<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rss xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" version="2.0" xmlns:itunes="http://www.itunes.com/dtds/podcast-1.0.dtd" xmlns:googleplay="http://www.google.com/schemas/play-podcasts/1.0"><channel><title><![CDATA[Migrant Insider]]></title><description><![CDATA[The first and only immigration newsroom in the Washington press corps — covering Congress, the White House, and the Supreme Court. Edited by Pablo Manríquez. Daily coverage of immigration politics and policy, told from the migrant perspective. Est. 2024]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com</link><image><url>https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!b8c6!,w_256,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F5e71d906-d759-4984-8665-f1385ff5739e_257x257.png</url><title>Migrant Insider</title><link>https://migrantinsider.com</link></image><generator>Substack</generator><lastBuildDate>Sun, 17 May 2026 14:29:19 GMT</lastBuildDate><atom:link href="https://migrantinsider.com/feed" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"/><copyright><![CDATA[Migrant Insider LLC]]></copyright><language><![CDATA[en]]></language><webMaster><![CDATA[migrantinsider@substack.com]]></webMaster><itunes:owner><itunes:email><![CDATA[migrantinsider@substack.com]]></itunes:email><itunes:name><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></itunes:name></itunes:owner><itunes:author><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></itunes:author><googleplay:owner><![CDATA[migrantinsider@substack.com]]></googleplay:owner><googleplay:email><![CDATA[migrantinsider@substack.com]]></googleplay:email><googleplay:author><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></googleplay:author><itunes:block><![CDATA[Yes]]></itunes:block><item><title><![CDATA[SCOOP: ICE Moves to Hike Deportation Stay Fee by 387 Percent ]]></title><description><![CDATA[The agency hasn&#8217;t touched the fee since 1989. Now it wants to charge $755 to people with final removal orders &#8212; many of them sick, broke, or both.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/scoop-ice-moves-to-hike-deportation</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/scoop-ice-moves-to-hike-deportation</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 15 May 2026 20:31:05 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/4dc28d91-5e68-4973-b376-49718aadfbc4_1024x683.webp" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>WASHINGTON &#8212;&nbsp;While Washington&#8217;s immigration lawyers have been buried in the USCIS fee overhaul that&#8217;s dominated the trade press, the federal agency that actually carries out deportations has been quietly moving to nearly quintuple its own fee &#8212; the one a person pays when they&#8217;re begging ICE not to put them on a plane.</p><p>ICE published a notice of proposed rulemaking on May 7 to raise the filing fee for Form I-246 &#8212; the application used to request a discretionary stay of deportation or removal &#8212; from $155 to $755. That&#8217;s a $600 jump. A 387 percent increase. And the first adjustment to that fee since George H.W. Bush was in his first year in office.</p><p>The rule is explicit about its ideological home. It ties the hike directly to President Trump&#8217;s executive order on &#8220;Ending Taxpayer Subsidization of Open Borders,&#8221; framing the fee increase as a cost-shift from &#8220;taxpayers&#8221; to &#8220;those receiving the direct services&#8221; &#8212; in this case, people who are already under final removal orders and, in many instances, asking for more time in the country because they are seriously ill, or because their child is a U.S. citizen, or because they have nowhere safe to go.</p><p>ICE projects the higher fee would extract roughly $2.25 million more per year from applicants, based on an estimated 3,745 fee-paying I-246 filings annually.</p><p>The agency acknowledges it cannot fully model how many people will simply stop filing because they can&#8217;t afford it. The rule notes that fee waivers remain available &#8212; but that ICE retains sole discretion over whether to grant them.</p><p>The public comment window closes July 6, 2026. Docket: ICEB-2020-0005 on Regulations.gov.</p><div><hr></div><p><em>This is why Migrant Insider exists &#8212; and why it can&#8217;t be a one-man shop forever. Paid subscribers are how we stay ahead of the outlets just now discovering this beat. Join the community that keeps this reporting alive, and tell one person who needs to read this.</em></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://migrantinsider.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://migrantinsider.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Senate Parliamentarian Kills Core of Republicans' ICE Funding Package]]></title><description><![CDATA[Senate rulekeeper strips CBP appropriations and $2.5B DHS fund, citing conflicts with child protection laws &#8212; and the Trump administration's own record.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/senate-parliamentarian-kills-core</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/senate-parliamentarian-kills-core</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 15 May 2026 00:07:09 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/85366fa1-3b36-42bd-b6c8-1394aeacee3e_1200x821.avif" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>WASHINGTON</strong> &#8212; The Senate&#8217;s top rulekeeper has delivered a significant blow to Republican plans to push billions in new immigration enforcement funding through a procedural fast track, ruling that core provisions of the ICE and Border Patrol reconciliation package run afoul of the chamber&#8217;s strict budget rules.</p><p>Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough advised Wednesday that multiple sections of the package are subject to a 60-vote point of order under the Byrd Rule, effectively killing them under a process designed to require only a simple majority.</p><div><hr></div><h4><strong>The Border Patrol Money Is Gone</strong></h4><p>The first casualty: the main Border Patrol funding sections &#8212; Sections 1 and 3(a)(5) &#8212; which MacDonough found &#8220;inappropriately funds activities outside of HSGAC&#8217;s jurisdiction.&#8221; In plain English, Republicans tried to use the Homeland Security Committee&#8217;s reconciliation lane to pay for programs that belong to other committees. The parliamentarian called the bluff.</p><div><hr></div><h4><strong>Children&#8217;s Protections Draw the Line</strong></h4><p>The second provision to fall is Section 3(a)(6), which would have allowed reconciliation funds to be used in the initial screening of unaccompanied migrant children. MacDonough found the provision &#8220;undermines decades-old protections for noncitizen children&#8221; enshrined in the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act &#8212; and cited the Trump administration&#8217;s own implementation of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act as evidence of how those funds have already been used to circumvent those protections.</p><div><hr></div><h4><strong>$2.5 Billion in Supplemental DHS Funds Also Axed</strong></h4><p>The third is Section 4 &#8212; a $2.5 billion block of additional DHS appropriations &#8212; which MacDonough ruled conflicts with both the Flores Settlement Agreement and the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, the twin legal frameworks that have governed how the U.S. government handles, houses, and screens migrant children for decades. Again, she pointed directly to how the Trump administration has already applied OBBBA spending as evidence of what this new money would actually do.</p><div><hr></div><h4><strong>A Procedural Ruling With Political Consequences</strong></h4><p>It is a notable move for a parliamentarian whose office is careful to note that its advice &#8220;is not a judgement on the relative merits of a particular policy.&#8221; MacDonough&#8217;s ruling is procedural, not political &#8212; but the practical effect lands like a sledgehammer on a package that Senate Republicans had structured as a workaround to Democratic opposition.</p><p>Senate Republicans opted to fund the bulk of DHS through the appropriations process while moving funding for immigration enforcement separately after talks with Democrats collapsed over reforms to ICE and CBP. That strategy required the reconciliation package to survive parliamentary review intact. It has not.</p><p>Republicans still hold 53 Senate seats. They do not hold 60.</p><div><hr></div><h4><strong>The Architecture of the Package, Now in Pieces</strong></h4><p>The package as drafted called for roughly $71.7 billion in new spending across two committee titles &#8212; and the sections now subject to a 60-vote threshold represent core architecture of the CBP side of that spending.