Politics

Trump’s immigration crackdown is expected to start on Day 1

Published

2 years ago

November 18, 2024

In his first 100 days, President-elect Donald Trump plans to begin the process of deporting hundreds of thousands of people. He is expected to end parole for people from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela. And he is likely to undo a policy that significantly constrained deportations for people who weren’t deemed threats to public safety or national security.

Trump’s team is already thinking about how to craft executive actions aimed to withstand the legal challenges from immigrants’ rights groups — all in hopes of avoiding an early defeat like the one his 2017 travel ban targeting majority-Muslim nations suffered. This time, Trump may have friendlier arbiters. These fights will be refereed by a federal judiciary that he transformed during his first term, including by appointing more than 200 federal judges himself. And at the very top — the ultimate decider of these questions — is the Supreme Court, to which he appointed three conservative justices.

But legal fights aren’t the only long-term challenge Trump’s ambitious immigration agenda will face. The logistical challenges of mass deportation are a little harder to predict. The speed at which Trump could remake deportation policy depends on surmounting tactical challenges like expanding detention capacity and cutting through a massive immigration court backlog.

Trump has already tapped South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, who has little experience with the Department of Homeland Security, to lead the sprawling agency. From inside the White House, Stephen Miller, widely seen as the architect of Trump’s first-term restrictionist agenda, has an expansive role over domestic policy. And Thomas Homan, a former acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement under Trump, is returning to be the administration’s border czar.

Through it all, Trump’s immigration team will face intense and sustained scrutiny from the president himself.

Here are some of the immigration initiatives Trump’s team is expected to roll out quickly, and the hurdles they could face:

Ramping up deportations

Trump campaigned on mass deportation — something that could affect large swaths of the 11 million people DHS estimates are in the U.S. without legal authorization.

But deporting millions of people could run into some logistical problems. According to DHS, the largest number of yearly removals came in FY 2013 during the Obama administration, when more than 430,000 people were removed from the U.S.

Trump’s advisers have indicated they would prioritize people with criminal convictions and final removal orders for deportation. In 2022, according to the pro-immigration American Immigration Council, about 1.19 million people had those orders — meaning their cases had worked their way through immigration court and judges decided they must leave. Just removing the people in that category could take years.

Finding, detaining and removing those people would be resource-intensive, said John Sandweg, acting director of ICE from 2013 to 2014. Detention capacity alone would be a costly and immediate challenge. Lawmakers need to appropriate the funding, and even if they do, the administration would need to hire, vet and train more officers — no easy feat.

ICE currently employs 7,000 officers who conduct 250,000 deportations a year, according to the agency. If Trump’s administration wanted to quadruple this number, as Trump has promised, training academies couldn’t handle a deluge of new hires.

“It is just a resource game, but it’s a hard game to play,” Sandweg said.

Regardless of the hurdles and impediments, Trump has been unequivocal.

“It’s not a question of a price tag. It’s not — really, we have no choice,” he told NBC News on Thursday. “When people have killed and murdered, when drug lords have destroyed countries, and now they’re going to go back to those countries because they’re not staying here. There is no price tag.”

Ending parole for people from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela

Another Biden administration program that’s likely to end fast: a special visa-free humanitarian parole process for some residents of Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela. The Biden administration, to discourage migrants from trying to cross the border illegally, offered a way for some people from these countries to enter the country legally if they were vetted and had an American-based sponsor. As of August, nearly 530,000 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans had traveled to the U.S. via the program and were granted permission to live and work in the U.S. for two years.

Trump, meanwhile, campaigned on expelling many of them. Over the summer, he spread baseless claims that Haitians in Springfield, Ohio, were eating people’s pets. And he promised to revoke Haitians’ eligibility for Temporary Protected Status — another program that shields some people from countries with unsafe conditions from deportation and grants them work permits. Many Haitians can work in the U.S. legally because of TPS, a tool secretaries of Homeland Security have used since 1990.

“All that stuff is going to end very fast, almost immediately,” said Dan Stein of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), a restrictionist group.

Stein’s group is closely allied with Trump’s team and became a feeder for personnel during the first Trump administration.

“They basically hired half our staff,” he said.

Mark Krikorian, of the restrictionist Center for Immigration Studies, agreed that the temporary provision of TPS work documents to people from certain countries deemed dangerous would likely be constricted dramatically.

Currently, DHS makes this program available to people from 16 countries, including El Salvador, Ukraine, Syria, Somalia and Haiti. During Trump’s first term, his administration tried to end TPS status for more than 300,000 people. But immigrants sued, arguing the move was made out of racial animus. They secured a nationwide injunction that lasted through the Trump administration.

