End of TPS for many New Yorkers
Giddel Contreras and his wife Maribel Hernandez Rivera are planning for the worst. Contreras is a Honduran national whose future is unknown. In 1998, Contreras obtained Temporary Protected Status, also known as TPS. Honduras had suffered a natural disaster that year so the U.S. government granted TPS to Hondurans allowing them to remain in the U.S. legally.
Trump's MS-13 talk
President Trump hosted a discussion on Long Island with several elected officials, law enforcement, and members of the community to talk about gangs, violence, and illegal immigration.
VIDEO: Ranting lawyer dodges reporters
In this video from the New York Post, Manhattan lawyer Aaron Schlossberg hid his face behind an open umbrella outside his West 60th Street building. As reporters peppered him with questions about his angry, hateful tirade at Fresh Kitchen, Schlossberg stormed off.
Justices weigh travel ban
At the much-anticipated oral argument on Wednesday, a divided United States Supreme Court signaled that it just might give its blessing to President Trump's travel ban. The big question before the justices: is Trump's travel ban a legitimate act of national security or unconstitutionally anti-Muslim?
Cuomo condemns ICE raid
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo threatened to sue federal immigration officials Wednesday following a raid on an upstate dairy farm during which armed federal agents allegedly trespassed on private property and handcuffed an American citizen who tried to videotape the incident.
Trump frustrated by border wall delays
Until he gets his border wall, President Donald Trump announced he wants to deploy the U.S. military to secure the border with Mexico. The White House later said Trump wants to mobilize the National Guard. The president was still fired up as he has been for days about illegal immigration. Federal law prohibits the use of active duty service members for law enforcement inside the U.S., unless specifically authorized by Congress. But over the past 12 years, presidents have twice sent National Guard troops to the border to bolster security and assist with surveillance and other support.
U.S. Census lawsuit
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has fought the Trump travel ban, the cancellation of DACA, and now the change coming to the U.S. Census in 2020. Schneiderman's lawsuit says the Trump administration added the citizenship question to deter immigrant participation. He argues that intent is at odds with the U.S. Constitution's command that the Census count every person in the United States.
Trump: 'DACA is dead'
"DACA is dead," according to President Trump, who unleashed a string of immigration-themed tweets. The fate of the program giving legal status to undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. as children has been uncertain since Trump ended it in 2017. The president blamed Democrats for the failure to reach a deal on DACA-related legislation.
No deal on DACA
As President Trump took to Twitter Easter Sunday to blame Democrats for no deal on DACA, a man in Brooklyn is now wondering what will happen to him. Ricardo Aca attends Baruch College and studies commercial photography. But his journey to the U.S. started when he was 14. His sister, who was 12 at the time, his stepfather and a group snuck across the border from Mexico. Then they met someone, hopped in a van, and then drove to Bushwick to meet his mom, who paved the way. He hadn't seen her in two years.
Sanctuary church standoff
A Guatemalan immigrant who has found refuge from ICE at the Fourth Universalist Society, a historic church in Manhattan, said she will fight to prevent being separated from her children. Aura Hernandez, a mother of two who used to clean homes, has lived illegally in the U.S. since 2005. She worries that if she leaves the church that she will be deported.
ICE detainee escapes
A man who was in the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents escaped and ran out of John F. Kennedy Airport Tuesday night. It happened inside Terminal 4 while the detainee was supposed to be boarding a commercial flight back to Senegal, Port Authority Police said. Agents had removed handcuffs from Mohamadou Lamine Mbacke, 31, and were about to bring him on to a plane when he ran off at about 8:30 p.m., according to ICE.
Museum preps immigrants for citizenship
A group got a special history lesson at the New-York Historical Society—a lesson they'll need in order to pass a very important exam. The society and CUNY Citizenship Now! partnered in summer 2017 to launch the Citizenship Project—an initiative helping the more than 1 million legal immigrants in New York become American citizens through civics and American history classes.
NYCLU sues feds over immigrant children
The New York Civil Liberties Union has filed a class action lawsuit against the Office of Refugee Resettlement, accusing the agency of keeping immigrant children in prolonged detention. The NYCLU says immigrant minors who don't have any ties to gangs are being detained illegally and indefinitely.
DACA injunction
For the second time in two months, a federal judge has barred President Donald Trump's administration from ending the Obama-era DACA program for now. The program, which protects undocumented immigrants who came to the U.S. when they were minors, was set to expire March 5, 2018.
Health worker shortage
The Menorah Center for Rehabilitation and Nursing Care in Brooklyn could soon be facing a labor shortage. That's because many in the pool of workers the Center normally hires from to be certified nurse assistants (or CNAs), worry about their immigration status.
Immigrants get temporary reprieve
Yohanes Tasik, Harry Pangemanan, and Arthur Jemmy are breathing a little bit easier after a federal judge temporarily halted their deportation. The three undocumented Indonesian immigrants had been seeking sanctuary in the Reformed Highland Church in Highland Park, New Jersey, to prevent ICE agents from detaining them. Last month, Gov. Phil Murphy visited the men at the church to give them his support.
Immigration reform, DACA, border wall
The future remains uncertain for so-called dreamers gathered in Brentwood, Long Island, to criticize President Donald Trump after his state of the union address. Blanca Villanueva, whose parents are immigrants, said at Wednesday's rally that Trump "knows nothing" about immigration policy and the needs of her community. Nearly 700,000 unauthorized immigrants who call themselves "dreamers" under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program.
Grieving mom at SOTU
During his State of the Union address, President Donald Trump honored the parents of victims of MS-13 gang violence. Among his guests was Evelyn Rodriguez, who said that protecting kids is more important than any political agenda. her daughter, Kayla Cuevas, 16, was brutally murdered by members of the vicious gang in 2016.
DACA case in court
A federal judge in Brooklyn heard arguments for a preliminary injunction to block President Donald Trump's decision to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, also known as DACA. U.S. District Judge Nicholas Garaufis accused the president of making vicious anti-immigrant statements.
Trump administration vs. sanctuary cities
The U.S. Justice Department on Wednesday threatened to subpoena 23 jurisdictions if they don't turn over information about their "sanctuary" policies—triggering a backlash from mayors across the country who pulled out of a White House meeting. Several Democratic mayors—including New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio—announced they would boycott a planned working session with the president at the White House on Wednesday.