Free Republic

With his hands and feet handcuffed, tied leg to leg with other detainees, José Daniel Simancas Rodríguez was put on a plane. He says he was told he would go to Miami.Hours later, when they landed, Simancas and his fellow passengers were transferred to a bus with the windows covered by bags. By then he already suspected where he had arrived: Guantanamo. What he did not imagine was that this was just the beginning of a nightmare that would last 15 days.Simancas was one of 177 Venezuelans deported by the United States who had been transferred to the US naval...

On Sunday, we reported on the arrest and pending repatriation of one Mahmoud Khalil, a Hamas-supporting agitator who has been attending Columbia University on a student visa. As we reported, Khalil has been detained, his visa and green card revoked, and he will be sent back to where he came from. Now, Democrats from the Senate Judiciary Committee are announcing they are in favor of releasing Khalil — did we mention that he's a Hamas-supporting agitator? Their X post is three words: Free Mahmoud Khalil.President Trump was quick on the reply: “This is the first arrest of many to come.”...

The Trump administration sent the far-left into an apoplectic rage on Sunday when it was announced they had detained pro-Hamas activist Mahmoud Khalil. The Department of Homeland Security took him into custody with the intent to revoke his green card and deport him after he repeatedly expressed public support for terrorism. Khalil is originally from Syria and has been one of the leaders of the antisemitic harassment campaign taking place at Columbia University. During the summer of 2024, he helped instigate and organize a group of Hamas supporters who illegally occupied public spaces around the school, becoming one of their...

Gurpreet Singh was handcuffed, his legs shackled and a chain tied around his waist. He was led on to the tarmac in Texas by US Border Patrol, towards a waiting C-17 military transport aircraft. It was 3 February and, after a months-long journey, he realised his dream of living in America was over. He was being deported back to India. "It felt like the ground was slipping away from underneath my feet," he said. Gurpreet, 39, was one of thousands of Indians in recent years to have spent their life savings and crossed continents to enter the US illegally through...

A federal judge has ruled against the Denver public schools system’s attempts to block immigration officials from carrying out raids on school grounds, marking a win for the Trump administration as it looks to ramp up its deportation efforts. U.S. District Judge Daniel Domenico said Denver Public Schools failed to prove that a recent drop in student attendance at schools was due to the Trump administration reversing a 2021 Biden-era policy of protecting schools — and other sensitive areas like churches — from ICE raids. There are currently more than 1.4 million individuals on ICE's final order of removal docket....

Students participating in Pro-Hamas demonstrations on college campuses who are non-immigrant visa holders have been put on notice that they will face deportation by the Trump administration. Firming up a similar message from President Donald Trump, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, whose department issues the visas required to study in the United States, made clear that foreign students who support terrorist organizations will face severe consequences. In a Truth Social post by President Trump on Tuesday, the Commander in Chief issued a warning to students protesting on behalf of Hamas, saying, “Agitators will be imprisoned/or permanently sent back to the...

The Trump administration is arresting illegal migrants at a break-neck pace, far outpacing the rate at which the Biden White House nabbed those living unlawfully in the country. Federal immigration authorities have arrested more than 20,000 illegal migrants in President Donald Trump’s first month back into office, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) confirmed Wednesday The number marks a 627% increase in monthly arrests in comparison to the roughly 33,000 at-large arrests made during President Joe Biden’s last year in the White House. “President Trump and this Administration are saving lives every day because of the actions we are taking...

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot on Wednesday called for European governments to co-operate on restricting immigration from countries that refuse to take back undocumented migants who are facing deportation from Europe. France’s foreign minister said Wednesday that he wanted “all” European countries to co-operate and start cutting back visas available to nationals of countries that refuse to take back illegal migrants expelled by Paris. Jean-Noël Barrot spoke after an Algerian-born man went on a stabbing rampage in the eastern French city of Mulhouse at the weekend, killing one person and wounding several others in what President Emmanuel Macron called an...

President Trump escalated his efforts to curb illegal immigration on Tuesday by requiring aliens to register in a tracking database or face prison time and fines.The Trump Administration is encouraging illegal aliens to self-deport with the new tracking system.The DHS said illegal aliens will face harsh penalties if they don’t submit fingerprints or disclose to the government if their address has changed.The Wall Street Journal reported:The Trump administration created a registry for immigrants in the U.S. illegally to submit their personal information or face fines and prison time, according to documents including a draft regulation seen by The Wall Street...