Rolling back the Mayorkas memo

Early in the Biden administration, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas issued a memo laying out priorities for which immigrants to deport. It emphasized people who threaten national security and public safety, and it directed ICE officers to learn “the totality of the facts and circumstances” about criminal convictions before deciding whether to deport someone — rather than solely using a conviction as a basis for deportation.

Immigration restrictionists expect that guidance will be one of the first things to go.

“That stuff’s going to end obviously, right away,” said Krikorian, whose work was frequently cited by the first Trump administration.

Another person close to Trump’s transition, granted anonymity to discuss sensitive plans, said Mayorkas’ memo could be revoked as soon as Day One, possibly as part of a broader package of executive actions intended to reduce “bureaucratic” hurdles that impede deportations.

Deactivating the CBP One app

The Biden administration rolled out a mobile phone application called CBP One that migrants could use to set up appointments to seek asylum. While Democrats hoped it would create more order around the border, Republicans said the initiative was a way to rush in people who shouldn’t be allowed to enter the United States. Amnesty International, meanwhile, said it violates international law by restraining where and how people could seek asylum. Either way, under Trump, according to the person close to the transition, it’s likely toast.

In the first 100 days, Trump’s immigration team will likely assess which countries they deem most problematic and decide whether to threaten sanctions.

Ramping up immigration diplomacy

Another tool the Trump administration may use quickly is threats to countries that resist repatriating unwanted migrants.

One challenge for rapid deportations is that the home countries of many migrants — particularly those convicted of violent crimes — don’t always want to take them back. So those people sometimes stay in jails or immigration detention centers in the U.S. indefinitely. To pressure those countries, the U.S. government can threaten to restrict visas for certain categories of applicants.

The Trump and Obama administrations both deployed this option because of this recalcitrance. But the Biden administration has not. In the first 100 days, Trump’s immigration team will likely assess which countries they deem most problematic and decide whether to threaten sanctions.

“I think you’re going to see a significant increase and you’re going to see it early,” Krikorian said. “I’m pretty certain it would be in the first hundred days — there’s no reason you’d wait three months to do something.”

The moves would require cooperation from the State Department, which issues visas. So Trump’s immigration-focused advisers will likely ensure that candidates for top roles at State are simpatico with the administration’s immigration policy — and Sen. Marco Rubio is widely expected to be Trump’s pick for secretary of State.

“That’s going to be a condition for their appointment,” said Jessica Vaughan, also of the Center for Immigration Studies. “They’re not going to appoint someone and want to be surprised later on — ‘I don’t know, we’re not going to play our role.’ It’s in the job description.”

Trump has also said he would restore his Remain in Mexico policy — officially called Migrant Protection Protocols — that required some asylum-seekers to stay south of the U.S.-Mexican border while they await immigration court hearings. But this will require the Trump administration to reach a deal with Mexico to restart the program.

Politics

Gavin Newsom’s first 2028 test: This fall, in Nevada

Published

2 hours ago

September 7, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

LAS VEGAS — If California Gov. Gavin Newsom runs for president in 2028, next-door Nevada will be a crucial test. This fall’s governor’s race is offering a preview.

As GOP Gov. Joe Lombardo runs for reelection, he’s trying to pin high Nevada fuel prices — a majority of which is imported from California — on “Gavin Newsom’s energy policies.” He lambasts California as too expensive and too regulated. And he’s hammering his Democratic opponent, Attorney General Aaron Ford, for accepting Newsom’s endorsement, betting that it will turn off Nevada swing voters.

“The contrast is simple: I’m fighting Gavin Newsom’s agenda and Aaron Ford is trying to import it into Nevada,” Lombardo said in a statement to Blue Light News.

This could be a test run for 2028, when Newsom may call upon Nevadans — one-fifth of whom were born in California — to deliver him a primary victory in the early-voting state, and possibly a presidential victory.

“They understand California costs more,” Donna West, chair of the Nevada Democratic Party’s senior caucus, said of Nevada’s California expats. “They also understand that California is the fourth-largest economy in the entire world, and that Gavin Newsom ran that as effectively as he possibly can.”

Newsom’s office declined to comment. A person close to the governor, granted anonymity to discuss the sentiment in his orbit, said they are “thrilled” Republicans are spending money to “plaster Newsom’s name across a key early state.”

“Republicans seem awfully concerned about an endorsement from someone who leads the 2028 Democratic field in Nevada by nearly 2-to-1,” the person said, pointing to a November 2025 Emerson poll of a hypothetical 2028 Democratic primary field.

Ford, for his part, shrugs off the attacks.

“Lombardo tries to cast blame elsewhere, but everyone knows that when the war started in February, that we saw our gas prices increase almost immediately,” Ford told Blue Light News after a recent town hall in Las Vegas. “People believe their own eyes, and they remember their experiences.”

