Week of September 16–22, 2026

A federal judge in Washington, D.C., ruled on September 15 that the Department of Homeland Security likely violated the First Amendment when it delivered a "warning notice" to David Streever, a New York man who had emailed then acting ICE director Todd Lyons in January calling him a "monstrous human being" and comparing him to a Nazi. Agents visited Streever's home in June and later a hotel where he was staying with his daughter.

Judge Rudolph Contreras wrote that the notice "practically shouts that Mr Streever may be prosecuted if he continues to engage in his political speech." The preliminary injunction bars DHS, Secretary Markwayne Mullin and ICE from issuing another such notice or prosecuting Streever for his speech while the case proceeds.

A DHS spokesperson denied trying to suppress speech, saying ICE investigates all credible threats against its officers. The order still permits investigations of future conduct that do not target protected speech.

A week after the September 9 expiration date for Temporary Protected Status for El Salvador passed, the Trump administration had issued neither an extension nor a termination, leaving roughly 200,000 Salvadorans without a clear answer about their legal status. USCIS says only that an announcement will come "at the appropriate time" and that Salvadorans under TPS retain protection until then.

The administration has already terminated TPS for 13 of the 17 designated countries, and the Supreme Court cleared those efforts in June. Salvadorans were the first group granted the status, in 1990, and many have held it for 25 years or more.

Advocates say the silence is causing firings and employer confusion, particularly in Los Angeles and the Washington area, where more than 40,000 TPS holders live. Lawyers warn that a termination could be published at any time, since the automatic six-month extension applies only if an internal deadline is missed.

Source: Politico

A preliminary injunction from U.S. District Judge Maame Ewusi-Mensah Frimpong, which reached the public docket on September 16, orders immigration agents to stop making civil arrests without a warrant unless they first determine that the person is likely to escape before a warrant can be obtained. The order covers the Central District of California, including Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties.

Frimpong wrote that the government "is regularly abstaining from conducting a likelihood of escape analysis at all," and that unlawful presence alone is not enough to show escape risk. Agents must now document the specific facts supporting each warrantless arrest.

Plaintiffs' lawyers said a review of government arrest narratives found that 89 of 113 cases contained no escape-risk assessment or used template language. The judge denied the government's request for a 14-day stay. Similar practices have been blocked in Portland, Colorado and Washington, D.C.

Source: Los Angeles Times

The White House withdrew the nomination of former Oklahoma state trooper Lance Schroyer to lead Immigration and Customs Enforcement, according to a notice of withdrawals sent to the Senate on September 17. No reason was given.

Schroyer's nomination had been blocked by Sen. Rand Paul, chair of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, who was dissatisfied with the information the White House provided about the shootings of two U.S. citizens by federal agents in Minnesota, according to a person familiar with the decision.

Schroyer is a senior adviser to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and was the secretary's top pick for the job after acting director Todd Lyons left in April. He spent decades in Oklahoma local law enforcement but had no ICE experience. Acting ICE chief David Venturella has run the agency while the nomination was pending, leaving the agency without a Senate-confirmed director.

Source: NBC News

Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar, a Republican from Miami, released a campaign ad on September 17 addressing President Trump directly and saying that some of his immigration enforcement efforts "have gone too far." She said Hispanic voters who helped elect him in 2024 "feel betrayed today."

In the ad, Salazar said that in July half of the 50,000 people detained had no criminal record. CBS News has reported that July was the first month of Trump's second term in which people with only civil immigration violations made up more than half of those arrested. Salazar said she was not calling for amnesty but for "a dignified life in this promised land."

Nearly three-quarters of her Republican-leaning district is Hispanic. A recent CBS News poll found 55 percent of adults disapprove of the president's handling of immigration. Her Democratic opponent, Eliott Rodriguez, called the video "mind-boggling" and pointed to her voting record.

Source: CBS News

The White House said on September 18 that President Trump has extended for another year his executive order imposing a $100,000 fee on H-1B nonimmigrant visas. The original order, issued in September 2025, was due to expire this month.

The administration wants to raise the fee permanently from the current range of roughly $2,000 to $5,000. The order does not apply to renewals of existing visas or to foreign citizens already in the United States on student visas, who make up a large share of new H-1B recipients.

The fee remains tied up in litigation. A federal judge ruled in June that it was illegal and barred the government from collecting it, and a Boston-based appeals court is reviewing that decision. Another court is weighing a challenge brought by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The visas, created by Congress in 1990, are heavily used by technology employers recruiting from India and China.

Source: Reuters

A Department of Homeland Security rule that took effect September 18 allows immigration officers to deny green card applications based on the use of noncash public benefits, including Medicaid, food stamps, tuition assistance and free school lunch. Previously only direct cash payments and long-term institutional care were considered under the "public charge" standard, which dates to 1882.

