In this post, I summarize why Trump's order imposing $100,000 fee on H-1B visas is harmful and illegal. I build in part on insightful piece by my @cato.org colleague @davidjbier.bsky.social one of America's leading immigration policy experts: reason.com/volokh/2025/...

This is the lead story in the New York Times. If you're in the business of communicating, whether through journalism, commentary, or art, this is the five-alarm fire. People are going to remember who spoke up and who stayed conveniently silent or postured about "neutrality."

Starting now!

80% of convicted drug traffickers were US citizens in 2024. Trump wants to convince you that he can murder enough foreigners to end overdoses, but he cannot. It is an alternate reality. Citizens pay for drugs to be brought here and they go get and distribute them. Will he start murdering them too?

They search. Find nothing. STOP DOING SEARCHES. JUST BLOW THEM UP FROM NOW ON.

Don’t do this in our name. These are Trump deportations

Abolish the presidency. I can't believe no one has even proposed it yet. It's the biggest flaw in the Constitution, and it is the branch that will lead us into authoritarianism.

My Cato colleague @davidjbier.bsky.social on the illegal and extremely dangerous nature of Trump's extrajudicial killing of alleged Venezuelan smugglers at sea. No officials should be trusted with this sort of power, and this administration in particular has proved multiply untrustworthy.

The “bipartisan” State Department reauthorization bill would authorize the SoS to revoke passports of any individual “determined to have knowingly aided, assisted, abetted, or otherwise provided material support to a foreign terrorist organization.” Ominous indeed. bsky.app/profile/bcfi...

My guess is that his threat to prosecute feds who violate the rights of Chicagoans did it. Every D governor and AG should be making the same promise.

CBO says we are 5 years away from population decline if not for immigration. The fact that 3.5 of those will be spent exacerbating the problem is shocking

The President Should Not Have a License to Kill - "This strike is the culmination of a decade-long campaign by the president and his advisors to dehumanize foreigners and deny their rights."

This is exceptional. Everyone should read it. At its core it’s inspiring and hopeful about the ability of determined lawyers and judges to use the law to protect those Trump and his followers would harm. But it’s also devastating. I never much believed in evil, but I do now.

US citizen plaintiffs in the case literally described what happened when they were arrested by ICE. Kavanaugh writing that the government is more injured by not doing this is closer to a “positive good” argument — more Calhoun than Plessy.

Among myriad problems with this ruling, can we pause to appreciate the childlike naïveté exhibited by Cavanaugh on the barely-worth-mentioning inconvenience of being detained and interogated by ICE? We are approaching Plessy levels of obtuseness, or feigned obtuseness.

🚨The Supreme Court today gives Trump a license to engage in racial profiling, with Justice Kavanaugh writing in concurrence to expressly endorse ICE and Border Patrol targeting any Latinos they observe in Los Angeles speaking Spanish and then demanding their papers.

It's not the most important part of the issue but Kavanaugh saying "well they should just sue if they're the victims of excessive force from ICE" when he himself has previously voted to bar lawsuits against federal officers for violations of the 4th Amendment in immigration cases takes chutzpah.

They scooped up “everyone”. More 4th amendment violations from this unconstitutional admin. When will NY start arresting these criminals?

I’m old enough to remember when the Justice Department told a federal judge that Abrego Garcia’s immigration matters would be handled by an ICE desk officer like it would in any other “garden variety” case

by my count, this makes seven confirmed no true bills from grand juries, plus three other felony cases dismissed (two gun cases, one assault of a federal officer), plus two cases downgraded from felony assault on federal officers to misdemeanor

The administration that can't tell a Maryland dad or a makeup artist from a "terrorist" now claims the right to blow up boats carrying people they imagine to be terrorists. If you have tattoos, maybe stay on dry land until a court inevitably strikes this down. www.nytimes.com/2025/09/04/u...

I have received a new disclosure from ICE removal operations showing that it has commandeered more than ***42,000 personnel*** (agents and non-agents) from other agencies in August alone. They are stealing from public safety and security for their population purge

I have obtained new data showing that ICE has diverted at least **25,000 officers** into its mass deportation efforts, including at least 14,498 federal law enforcement officers. This is the lower-bound b/c many Border Patrol agents are independently engaged in interior arrests

I really want to see the JAG memo which purported to justify the idea the military can randomly drone strike a boat in international waters because we suspect it might be doing something illegal under civilian law. Preferably because it's being used as an exhibit at trial.

WOW. I missed this last week. What a disgraceful decision to bar nonprofits like the League of Women Voters from registering voters after naturalization ceremonies.

