WASHINGTON — Sophia Nyazi’s husband, Milad, shook her awake at 8 a.m. “ICE is right here,” he informed her.
Three uniformed Immigration and Customs Enforcement brokers have been downstairs on the household’s house on Long Island, N.Y., on Tuesday, based on a video reviewed by The Times that she captured from atop the staircase.
Nyazi stated the brokers requested whether or not her husband was making use of for a inexperienced card. They informed her they must detain him due to the capturing of two National Guard members every week earlier in Washington, D.C.
“He has nothing to do with that capturing,” Nyazi, 27, recalled answering. “We don’t even know that individual.”
Her protests didn’t matter. The Trump administration has put into movement a broad and unprecedented set of coverage modifications aimed toward considerably limiting authorized immigration avenues, together with for immigrants lengthy thought of essentially the most weak.
Unfortunately, I believe the administration took this one very tragic incident and politicized it as a solution to shut down even authorized immigration
— Sharvari Dalal-Dheini, of the American Immigration Lawyers Assn.
Milad Nyazi, 28, was detained as a result of, like the person charged within the capturing which left one National Guard member useless, he’s from Afghanistan.
The administration has paused selections on all functions filed with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, or USCIS, by folks in search of asylum. The visa and immigration functions of Afghans, whom the U.S. had welcomed in 2021 because it pulled all troops from the nation, have been halted.
Officials additionally froze the processing of immigration instances of individuals from 19 nations the administration considers “high-risk” and can conduct case-by-case evaluations of inexperienced playing cards and different immigration advantages given to folks from these nations since former President Biden took workplace in 2021.
Immigration legal professionals say they realized that dozens of naturalization ceremonies and interviews for inexperienced playing cards are being canceled for immigrants from Haiti, Iran, Guinea and different nations on the checklist.
In a few instances, immigration officers informed immigrants that that they had been ready to grant a inexperienced card, however have been unable to take action due to the brand new steerage, stated Gregory Chen, authorities relations director at American Immigration Lawyers Assn.
Although it’s unclear precisely how many individuals might be affected by the brand new guidelines, 1.5 million immigrants have asylum instances pending with USCIS.
“These are sweeping modifications that actual collective punishment on a large swath of people who find themselves making an attempt to do issues the fitting approach,” stated Amanda Baran, former chief of coverage and technique at USCIS beneath the Biden administration. “I fear about all of the individuals who have dutifully filed functions and whose lives at the moment are on maintain.”
Administration officers known as the Nov. 26 capturing a “terrorist assault” and defended the modifications as crucial to guard the nation. Rahmanullah Lakanwal, 29, faces fees stemming from the capturing that killed Army Spc. Sarah Beckstrom, 20, and critically wounded Air Force Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, 24.
“The safety of this nation and of the American folks stays paramount, and the American folks won’t bear the price of the prior administration’s reckless resettlement insurance policies,” Joseph Edlow, director of USCIS, stated in a message posted Nov. 27 on X. “American security is non-negotiable.”
Lakanwal pleaded not responsible final week and his motive stays beneath investigation. In Afghanistan, he served in a counterterrorism unit operated by the CIA.
Lakanwal entered the U.S. in 2021 via a Biden administration program that resettled almost 200,000 Afghans within the wake of the U.S. withdrawal, officers stated. He utilized for asylum in December 2024 and it was accredited beneath the Trump administration in April, based on an announcement by the nonprofit #AfghanEvac.
Afghans who labored with U.S. troops have been believed to face hazard if left behind beneath the Taliban-run authorities. Along with present process routine safety screening, they submitted to extra “rigorous” vetting, which included biometric and biographic checks by counterterrorism and intelligence professionals, the Department of Homeland Security stated on the time.
Two federal stories from 2024 and this yr pointed to some failings of the screening, together with information inaccuracies and the presence of 55 evacuees who have been later recognized on terrorism watch lists, although the latter report famous that the FBI had then adopted all required processes to mitigate any potential menace.
It’s unclear precisely how the administration will perform evaluations of 1000’s of people that already reside legally within the U.S. The federal authorities can’t simply strip folks of everlasting authorized standing. The menace of reopening instances, nonetheless, has sparked alarm in immigrant communities throughout the nation.
About 58,600 Afghan immigrants name California house as of 2023, way over some other state, based on the Migration Policy Institute. Interviews with a dozen local people advocates, immigration attorneys and members of the family of these detained paint an aggressive effort by the federal authorities to spherical up current Afghan immigrants within the wake of the D.C. capturing.
“Unfortunately, I believe the administration took this one very tragic incident and politicized it as a solution to shut down even authorized immigration. And it’s undoubtedly gone a lot broader than the Afghan neighborhood,” stated Sharvari Dalal-Dheini, the director of presidency relations on the American Immigration Lawyers Assn.
Trump administration officers cited the capturing in a spate of coverage modifications final week.
On Friday, USCIS introduced it had established a brand new middle to strengthen screening with supplemental evaluations of immigration functions, partly utilizing synthetic intelligence. The USCIS Vetting Center, based mostly in Atlanta, will “centralize enhanced vetting of aliens and permit the company to reply extra nimbly to modifications in a shifting menace panorama,” the company stated.
