danger to national security,' or who officials claim have acquired their citizenship through 'material misrepresentations.' The division also notes that it could pursue denaturalization in 'any other cases' that officials believe are 'sufficiently important to pursue.' 'These categories do not limit the Civil Division from pursuing any particular case, nor are they listed in a particular order of importance,' according to the memo. Immigration attorneys and advocacy groups warn that such sweeping guidelines — fueled by a politically motivated agenda — could end up targeting a broad spectrum of U.S. citizens. Trump wouldn't be the first president to strip citizenship from naturalized citizens, but it's an exceedingly rare measure; the government pursued an average of 11 denaturalization cases between 1990 and 2017, when the first Trump administration began ramping up efforts to strip American citizenship, according to the Immigrant Legal Resource Center. Roughly 25 million people in the United States are naturalized citizens, or immigrants who completed the lengthy legal process to become a citizen. More than 22,000 Americans were denaturalized following the the Naturalization Act of 1906 through 1967, but those efforts largely dissipated following that year's landmark Supreme Court ruling that held that denaturalization is unconstitutional in most circumstances, unless an immigrant had 'illegally procured' citizenship through fraud or other means. 'Citizenship is no light trifle to be jeopardized any moment Congress decides to do so under the names of one of its general or implied grants of power,' Justice Hugo Black wrote in the court's majority opinion.' But by 2020, the first Trump administration had filed 94 denaturalization cases. Joe Biden's administration had pursued 64 such cases. The first Trump administration also opened a 'Denaturalization Section' within the Justice Department's Office of Immigration Litigation to specifically investigate and prosecute a 'growing number of referrals anticipated from law enforcement agencies.' Under the Justice Department, denaturalization cases would play out in civil courts, where there is a lower burden of proof than criminal cases, no statute of limitations, and no right to an attorney. While criminal defendants receive court-appointed attorneys, a right to a jury trial and a verdict of proof 'beyond a reasonable doubt,' there are no such guarantees through a civil process. The burden of proof is 'clear and convincing evidence' rather than 'beyond a reasonable doubt,' and a judge — without a jury present — makes that decision. The Justice Department's new criteria in its June 11 memo — which calls on prosecutors to open 'any' case they determine are 'sufficiently important' — opens the door for 'opaque and arbitrary' enforcement, according to George Mason University immigration economics professor Michael Clemens. That language gives the government 'wide discretion' to decide who to target, according to Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law professor emeritus Steve Lubet. "Many of the categories are so vague as to be meaningless,' he told NPR. 'It isn't even clear that they relate to fraudulent procurement, as opposed to post-naturalization conduct.' Lubet also feared the far-reaching 'ripple effects' of stripping citizenship for a wider range of citizens, which could threaten families with mixed legal status, particularly natural-born citizens whose parents' lost their citizenship. 'People who thought they were safely American and had done nothing wrong can suddenly be at risk of losing citizenship,' he added. The White House has used citizenship as a cudgel in his government-wide deportation project, with administration officials and Republican members of Congress threatening to strip citizenship from their political enemies. Last week, Republican Rep. Andy Ogles sent a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi demanding a federal investigation to determine whether New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani — a naturalized U.S. citizen who was born in Uganda — should be stripped of his citizenship. On June 10, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt indicated that the allegations against him 'should be investigated.' Some Republican officials are also cheering on the revival of Sen. Joseph McCarthy's notorious Un-American Activities Committee and calling on the president to invoke the Communist Control Act, the decades-old law that ostensibly targeted Communist Party members and prohibited communists from certain public roles. The act has since faced a wave of legal challenges as a McCarthyist relic of the red scare era. 'New York City is on the verge of electing a socialist for mayor,' Republican Sen. Mike Collins wrote last week. 