HuffPost by Sanjana Karanth
House Democrats introduced a bill on Tuesday that would repeal a little-known provision in immigration law that the Trump administration keeps citing as reason to deport visa holders and legal permanent residents whose speech does not align with the White House.
HuffPost first obtained a copy of the Land of the Free Act, introduced by Reps. Deborah Ross (D-N.C.) and Becca Balint (D-Vt.). The bill takes aim at the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 — specifically, a once rarely used provision that allows for noncitizens to be deported if the secretary of state believes their presence in the U.S. is a foreign policy threat.
“It might be more than 300 at this point,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in March. “We do it every day. Every time I find one of these lunatics, I take away their visa.”
Before this Trump administration, officials only invoked the provision 15 times over the past 35 years, with only four cases resulting in deportation. But with Rubio stretching his power to detain and deport foreign students who express pro-Palestinian views, the new bill aims to make it harder for the administration to weaponize someone’s immigration status to stifle political speech.
“Since day one, the Trump administration has continually violated the constitutionally protected free speech rights of immigrants in this country,” Ross told HuffPost. “We cannot let this corrupt administration go unchecked and undeterred. … The freedom of speech is a foundational principle of our democracy, and I urge my colleagues to join us in this important fight to protect it.”
The bill’s co-sponsors include Democratic Reps. Rashida Tlaib (Mich.), Hank Johnson (Ga.), Mary Gay Scanlon (Penn.), Lateefah Simon (Calif.), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.) and Summer Lee (Penn.).
A spokesperson for the State Department declined HuffPost’s request for comment. White House spokesperson Anna Kelly said that the Trump administration has “the constitutional authority to promote and protect the foreign affairs and national security interests of the United States, including through visa programs.”
“Foreigners who pose a threat to these interests will not be welcomed into our country,” she continued.
The provision resurfaced earlier this year when federal immigration officers arrested Columbia University student Mahmoud Khalil and Tufts University student Rümeysa Öztürk for speaking out against Israel’s U.S.-funded destruction of Gaza. Both sat for months in immigration detention as a result of Rubio revoking their legal status on allegations that they were a threat to U.S. foreign policy.
At least 150 lawyers and legal scholars filed a brief in response to Khalil’s detention, arguing the provision Rubio used is so vague that it should be considered unconstitutional. The Supreme Court has already held that noncitizens in the U.S. have the same First Amendment rights as citizens in several contexts.
Congress passed the original Immigration and Nationality Act in McCarthyist 1952, permitting the secretary of state to deport any noncitizen whose presence and activities in the U.S. is believed to pose a serious threat to foreign policy. In 1990, lawmakers amended the law to say that a noncitizen can only be deported for their beliefs or speech if the secretary of state personally finds their presence “would compromise a compelling United States foreign policy interest.”
In 1996, the provision in question was struck down as unconstitutional by none other than Judge Maryanne Trump Barry, sister of the very president now accused of abusing the deportation law. In her ruling, she said the provision’s language was too vague and that it gives the secretary of state too much unrestricted power. An appeals court eventually vacated her ruling.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/trump-deport-noncitizens-provision-immigration_n_689a71cde4b0be3f5edc8603