Feb. 5 (UPI) -- President Donald Trump's onslaught of executive orders and policy changes, many signed on his first day in office, outline his plan to carry out mass deportations and crack down on unauthorized entries into the United States.
Some of these efforts have already been met with legal challenges and may ultimately be unenforceable, however, Jeff Joseph, president-elect of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, told UPI the desired effects have still been met.
"The message they're sending is they intend on being extremely enforcement minded when it comes to immigration," Joseph said. "The point is to send a message of disruption, chaos, hope that people will deport themselves. It creates fear and separates families because people will pick up and leave. It's not been done because they want to be successful [in court]. It's because they want to create mass hysteria."
The executive order titled "Protecting the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship" has been quickly met with lawsuits as it seeks to eliminate birthright citizenship from the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution. It interprets the amendment to say that "citizenship does not automatically extend to persons born in the United States" if their parents were not "lawfully present" or a permanent resident of the country at the time of their birth.
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This interpretation breaks from a longstanding understanding of the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment, dating back to its ratification in 1868.
"We heard rumors of coming for undocumented folks. To expand this to people who are in the country lawfully was kind of shocking to the system," Joseph said. "I want to highlight that Indians and Chinese people who are on H-1B visas could be here for decades before being legal. Any child you have during that time that is stuck in that green card backlog is no longer a citizen based on this executive order. It shocks the conscience."
Seven lawsuits have been filed against the Trump administration over this executive order, including two in New Hampshire and Massachusetts that were filed immediately after it was signed.
On Jan. 23, a federal judge signed a restraining order that blocked Trump's attempt to end birthright citizenship for the time being. Judge John Coughenhour called the attempt "blatantly unconstitutional."
In the past, Joseph would have been confident that the U.S. Supreme Court would uphold the Fourteenth Amendment but he is not as confident about how the court will respond after Roe vs. Wade was overturned in 2022,
"I do have concerns. This court is also super concerned with executive overreach," he said. "They don't like executives to have unchecked power. This isn't even a situation with usurping the law. This is a president, through executive order, claiming fiat over the whole Constitution."
Trump has signed seven executive orders overhauling U.S. immigration policies while also giving directives to enforcement agencies like U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to take aggressive actions to detain immigrants. He also revoked a number of Biden administration policies that were aimed at creating a more humane immigration system and resettling refugees.
In their place, Trump has reverted back to policies from his first administration. He has suspended the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program to realign its priorities toward only admitting refugees "who can fully and appropriately assimilate."
The U.S. attorney general is directed to focus on so-called sanctuary cities, seeking possible violations and encouraging stricter enforcement of immigration laws.
Reports of raids have spurred up across the country, beginning within hours of Trump's presidency. Along with workplace raids that were touted by his border czar Tom Homan, the president has directed immigration officials to raid schools and churches.
Chief among his actions, Trump declared a national emergency at the southern border, directing military resources to be sent to the border and calling for additional physical barriers to be constructed. He has clarified the role the military will play under his presidency, placing a priority on "securing the border." He also authorized state law enforcement to work with federal agencies to identify and detain people who are not legally authorized to reside in the country.
The overarching goal, according to the national emergency, is to stem the flow of migrants coming into the country without authorization.
The quick mobilization of immigration officers and aggressive tactics should come as no surprise, according to Donald Sherman, executive director and chief counsel for Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. He told UPI the presidential transition team prepares the incoming administration to begin executing its agenda immediately. Trump was clear on the campaign trail about what he intended to do.
"Donald Trump said that he wanted to terminate the Constitution and I think his first week and a half back in office, he demonstrated a number of actions that violate the Constitution, violate the separation of powers and are otherwise illegal," Sherman said.
"The legal actions demonstrate that the American public -- folks that we represented in our case challenging [the Department of Government Efficiency], like veterans, teachers -- are not going to sit by and allow this president, who has been convicted of multiple felonies and demonstrated his lawlessness, violate the law unchallenged."
None of Trump's actions clarify how legal pathways to citizenship will be improved or otherwise reformed.
Within moments of him being sworn in, the CBP One App, a tool that helps hopeful immigrants schedule appointments at the southern border, was shut down. This effectively stopped people from tracking their existing appointments or making new arrangements immediately.
CBP One was a free app administered by U.S. Customs and Border Protection. It allowed noncitizens who were seeking asylum, work permits or other forms of legal entry to submit information and documents before arriving at the border. It was used by more than 1 million people who came to the United States on temporary work permits or through other forms of authorization.
Unlike other moves by the administration, the removal of the CBP One App is unlikely to face a legal challenge, Joseph said.
"It's an administrative tool that the agency is using. It's not a right," Joseph said. "It was not perfect. Nobody thought it was perfect but it served a purpose to try and create some order at the border. It's really unfortunate they have taken it away."