'Might be time to bring back the committee.' The Justice Department's latest memo also echoes Stephen Miller's 2023 pledge that the first administration's 'denaturalization project' would be 'turbocharged' under a second Trump administration. Miller, Trump's White House deputy chief of staff and a key architect of the president's anti-immigration agenda, has led efforts across the federal government to aggressively remove immigrants from the country. Trump has also floated sending U.S.-born citizens to foreign prisons. 'What, you think there's a special category of person?' he said in remarks from the White House next to Salvadoran president Nayib Bukele in April, following El Salvador's agreement to detain deportees inside the country's notorious CECOT prison. 'They're as bad as anybody that comes in,' Trump said. We have bad ones too.' Trump revived the idea of deporting citizens while speaking in Florida on Tuesday during a visit to an expansive new immigration detention center in the Everglades. 'We also have a lot of bad people who have been here a long time,' Trump said. 'Many of them were born in our country,' he added. 'I think we ought to get them the hell out of here, too, if you want to know the truth. So maybe that'll be the next job that we'll work on together.' The Trump administration also is pursuing an attempt to unilaterally redefine who is eligible for citizenship. Shortly after taking office, Trump signed an executive order that seeks to amend the 14th Amendment of the Constitution to exclude citizenship from newborn children born to certain immigrant parents. Two dozen states, immigrant advocacy groups and pregnant immigrants sued to block the order from taking effect. Several rulings from federal judges and appeals courts issued nationwide injunctions blocking the order, but a ruling from the Supreme Court has limited the scope of those injunctions, teeing up more legal challenges against Trump's executive order. The Justice Department intends to return to the Supreme Court with a renewed challenge against birthright citizenship later this year. Trump's State Department has moved to strip legal status for thousands of international students, including students with permanent lawful status, over campus demonstrations against Israel's war in Gaza. The Trump administration has also stripped legal status for more than 1 million people who were granted humanitarian protections to live and work in the United States — radically expanding the pool of 'undocumented' people now vulnerable for arrest and removal. The administration 'de-legalized' roughly 1.4 million immigrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela by stripping their 'temporary protected status' designation, intended to legally allow immigrants into the United States who are fleeing disaster, violence and crisis abroad. Meanwhile, thousands of people with pending immigration cases have been ordered to immigration court hearings and ICE check-in appointments each week only to have their cases dismissed, with federal agents waiting to arrest them.
Miami Herald
07-07-2025
- Politics
- Miami Herald
Justice Department, driven by Trump policy, plans to go after naturalized U.S. citizens
In his all-out war on illegal immigration, President Donald Trump has branded immigrants as 'criminals,' 'invaders' and 'predators,' as his administration targets millions of Haitians, Latin Americans, gang members and foreign college students for deportation. Now, the president has directed the Justice Department to bolster its resources in a major crackdown on naturalized citizens suspected of unlawfully obtaining their U.S. citizenship. According to a recent memo, the department plans to focus not only on individuals who may have lied about a crime or having done something illegal during the naturalization process. But authorities also plan to focus on others who may have committed a crime after becoming citizens — a generally untested legal frontier. Citing Trump's policy objectives in the June 11 memo, the head of DOJ's Civil Division instructed government lawyers to go after naturalized citizens who pose a potential danger to national security, such as acts of terrorism or espionage, violated human rights, engaged in international drug trafficking or committed felonies that were not disclosed during the naturalization application. The DOJ list of priority targets, backed by Attorney General Pam Bondi, even includes naturalized citizens who have been convicted of defrauding the U.S. government, such as Medicare, Medicaid and COVID-19 loan programs. 'These categories are intended to guide the Civil Division in prioritizing which cases to pursue; however, these categories do not limit the Civil Division from pursuing any particular case,' Assistant Attorney General Brett A. Shumate wrote in the memo, pointing to an expansive interpretation of laws on the revocation of naturalization. A range of critics, including immigration and defense attorneys, say the Justice Department's new 'priorities for denaturalization cases' are extremely broad and vague — allowing the Trump administration to target any number of naturalized citizens for various offenses that may fall outside the scope of the law, before trying to deport them to their native country. Ultimately, a federal judge must decide on any government bid to revoke the status of a naturalized citizen, a long process involving likely appeals. 