</p><p>The ruling puts Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., and Budget Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., in the position of having to redraft or abandon the stripped provisions before a floor vote. Graham said his language was constructed to give both committees maximum flexibility while avoiding jurisdictional conflicts &#8212; a claim the parliamentarian has now directly contested.</p><div><hr></div><h4><strong>A Warning Shot for the Courts</strong></h4><p>For immigration advocates and civil rights attorneys who have spent years defending the Flores Agreement and the TVPRA from executive branch erosion, the ruling is a rare procedural vindication. It is also a warning: the parliamentarian&#8217;s finding that the Trump administration&#8217;s OBBBA implementation itself constitutes evidence of intent is language that is likely to surface again in federal court.</p><p>The package now returns to the drawing board &#8212; with a Senate floor vote still on the calendar and a House that has yet to formally adopt the same budget resolution.</p><div><hr></div><p><em>This is why Migrant Insider exists &#8212; and why it can&#8217;t be a one-man shop forever. Paid subscribers are how we stay ahead of the outlets just now discovering this beat. Join the community that keeps this reporting alive, and tell one person who needs to read this.</em></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://migrantinsider.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://migrantinsider.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[USCIS Rewrites the Rules on Deferred Action — and Immigrant Children Pay the Price]]></title><description><![CDATA[A sweeping rewrite of federal deferred action rules ends automatic deportation relief for 200,000 Special Immigrant Juveniles &#8212; and hands officers broad new grounds to deny]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/uscis-rewrites-the-rules-on-deferred</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/uscis-rewrites-the-rules-on-deferred</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Thu, 14 May 2026 18:59:22 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/3eaf4b86-1548-4565-982a-fb625a2dc8ac_599x399.jpeg" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>WASHINGTON</strong> &#8212; The Trump administration has quietly completed a sweeping rewrite of the federal rules governing deferred action &#8212; the last-resort immigration relief that keeps people from being deported while they wait for Congress&#8217;s machinery to catch up with their lives.</p><p>The most consequential change targets the most vulnerable people in the system: children.</p><p>In June 2025, USCIS rescinded its policy of granting deferred action to recipients of Special Immigrant Juvenile Status &#8212; known as SIJS &#8212; who were unable to adjust to permanent residence because a visa number wasn&#8217;t yet available. The policy had been a lifeline since 2022.</p><p>Around 200,000 SIJS youth awaiting visas had been granted protection from deportation and work authorization under the old framework. These are not people who crossed a border illegally as adults pursuing economic opportunity. They are young people whom a state court has already determined cannot safely be reunified with a parent &#8212; due to abuse, neglect, or abandonment &#8212; and whom Congress specifically designed a protection pathway for.</p><p>Now that pathway has a cliff at the end.</p><p>SIJS recipients who already have deferred action and work permits will generally keep them until they expire &#8212; but USCIS retains the discretion to terminate them early. Young people newly approved for SIJS will not automatically receive deportation protection or work authorization, and no new work permit applications under the (c)(14) category will be accepted.</p><p>Then, in April, USCIS made it permanent.</p><p>Policy Memorandum PM-602-0198, issued April 10, 2026, confirmed that after a 30-day notice period, USCIS will no longer automatically consider granting deferred action for SIJs who cannot yet adjust status due to visa availability. The agency cited a July 2025 internal report it says identified &#8220;significant national security and integrity vulnerabilities&#8221; in the SIJS program &#8212; including what USCIS described as a pathway to lawful permanent residence and eventual citizenship for criminal aliens, gang members, and known or suspected terrorists.</p><p>Immigration advocates dispute that framing sharply, and they&#8217;ve gone to court to say so.</p><p>A lawsuit, <em>A.C.R. v. Noem</em>, filed in the Southern District of New York, alleges the government violated the Administrative Procedure Act when it terminated the policy without proper notice or justification, leaving thousands of SIJS beneficiaries at risk of deportation and labor exploitation. In February 2026, plaintiffs filed an appeal to the Second Circuit challenging the portion of the district court&#8217;s decision that applied a higher standard to those whose petitions were approved after June 6, 2025.</p><p>Meanwhile, the rewritten Policy Manual tells USCIS officers something else: that deferred action is now, officially, extraordinary.</p><p>The updated Chapter 5 lays out an expanded list of factors that can sink a deferred action request &#8212; including whether an applicant has &#8220;endorsed, promoted, supported, or otherwise espoused anti-American views&#8221; or views tied to antisemitic terrorism, including in social media content. It&#8217;s language that did not exist in prior iterations of the manual, and it hands officers broad interpretive latitude at a moment when the administration has been aggressive in citing social media posts as grounds for enforcement action.</p><p>The manual also makes explicit what was always implicit but rarely enforced so bluntly: prosecutorial discretion will be exercised only in compelling cases after a determination that discretion is warranted based on a totality of the circumstances, on a case-by-case basis, and only when clearly authorized by statute or regulation.</p><p>In plain English: if Congress didn&#8217;t write it in the law, USCIS no longer considers itself in the business of filling the gap.</p><p>Without deferred action, SIJS youth will no longer be able to obtain work authorization, leaving them to navigate an unregulated labor market that advocates say is rife with trafficking and abuse.</p><p>The administration has redrawn the line between compassion and compliance &#8212; and drawn it tighter than it&#8217;s been in a generation.</p><div><hr></div><p><em>This is why Migrant Insider exists &#8212; and why it can&#8217;t be a one-man shop forever. Paid subscribers are how we stay ahead of the outlets just now discovering this beat. Join the community that keeps this reporting alive, and tell one person who needs to read this.</em></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://migrantinsider.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://migrantinsider.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[The Man Who Built the Cages Now Runs the Agency]]></title><description><![CDATA[David Venturella spent a decade at GEO Group. Now he's acting ICE director. For migrant communities, that's not a coincidence &#8212; it's the point.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/the-man-who-built-the-cages-now-runs</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/the-man-who-built-the-cages-now-runs</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Wed, 13 May 2026 17:11:50 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/852a65df-c6b6-40df-9d5c-cce2003a7198_1200x630.jpeg" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>WASHINGTON &#8212;&nbsp;There is a door in Washington that never stops spinning.</p><p>It is not a famous door. Nobody has put a plaque on it. No tourists photograph it. But it is the most important door in American immigration enforcement, and a man named David Venturella has walked through it so many times in the last two decades that the hinges have learned his name.</p><p>On one side of the door: the federal government, with its badges and its databases and its authority to take a human being and put them in a cage. On the other side: GEO Group, which builds the cages and bills the government by the bed, by the day, for as long as the government keeps filling them.</p><p>Venturella spent thirty-plus years mastering both sides.</p><p>He started in 1986 with the old Immigration and Naturalization Service in Chicago, working his way up through arrests and deportations and removals, climbing the ladder of a bureaucracy that measures success by how many people it puts on planes. He ran Detention and Removal Operations at ICE. He ran Secure Communities &#8212; the program that turned local cops into immigration enforcers and a traffic stop into a deportation order. He negotiated with Cuba. He sat in on White House working groups. He was, by any measure, the consummate insider, the kind of man who gets things done quietly and never makes the evening news.