US charges 11 in sham marriage immigration scheme, following Trump 'birth tourism' order

Kevin R. Johnson

13 Aug 2026 — 1 min read

Andrew Goudsward for Reuters the U.S. Justice Department yesterday charged 11 people in a decade-long scheme that arranged about 1,000 sham marriages to allow mostly ‌Chinese nationals to achieve legal immigration status in the United States, according to court documents.

"According to the indictment, from at least 2016 through July 2026, the defendants operated a nationwide and international marriage fraud network that arranged sham marriages between foreign nationals — primarily citizens of the People’s Republic of China — and United States citizens. Although based principally in New York City, the network allegedly arranged sham marriages throughout the United States and overseas including in Connecticut, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, Florida, Vanuatu, and China. "

Austin Kocher: Getting Our Bearings in an Age of Mass Deportation

The Baseline, a new monthly column on Documented by ImmigrationProf blogger Austin Kocher, explores the impact of rising immigration enforcement. The first installment begins "We are living through one of the most intense periods of immigration enforcement in American history. "

A Reckoning in Springfield: A truck driver out on his route confronts what the country has become

A Reckoning in Springfield: A truck driver out on his route confronts what the country has become by Stephanie McCrummen in the Atlantic Monthly (subscription required) tells a disturbing story of the real life impacts on U.S. citizens of the end of Temporary Protected Status for Haitians.

Immigration Article of the Day: Affidavits Are Forever: Public Charge, Domestic Violence, and the Enforceability of Immigration Law's Affidavit of Support by Veronica Thronson

Affidavits Are Forever: Public Charge, Domestic Violence, and the Enforceability of Immigration Law's Affidavit of Support by Veronica Thronson, 41 Yale Law & Policy Review 69 (2022) Abstract Part I of this Article provides a brief background on the central role that family relationships play in the immigration

ICE Put Protester Photos Into a Palantir Database

In a class action lawsuit related to the DHS action "Operation Catch of the Day" in Maine, newly released documents reveal that ICE agents took photos of immigration protestors and fed them into a Palantir surveillance database. (See, e.g., Yahoo! News; Wired Magazine). I became aware of

Read more

Austin Kocher: Getting Our Bearings in an Age of Mass Deportation

A Reckoning in Springfield: A truck driver out on his route confronts what the country has become

Immigration Article of the Day: Affidavits Are Forever: Public Charge, Domestic Violence, and the Enforceability of Immigration Law's Affidavit of Support by Veronica Thronson

ICE Put Protester Photos Into a Palantir Database