'Traditionally, the law was intended to apply to individuals who committed an unlawful act before becoming naturalized citizens—particularly if that act was not disclosed during the naturalization process or if there was a material misrepresentation on the application,' Miami immigration attorney Steven Goldstein told the Miami Herald. 'What appears to be happening now is an effort to broaden the law's scope, targeting conduct that occurs at any point after naturalization, based on interpretations laid out in the memo,' said Goldstein, a former federal prosecutor with the now-defunct Immigration and Naturalization Service. 'This administration has aggressively expanded the reach of immigration enforcement — and they've shown they're unafraid to defend these expansions in court.' The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers condemned the Justice Department's new directive. 'The Trump Administration's push to revoke citizenship is alarming, and raises serious Fourteenth Amendment concerns,' group president Christopher Wellborn said in a statement. 'Although the memo purports to target concealment of earlier offenses, the language suggests that any offense, at any time, may be used to justify denaturalization,' he said. 'This is particularly concerning given the administration's reliance on vague claims of gang affiliation in deportations.' The impact of the new DOJ policy aimed at U.S. citizens who were born in a foreign country is unclear. According to the Migration Policy Institute, a Washington, D.C., think tank, the United States has about 24.5 million naturalized citizens, a little more than half of the country's immigrant population. Historically, the Justice Department has zeroed in on Nazi collaborators, Communist party members and spies for denaturalization if they 'illegally procured' their U.S. citizenship, including 'by concealment of a material act or by willful misrepresentation,' according to federal law. Denaturalization was commonly used during the McCarthy era of the late 1940s and early 1950s, and expanded during the Obama administration and Trump's first term in office. The country's latest denaturalization case occurred in mid-June when a federal judge revoked the citizenship of Elliott Duke, an American military veteran from the U.K. who was convicted a decade ago of receiving and possessing child-porn images while stationed in Germany — a crime he did not disclose on his naturalization application before becoming a U.S. citizen in 2013. Trump and Mamdani The issue became even more heated after the Trump administration raised the possibility of stripping Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic mayoral candidate for New York City, of his U.S. citizenship as part of the crackdown against foreign-born citizens convicted of certain offenses. The spurious allegation, known to be false, is that Mamdani may have concealed his support for 'terrorism' during the naturalization process. Mamdani, 33, who calls himself a Democratic socialist, was born in Uganda to ethnic Indian parents, became a U.S. citizen in 2018 and has attracted widespread media attention over his vocal support for Palestinian rights. Trump, during a visit last week to the new Everglades detention facility called Alligator Alcatraz, was asked about Mamdani's pledge to 'stop masked' Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents 'from deporting our neighbors.' Trump responded: 'Well, then, we'll have to arrest him.' Mamdani posted a statement on X: 'The President of the United States just threatened to have me arrested, stripped of my citizenship, put in a detention camp and deported. Not because I have broken any law but because I will refuse to let ICE terrorize our city.' Miami test case Longtime North Miami immigration attorney Andre Pierre, who toiled for years on a landmark denaturalization case, said he has seen both Democratic and Republican administrations pursue aggressive immigration policies — but no president has made the issue as controversial and visible as Trump. Pierre said Trump ran for re-election on the campaign promise of ridding the country of illegal immigrants who have been convicted of committing crimes, along with gang members from El Salvador and Venezuela. But as soon as he was sworn in as president for a second term, he said, Trump started going after everyday, working-class Venezuelans, Haitians, Cubans and other immigrants with temporary protected status or humanitarian parole. 