</p><p>Then in 2012, he walked through the door.</p><p>GEO Group welcomed him as an executive vice president. GEO Group, which operates immigrant detention centers where detainees have described medical neglect, abuse, and the particular cruelty of indefinite confinement. GEO Group, which does not make cars or vaccines or anything a civilization requires &#8212; it makes money by holding human beings in rooms, and it pays its executives very well to make sure the government keeps sending more human beings to fill those rooms.</p><p>Venturella stayed at GEO for roughly a decade.</p><p>Then he walked back through the door.</p><p>DHS brought him back as a consultant. Then as an adviser. They handed him an ethics waiver so the standard rules restricting work involving a recent employer would not inconvenience him. They kept his name off some public leadership lists. By 2025, House Judiciary Democrats were writing letters describing him as the effective No. 2 at ICE, the man overseeing detention contracts &#8212; the very contracts that sent hundreds of millions of dollars to companies like GEO.</p><p>Let that sentence sit for a moment.</p><p>The man who left ICE to work for GEO came back to ICE to manage GEO&#8217;s contracts with ICE.</p><p>If you wrote this as fiction, an editor would send it back. Too on the nose, the editor would say. Nobody would believe it.</p><p>But this is not fiction. This is the United States government.</p><p>And now it gets worse.</p><p>In May 2026, the Department of Homeland Security announced that Venturella would become the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The whole agency. Every arrest. Every detention. Every deportation flight. Every contract with every private prison company in the country &#8212; his to oversee. Tom Homan&#8217;s ally. The quiet operator. The man who, according to reporting summarizing the New York Times, once called the ICE Miami field office personally to make sure a woman named Amanda Ungaro was taken into custody straight from jail, before she could post bond, as &#8212; and this phrase should haunt you &#8212; <em>&#8220;a favor for a friend of the president.&#8221;</em></p><p>The friend was a Trump associate in a custody dispute with Ungaro. He called Venturella. Venturella called Miami. Ungaro was detained.</p><p>That is what the power looks like when it is personalized. That is what happens when the man running the machinery has spent decades learning exactly which levers to pull, for whom, and when.</p><p>For migrant communities, this appointment is not a bureaucratic abstraction. It is a message, delivered without ambiguity: the agency that can appear at a home before dawn, that can intercept someone at a courthouse, that can separate a parent from a child, is now run by a man whose career has been defined by expanding detention, by moving between government and the private industry that profits from it, and by doing favors, quietly, for the right people.</p><p>Venturella&#8217;s supporters will call him an experienced professional. They will cite his Harvard-MIT executive program. They will mention his bilateral repatriation negotiations, his diplomatic portfolio, his decades of institutional knowledge.</p><p>They are not wrong that he knows the system.</p><p>That is precisely the problem.</p><p>A man who has spent his career building a system does not dismantle it. He perfects it. He makes it run smoother, quieter, more efficiently &#8212; which, in this context, means more people detained, more contracts signed, more families torn apart with less friction and fewer headlines.</p><p>Jimmy Breslin used to say that you find the truth in the man with the broom, not the man giving the speech.</p><p>Here is the man with the broom: he came up through INS in Chicago sweeping people into removal proceedings. He swept for GEO Group for a decade, building the rooms that hold the people. He came back to sweep the contracts that paid for the rooms. And now he runs the whole building.</p><p>The door is still spinning.</p><div><hr></div><p><em>This is why Migrant Insider exists &#8212; and why it can&#8217;t be a one-man shop forever. Paid subscribers are how we stay ahead of the outlets just now discovering this beat. Join the community that keeps this reporting alive, and tell one person who needs to read this.</em></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://migrantinsider.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://migrantinsider.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Stephen Miller Lied About Migrant Jobs Going to American Workers]]></title><description><![CDATA[Stephen Miller's broken promise that mass deportations would equal jobs for gringo workers is now peer-reviewed. Removing migrants actually lost jobs for the native born workforce.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/stephen-miller-lied-about-migrant</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/stephen-miller-lied-about-migrant</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 08 May 2026 16:11:24 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/aa853a9a-3ee8-4ed0-af47-e32110055081_2048x1295.jpeg" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>WASHINGTON</strong> &#8212;&nbsp;The promise was simple, and Stephen Miller has been making it for years: clear out the undocumented workers, and American workers get their jobs back. The data is now in. The promise was a lie.</p><p>A new working paper published this month by the <strong>National Bureau of Economic Research</strong> &#8212; the first comprehensive, causal national study of the labor market effects of Trump&#8217;s immigration enforcement surge &#8212; finds no evidence that heightened ICE activity has produced job gains for U.S.-born workers. None. Not in agriculture. Not in construction. Not in manufacturing. Not anywhere.</p><p>What it did find is a chilling effect so severe it is contracting entire industries.</p><div class="file-embed-wrapper" data-component-name="FileToDOM"><div class="file-embed-container-reader"><div class="file-embed-container-top"><image class="file-embed-thumbnail-default" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!0Cy0!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack.com%2Fimg%2Fattachment_icon.svg"></image><div class="file-embed-details"><div class="file-embed-details-h1">New Study: Mass Deportations Are Job Killers For Native-Born</div><div class="file-embed-details-h2">3.6MB &#8729; PDF file</div></div><a class="file-embed-button wide" href="https://migrantinsider.com/api/v1/file/40ee865c-e2a1-4abf-84e1-8d4cc8e73c50.pdf"><span class="file-embed-button-text">Download</span></a></div><a class="file-embed-button narrow" href="https://migrantinsider.com/api/v1/file/40ee865c-e2a1-4abf-84e1-8d4cc8e73c50.pdf"><span class="file-embed-button-text">Download</span></a></div></div><p><strong>Elizabeth Cox</strong> and <strong>Chloe N. East</strong>, economists at the <strong>University of Colorado Boulder</strong>, analyzed ICE arrest data from October 2023 through October 2025 alongside Current Population Survey labor data. They divided the country into &#8220;treated&#8221; areas &#8212; those that experienced sudden, large spikes in ICE arrests &#8212; and control areas that did not. The methodology is rigorous enough to isolate enforcement shocks from the noise of tariffs, seasonal shifts, and broader macroeconomic changes happening simultaneously in 2025.</p><p>Their core finding: in high-enforcement areas, likely undocumented workers still present in the United States &#8212; people who were not arrested, not deported, simply frightened &#8212; reduced their employment by 4 percent. Among men, who make up more than 90 percent of ICE&#8217;s arrest targets, the drop was 5 percent, with two fewer hours worked per week.</p>
