The Trump administration is moving to arrest thousands of people already legally admitted to the US as refugees and detain them indefinitely for aggressive “rescreening”, a report published on Thursday said.
Under the new policy, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said that federal immigration officers can and should arrest anyone who has not yet obtained the right to permanent residence, a so-called green card, and subject them to interviews to assess their refugee claims while they are in custody, as first reported by the Washington Post.
The memo reverses a 2010 Obama administration policy that said failure to apply for a green card within a year of admission to the US was insufficient basis for such an arrest or detention, the newspaper reported.
The DHS move is pertinent to an ongoing case in Minneapolis in which a federal judge last month blocked the Trump administration from further arrests of settled refugees in Minnesota, and ordered the release of at least 100 more arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Officials said “Operation Parris” (post-admission refugee reverification and integrity strengthening), which targeted about 5,600 refugees in Minnesota who had not yet become permanent residents, was “a sweeping initiative re-examining thousands of refugee cases through new background checks and intensive verification of refugee claims”.
In his order, district court judge John Tunheim, who is scheduled to hear further arguments on Thursday in the class-action lawsuit brought by refugee groups, lambasted the detentions. “Refugees have a legal right to be in the United States, a right to work, a right to live peacefully,” he wrote.
Wednesday’s DHS memo, also obtained by CNN, appears to directly contradict Tunheim’s order, and claims existing “incomplete” guidance compels it to make arrests and detentions.
“When a refugee is admitted to the United States, the admission is conditional and subject to a mandatory review after one year,” the memo said.
Detained refugees can remain in custody “for the duration of the inspection and examination process”.
The move comes amid an escalating immigration crackdown by the Trump administration. US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) plans to spend an estimated $38.3bn to buy and retrofit warehouses across the country as detention centers for tens of thousands of people, it was reported last week.
Meanwhile, Donald Trump’s approval rating over his handling of immigration issues dropped to a new low in February of 38%, down from 44% in December, a Quinnipiac poll found. It followed the January killings of US citizens Renee Good and Alex Pretti by federal agents during protests against immigration enforcement in Minneapolis.
The DHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
World Relief, a Christian humanitarian organization that provides legal and other support for detained Minnesota refugees and their families, called the government’s move an “unprecedented reversal of decades-long interpretation of refugee law”.
Myal Greene, the group’s president and chief executive, said in a statement: “The character of a nation is revealed in how it honors its commitments and how it treats the most vulnerable. Today, we have failed on both counts.
“Forcing refugees, who have already been stringently interrogated, to undergo further questioning was already an affront, but irrevocably breaking their trust by withdrawing the safety promised to them and placing them in physical custody displays a very low value of human life.”
