Articles Posted in Deportation

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Imagine waiting more than ten years as a lawful permanent resident for the day you can finally become a U.S. citizen.

One of our clients did exactly that. He received his N-400 citizenship interview notice, prepared for the appointment, and arrived at the USCIS office in Los Angeles excited about taking the next step toward naturalization. He believed he was eligible for citizenship, and his attorney had advised him that he qualified.

But he never walked out of that USCIS office as a new U.S. citizen.

Instead, ICE agents placed him in handcuffs and escorted him out of the building.

This is not a scene from a movie. It is a reality that some green card holders have faced when appearing for their naturalization interviews.

And he is not the only one.

Lessons From Real Client Cases

In this blog post, we share real client stories involving lawful permanent residents who appeared for their U.S. citizenship interviews only to be detained by ICE agents. These cases involve old removal orders, unpaid tickets that were forgotten and later turned into warrants, political activism that attracted government scrutiny, and other problems applicants may not realize could surface during the naturalization process.

Most importantly, we explain what these cases can teach other green card holders, and the steps you should take before filing your application.

What Happens at the N-400 Citizenship Interview

When you apply for U.S. citizenship, you file Form N-400, Application for Naturalization. At the interview, a USCIS officer will review your application with you and ask questions to confirm that the information you provided is accurate.

The officer may also review important parts of your immigration history, including your travel outside the United States, tax history, child support obligations, and any arrests, citations, charges, or other criminal issues. You will also be required to complete the English and civics portions of the naturalization test, unless you qualify for an exception.

At the end of the interview, USCIS may approve your application, continue the case because additional information or evidence is needed, or deny the application. An immediate denial at the interview itself is less common.

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For most green card holders, returning to the United States after a vacation feels like a routine part of travel. But in 2026, that return can sometimes come with unexpected problems.

In recent months, some green card holders have been taken to secondary inspections, questioned, and even detained at U.S. airports.

In these cases, the issue is not the vacation itself, but something in the traveler’s immigration history, criminal record, or time spent outside the country that gets flagged by Customs and Border Protection.

In this article, we’ll break down the top 3 reasons green card holders can run into trouble when returning to the U.S., along with 5 airports where travelers should be especially prepared for closer inspection.

The “Arriving Alien” Trap for Green Card Holders

One of the biggest risks for a green card holder returning from abroad is being treated as an “arriving alien” by immigration officers.

Normally, a lawful permanent resident returning from a trip is not considered to be seeking admission to the United States. But under certain circumstances, CBP can do just that.

Once CBP treats a green card holder as an arriving alien, they can be required to prove they are still eligible to enter the United States under rules for people seeking admission.

This matters because it can expose travelers to detention and removal proceedings and can make defending the case more complicated.

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The Republican-backed Senate has just introduced a $72 billion immigration enforcement bill— a massive federal spending package focused on expanding immigration enforcement across the United States.

Republicans are using the budget reconciliation process, allowing the bill to pass with a simple majority vote and avoid a Democratic filibuster. However, the legislation has encountered procedural obstacles after the Senate parliamentarian ruled that parts of the proposal violated Senate reconciliation rules.

The key provisions of the spending proposal include:

  • Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE): Over $38 billion for ICE operations, expanded detention capacity, deportation flights, and artificial intelligence capabilities.
  • Customs & Border Protection (CBP): $26 billion for border security and patrol operations.
  • Department of Homeland Security (DHS): $5 billion designated to remove individuals who do not qualify for benefits.
  • Department of Justice (DOJ): $1.5 billion to hire more judges and increase prosecutions.
  • White House Upgrades: An additional $1 billion set aside for the Secret Service to make security upgrades for the President and his cabinet

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Still holding a green card in 2026? You might be missing out—big time. While lawful permanent residence offers stability, it also comes with limits that many immigrants don’t realize until it’s too late. From travel and tax exposure to voting rights and deportation risk, the gap between a green card and U.S. citizenship is wider than ever.

Here are five surprising differences that could make staying a permanent resident a costly mistake.

#1 Security & Deportation Concerns

One of the biggest risks of remaining a green card holder is that old criminal issues never truly disappear. Even offenses from years—or decades—ago can trigger detention or deportation if immigration laws or enforcement priorities shift.

Unlike U.S. citizens, permanent residents can be placed in removal proceedings based on past conduct—sometimes years later—making citizenship the only status that offers true long-term security from deportation. For example, a lawful permanent resident can now be detained without ever being convicted of a crime. Under the Laken Riley Act, non-citizens can face mandatory detention based solely on an arrest or charge, meaning an accusation alone can be enough to trigger custody.

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I-751 denials for conditional residents are surging in 2026, and many conditional green card holders are being caught off guard. What used to be a routine filing is now under intense scrutiny, with even minor errors triggering denials. As USCIS tightens standards, understanding the risks—and how to avoid them—has never been more critical.

A conditional permanent resident is someone who received a two-year green card through a recent marriage and must file Form I-751 during the 90 days before it expires to prove the marriage is real and remove those conditions. Failure to timely file an I-751 application can lead a person to lose their status.

In this video, we break down exactly how to avoid becoming part of the rising denial statistics and set your application up for approval.

If you are Divorced, Expect a Tougher Review

In just recent months, the I-751 approval rate has plunged from roughly 85% to just under 60%.

A major driver of these denials is USCIS’s heightened scrutiny of divorced applicants. I-751 waivers are filed by applicants who are no longer married to the U.S. citizen spouse through which they originally obtained conditional residence.

Applicants filing I-751 waivers face tougher scrutiny, with officers increasingly questioning the legitimacy of marriages that ended in divorce.