DHS estimates the rule could cut federal and state payments by $13 billion a year by prompting about 950,000 people to disenroll from or avoid safety net programs. The rule applies to immediate relatives of citizens and permanent residents, fiances, and skilled and religious workers. Refugees and asylum seekers are exempt.

New York led 21 other states, the District of Columbia and several cities in suing over the rule, arguing it failed to consider harms to mixed-status families and U.S. citizen children. Analysts warn that vague guidance on which benefits count will produce inconsistent decisions.

Source: The Washington Post

A three-judge panel of the First U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on September 18 largely upheld a February district court decision declaring unlawful the DHS policy that allows rapid deportation of migrants to countries other than their own. The policy, adopted in March 2025, permitted removals with as little as six hours of notice when the destination country had not given the State Department assurances against persecution or torture.

Judge Seth Aframe wrote that immigration law requires a "meaningful" chance to raise fear-based claims and that DHS's reading would deny that protection to many noncitizens sent abroad with no notice of their destination.

Refugees International and Human Rights First count more than 25,000 people sent to at least 29 third countries, including Mexico, Uganda, Equatorial Guinea, Liberia and the Central African Republic. DHS General Counsel James Percival said the policy remains in force because the ruling is not yet in effect. The case is expected to reach the Supreme Court.

Source: Reuters

ICE officer Christian Castro, 52, pleaded not guilty on September 18 in federal court in St. Paul to six counts of making false statements about the January 14 shooting of Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis, a 24-year-old Venezuelan man wounded in the leg when Castro fired through the front door of a Minneapolis home.

Prosecutors say Castro falsely told the FBI that he had been attacked by men wielding a broom and a shovel. He appeared in state court in Hennepin County a day earlier on four counts of second-degree assault with a dangerous weapon and one count of falsely reporting a crime, and was released with an ankle monitor and ordered to surrender his passport and firearms.

Castro, who has been suspended without pay, was arrested in Texas in May on a nationwide warrant, and his extradition became a months-long dispute between Minnesota and Texas officials. The shooting occurred during the federal immigration operation in the Twin Cities.

Source: CNN

Immigration arrests reached their highest recorded monthly level in August even as large, visible raids have become less common, according to an analysis by The Marshall Project of ICE data obtained by the Deportation Data Project at Berkeley and UCLA. Reporter Lauren Villagran described the shift on PBS NewsHour on September 18 as a "shadow surge."

Arrests have more than doubled this year in 15 states and the District of Columbia, driven partly by more than 2,000 agreements between ICE and state and local law enforcement agencies. Florida's highway patrol hands over thousands of people stopped for minor traffic violations, and one Ohio sheriff's department has 44 deputies deputized for immigration arrests. Missouri now has 130 such agreements.

Villagran said 70 percent of the more than 65,000 people detained in a July snapshot had no criminal conviction, and that Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin promised "results without the headlines" when he took office.

Source: PBS NewsHour

Almost 80 percent of unaccompanied children placed in immigration court proceedings in July, and more than 90 percent in August, were sent to shelter networks in Texas, according to an analysis by the data platform bklg.org shared with the Guardian. That amounts to 925 children in Office of Refugee Resettlement custody with open Texas cases, 651 of them placed there in July and August alone.

Texas does not license ORR care providers, which reduces child welfare oversight, and legal representation rates are low. Nationally, 31.7 percent of children in ORR custody with active cases have a notice of representation on file; the figure is 17.2 percent in Houston, 18.6 percent in El Paso and 8.7 percent in San Antonio.

Advocates fear the concentration of children near the border is preparation for removal flights. ORR did not respond to a request for comment. The agency is also seeking contracts for emergency influx facilities with up to 3,000 beds while operating at about 27 percent capacity.

Source: The Guardian

The Department of Homeland Security published a notice on September 21 extending its Finding of Mass Influx of Aliens for another 180 days. The finding was first issued on January 23, 2025 and has been extended repeatedly, most recently in March 2026 through September 17, 2026.

Under 8 U.S.C. 1103(a), a mass influx finding lets the secretary authorize state and local law enforcement officers, with their superiors' consent, to perform the duties of federal immigration officers. Related regulations at 28 CFR 65.83 permit the secretary to request state or local assistance in administering the immigration laws and to declare an immigration emergency.

The notice states that circumstances endangering the lives, property, safety or welfare of residents of all 50 states continue to exist and that an actual or imminent mass influx is arriving at the southern border. It cites Proclamation 10888 and the figure of at least 8 million people encountered at the southern border between 2020 and 2024.

Source: Federal Register