The Intercept: FBI Redirected a Quarter of Staff to Target Immigrants Under Trump’s Deportation Push

Kevin R. Johnson

02 May 2026

Akela Lacy for The Intercept reports that

"[t]he Federal Bureau of Investigation multiplied the number of employees assigned to immigration by a factor of 23 in the first nine months of the second Trump administration . . . . There were 279 FBI personnel working on `immigration-related matters' before Trump took office in January 2025 . . . . By September, that number had ballooned to more than 6,500."

The redeployment of FBI personnel came under the leadership of FBI Director Kash Patel.

Immigration Article of the Day: Sanctuary and the Data State by Fatma Marouf & Huyen Pham

Sanctuary and the Data State by Fatma Marouf & Huyen Pham, Columbia Law Review, Vol. 126, Forthcoming 2026 Abstract Historically, sanctuary policies focused on protected physical space and limits on police cooperation with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)—rejecting detainer requests, restricting jail access, and declining formal collaboration agreements. But

In an anti-fraud measure, U.S. government freezes Microsoft, Adobe, Infosys lawful permanent resident applications

Reuters reports (and here) that the Trump administration has frozen some lawful permanent resident filings by Microsoft (MSFT.O), Adobe(ADBE.O) and major IT outsourcers and opened probes into nine top universities, including Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Brown, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of Pittsburgh, Arizona State, and UC

Human Rights Watch: "To Scare People": US Expulsions of Third-Country Nationals to Countries in Africa

From a press release from Human Rights Watch: US: Deportations to African Countries Not Their Own Denied Due Process; Some Returned to Danger in Home Countries * The United States has sent more than 500 people whom it cannot deport to their own countries, because of the danger they would face,

Immigration Article of the Day: Recalibrating the Plenary Power Doctrine After Trump v. Hawaii, Thuraissigiam, and Loper Bright by Abdul Aziz Meslat

Recalibrating the Plenary Power Doctrine After Trump v. Hawaii, Thuraissigiam, and Loper Bright by Abdul Aziz Meslat Abstract This Article reexamines the constitutional foundations and contemporary operation of the plenary power doctrine in U.S. immigration law. For more than a century, the doctrine has afforded Congress and the Executive

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Immigration Article of the Day: Sanctuary and the Data State by Fatma Marouf & Huyen Pham

In an anti-fraud measure, U.S. government freezes Microsoft, Adobe, Infosys lawful permanent resident applications

Human Rights Watch: "To Scare People": US Expulsions of Third-Country Nationals to Countries in Africa

Immigration Article of the Day: Recalibrating the Plenary Power Doctrine After Trump v. Hawaii, Thuraissigiam, and Loper Bright by Abdul Aziz Meslat