What many applicants don’t realize is that you should only file an I-751 waiver after your divorce is final, because without a final divorce decree, USCIS will likely deny the case.

If you don’t have your final divorce decree within the 90-day filing window, you should work with an attorney to fully document your pending dissolution and explain the situation to USCIS.

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Major changes are coming to the marriage-based green card process in 2026, including stricter vetting, heightened enforcement, expanded evidence requirements, and increased detention of applicants flagged for further review at interviews.

To find out more, please keep on watching.

What to Expect: Shift Toward Heightened Enforcement

In 2025, internal policy shifts at USCIS stopped the issuance of Requests for Evidence, required medical exams to be filed with adjustment applications in a single package, and, most notably, created an unprecedented rise in denials and detentions at green card interviews.

Detentions at Green Card Interviews

In recent months, things took a turn for the worst. USCIS officers have been increasingly working alongside Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to identify and flag green card applicants they believe are potentially ineligible for benefits. Those flagged for additional review have faced immediate detention at their green card interviews.

Although the law allows visa overstays to be forgiven for those married to U.S. citizens, USCIS officers have been reporting visa overstays to ICE during green card interviews, resulting in their immediate detention. This has occurred in recent weeks in San Diego to a Navy spouse, a breastfeeding mother, and even an elderly man, signaling that enforcement is being taken to an unprecedented level.

Under Trump, internal ICE policies have included numerical targets for deportations, effectively creating quotas for enforcement officers. These targets set specific numbers of removals to be achieved within given timeframes, which places added pressure on USCIS officers to flag these individuals for removal.

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Navigating the U.S. immigration system is difficult enough — but what many people don’t realize is that even legal immigrants can face deportation for mistakes they never knew were serious.

From minor paperwork oversights to everyday misunderstandings of immigration rules, these pitfalls can put lawful status at risk without warning.

In this guide, we break down the 7 most common mistakes that get even legal immigrants deported — and number 4 surprised even us. Understanding these risks is essential to protecting your future in the United States.

Mistake #1 Crimes of Moral Turpitude

Certain offenses—known as crimes involving moral turpitude—carry especially harsh consequences, including deportation, even for green card holders.

These crimes typically involve conduct considered dishonest, deceptive, or morally unacceptable, such as fraud, theft, domestic violence, or certain assault-related offenses.

What complicates things further is that even a single conviction could trigger removal proceedings for permanent residents and nonimmigrant visa holders.

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Recent changes to the green card application process have added new hurdles that could make interview approvals more difficult. In this blog, we’ll break down what these changes are and how they could affect your chances of success.

What’s changed?

  • USCIS officers now have expanded authority
  • Immigration officers have been granted law enforcement powers as federal agents
  • Increased ability to investigate immigration cases for fraud, misrepresentation, and other violations
  • Authority to refer cases for criminal prosecution
  • Power to arrest and detain applicants during green card interviews for violations

USCIS Shifts from Administrative to Law Enforcement Agency

For decades, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has primarily served as an administrative agency. Its core function has been to process immigration benefits such as green cards, work permits, naturalization, and other legal status applications. USCIS operated separately from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), which is tasked with enforcing immigration laws, including detaining and removing individuals who are in violation. This separation reflected a clear distinction between those applying for lawful immigration benefits and those facing enforcement actions.

However, in recent months, USCIS policies have started to shift in a direction that aligns more closely with immigration enforcement. Officers within the agency are being granted expanded authority, including certain law enforcement powers. For example, USCIS officers now have increased discretion to investigate cases for fraud, misrepresentation, or other immigration violations — and in some cases, they may refer cases for prosecution or even detain applicants during in-person interviews for immigration violations.

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The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has ramped up its enforcement efforts against individuals who have falsely claimed U.S. citizenship.

In a new policy memorandum issued on August 20, 2025, USCIS clarified that making a false claim to U.S. citizenship is a serious immigration violation that results in a permanent lifetime bar to adjustment of status—and, in most cases, there is no available waiver to overcome this ground of inadmissibility.

The policy memo explains that an immigration officer may find someone inadmissible for a false claim to U.S. citizenship, if the person made the claim with the subjective intent to gain a benefit or purpose under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) or any other federal or state law.

This requires an officer to consider direct or circumstantial evidence to determine whether the individual had the subjective intent to gain such a benefit or purpose based on the following factors: age, level of education, background, mental capacity, level of understanding, appreciation of the difference between truth and falsity, and other relevant circumstances.

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In a significant shift in immigration policy, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) now has the authority to deny green card applications outright—without first issuing a Request for Evidence (RFE) or Notice of Intent to Deny (NOID).

In this video, attorney Jacob Sapochnick explains how this new change empowers USCIS officers to make immediate decisions when an application lacks sufficient initial evidence, potentially leaving applicants with fewer opportunities to correct mistakes or provide missing documentation.

This makes the application process more unforgiving and raises the stakes for submitting a thorough and complete green card application from the start. Here’s what you need to know about how this policy could impact your green card journey, and more importantly how to protect yourself.

What’s changed?

Previously, when a green card application was submitted with missing or insufficient information, USCIS would typically issue a Request for Evidence (RFE). This notice outlined the specific issues or missing documents and gave the applicant a chance to respond and provide the necessary information to support their case by the specified deadline.

The RFE process served as a safeguard, allowing applicants to correct honest mistakes or oversights before a final decision was made on their application.

Now, that safeguard is no longer guaranteed. Under new USCIS policies, officers can deny green card applications outright if they determine the initial submission lacks sufficient evidence, without first issuing a Request for Evidence (RFE) or Notice of Intent to Deny (NOID).

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