- On Monday, the Trump Administration placed a freeze on trillions of federal spending, including grants. This freeze would have impacted a broad array of federal spending, including funds for citizenship programs, Head Start, energy assistance, shelter funding, and the Children’s Health Insurance Program. These cuts would have devastated communities, organizations, and state budgets, and the administration is clear that one of their targets is funding that goes to organizations that serve undocumented immigrants. The funding freeze was quickly blocked by a federal judge on Tuesday and was later retracted by the administration on Wednesday. While we have some breathing room at the moment, we fully expect the administration to target these funds in the near future, likely in a piecemeal fashion.
- On January 29, the administration vacated the previous administration’s decision to extend Temporary Protected Status for Venezuela, effective immediately. For those who have already submitted applications under the previous extension, all processing will cease and application fees will be refunded. Similarly, for anyone who already had an extension approved, all newly issued documents with an expiration date of October 2, 2026 will be invalidated and filing fees will be refunded. TPS holders from Venezuela will be granted an automatic 6-month extension of their listed expiration date (listed expiration dates are either April 2, 2025 or September 10, 2025).
- On January 29, President Trump signed the Laken Riley Act into law, the first bill signing of his new administration. This bill extends mandatory detention for those without lawful status where they are accused of certain crimes, including crimes as minor as shoplifting. Convictions under this provision of the law will not be necessary to trigger mandatory detention.
- January 29th was a busy day for the Trump Administration, as the President also announced that he would order the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Defense to convert Guantánamo Bay into an immigration detention center capable of holding 30,000 immigrants. Read MIRA’s statement in response to this proposal here