The future looked bright for Luis Eduardo Perez Parra, Leonel Rivas Gonzalez and Abrahan Josue Barrios last week. After being held in immigration custody for over a year and facing the possibility of transfer to Guantánamo Bay, the three men asked a federal court to intervene, warning they might have “disappeared into the legal black hole” of Guantánamo. Last Sunday, a federal judge in New Mexico handed down a surprise ruling blocking the Trump administration from sending the men to Guantánamo -- the first successful legal challenge to the policy since it was enacted last month. But their victory was...

The Trump administration, eager to force local officials to collaborate with ICE, is coming for a Tompkins County sheriff who released a man who’d served his sentence. Central New York’s Tompkins County, home to Ithaca, found itself in the federal government’s crosshairs last month when the Trump administration made the county a focal point of the president’s push to force localities to dedicate resources to mass deportations. Sheriff Derek Osborne did something routine: He released a man from jail after he’d served his sentence. But Immigration and Customs Enforcement wanted Osborne to hold the man, an undocumented immigrant, past his...

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem signed a memo this week deputizing up to 600 State Department officials as immigration officers, as part of a government-wide push to ramp up deportations and secure the border. Noem signed an order that deputized up to 600 special agents in the State Department’s Diplomatic Security Service to help with the arrest and deportation of illegal immigrants. "Under President Trump, the Department of Homeland Security will use every tool and resource available to secure our border and get criminal illegal aliens out of our country," Noem said in a statement. "The safety...

That includes 11,379 Mexicans and 3,091 non-Mexicans, likely from Central America. Nearly 500 migrants per day are being sent back across the border.

Legal services groups that offer representation and guidance to thousands of migrant children facing deportation said on Tuesday that they were abruptly directed by the Trump administration to halt their government-funded work. Affected organizations across the U.S. said the move would prevent them from offering critical legal services, including "know your rights" sessions, to migrant children who crossed the U.S. southern border without their parents or legal guardians. Under U.S. law, the Department of Health and Human Services is responsible for housing unaccompanied migrant minors who enter the U.S. without legal authorization, until they turn 18 or can be placed...

People attending recent mandatory immigration check-ins or court appearances have been escorted out in federal custody after the Trump administration allegedly tricked, lied to, or otherwise deceived them as part of its mass deportation campaign. Amid a blitz of immigration-related policy changes over the last few weeks, Donald Trump and his subordinates have greenlit the ability of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) to conduct potential civil enforcement operations at courthouses, including in immigration courts. They have also reportedly set daily arrest quotas between at least 1,200 and 1,500 and gotten angry when agents have not consistently met those targets...

In a wide-ranging interview, Archbishop Viganò praised Donald Trump for the 'return of the U.S. to the Geneva Consensus Declaration, which defends the right to life for all, reaffirms the importance of the family,' and affirms no international ‘right’ to abortion.(LifeSiteNews) — The following article is from an interview between Italian journalist Aldo Maria Valli and Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò for the blog Duc in Altum on February 16, 2025. Aldo Maria Valli: Your Excellency, the Trump Administration’s decision to put a stop to the immigration policies of the woke Left was part of the electoral platform that brought Donald...

The Trump administration sent three illegal immigrants back to their home country of Venezuela in response to a judge's decision blocking them from being sent to Guantánamo Bay as part of a continued crackdown on illegal immigration. U.S. District Judge Kenneth J. Gonzales of New Mexico issued a memo Friday announcing the court had vacated a March 3 status conference for three Venezuelan migrants just five days after it blocked the Trump administration's efforts to transfer the migrants to Guantánamo Bay. Since then, Gonzales said, respondents had filed a notice of removal "informing the court that all three petitioners were...

Attorney General Pam Bondi will hold a press briefing today at the Trump White House. Watch LIVE at 4 pm EST on Wednesday, Feb. 12, 2025. The former Florida Attorney General is expected to make remarks on the judicial overreach of numerous far-left judges across the country who believe they were elected US president.

The Justice Department announced Wednesday it was suing New York state over its policy of limiting cooperation with federal immigration enforcement, with Gov. Kathy Hochul, state AG Letitia James and DMV chief Mark Schroeder in AG Pam Bondi’s crosshairs. “This is a new DOJ,” Bondi announced. “New York has chosen to prioritize illegal aliens over American citizens. It stops. It stops today.”

Pope Francis issued a major rebuke Tuesday to the Trump administration’s plans for mass deportations of migrants, warning that the forceful removal of people purely because of their illegal status deprives them of their inherent dignity and “will end badly.” Francis took the remarkable step of addressing the U.S. migrant crackdown in a letter to U.S. bishops in which he appeared to take direct aim at Vice President JD Vance's defense of the deportation program on theological grounds. U.S. border czar Tom Homan immediately pushed back, noting that the Vatican is a city-state surrounded by walls and that Francis should...