The demonization of California is nothing new in Nevada politics: For years, Republicans have blasted their western neighbor as too expensive and too woke.

But the stakes are higher, and the connection more palpable, this year, as Newsom explores a presidential bid. He would likely need to perform very well in Nevada, now second on the Democratic calendar, to build early momentum toward the party nomination. And come November 2028, he’d need to fare well in Nevada again, this time among the state’s general electorate, a plurality of which are independents.

Newsom has stumped for Democrats across the country this cycle, and he blitzed through the South this week, including a swing through South Carolina, whose Democrats will vote first, right before Nevada, in 2028.

But Republicans are looking to weaponize Newsom’s Silver State swing in July, where Ford introduced him at a new Las Vegas field office as “the governor of the great state of California.”

“Our next president!” an audience member shouted, eliciting cheers.

The Lombardo-aligned Better Nevada PAC shared polling with Blue Light News in July showing Newsom’s favorability 20 points underwater in Nevada and losing a hypothetical 2028 head-to-head with Vice President JD Vance. Shortly thereafter, the PAC began an ad blitz tying Ford to the California governor.

Billboards touting Newsom’s endorsement of Ford, paid for by the PAC, now line highways across Nevada, and digital and streaming ads have run consistently since the visit. “Newsom and Ford: Shared vision. Shared values,” one ad says.

A person familiar with the PAC’s internal polling, granted anonymity to discuss private data, said it shows Newsom’s endorsement is now the second-most-known datapoint about the attorney general.

“Gavin Newsom is the singular most unpopular elected official in Nevada,” said Jeremy Hughes, a longtime Nevada GOP strategist running the Lombardo-aligned PAC. “Aaron Ford brought him into the state. … There’s no better way to help him out than to put up these signs and run ads, letting people know that he’s excited about being endorsed by Gavin Newsom.”

Republicans in the state have long blamed Californian expats for housing shortages and rising prices and connect their opponents to California liberals. A surge of ex-Californians leaving the state during the Covid-19 pandemic, some fleeing high taxes and cost of living, accelerated the trend.

Sam Brown, the GOP nominee for U.S. Senate in 2022, blasted the “energy policies of Gavin Newsom”; in 2018, GOP governor nominee Adam Laxalt lamented the “Californization” of Nevada, even as Californians bankrolled his campaign. During Lombardo’s first run for governor in 2022, he slammed incumbent Democratic Gov. Steve Sisolak for taking his cues from Newsom: “Don’t let Steve Sisolak turn Nevada into California,” one post said. Republicans tied their opponents to Nancy Pelosi for decades.

Lombardo’s argument this time around is more focused. He notes that the vast majority of Nevada’s gasoline comes from California, and argues that California’s efforts to cut carbon emissions have caused fuel prices to soar. A gallon of gas in Nevada costs nearly $5, according to AAA, one of the highest prices in the nation.

“The policies coming from Gavin Newsom and California Democrats … don’t stop at their state line,” Lombardo said in a statement. “Nevada and other states import a significant portion of our fuel from California, so when Governor Newsom shuts down refineries and imposes regulations that reduce supply and increase costs, Nevada families feel the consequences at the pump.”

It’s a strategy that allows Lombardo — running in a difficult national environment for incumbent Republicans — to acknowledge voters’ economic pain without blaming President Donald Trump or his own party. Indeed, Lombardo shared an April column in the Nevada Independent that placed blame at the feet of both Newsom and Trump. (Lombardo, in his post, blamed only Newsom.)

Democrats don’t think voters will buy it. ‘“As far as gas prices, it’s so obviously increased since the war,” Rep. Dina Titus said. “People in Nevada aren’t stupid.”

Ford has his own millstone to saddle Lombardo with: the president. At a recent town hall in Las Vegas, he repeatedly blasted the “Lombardo-Trump economy” that is “making everything too expensive.”

“Voters absolutely tie the handling of the economy to Trump,” said Mike Noble, an independent Phoenix-based pollster who works in Nevada regularly. “Instead of blaming Trump, why not tie it to the boogeyman next door and blame California?”

Politics

‘We are winning elections’: Bernie Sanders on Democrats’ progressive wing

Published

1 day ago

September 6, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

‘We are winning elections’: Bernie Sanders on Democrats’ progressive wing

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Politics

Trump wants the Postal Service to radically overhaul mail voting. But ballots are already going out.

Published

3 days ago

September 4, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

President Donald Trump’s controversial demands for the Postal Service to overhaul and monitor millions of mail ballots hit another snag on Friday, when North Carolina became the first state in the nation to start sending out ballots for the November election.

