The Trump administration is broadening its immigration crackdown beyond those living in the country illegally. Now, it is targeting people who already have lawful permanent residency.
The Department of Homeland Security is seeking to deport at least 50 green card holders through a new unit dedicated to revoking thousands of immigrants with permanent residency across the country, according to internal data obtained by The New York Times.
Those cases represent a small fraction of the total number of green card holders who have been reviewed so far. About 2,890 cases had been reviewed or were still being assessed as of May 7. Eighty percent of those cases were deemed as requiring “no further action.” More than 500 green card holders were still under review.
The figures reveal the early results of the administration’s efforts to screen green card holders suspected of committing fraud or posing threats. The recent creation of the unit also underscores how aggressively administration officials are trying to root out immigrants they believe should be stripped of their legal status and removed from the country.
A New ‘Removal Apparatus’
The unit tasked with reviewing green card holders is part of a new division within the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services called the “Tactical Operations Division.” It has several units, including “LPR Operations,” “Denaturalization,” and “Refugee Revetting.”
In an email reviewed by The Times, Daniel Andrade, the division’s director, described the unit dedicated to screening green card holders as an “LPR removal apparatus,” referring to lawful permanent residents. About 40 immigration officers are working on screening green card holders, according to the documents.
The Trump administration’s revetting efforts are significantly broader and more aggressive than previous efforts to review immigrants lawfully in the country, according to former homeland security officials. A green card holder’s criminal record would typically be reviewed by USCIS when that individual applied for renewal, naturalization, or another benefit. Through the new unit, the agency is more proactively reviewing and seeking to deport green card holders.
“This intense focus on revetting is new,” said Sharvari Dalal-Dheini, the senior director of government relations for the American Immigration Lawyers Association.
Why Green Card Holders Can Be Deported
Green card holders can be deported for various reasons, including convictions of certain crimes or fraudulently obtaining status. A lawful permanent resident who is convicted of drug trafficking or murder can be deported, for instance. Some minor offenses can also make them eligible for deportation. Other misdemeanors typically do not make them removable, such as a first-time DUI that did not result in injuries.
Zach Kahler, a spokesman for USCIS, said the people being revetted included those arrested and convicted of various crimes, including sexual assault, domestic violence, driving under the influence, and possession of drug paraphernalia. Some “admitted to membership in an organization suspected of illegally or illicitly obtaining export-controlled information and technology for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps,” Kahler said.
He added that those who were being screened also included people who were determined by USCIS to have lied to get their permanent resident status.
But the fact that few of those targeted were found to have been approved improperly suggests that the sweep included a broader pool of people than just those convicted of crimes or who had committed fraud.
Criticism of the Approach
Some former homeland security officials questioned the effectiveness of the agency’s focus on revetting immigrants already approved for legal status.
“There have been a lot of questions about whether or not this is a responsible use of USCIS’s resources, especially when you consider how backlogged the agency is,” said Sarah Pierce, a former policy analyst at USCIS who is now the director of social policy at the center-left think tank Third Way. “I think the numbers only continue to raise those questions.”
The agency had more than 11 million pending applications for a variety of immigration benefits at the end of September, according to the latest data from USCIS. That backlog has continued to grow over the years, roughly doubling since the end of 2019.
Deportation is not immediate. Green card holders usually have the chance to appear before an immigration judge who issues a decision on their case. There is limited public data on the number of green card holders who are deported annually. The federal government has typically opted not to target them unless they have committed particularly serious crimes, according to former homeland security officials.
The Bottom Line
The Department of Homeland Security is seeking to deport at least 50 green card holders through a new unit dedicated to revoking thousands of immigrants with permanent residency. About 2,890 cases had been reviewed or were still being assessed as of May 7. Eighty percent required “no further action.” More than 500 remain under review.
The new unit is part of a broader administration effort to revoke the legal status of not just green card holders, but also refugees and naturalized citizens. Officials have argued that lax screening standards under the Biden administration make the vetting necessary. Critics say the effort is a misuse of resources at an agency already buried under an 11-million-case backlog.
Green card holders targeted for deportation can fight their cases before an immigration judge. But the creation of a dedicated “removal apparatus” signals that the Trump administration is treating lawful permanent residents as a new front in its immigration crackdown.