HUGE: "Nevertheless, at Defendants’ orders and contrary to Congress’s explicit instruction, federal troops executed the laws. ... In short, Defendants violated the Posse Comitatus Act." Working link here: storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

The Home Office's own (excellent) research summary says a) asylum seekers come to the UK primarily because of social networks/ties b) welfare and labour market policies are *not* a big "pull factor" c) safe routes would help freemovement.org.uk/wp-content/u...

Our new paper finds compelling evidence that immigrants are less likely to commit violent crimes from an unlikely source: crime victims. Immigrant victims are way less likely to be victimized by their family & other people they know, who are likely to be other immigrants www.cato.org/policy-analy...

Doing illegal unconstitutional tariffs is the embarrassment

NEWS: ICE's Chantilly office is a "black box" where conditions are increasingly dire, attorneys & a relative of person detained tell @msnbc.com - 1 meal a day = a single burrito - some 40-90 ppl crammed into room, sleeping on concrete - Some held as long as 7 days www.msnbc.com/msnbc/news/v...

The most important immigration fights right now are about the Constitution. None of it has anything to do with the substance of immigration policy. If you stand with ICE, you stand against the Constitution. Can the govt... 1. racially profile? 2. set up checkpoints wherever they want?

Our new paper finds compelling evidence that immigrants are less likely to commit violent crimes from an unlikely source: crime victims. Immigrant victims are way less likely to be victimized by their family & other people they know, who are likely to be other immigrants www.cato.org/policy-analy...

Have the Democrats promised to end tariffs? Have they said they’d repeal the mass deportation funding? Any of them? Clearly and unequivocally?

📍 𝐖𝐀𝐒𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐓𝐎𝐍: Federal agents arrested two firefighters battling the Bear Gulch wildfire, ordering them to line up, despite risking their lives to protect the community. A firefighter said: "You risked your life out here to save the community. This is how they treat us." #AbuseofPowerWatch

USA Today covers our study on immigrant crime reporting before the crackdown. My sense is that there's never been a time when immigrants, legal and illegal, were more concerned about interacting with law enforcement in this country. DHS believes that's a good thing!

NEW PAPER! We look at immigrant criminality from the perspective of victims. Criminals tend to victimize the people in their community. If immigrants are setting off a crime wave, immigrants would be their 1st victims. Do we see that... no! Just the opposite... 🧵 www.cato.org/policy-analy...

Important read 👇

NEW PAPER! We look at immigrant criminality from the perspective of victims. Criminals tend to victimize the people in their community. If immigrants are setting off a crime wave, immigrants would be their 1st victims. Do we see that... no! Just the opposite... 🧵 www.cato.org/policy-analy...

More FAKE assaults

Opposition to evil is to important to be left to the Left. "Let's get those billionaires at the ICE office." Aside from that making no sense at all, billionaires are, in general, far more in favor of protecting immigrant rights than "workers." Defend our country intelligently please.

Understand this man's family are all US citizens. His wife, his kids, are Americans. Only this administration would cavalierly say: "get out" to its own people.

Cato has published my comprehensive review of the ~240 Venezuelans the US government renditioned 2 months ago to Salvador’s notorious prison. We identified FIFTY who came legally, never violated any immigration law, but are imprisoned at the US government’s request and at US taxpayer expense.

🧊😲✈️ CHILD IN CHAINS‼️ 👉 Thursday August 21, 2025 at Boeing Field in Seattle, we spotted this apparent girl in chains being directed up the steps of an Avelo Airlines 737 (tail: N805VL) on the live web cam feed from the airport 👀 (clip courtesy lalabote.bsky.social)

We have known for at least a yr that Trump would send troops into sanctuary cities to boost ICE enforcement and inflame everything to the point that he has an excuse to declare them in rebellion & invoke the Insurrection Act, which will justify more troops & more permanent occupation by midterms

ICE, DC Police, Park Police, DHS, and HSI brutally arrested a man who refused to provide identification after being stopped for eating in public. Goons attempted to stop community members from recording his injuries during the incident.

Yesterday, our atty left the DTLA federal building “B18” & what she witnessed was disturbing. Her client has been trapped in a basement room w/ 50 others since Tuesday. ❌ No beds ❌ No showers ❌ Same clothes ❌ Sporadic meals ❌ No medical care after a violent arrest

Pew finds that in 2023, 14 million "unauthorized" immigrants were in the US. BUT it finds that six million, or 44 percent, were actually authorized to stay here at that time. Trump has obliterated those protections and is trying to deport them all indiscriminately!

ICE lied to courts about its use of illegal profiling. We can't trust the government to tell us the truth about what it's doing because it is controlled by liars from the top down. www.cato.org/blog/anti-pr...