In March, Trump signed the initial executive order, which aimed to crack down on mail-in voting — which he regularly alleges without evidence is a vector for widespread voter fraud — and assert an unprecedented amount of federal control over the upcoming elections.

Under this order and the subsequent rule drafted by the U.S. Postal Service, the USPS would refuse to deliver ballots to states that failed to provide lists of eligible mail voters or did not adhere to an approved envelope design style.

Since then, the order has faced legal challenges, and it remains paused by a federal judge’s orders. But the Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to allow the new rule to proceed — something current and former election officials from both parties say would be both a legal nightmare that oversteps the federal government’s traditional role in elections and a logistical one that is happening far too close to the November election to implement even if they agreed with it.

“Why the hell are you rocking the boat this late in the game?” said Stephen Richer, a former Republican recorder of Maricopa County, Arizona, who has clashed with Trump allies for defending the security of the 2020 election.

Still, election officials are trying to project a sense of normalcy for voters, particularly in North Carolina, which serves as a test of whether established local election systems can operate normally amid intensifying federal scrutiny.

“I want to emphasize this point because there has been a lot of outside noise: Our county workers are ready,” Sam Hayes, a longtime Republican lawyer in the state and now executive director of the North Carolina State Board of Elections, said in a Thursday afternoon press conference.

He added, “All we can do is what we’re doing. … It is business as usual as far as I’m concerned.”

Despite the legal challenges, the Trump administration has continued to press the courts to let it proceed. The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court on Thursday to lift an order from a Massachusetts judge which temporarily prevents the USPS from enforcing their rule. It is the second time the Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to step in, after winning an earlier victory in which the high court dismissed an earlier hold on the rule as premature.

“The uncertainty is coming from a single activist judge who continues to try and obstruct President Trump from implementing commonsense measures to protect the security of mail-in ballots and ensure only Americans vote in American elections,” White House spokesperson Lauren Bis said in a statement. “These safeguards for mail ballots were proposed months ago giving election officials ample time to prepare for the 2026 election.”

The USPS did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Election officials said that if the rule goes into effect this close to November, it would cause chaos and place added strain on the USPS and election officials. And an anonymous federal whistleblower said in a report circulated earlier this week by Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) that the USPS was moving forward in a “secretive, rushed, chaotic, and fundamentally flawed process” to try to implement the new system ahead of the midterms.

In the coming weeks, states across the country will follow North Carolina’s lead. Nine other states will begin mailing ballots in the next two weeks, according to a tracker from the National Conference of State Legislatures — with the biggest day for mailing coming 45 days before the election in mid-September.

“It would be so outrageous to try to let this go into effect. It’s hard to even imagine,” said Ben Hovland, a senior fellow for democracy at the progressive think tank Center for American Progress and former Democratic commissioner with the Election Assistance Commission who was fired by Trump in July.

He added, “It would be a break-glass moment for our democracy.”

The rule would require meticulous changes to ballot handling and tracking practices that Hovland said are impossible to implement before Election Day in about two months, effectively disenfranchising millions of voters.

“Ballots are printed. Envelopes are printed. You can go on and on with all the practical reasons that show that implementing something like this at this time is not feasible,” he said.

Richer said he doubted the new rules would bring about more security. Even if the USPS received lists from the states, according to the postal service’s final rule, it would not do any additional vetting of the list, Richer said.

“It’s just that the mail ballots have to be on that list, and I don’t see what added value for election integrity that does,” he said.

He added, “It creates a lot of administrative burden, and I think it creates a lot more opportunity for error.”

While a decision looms in the courts, election officials and experts cast doubt on the likelihood of the rules going into effect before November. A more pressing issue, they said, is the confusion and uncertainty surrounding mail-in ballots, which could subvert and change the behaviors of voters.

“It makes things seem messy or difficult, and it can dissuade people from participating or coming out to vote,” Hovland said. “It certainly also helps establish a pretext to make bad faith claims about election results.”

Hovland said that while none of these claims of voter fraud are backed up with facts, they could cause Americans to lose faith in the voting process.

Still, some current officials contended they were well-prepared for whatever happens — and that they’d be able to communicate effectively with voters who have become increasingly buffeted by dramatic rhetoric about the once-unmentioned nuts and bolts of actually running an election.

“There’s always a lot of noise around elections, that’s not going to change, and it can be hard to differentiate that from what’s actually going on on the ground,” said Jason Tyson, director of external affairs for the North Carolina State Board of Elections.

As Election Day approaches, Tyson and election officials said they urge voters to check their registration status and make a plan to vote.

He added, “I think we’ve got a really well-trained, solid staff who are ready, and who have gone through all of the checks and balances and points of contact that we need to do to get to where we are.”