Four journalists, including three working for the Associated Press, were detained in Cameroon on Tuesday while reporting from a facility where migrants deported by the Trump administration are held, according to one of the detained journalists and two lawyers advocating for the deportees. Source link
WASHINGTON (RNS) — A group of nearly 400 prominent Christian leaders called President Donald Trump’s administration “cruel and oppressive” and accused the government of being corrupted by an aberrant form of Christianity, in an Ash Wednesday (Feb. 18) statement. The statement, provided exclusively to Religion News Service in advance, has a list of signers that includes a mix of denominational leaders, seminary presidents, scholars and leaders of prominent congregations. In it, they urged fellow faithful to commit to “greater acts of courage to resist.” “We are facing a cruel and oppressive government; citizens and immigrants being demonized, disappeared, and even killed; the erosion of hard-won rights and freedoms; and a calculated effort to reverse America’s growing racial and ethnic diversity — all of which are pushing us toward authoritarian and imperial rule,” reads the letter, which organizers said was spearheaded by a group of Christian leaders who have been meeting regularly to discuss how to respond to the administration. The document raises concerns about “an endangered democracy and the rise of tyranny” and warns of …
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration spent at least $40 million to deport roughly 300 migrants to countries other than their own as immigration officials expanded the practice over the last year to carry out President Donald Trump’s goals of quickly removing immigrants from the U.S., according to a report compiled by the Democratic staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. The Democrats on the Foreign Relations panel, led by Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, criticize the practice of third country deportations as “costly, wasteful and poorly monitored” in the report and call for “serious scrutiny of a policy that now operates largely in the dark.” The State Department, which oversees the negotiations to implement the programs, has stood behind the practice of third country deportations and defended it as a part of Trump’s campaign to end illegal immigration. “We’ve arrested people that are members of gangs and we’ve deported them. We don’t want gang members in our country,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio responded when asked about some of the third country deportations at a Senate …
Carlos Aranibar is a former Downey public works commissioner and remains involved in local Democratic politics. But until a few weeks ago, the son of Bolivian and Mexican immigrants hadn’t joined any actions against the immigration raids that have overwhelmed Southern California. Life always seemed to get in the way. Downey hadn’t been hit as hard as other cities in southeast L.A. County, where elected officials and local leaders urged residents to resist and helped them organize. Besides, we’re talking about Downey, a city that advocates and detractors alike hyperbolically call the “Mexican Beverly Hills” for its middle-class Latino life and conservative streak. Voters recalled a council member in 2023 for being too wokosa, and the council decided the next year to block the Pride flag from flying on city property. A few months later, Donald Trump received an 18.8% increase in voters compared with 2020 — part of a historic shift by Latino voters toward the Republican Party. That’s now going up in flames. But it took a while for Aranibar to full-on join …
The Ghezelgechi family escaped persecution but is now stranded in Panama after being caught up in Trump’s third-country deportations Source link
Kilmar Abrego Garcia enters a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office in August 2025 in Baltimore after he was returned to the U.S. from El Salvador. Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images hide caption toggle caption Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images The case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia captured national headlines last year as part of a wave of criticism against the second Trump administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement. It was the speed of his deportation — from working in Maryland one week, to getting whisked off to a notorious prison in El Salvador the next. But it was also because it was a mistake: something a government lawyer admitted in court. Immigration lawyers said Abrego Garcia’s landmark case highlights the challenges with the speed and scale of the Trump administration’s goal of mass deportations. “We really thought this was going to be one of a kind,” said Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg, one of Abrego Garcia’s lawyers. “If anything, it was just the tip of the spear. There have been countless illegal deportation cases since then. If anything, the problem is getting worse …
At her first briefing since the Minneapolis shooting of Alex Pretti, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt blamed Democratic leaders for refusing to enforce federal immigration law. She described Pretti as an armed left-wing agitator and said the administration’s message was clear: the Biden-era approach to immigration enforcement is finished. Leavitt accused Democrats and hard-left activists of trying to obstruct the mandate voters gave President Trump, while federal immigration officers are carrying out the will of the American people. She noted that Trump has condemned the “vile” treatment of those officers and called the resistance to enforcement deadly. She also outlined what the White House sees as the path forward in Minnesota, stressing cooperation from state and local officials who have shielded illegal aliens. Trump spoke with Gov. Tim Walz on Monday in a productive conversation, Leavitt said, noting the two were on a similar wavelength about next steps. The administration’s demands include turning over all criminal illegal immigrants in state and local custody for immediate deportation, requiring local police to transfer all illegal aliens …
SPRINGFIELD, Ohio (RNS) — “We have orders of deportation,” said a volunteer in a raised voice, posing as an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent and pounding on the sanctuary door. “What you’re doing is harboring.” Inside the sanctuary, hundreds of trainees blocked the large wooden double doors. One called out, “We’re exercising our First Amendment right to freedom of worship.” The handful of faux ICE agents moved to a different entryway. As they pried open the side door to the sanctuary, some trainees held up phones to record the encounter while others blew whistles. The scenario was part of a roleplay exercise at a rapid response training in Springfield, Ohio, on Saturday (Jan. 24). Despite the winter storm in the forecast, nearly 200 people from in and around Springfield gathered at Central Christian Church for the event organized by G92, a new Springfield-based coalition of pro-immigrant churches and advocates named after the 92 times the Hebrew word “ger,” which means stranger or sojourner, appears in the Hebrew Bible. “For many people, this isn’t just …
Authored by Bill Pan via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours), CBS’s “60 Minutes” finally aired its report on the Trump administration’s deportations, more than a month after the segment was taken down from the program’s lineup. Guards stand outside a cell block at the Center for Terrorism Confinement (CECOT) in Tecoluca, El Salvador, on April 4, 2025. Alex Peña/Getty Images In the report, broadcast on Jan. 18, correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi examined deportees sent to El Salvador’s maximum-security prison, known by its Spanish acronym CECOT. It aired without any mention of the story having previously been pulled from its originally scheduled date, Dec. 21, 2025. The unaired segment nevertheless appeared online a day after it was pulled. Global TV, which airs “60 Minutes” in Canada, briefly featured the piece on its app, apparently by mistake. CBS News said in an emailed statement to The Epoch Times that its leadership “has always been committed to airing the ‘60 Minutes’ CECOT piece as soon as it was ready.” “Tonight, viewers get to see it, along with other important …
Thousands of demonstrators took to the streets of Minneapolis on Saturday chanting the name of the woman killed by a federal agent in the city, amid widespread anger at use of force in the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. Organisers said more than 1,000 events were planned across the United States under the slogan “ICE, Out for Good” – referring to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency that is drawing growing opposition over its execution of President Donald Trump’s effort at mass deportations. The slogan is also a reference to Renee Good, the 37-year-old mother shot dead in her car by an ICE agent on Wednesday. Thousands braved frigid weather and streamed toward a snow-covered park to mobilise near the scene of the shooting. They carried signs demanding “ICE OUT” of Minnesota. At the start of the protest, a voice called out, “Say her name!” The crowd shouted back: “Renee Good!” Her death has sparked strong emotions in this Democratic stronghold, and across the nation. “We got ICE shooting women in the face for self-defence. It …
