The Trump Immigration Changes That Flew Under the Radar, From Social Media Vetting to Secret Asylum Rules

The loudest immigration stories of the Trump years came from the southern border: families separated, children detained, force used against asylum seekers, and a moment when the president floated the idea of shooting migrants to stop them. A quieter set of changes, as Quartz laid out in December 2019, reached further inland and touched people who had already built lives in the United States, including green card holders and naturalized citizens.

Start with social media. In 2018, the Department of Homeland Security announced it would require migrants to list their social media accounts on immigration forms, so that their activity could be monitored and recorded. The monitoring is not supposed to apply to naturalized citizens, but what an applicant has posted could shape a citizenship application, since comments and conversations can be read for reasons to deny it. DHS says people who become citizens will not be monitored further, but their earlier social media history will stay on file.

That detail matters because of a parallel push to denaturalize citizens. According to the ACLU, since 2017 the administration has run a far-reaching campaign investigating naturalized citizens for inconsistencies in their applications, or for conduct that might justify stripping their citizenship and deporting them. The campaign is costly and has produced little. From 2004 to 2016, about 40 people a year were denaturalized. In 2017 and 2018, despite heavier investment, fewer than 100 citizens were found to have obtained their status irregularly. The administration nonetheless stood by its 2017 pledge that civil denaturalization would play a prominent role in securing the immigration system, and it requested more than $200 million to look into some 887 leads and review about 700,000 files in 2019.

The "public charge" rule, which took effect in October, falls hardest on low- and middle-income immigrants. It broadens the definition of someone likely to need government support, and therefore subject to denial of entry. Under it, a public charge is a person who receives public benefits for more than 12 months in any 36-month period. Benefits are aggregated, so two benefits in a single month count as two months. Medicare and Medicaid, food stamps, and rental support are among those counted. Children are exempt. The rule also looks forward: officials now weigh an applicant's age, health, skills, and assets to judge whether the person might become a public charge, and can deny visas or adjustments of status on that basis.

Asylum eligibility narrowed as well. In 2018, Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced that migrants who were victims of "private" crimes in their home countries would no longer qualify as refugees, a position the article says runs contrary to international asylum law. The change chiefly affects women fleeing domestic or gender violence. Sessions said that a government's failure to protect them or prosecute the crime was no longer a reason to grant refuge.

Temporary Protected Status, offered to citizens of countries hit by disasters or war, has also been targeted. The administration has tried to end it for Sudan, Nicaragua, Haiti, and El Salvador, but a court has so far blocked the change. The final outcome is pending. Status has been renewed through 2021, though a reversal of the court decision would end it. Terminations sought for Nepal and Honduras are likewise on hold until further notice. Fewer countries are being added, too: citizens of the Bahamas were not granted TPS after Hurricane Dorian devastated the islands in September.

The article argues that the hardest changes to face are the unpublicized ones. A published rule, however drastic, at least gives immigrants and legal experts clarity and a chance to respond. Unannounced changes leave people scrambling through an already complex system. The example given is the credible fear interview, the preliminary screening of whether an asylum seeker has a good reason to seek protection. Until July, 97% of applicants passed and could begin their applications, which does not guarantee asylum. Since July, only 10% have.

Part of the drop comes from a new rule, challenged in court, barring people who did not seek asylum in a transit country such as Mexico. Advocates point to other factors, including interviews now being conducted by Border Patrol officers rather than asylum specialists. A lawsuit filed in September alleges something more: that the new procedures were never published, making it essentially impossible for applicants to know the requirements and prepare. That suit, along with the litigation over TPS and the transit rule, is where these changes will next be tested.