On Thursday, USCIS stated work permits granted to immigrants would expire after 18 months, not 5 years. The change contains work permits for these admitted as refugees, with pending inexperienced card functions and with pending asylum functions.
In a memorandum Tuesday outlining the pause on asylum functions and the immigration instances of individuals from the 19 nations additionally topic to a journey ban, USCIS acknowledged that the modifications might lead to processing delays however had decided it was “crucial and acceptable” when weighed “towards the company’s obligation to guard and protect nationwide safety.”
Immigrants already had been on excessive alert because the Trump administration canceled non permanent humanitarian applications, in the reduction of refugee admissions — apart from a restricted variety of white South African Afrikaners — and elevated makes an attempt to ship these with deportation orders to nations the place they’ve no private connection.
Before the Washington capturing, a Nov. 21 memo confirmed that the administration deliberate to evaluation the instances of greater than 200,000 refugees admitted beneath the Biden administration. Although asylum seekers apply after arriving within the U.S., refugees apply for admission from outdoors the nation.
Nyazi questioned why Afghans are being singled out, noting {that a} white individual allegedly assassinated Charlie Kirk, however “I don’t see any ICE brokers going into white folks’s homes.”
Asked why Milad Nyazi was detained, Tricia McLaughlin, assistant public affairs secretary for Homeland Security, known as him a felony, citing two arrests on suspicion of home violence.
“Under Secretary [Kristi] Noem, DHS has been going full throttle on figuring out and arresting identified or suspected terrorists and felony unlawful aliens that got here in via Biden’s fraudulent parole applications and dealing to get the criminals and public security threats OUT of our nation,” McLaughlin stated in an announcement.
Nyazi stated the fees, which didn’t stem from incidents of bodily violence, have been dropped and his file was later expunged.
She and her husband obtained engaged in 2019 in Afghanistan and utilized for a fiance visa, as a result of Nyazi is a U.S. citizen. Their software was accredited in 2021. Soon after, with the Taliban takeover in full power, the U.S. authorities allowed Milad Nyazi to fly to the U.S. He has a pending inexperienced card software, Nyazi stated.
On Tuesday, the couple’s 3-year-old daughter screamed and cried as her father was handcuffed and brought away. He has a court docket listening to this week.
Zahra Billoo, government director of the San Francisco Bay Area chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, and others say Afghans in numerous levels of their authorized immigration course of — not solely these with deportation orders — have been focused. She stated at the very least 17 Afghans within the Bay Area have been detained since Monday.
Lawyers stated lots of the Afghans detained final week had arrived on the U.S.-Mexico border, the place that they had sought asylum.
Paris Etemadi Scott, authorized director of the Pars Equality Center in San José, stated three of her purchasers, an Afghan mom and her two sons who’re each of their early 20s, have been detained Dec. 1 throughout a routine check-in with ICE. All have pending asylum functions, she stated.
Rebecca Olszewski, managing legal professional on the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center, stated her Afghan consumer, who additionally has a pending asylum case, reported for his month-to-month digital check-in Friday and was informed to point out up in individual the subsequent day, the place he was detained.
Since the capturing, administration officers and the president have used dehumanizing language to explain immigrants. In asserting the 19-country journey ban Dec. 1, Noem posted on X that she was recommending a “a full journey ban on each rattling nation that’s been flooding our nation with killers, leeches, and entitlement junkies.”
In a Cabinet assembly the subsequent day, Trump referred to Somali immigrants as “rubbish” who “contribute nothing.” (A number of days later, Noem stated the administration would broaden the journey ban to greater than 30 nations.)
On Thanksgiving Day, Trump had stated on his social media platform that he intends to “completely pause migration from all Third World Countries” and deport those that are “non-compatible with Western Civilization.”
In current days, a ghostly quiet has overtaken Shafiullah Hotak’s common haunts in North Sacramento, the place the Afghan inhabitants within the metropolis is very dense. Hotak, 38, is an Afghan immigrant who served as a program supervisor at refugee resettlement group Lao Family Community Development till layoffs because of federal cuts pressured him out of labor in May.
On Thursday, immigration brokers banged on doorways at an house advanced on Marconi Avenue, the place a whole lot of Afghans have resettled. Just one worker sat in an Afghan-owned tax and bookkeeping enterprise that was sometimes buzzing with purchasers. A close-by park, the place youngsters kick round soccer balls and laughing packs of kids roam after faculty, was empty. And the strains at a halal market identified for its sesame-topped Afghan bread had disappeared.
“The scenario we’ve got in our neighborhood jogs my memory of after we used to go to work in Afghanistan,” Hotak stated. “We needed to take completely different routes day-after-day as a result of individuals who have been towards the U.S. mission in Afghanistan have been concentrating on folks. There have been bombings and shootings.”
Hotak stated “Kill the eyes,” is what the enemies of the U.S. in Afghanistan used to advise as to the best way to take care of native Afghans aiding the navy, so as to blind their operations.
“But these days these ‘eyes’ are right here within the U.S. and the U.S. authorities is seeking to choose them up and put them in jail,” Hotak stated.
Times employees writers Castillo reported from Washington and Hussain and Uranga from Los Angeles.