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[The ICE Alert System No App Store Can Kill]]></title><description><![CDATA[Sherman Austin built STOPICE.net to put real-time ICE alerts in half a million phones &#8212; no download required, no data collected, no off switch for the feds.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/the-ice-alert-system-no-app-store</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/the-ice-alert-system-no-app-store</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Logan Johnson]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Thu, 07 May 2026 19:20:25 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ggHe!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F1a6e7458-822a-4ae0-8fc1-10d8c1b7fdb9_1006x720.jpeg" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>JACKSONVILLE, FLA.</strong>&#8212;&nbsp;For some people, resistance looks like working a food pantry in the community, distributing know your rights information, attending a protest or even singing the woes of the nation. To 43-year-old programmer, web developer and activist Sherman Austin, however, fighting back looks a bit different.</p><p>Since early 2025, Austin has been full-steam ahead developing and managing <a href="https://www.stopice.net/">STOPICE.net</a> &#8211; a mobile alert system tracking ICE activity across the nation. The service works via crowd sourced reporting. Essentially, users submit their own ICE sightings, reports are vetted for legitimacy, and STOPICE.net sends an alert out to those nearby.</p><p>&#8220;I want it to be something that can get the time sensitive information out to people right away,&#8221; Austin told Migrant Insider.</p><div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ggHe!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F1a6e7458-822a-4ae0-8fc1-10d8c1b7fdb9_1006x720.jpeg" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ggHe!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F1a6e7458-822a-4ae0-8fc1-10d8c1b7fdb9_1006x720.jpeg 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ggHe!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F1a6e7458-822a-4ae0-8fc1-10d8c1b7fdb9_1006x720.jpeg 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ggHe!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F1a6e7458-822a-4ae0-8fc1-10d8c1b7fdb9_1006x720.jpeg 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ggHe!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F1a6e7458-822a-4ae0-8fc1-10d8c1b7fdb9_1006x720.jpeg 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ggHe!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F1a6e7458-822a-4ae0-8fc1-10d8c1b7fdb9_1006x720.jpeg" width="1006" height="720" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/1a6e7458-822a-4ae0-8fc1-10d8c1b7fdb9_1006x720.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:720,&quot;width&quot;:1006,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ggHe!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F1a6e7458-822a-4ae0-8fc1-10d8c1b7fdb9_1006x720.jpeg 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ggHe!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F1a6e7458-822a-4ae0-8fc1-10d8c1b7fdb9_1006x720.jpeg 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ggHe!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F1a6e7458-822a-4ae0-8fc1-10d8c1b7fdb9_1006x720.jpeg 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ggHe!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F1a6e7458-822a-4ae0-8fc1-10d8c1b7fdb9_1006x720.jpeg 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><h1><strong>Design Philosophy</strong></h1><p>STOPICE.net is deliberately low-tech for the dual purpose of accessibility and user privacy. Any device that has cell service &#8211; whether it be the newest Apple contraption or the sketchiest flip phone &#8211; c&#8230;</p>
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[ICE Is Coming to the World Cup.]]></title><description><![CDATA[What happens when the world's biggest sporting event lands in America's most aggressive immigration enforcement era?]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/ice-is-coming-to-the-world-cup</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/ice-is-coming-to-the-world-cup</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Wed, 06 May 2026 11:30:57 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/05e99534-c7cf-4aa1-becf-d40b73ec7b63_1126x1702.png" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>WASHINGTON</strong> &#8212; The 2026 FIFA World Cup was supposed to be a gift &#8212; a 78-match, $10 billion showcase of American hospitality, with MetLife Stadium hosting the final in front of a global audience. What nobody put in the brochure was Immigration and Customs Enforcement.</p><p>Acting ICE Director Todd Lyons told Congress the agency will be a &#8220;crucial&#8221; part of the tournament&#8217;s security framework. He has declined to suspend operations. He has declined to create any formal buffer zones. What he has not declined to do, at least not yet, is allow Enforcement and Removal Operations &#8212; ICE&#8217;s deportation machinery &#8212; to keep running in the same cities where the games will be played.</p><p>The numbers are not abstract. ICE arrested at least 92,392 people in and around U.S. World Cup host cities between January 20 and mid-October of the last reporting period, according <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2026/04/10/world-cup-2-months-out-fifa-and-host-cities-sideline-rights">a report</a> last month by Human Rights Watch. Roughly two-thirds had no U.S. criminal convictions.</p><p>The World Cup kicks off in 36 days.</p><div><hr></div><h2><strong>THE DRESS REHEARSAL</strong></h2><p>Before the 2026 tournament, there was the 2025 FIFA Club World Cup &#8212; 32 clubs, U.S. venues only, and a front-row seat to what a World Cup with ICE looks like in practice.</p><p>In January, CBP posted a &#8220;suited and booted&#8221; message to social media touting its security role at opening games, then deleted it after backlash and reported pressure from FIFA. CBP officers showed up at stadiums. CBP officers showed up at a Miami kick-off boat party with FIFA officials, where crew members were questioned about immigration status during what the agency called a routine inspection.</p><p>Then, last July 13, ICE arrested an asylum seeker who had attended the Club World Cup final with his children. He had lived in the United States for years. He was removed from the country.</p><p>Human Rights Watch called it a signal. Officials called it business as usual. The difference in interpretation is exactly what&#8217;s driving the current fight.</p>
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Ex-ICE Deputy Loses House GOP Primary in Ohio]]></title><description><![CDATA[Madison Sheahan failed to impress GOP voters with her banter about mass deportations and working for Kristi Noem.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/madison-sheahan-loses</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/madison-sheahan-loses</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Wed, 06 May 2026 10:15:21 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!EiB9!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc6de4f11-af56-4659-98d4-498bb5a879b2_1500x1001.webp" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>WASHINGTON</strong> &#8212; The woman who ran the machinery of America&#8217;s mass deportation campaign couldn&#8217;t win a Republican primary in Northwest Ohio.</p><p>Madison Sheahan &#8212; who resigned as deputy director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in January to run for Congress &#8212; lost Tuesday&#8217;s GOP primary in Ohio&#8217;s 9th Congressional District to Derek Merrin, the former state legislator who will now face Rep. Marcy Kaptur, D-Ohio, in one of the most closely watched House races of the 2026 cycle.</p><p>The race was called quickly. There was no recount drama. Sheahan never broke out.</p><p>In a crowded field that also included state Rep. Josh Williams, Air Force veteran Alea Nadeem, and health-care executive Anthony Campbell, Merrin &#8212; who lost to Kaptur by fewer than 2,400 votes in 2024 &#8212; won on the strength of name recognition, existing campaign infrastructure, and something Sheahan couldn&#8217;t manufacture: a record that Ohio Republicans didn&#8217;t have to defend.</p><div><hr></div><h4><strong>NO PRIOR LAW ENFORCEMENT EXPERIENCE</strong></h4><p>Sheahan&#8217;s record, by contrast, was the whole story. </p>
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Grassley Just Handed ICE $38 Billion. Here's the Fine Print.]]></title><description><![CDATA[Senate Judiciary Committee language would fund migrant mass removal machine through 2029.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/grassley-just-handed-ice-38-billion</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/grassley-just-handed-ice-38-billion</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Tue, 05 May 2026 13:17:10 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/b48796e0-ff77-4266-8d4f-3bdb49ffb241_1160x773.jpeg" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>WASHINGTON</strong> &#8212; The paper is out. Now comes the reckoning.</p><p>Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, released the legislative text of his committee&#8217;s title of the Republican reconciliation bill Monday night &#8212; a document that would funnel nearly $39.2 billion toward immigration enforcement, lock in ICE and CBP funding through the end of the Trump presidency, and erect a new wall of fees designed to price migrants out of every legal pathway available to them.</p><div class="file-embed-wrapper" data-component-name="FileToDOM"><div class="file-embed-container-reader"><div class="file-embed-container-top"><image class="file-embed-thumbnail-default" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!0Cy0!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack.com%2Fimg%2Fattachment_icon.svg"></image><div class="file-embed-details"><div class="file-embed-details-h1">Reconciliation Senate Judiciary Committee Title</div><div class="file-embed-details-h2">30.7KB &#8729; PDF file</div></div><a class="file-embed-button wide" href="https://migrantinsider.com/api/v1/file/1ce76fd9-8149-467b-bb4a-6dd4a5358508.pdf"><span class="file-embed-button-text">Download</span></a></div><a class="file-embed-button narrow" href="https://migrantinsider.com/api/v1/file/1ce76fd9-8149-467b-bb4a-6dd4a5358508.pdf"><span class="file-embed-button-text">Download</span></a></div></div><p>Combined with a separate $32.5 billion from the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, the total package comes to roughly $69.2 billion &#8212; with ICE alone set to receive approximately $38.2 billion. </p><p>The Judiciary title would cover ICE hiring and training, transportation, information technology, and funding for so-called 287(g) agreements &#8212; the program that deputizes local police departments to carry out federal immigration enforcement.</p><p>An additional $750 million would go to the Federal Law Enforcement Train&#8230;</p>