'A lot of people in these communities voted for for him and didn't think he was going to go that far,' Pierre told the Herald. Pierre said it was only a matter of time before the Trump administration would zero in on naturalized foreign-born citizens in the United States. But after reviewing the Justice Department's list of priorities for denaturalization cases, he came away dismayed. 'This memo is shocking,' Pierre said. 'But I don't see a lot of evidence supporting the kind of cases they want to go after.' Decades ago, Pierre represented a Haitian restaurant owner in Miami who applied for naturalization in November 1994, was approved in February 1996 and took the oath of allegiance and became a naturalized citizen in April 1996. But that fall, Lionel Jean-Baptiste was arrested on cocaine distribution charges, convicted at trial and sentenced to eight years in prison. Evidence showed that Jean-Baptiste committed the crime in March 1995 while his application for naturalization was still awaiting approval by the U.S. government — a fact that would ultimately undo his citizenship. After his conviction, government lawyers moved to revoke his naturalization status in what was considered to be a 'test' case, claiming he illegally procured his citizenship because he failed to show 'good moral character' during the application process. A federal trial judge agreed — a decision affirmed in 2005 by a federal appeals court in Atlanta. The key issue was whether the mere allegation of criminal activity against the Haitian immigrant demonstrated a lack of good moral character, a requirement for naturalization. 'The case dragged on for years,' Pierre said. 'It went all the way up to the Supreme Court.' After Jean-Baptiste, 77, lost his naturalization status, Immigration and Customs Enforcement was then able to take the next step of deporting him to Haiti. U.S. v. Fedorenko The Justice Department's new memo on denaturalization policies suggests that government lawyers might be able to pick ripe cases and expedite naturalized citizens as part of the Trump administration's aggressive goal of deporting millions of illegal immigrants. But a historic South Florida case that lasted for years suggests otherwise, because of the extraordinary due process afforded the defendant: Feodor Fedorenko, a former guard at the infamous Treblinka death camp in Poland, where the Nazis killed about 900,000 Jews during the Holocaust. When the Ukrainian-born Fedorenko applied for a visa to enter the United States in 1949, he lied about his activities during the war. He was granted a visa and lived in the U.S. under the radar for about 20 years. He then applied for U.S. citizenship and once again lied about his activities during the war and failed to disclose his collaboration with the Nazis in carrying out war crimes. He became a naturalized U.S. citizen and continued with his life working at a factory in Connecticut — until his retirement in Miami Beach. Authorities caught up with him. In 1978, federal prosecutors moved to strip Fedorenko of citizenship at trial before U.S. District Judge Norman Roettger in Fort Lauderdale. Fedorenko's case, which was cited several times in the Jean-Baptiste ruling by the appeals court, featured dramatic testimony by a half-dozen Jewish survivors of Treblinka who were living in Israel, by Fedorenko himself and by character witnesses. When asked about the gas chambers at the camp, Fedorenko testified that he never went near them, though he could see them from the guard tower where he was stationed occasionally, according to 2014 book, 'Forgotten Trials of the Holocaust.' Fedorenko, who considered himself a 'prisoner of war' even though he worked as a private in the German army, acknowledged that the Germans gave him a gun. But he denied that he ever whipped or shot an inmate. The lead Justice Department lawyer, Jon Sale, who had been an assistant special Watergate prosecutor, was tasked with proving by 'clear and convincing' evidence that Fedorenko illegally procured his citizenship by hiding his past as a Nazi guard from U.S. immigration authorities. But in the end, Roettger rejected the testimony of the Treblinka survivors and spared Fedorenko from being denaturalized. Although Roettger was not entirely convinced of Fedorenko's 'do no evil' depiction of himself as a Treblinka guard, the judge never took the next step of finding that his denial of what witnesses said about him was also untrue. Sale's team appealed, and the judge's ruling was overturned in 1979. Two years later, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld that ruling, leading to the former Nazi guard's denaturalization. 'Even then, his due process rights continued to be honored when the Immigration and Naturalization Service afforded him administrative hearings and appeals,' Sale, a prominent defense lawyer in Miami, told the Herald. 'After all this due process, he was finally deported to the Soviet Union.' There, because of his commission of war crimes in Crimea, Fedorenko, 79, was tried, found guilty and executed in 1987, a year after his deportation.