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[State Dept. Quietly Rewrites the Visa Interview]]></title><description><![CDATA[A worldwide cable mandates two new questions that could bar persecution survivors from ever boarding a plane to the U.S. &#8212; before they set foot on American soil.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/state-dept-quietly-rewrites-the-visa</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/state-dept-quietly-rewrites-the-visa</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Mon, 04 May 2026 19:20:17 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/4b27bf3d-e0a7-49ed-b0d5-b6d1a9c60a0c_275x183.jpeg" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>WASHINGTON</strong> &#8212;&nbsp;Every person on earth applying for a U.S. tourist visa, student visa, or work visa now faces two new questions before their consular interview can proceed: Have you been harmed in your home country? Do you fear going back?</p><p>Answer yes &#8212; or stay silent &#8212; and the denial follows automatically.</p><p>The State Department issued the directive in a worldwide cable dated April 28, publicly confirmed two days later. The Guardian obtained the cable. The Washington Post first reported it.</p><p>The questions target what the administration calls &#8220;asylum shopping&#8221; &#8212; the department&#8217;s term for applicants it believes are concealing protection claims to gain entry on temporary visas. &#8220;The high number of aliens claiming asylum in the United States indicates that many aliens misrepresent this intention to consular officers,&#8221; the cable reads.</p><p>The directive cites Executive Order 14161, which President Trump signed on his first day back in office, ordering federal agencies to tighten immigration screening.</p><h2><strong>The&#8230;</strong></h2>
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[House Republicans Advance Two-Track Plan to Supercharge ICE Funding (Again)]]></title><description><![CDATA[Budget framework unlocks $70 billion for enforcement; plus separate funding vote to re-open DHS.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/house-republicans-advance-two-track</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/house-republicans-advance-two-track</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Thu, 30 Apr 2026 16:40:22 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/4d0bc3cc-09c0-4a30-b06b-95c6cf6c1959_1920x1080.webp" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>WASHINGTON (AP) &#8212; House Republicans on Wednesday advanced a two-track strategy to pour billions more into Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol while postponing a full funding deal for the Department of Homeland Security, sharpening a partisan fight over immigration enforcement and the ongoing DHS shutdown.</p><p>The plan, backed by President Donald Trump and driven by hard-line immigration allies in Congress, would first use the budget reconciliation process to send tens of billions of dollars to ICE and U.S. Customs and Border Protection outside the normal Senate filibuster process. GOP leaders then plan to move a separate appropriations package later to reopen the rest of DHS.</p><p>The strategy effectively gives ICE a second major funding boost after Republicans already approved a massive enforcement increase in last year&#8217;s One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Critics say the approach underscores how deeply GOP lawmakers have aligned themselves with Trump&#8217;s deportation agenda and White H&#8230;</p>
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Supreme Court Signals It May Let Trump Kill TPS for Haitians and Syrians — With Barely a Look at the Evidence]]></title><description><![CDATA[Watch now | Conservative justices lean toward giving DHS unchecked power to terminate humanitarian protections.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/supreme-court-signals-it-may-let</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/supreme-court-signals-it-may-let</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Wed, 29 Apr 2026 20:04:53 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/3dd44a56-65d0-4c2f-b684-8cd43e6e0d61_2560x1707.webp" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>WASHINGTON</strong> &#8212; The nine justices of the Supreme Court heard arguments Tuesday in a case that will decide whether the Trump administration can end Temporary Protected Status for more than 300,000 Haitians and 6,000 Syrians &#8212; and whether any federal court has the power to say no.</p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://migrantinsider.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://migrantinsider.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p>The cases, <em>Mullin v. Doe</em> and <em>Trump v. Miot</em>, were argued together in a packed courtroom while TPS holders and their advocates rallied outside with drums and chants and speeches from members of Congress. Inside, the justices heard nearly two hours of argument on questions that will shape the legal futures of roughly 1.3 million people from 17 countries who hold some form of TPS.</p><p>The headline question: Can courts review how the administration ended TPS? Or did Congress write a statute that puts that decision beyond judicial reach?</p><p>The government&#8217;s answer was emphatic. Solicitor General D. John Sauer argued that TPS is &#8212; by design &#8212; temporary, and that Congress handed the Homeland Security secretary sweeping authority to end it with virtually no judicial second-guessing. The no-review clause in the statute, he told the Court, covers not just the final termination decision but every step of the process leading to it.</p><p>&#8220;TPS designations have lasted years, sometimes decades,&#8221; Sauer argued. Congress, he said, never intended the program to become de facto permanent amnesty.</p><div><hr></div><div class="digest-post-embed" data-attrs="{&quot;nodeId&quot;:&quot;3e752217-669c-4cfb-9ae5-68bc49cca827&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;WASHINGTON &#8212; A discharge petition to force a House floor vote on restoring Temporary Protected Status for Haitian migrants crossed the threshold of 218 signatures Saturday, a milestone that strips Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., of his most powerful tool: the ability to simply let a bill die in committee and never speak of it again.&quot;,&quot;cta&quot;:&quot;Read full story&quot;,&quot;showBylines&quot;:true,&quot;size&quot;:&quot;sm&quot;,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;SCOOP: Ayanna Pressley Forces Floor Vote on Haitian TPS&quot;,&quot;publishedBylines&quot;:[{&quot;id&quot;:21387176,&quot;name&quot;:&quot;Pablo Manr&#237;quez&quot;,&quot;bio&quot;:&quot;News Editor, Migrant Insider &#127464;&#127473;&#127482;&#127480;&quot;,&quot;photo_url&quot;:&quot;https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!HhOY!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F23be1cfe-c14f-46fd-ad81-12aed96bb69b_400x400.jpeg&quot;,&quot;is_guest&quot;:false,&quot;bestseller_tier&quot;:100}],&quot;post_date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-28T15:01:07.860Z&quot;,&quot;cover_image&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/b446afeb-0de4-438b-9973-db6b33fc8660_578x485.png&quot;,&quot;cover_image_alt&quot;:null,&quot;canonical_url&quot;:&quot;https://migrantinsider.com/p/scoop-ayanna-pressley-forces-floor&quot;,&quot;section_name&quot;:null,&quot;video_upload_id&quot;:null,&quot;id&quot;:192418633,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;newsletter&quot;,&quot;reaction_count&quot;:101,&quot;comment_count&quot;:5,&quot;publication_id&quot;:2496898,&quot;publication_name&quot;:&quot;Migrant Insider&quot;,&quot;publication_logo_url&quot;:&quot;https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!b8c6!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F5e71d906-d759-4984-8665-f1385ff5739e_257x257.png&quot;,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;youtube_url&quot;:null,&quot;show_links&quot;:null,&quot;feed_url&quot;:null}"></div><div><hr></div><p>Attorneys for Haitian and Syrian TPS holders pushed back hard. Ahilan Arulanantham, arguing for the Syrians, told the Court the administration was asking for &#8220;a blank check&#8221; over the futures of more than a million people. The no-review clause, he argued, bars courts from questioning the ultimate discretionary call &#8212; not from checking whether DHS actually followed Congress&#8217;s mandatory procedures before making it. Those procedures include a genuine consultation with the State Department and a real assessment of current country conditions.</p><p>&#8220;The government reads this statute as a blank check,&#8221; Arulanantham said.</p><p>Geoffrey Pipoly, arguing for Haitian TPS holders, brought the argument down from the legal clouds and planted it in Port-au-Prince. More than 9,000 people were killed in Haiti last year. The homicide rate is approximately 76 per 100,000. Gangs control over 70 percent of the capital and key rural corridors. More than 5.8 million Haitians face acute food insecurity. Given all of that, Pipoly argued, the administration cannot credibly claim conditions have improved enough to justify terminating TPS.</p><p>The contradiction did not escape the liberal justices. Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson pressed Sauer on a tension that advocates outside had been hammering all morning: the State Department tells American citizens &#8220;do not travel&#8221; to Haiti and Syria. How, they asked, can the administration simultaneously argue those countries are safe enough to deport TPS holders back to?</p>
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Stephen Miller's Border Blueprint Gets Shredded in Federal Court]]></title><description><![CDATA[A D.C. Circuit panel rules Trump&#8217;s asylum ban is unlawful, dealing a major blow to the administration&#8217;s most aggressive immigration gambit.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/stephen-millers-border-blueprint</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/stephen-millers-border-blueprint</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Mon, 27 Apr 2026 20:11:52 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/a9a9f3df-4ec4-468a-ba96-1c821cb3f737_1200x800.webp" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>WASHINGTON &#8212; The legal scaffolding Stephen Miller spent years engineering around the southern border took a significant hit Thursday when a federal appeals court ruled that President Trump&#8217;s Inauguration Day proclamation effectively shutting down asylum was unlawful &#8212; and ordered the government to stop using it.</p><p>The ruling from a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit is one of the most consequential rebukes to Miller&#8217;s immigration strategy since Trump returned to power, striking at the heart of a legal theory the administration has used to justify some of its most aggressive border enforcement moves.</p><p>&#8220;The president cannot unilaterally eliminate the right to seek asylum by executive order,&#8221; ACLU attorney Lee Gelernt, who argued the appeal, said after the ruling. He added the decision could &#8220;potentially save the lives of thousands of people fleeing grave danger.&#8221;</p><h3>What Miller Built &#8212; and What the Court Just Dismantled</h3><p>On Inauguration Day 2025, Trump signed a pre&#8230;</p>
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Congress Is About to Vote on $140 Billion for ICE. Nobody Knows Where the Last $100 Billion Went.]]></title><description><![CDATA[DHS stopped reporting spending data when the shutdown began. Now Republicans are moving to appropriate more &#8212; without a public accounting of what's already been spent.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/congress-is-about-to-vote-on-140</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/congress-is-about-to-vote-on-140</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 24 Apr 2026 15:21:29 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/da258ced-0fed-4a69-9ec5-25faeb5f0c73_1024x683.jpeg" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>WASHINGTON</strong> &#8212; Senate Republicans are preparing to vote on a budget resolution that would hand ICE and Border Patrol up to $140 billion in new funding. There&#8217;s one problem with that plan: the two agencies are still sitting on more than $100 billion Congress gave them less than a year ago, and the Trump administration has gone dark on how it&#8217;s being spent.</p><p>That&#8217;s the double-barreled finding contained in a new Senate Budget Committee analysis and an independent review of federal spending data <a href="https://www.kevinmcnellis.com/posts/ice-cbp-obba-obligation/">published</a> by budget analyst <strong>Kevin McNellis</strong> &#8212; a combination that raises urgent questions about fiscal oversight at the very moment Republicans are moving to dramatically expand the enforcement apparatus.</p><p>According to the <strong>Senate Budget Committee</strong>, <strong>Office of Management and Budget</strong> data shows that as of the end of March, ICE had not obligated $63.2 billion of the $74.9 billion it received under last year&#8217;s One Big Beautiful Bill Act. CBP had not obligated $40 billion of its $64.7 billion allocation. Combined: $103 billion in unobligated funds &#8212; and counting.</p>
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA["ICE Works For me" — Now She's On Leave]]></title><description><![CDATA[Watch now | A government contractor filed an OIG complaint against a 29-year-old deputy assistant secretary for counterterrorism at DHS. Congress has questions.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/ice-works-for-me-now-shes-on-leave</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/ice-works-for-me-now-shes-on-leave</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 24 Apr 2026 10:42:32 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/195332846/b8c003e8e8ebbecb4c993b79d944f0e7.mp3" length="0" type="audio/mpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>WASHINGTON</strong> &#8212;Julia Varvaro, the 29-year-old deputy assistant secretary for counterterrorism at DHS &#8212; the official who reportedly bragged that &#8220;ICE works for me&#8221; &#8212; is now on administrative leave. </p><p><strong>The allegations:</strong> $40,000 in gifts, luxury trips to Italy and Aruba, and a Bottega handbag, all allegedly funded by a man she met on a site dedicated to &#8220;mutually beneficial&#8221; arrangements. That man has since been identified as a government contractor named Robert Bianchi, who filed a formal complaint with the DHS Office of the Inspector General.</p><p>Varvaro says this is an angry ex trying to destroy a career she built on a master&#8217;s degree and Ph.D. in homeland security. That may be. Breakups get ugly. Boyfriends buy gifts. But the OIG doesn&#8217;t typically put people on administrative leave over a bad breakup.</p><p>Overnight, reporter Jacqueline Sweet <a href="https://nypost.com/2026/04/23/us-news/sugar-daddy-ex-of-glam-dhs-official-ided-as-government-contractor-robert-bianchi/">broke</a> the identity of the alleged sugar daddy: Robert Bianchi. </p><div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!tW_y!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb16de248-405f-4055-9dcf-0125ab020f04_1200x799.jpeg" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!tW_y!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb16de248-405f-4055-9dcf-0125ab020f04_1200x799.jpeg 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!tW_y!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb16de248-405f-4055-9dcf-0125ab020f04_1200x799.jpeg 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!tW_y!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb16de248-405f-4055-9dcf-0125ab020f04_1200x799.jpeg 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!tW_y!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb16de248-405f-4055-9dcf-0125ab020f04_1200x799.jpeg 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!tW_y!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb16de248-405f-4055-9dcf-0125ab020f04_1200x799.jpeg" width="1200" height="799" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/b16de248-405f-4055-9dcf-0125ab020f04_1200x799.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:799,&quot;width&quot;:1200,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:135169,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/jpeg&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://migrantinsider.com/i/195332846?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb16de248-405f-4055-9dcf-0125ab020f04_1200x799.jpeg&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!tW_y!