Indian Express
04-07-2025
- Politics
- Indian Express
What is the Cold War-era ‘Nazi law' revived by Trump to strip citizenship?
A Cold War-era law once used to expel former Nazis is now at the centre of a sweeping Trump administration push to strip US citizenship from naturalised Americans, not just for fraud, but for being deemed a potential national security threat. A new Justice Department memo instructs attorneys to pursue denaturalisation more aggressively, targeting not only those who committed fraud in their immigration process but also individuals who may 'pose a potential danger to national security,' according to the directive, the CNN reported. The guidance, issued by the DOJ's Civil Division, aligns with Trump's broader effort to remake the federal immigration enforcement apparatus. While the law behind denaturalisation has long existed, and was historically used to prosecute former Nazis and war criminals, legal experts as per CNN, warn that the administration's new posture could be weaponised to intimidate naturalised citizens, especially those viewed as critical of Trump. 'The politicisation of citizenship rights is something that really worries me,' Cassandra Burke Robertson, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University, told CNN. Robertson added, 'I think it's just flatly inconsistent with our democratic system.' The denaturalisation statute stems from a McCarthy-era law designed to root out Communists during the Red Scare. Since then, it's most famously been used to prosecute Nazi collaborators. Beginning in 1979, the DOJ created a special unit to target those who concealed their roles in World War II atrocities. Eli Rosenbaum, the department's longtime Nazi hunter, stripped or revoked citizenship from over 100 individuals during his tenure. In 2022, he returned to lead US investigations into war crimes committed in Ukraine. The Obama administration later expanded the practice under 'Operation Janus,' targeting individuals who used stolen identities to become US citizens. In 2020, during Trump's first term, the DOJ even created a dedicated denaturalisation office, though it was quietly dismantled by the Biden administration a year later. One former DOJ official told CNN the initiative was more of a 'branding opportunity' than an effective enforcement mechanism. But now, under Trump's renewed leadership, the strategy is being revived with more institutional heft. Instead of a single office, the entire Civil Division has been instructed to prioritise denaturalisation 'in all cases permitted by law,' while urging US attorneys' offices to flag potential targets nationwide. Trump's DOJ filed 102 denaturalisation cases during his first administration, compared to 24 under President Biden, DOJ spokesperson Chad Gilmartin said on social media. Since Trump returned to office in January, five new cases have been filed in just five months. The department maintains that all denaturalisation efforts will be legally grounded. 'Denaturalisation proceedings will only be pursued as permitted by law and supported by evidence against individuals who illegally procured or misrepresented facts in the naturalisation process,' the DOJ said in a statement to CNN. But multiple current and former DOJ officials told CNN that the new memo is so broad that it risks giving the federal government leeway to file cases based on vague or politicised accusations — such as social media posts or political speech. Robertson warned the administration could retroactively comb through applications for minor errors or inconsistencies, particularly among naturalised individuals critical of Trump. Irina Manta, a law professor at Hofstra University, said the DOJ's move could cast a 'chilling effect' on speech. 'I regularly observe the fear firsthand,' she told CNN. Trump has, at times, publicly mused about removing even native-born citizens from the country. He has claimed that 'many' of the 'bad people' he wants to deport were born in the US, and recently said his administration should 'take a look' at revoking Elon Musk's citizenship after the billionaire criticised his spending plan. Now, one of Trump's allies has made that threat more formal. Republican Rep. Andy Ogles recently urged Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, who was naturalised in 2018 after immigrating from Uganda. Ogles claims Mamdani 'glorifies' people associated with Hamas in a rap song and should be considered for denaturalisation. Bondi has not publicly responded to the request.