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb16de248-405f-4055-9dcf-0125ab020f04_1200x799.jpeg 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!tW_y!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb16de248-405f-4055-9dcf-0125ab020f04_1200x799.jpeg 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!tW_y!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb16de248-405f-4055-9dcf-0125ab020f04_1200x799.jpeg 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!tW_y!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb16de248-405f-4055-9dcf-0125ab020f04_1200x799.jpeg 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a><figcaption class="image-caption">Photo Cred: <a href="https://nypost.com/2026/04/23/us-news/sugar-daddy-ex-of-glam-dhs-official-ided-as-government-contractor-robert-bianchi/">NYPost</a></figcaption></figure></div><p>The relationship has drawn intense scrutiny due to potential conflicts of interest and the official&#8217;s glamorous lifestyle, which was reportedly funded by Bianchi. Investigations into the matter highlight concerns over how their personal ties may have influenced government contracts or security clearances. This exposure is the latest development in a broader scandal involving the intersection of private wealth and public office at the DHS.</p><h3><strong>The Security Problem</strong></h3><p>The counterintelligence concern writes itself. When someone with access to the nation&#8217;s most sensitive counterterrorism data is under financial stress &#8212; or being bankrolled by an outside party &#8212; they become a recruitment target. It doesn&#8217;t matter whether the leverage comes from a disgruntled ex or a foreign intelligence service. The vulnerability is the same.</p><div class="image-gallery-embed" data-attrs="{&quot;gallery&quot;:{&quot;images&quot;:[{&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/png&quot;,&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/75ce61ed-5fa7-4d9b-b6f5-26cb9768bc5c_926x998.png&quot;},{&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/png&quot;,&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/663a25a7-c4f7-4b4c-9476-5a9f12fa6790_988x984.png&quot;}],&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;Source: Daily Mail&quot;,&quot;alt&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;staticGalleryImage&quot;:{&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/png&quot;,&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/0e9e45a6-ee90-4053-a5a5-564d30404900_1456x720.png&quot;}},&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p>Going into White House Correspondents&#8217; weekend, this is the story that won&#8217;t leave the conversation. I caught up with several members of Congress on the House steps Thursday to get their read on it.</p><p><strong>Rep. Ted Lieu, D-Calif</strong>., is calling for a full investigation into a DHS counter-terrorism official, arguing that the sensitivity of the role leaves no room for personal compromises. He warns that such vulnerabilities could create conflicts of interest or be exploited by foreign adversaries, potentially undermining national security.</p><p><strong>Rep. Alexander Vindman, D-Va.,</strong> didn&#8217;t mince words. He called the situation &#8220;obviously outrageous&#8221; and questioned how someone with these vulnerabilities ends up in a critically important counterterrorism role while the U.S. is, in his words, effectively at war with Iran. Whether the influence comes from an angry ex or a foreign power, he said, it demands a full investigation.</p><p><strong>Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md.,</strong> zeroed in on the &#8220;how&#8221; &#8212; how does a low-level FEMA staffer get fast-tracked into a top counterterrorism post? He characterized the broader administration as a &#8220;cesspool of political and financial corruption&#8221; where public policy is seemingly available to the highest bidder.</p><p><strong>Rep. Delia Ramirez, D-Ill.,</strong> a member of the Homeland Security Committee, was the most direct. She called for Varvaro&#8217;s immediate termination, framing this not as a personal relationship gone sideways but as a potential pay-to-play arrangement &#8212; government access and contracts traded for rent and luxury goods.</p><p>This story is still unfolding. The OIG complaint is in. Varvaro is on leave. Sweet had the latest scoop. And I made a YouTube video: </p><div id="youtube2-9_0FEhZYVUc" class="youtube-wrap" data-attrs="{&quot;videoId&quot;:&quot;9_0FEhZYVUc&quot;,&quot;startTime&quot;:null,&quot;endTime&quot;:null}" data-component-name="Youtube2ToDOM"><div class="youtube-inner"><iframe src="https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/9_0FEhZYVUc?rel=0&amp;autoplay=0&amp;showinfo=0&amp;enablejsapi=0" frameborder="0" loading="lazy" gesture="media" allow="autoplay; fullscreen" allowautoplay="true" allowfullscreen="true" width="728" height="409"></iframe></div></div><p>Give it a watch and be sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel if you haven&#8217;t already! </p><div><hr></div><div class="subscription-widget-wrap-editor" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://migrantinsider.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe&quot;,&quot;language&quot;:&quot;en&quot;}" data-component-name="SubscribeWidgetToDOM"><div class="subscription-widget show-subscribe"><div class="preamble"><p class="cta-caption">Migrant Insider subscribers support the most-independent newsletter in the Washington press corps. Consider signing up today:</p></div><form class="subscription-widget-subscribe"><input type="email" class="email-input" name="email" placeholder="Type your email&#8230;" tabindex="-1"><input type="submit" class="button primary" value="Subscribe"><div class="fake-input-wrapper"><div class="fake-input"></div><div class="fake-button"></div></div></form></div></div><p></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[SCOOP: Republicans Want to Add ICE Money Into the Farm Bill]]></title><description><![CDATA[As GOP Senators lock-in $70B more for immigration enforcement, House Rs are in talks to use the Farm Bill as yet another vehicle to fund ICE &#8212; a gambit designed to box Dems into a difficult vote.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/scoop-republicans-want-to-add-ice</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/scoop-republicans-want-to-add-ice</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Thu, 23 Apr 2026 23:16:13 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/6a3b0c1a-e7c7-4f81-a7ce-17b20b80f466_1067x600.jpeg" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>WASHINGTON</strong> &#8212; Republicans are exploring whether to use the 2026 farm bill as yet another vehicle to funnel money to ICE, according to two Democratic House aides working on the legislation and a House Republican lawmaker familiar with the discussions.</p><p>The conversations are happening as the Senate kicked off a late-night &#8220;vote-a-rama&#8221; Wednesday, pushing through a budget resolution that would pre-fund ICE and Customs and Border Protection for three and a half years &#8212; at a price tag of roughly $70 billion &#8212; using the budget reconciliation process to bypass the 60-vote filibuster threshold that would otherwise require Democratic support.</p><p>The House Republican, who was granted anonymity to discuss the ongoing negotiations, did not dispute the characterization of the farm bill discussions.</p><p>&#8220;Absolutely,&#8221; the lawmaker said, noting they didn&#8217;t want to get out in front of Agriculture Committee Chairman Glenn Thompson (R-PA). &#8220;We&#8217;re leaving no stone unturned when it comes to getting the brave men and &#8230;</p>