CNN
04-07-2025
- Politics
- CNN
Law used to kick out Nazis could be used to strip citizenship from many more Americans
For decades, the US Department of Justice has used a tool to sniff out former Nazis who lied their way into becoming American citizens: a law that allowed the department to denaturalize, or strip, citizenship from criminals who falsified their records or hid their illicit pasts. That power, under the new Trump administration, may be broadening. According to a memo issued by the Justice Department last month, attorneys should aim their denaturalization work to target a much broader swath of individuals – anyone who may 'pose a potential danger to national security.' The directive appears to be a push towards a larger denaturalization effort that fits with the Trump administration's hardline immigration policies. These could leave some of the millions of naturalized American citizens at risk of losing their status and being deported. People who have committed violent crimes, are members or associates of gangs and drug cartels or have committed fraud should also be prioritized, the memo, issued by the head of the DOJ's Civil Division, said. But for many officials and experts, the real concern, they say, is that it is designed to strike fear in the hearts of legal immigrants across the country – particularly those who are at odds with Trump himself. 'The politicization of citizenship rights is something that really worries me, I think it's just flatly inconsistent with our democratic system,' Cassandra Burke Robertson, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University, told CNN. The statute in question is part of a McCarthy-era law first established to root out Communists during the red scare. But its most common use over the years has been against war criminals. In 1979, the Justice Department established a unit that used the statute to deport hundreds of people who assisted the Nazis. Eli Rosenbaum, the man who led it for years, helped the department strip citizenship from or deport 100 people, and earned a reputation as the DOJ's most prolific Nazi hunter. Rosenbaum briefly returned in 2022 to lead an effort to identify and prosecute anyone who committed war crimes in Ukraine. But the department has broadened those efforts beyond Nazis several times, including an Obama-era initiative called Operation Janus targeting those who stole identities to earn citizenship. In 2020, Trump attempted to expand denaturalization efforts by creating a dedicated office at the Justice Department, but it was quietly disbanded by the Biden administration the following year. One former DOJ official called the office a 'branding opportunity,' noting that it was not particularly effective and did not fit with Trump's successor's priorities. Since returning to the White House, Trump has worked to redesign how the federal government enforces immigration in the country, pushing agencies like the FBI and US Marshals to join deportation efforts and targeting foreign student visas for people abroad hoping to attend a private university in the states. Instead of reinstating the stand-alone office from his first administration, the entire Civil Division is now being told to prioritize denaturalization 'in all cases permitted by law,' according to the memo, which also suggests that US attorneys' offices across the country should flag cases where they may be able to initiate denaturalization proceedings. Trump filed 102 denaturalization cases during his first administration, contrasted with the 24 cases filed under Biden, DOJ Spokesperson Chad Gilmartin said on social media Wednesday. So far, the second Trump administration has filed 5 cases in its first five months. The DOJ told CNN in a statement: 'Denaturalization proceedings will only be pursued as permitted by law and supported by evidence against individuals who illegally procured or misrepresented facts in the naturalization process.' But current and former DOJ officials who spoke to CNN said that the beyond instructing lawyers to file as many denaturalization cases as possible, the memo is so broad that it could allow the Justice Department to invoke vague or unsubstantiated claims to expel people from the country. Robertson, of Case Western, warned that the memo could give way to the Trump administration retroactively searching for missteps in the naturalization process of perceived political opponents, like student activists. Irina Manta, a law professor at Hofstra University, said that the administration's move could have a 'chilling effect' on free speech, both political and otherwise. 'I regularly observe the fear firsthand,' she said. Trump has publicly flirted with the notion of deporting American citizens he doesn't want in the country. Though the seriousness of these statements is highly unclear, he has called for everything from deporting 'bad people … many of them [who] were born in our country' to saying his administration should 'take a look' at removing Elon Musk after his erstwhile ally criticized the president's spending bill. At least one ally has taken a more formal step. Last week, Andy Ogles, a Republican congressman, asked Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate whether New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani—who was born in Uganda and naturalized in 2018— should be subject to denaturalization proceedings because he 'publicly glorifies' people connected to Hamas in a rap song. Bondi has not publicly responded to the letter.