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[The Dignity Racket]]></title><description><![CDATA[Fourteen years. Ten thousand dollars. No citizenship. Meet the Dignity Act &#8212; Maria Elvira Salazar's signature legislation and Washington's longest-running magic trick.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/the-dignity-racket</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/the-dignity-racket</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Thu, 23 Apr 2026 17:25:00 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-video.s3.amazonaws.com/video_upload/post/195262521/a3f28db5-b2b0-4091-8a35-317eaeb12184/transcoded-00001.png" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>WASHINGTON</strong> &#8212; There is a word for what Maria Elvira Salazar is doing on Capitol Hill, and it isn&#8217;t leadership. It isn&#8217;t reform. The word, as Mike Fernandez &#8212; a Cuban-American billionaire who knows something about exile and something about cowardice &#8212; put it plainly in the Miami Herald, is this: <em>&#8220;They may talk tough, but that is really to cover their cowardice.&#8221;</em></p><div id="youtube2-KLlnYH_TfKI" class="youtube-wrap" data-attrs="{&quot;videoId&quot;:&quot;KLlnYH_TfKI&quot;,&quot;startTime&quot;:null,&quot;endTime&quot;:null}" data-component-name="Youtube2ToDOM"><div class="youtube-inner"><iframe src="https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/KLlnYH_TfKI?rel=0&amp;autoplay=0&amp;showinfo=0&amp;enablejsapi=0" frameborder="0" loading="lazy" gesture="media" allow="autoplay; fullscreen" allowautoplay="true" allowfullscreen="true" width="728" height="409"></iframe></div></div><p>Salazar, the Miami Republican who represents one of the most immigrant-dense congressional districts in the country, has spent years marketing herself as the reasonable face of immigration reform &#8212; a daughter of Cuban exiles who understands the stakes. Her vehicle is the Dignity Act, a bill she has promoted with the fervor of a televangelist and the conviction of someone who voted, in the same breath, to make its core promise illegal.</p><div class="file-embed-wrapper" data-component-name="FileToDOM"><div class="file-embed-container-reader"><div class="file-embed-container-top"><image class="file-embed-thumbnail-default" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!0Cy0!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack.com%2Fimg%2Fattachment_icon.svg"></image><div class="file-embed-details"><div class="file-embed-details-h1">The Dignity Act Of 2025</div><div class="file-embed-details-h2">643KB &#8729; PDF file</div></div><a class="file-embed-button wide" href="https://migrantinsider.com/api/v1/file/c3b038b3-562a-4284-889f-722eabab9205.pdf"><span class="file-embed-button-text">Download</span></a></div><a class="file-embed-button narrow" href="https://migrantinsider.com/api/v1/file/c3b038b3-562a-4284-889f-722eabab9205.pdf"><span class="file-embed-button-text">Download</span></a></div></div><p>That&#8217;s not a typo.</p><p>In May 2023, Salazar voted for the Secure the Border Act, a piece of legislation that would have gutted the very parole authority that kept hundreds of thousands of Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans &#8212; her constituents &#8212; lawfully in the United States. The bill passed 219-213. </p>
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Six Immigration Stories Hiding in Plain Sight]]></title><description><![CDATA[The enforcement machine never sleeps. Neither should the press.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/six-immigration-stories-hiding-in</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/six-immigration-stories-hiding-in</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Mon, 20 Apr 2026 15:00:21 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/51a6ac98-8f8d-467a-915c-166e36ff46c0_1024x576.jpeg" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>WASHINGTON &#8212;&nbsp;</strong>Six immigration policy shifts are reshaping millions of lives right now &#8212; buried in Federal Register notices, USCIS memos, and trade-press alerts. Here&#8217;s what the front page missed.</p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://migrantinsider.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://migrantinsider.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p>
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[The Man ICE Took Was Already in a Museum]]></title><description><![CDATA[Criselda Vasquez's father posed for one of the most celebrated immigrant portraits in American art. Federal agents detained him on a California street.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/the-man-ice-took-was-already-in-a</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/the-man-ice-took-was-already-in-a</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Sun, 19 Apr 2026 22:02:08 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!49Av!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c52344c-cd0a-4af3-9b84-2109e28f1a53_1080x1628.jpeg" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>WASHINGTON</strong> &#8212;&nbsp;He is a man who went to work every day, raised four American children, and grew old in a country that never officially said he could stay. His daughter painted him into history anyway.</p><p>In 2017, Criselda Vasquez, a Chicana painter working out of California, reimagined Grant Wood&#8217;s <em>American Gothic</em> &#8212; the one on the refrigerator magnets, the one every American schoolchild knows &#8212; and put her parents in it. Her mother and father, both immigrants from Mexico, standing together, holding cleaning supplies and a hoe, a red truck behind them. Not in front of a Midwestern farmhouse. In front of their life.</p><p>She called it <em>The New American Gothic.</em></p><div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!49Av!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c52344c-cd0a-4af3-9b84-2109e28f1a53_1080x1628.jpeg" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!49Av!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c52344c-cd0a-4af3-9b84-2109e28f1a53_1080x1628.jpeg 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!49Av!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c52344c-cd0a-4af3-9b84-2109e28f1a53_1080x1628.jpeg 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!49Av!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c52344c-cd0a-4af3-9b84-2109e28f1a53_1080x1628.jpeg 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!49Av!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c52344c-cd0a-4af3-9b84-2109e28f1a53_1080x1628.jpeg 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!49Av!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c52344c-cd0a-4af3-9b84-2109e28f1a53_1080x1628.jpeg" width="1080" height="1628" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/7c52344c-cd0a-4af3-9b84-2109e28f1a53_1080x1628.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:1628,&quot;width&quot;:1080,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:210269,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/jpeg&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://migrantinsider.com/i/194735671?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c52344c-cd0a-4af3-9b84-2109e28f1a53_1080x1628.jpeg&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!49Av!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c52344c-cd0a-4af3-9b84-2109e28f1a53_1080x1628.jpeg 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!49Av!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c52344c-cd0a-4af3-9b84-2109e28f1a53_1080x1628.jpeg 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!49Av!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c52344c-cd0a-4af3-9b84-2109e28f1a53_1080x1628.jpeg 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!49Av!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c52344c-cd0a-4af3-9b84-2109e28f1a53_1080x1628.jpeg 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><p>The Lucas Museum for Narrative Art in Los Angeles <a href="https://lacmaonfire.blogspot.com/2026/04/ice-detains-man-in-new-american-gothic.html">bought</a> it in 2021. It hangs there now, or in storage, or somewhere in the permanent collection of American cultural memory. Her parents are in it. They are dignified. They are permanent.</p><p>Her father is not permanent. On the morning of Tuesday, March 31, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents st&#8230;</p>
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Matsui Said ‘Hell No’ to ICE Funding. Her Voting Record Says Otherwise.]]></title><description><![CDATA[The California Democrat was born in an internment camp. She&#8217;s also voted to fund ICE five times. Now she wants credit for opposing it.]]></description><link>https://migrantinsider.com/p/matsui-said-hell-no-to-ice-funding</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://migrantinsider.com/p/matsui-said-hell-no-to-ice-funding</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Pablo Manríquez]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Sat, 18 Apr 2026 17:19:41 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/1642178b-3dcd-4d26-9698-68a6fd95f0f5_1200x799.avif" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>WASHINGTON</strong> &#8212; Before she was a congresswoman, before she was a Sacramento powerbroker, before she was anyone&#8217;s idea of an anti-ICE crusader, Doris Matsui was a baby in the Poston War Relocation Center.</p><p>It was 1944. The U.S. government had rounded up more than 110,000 Japanese Americans &#8212; citizens and noncitizens alike &#8212; and warehoused them in desert camps under the authority of an executive order signed by Franklin D. Roosevelt. Matsui was born into that detention. She did not choose it. No one did.</p><p>It is the kind of origin story that, in a district built on refugee families and immigrant communities, carries enormous moral weight. It is the kind of story a campaign puts front and center. It is also the kind of story that makes what follows very hard to explain.</p><div><hr></div><h2>&#8216;Hell No&#8217; &#8212; and the Record That Follows It</h2>
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