Tag Archives: New Orleans

Newsweek: Iranian woman who has lived in US for four decades detained by ICE

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Mandana Kashanian, a 64-year-old Iranian woman who came to the United States at 17 years old just ahead of the 1979 Iranian Revolution, was arrested by U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE) on Sunday and is being in detention in Louisiana.

Newsweek has confirmed her detention in the ICE detainee database.

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Kashanian came to the U.S. on a student visa on July 24, 1978 and “gained authorization to remain in the U.S. until May 31, 1983 by changing her status to that of a spouse of a nonimmigrant student” according to documents from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit reviewed by Newsweek.

She eventually applied for asylum, but her claim was denied, according to the 2001 court documents. Her family told MSNBC that she applied for asylum and was denied multiple times. Kashanian has appealed several court decisions relating to her status as well as filing a motion to reopen appeals.

She married early on and then divorced. She then married Russ Milne, a U.S. citizen, in 1990 and the couple share a 32-year-old daughter together, who is also a U.S. citizen. Part of the complication of Kashanian’s status is due to her first marriage, which the court reported as “improper” and fraudulent, and subsequently interfered with her green card application once married to Milne.

Her father had worked as an engineer for the Shah in Tehran, according to Nola.com, and she claimed she would “experience extreme hardship if deported,” per court documents.

The local outlet said she was granted a stay of removal on the basis that she comply with immigration requirements, which her family says she has always met. Her husband told MSNBC on Friday that she has no criminal history.

She has lived in the states for almost 50 years, setting down roots in New Orleans. She shares Persian recipes on a YouTube channel, was involved in her daughter’s parent-teacher association, volunteered after Hurricane Katrina, and helps out family and neighbors, her husband told MSNBC.

On June 22, she was arrested by officers in unmarked vehicles, her neighbor Sarah Gerig, told Nola.com, noting that the arrest was less than a minute.

Kashanian is currently held in South Louisiana ICE processing center, according to the ICE database. The GEO Group runs the 1,000-person capacity facility located in Basile, Louisiana.

Iranian woman who has lived in US for four decades detained by ICE
Mandana Kashanian, who came to the U.S. as a teenager on a student visa in 1978, has been arrested by immigration officials and is in an ICE detention facility.

https://www.newsweek.com/iranian-woman-who-has-lived-us-four-decades-detained-ice-2092082

Associated Press: After decades in the US, Iranians arrested in Trump’s deportation drive

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Mandonna “Donna” Kashanian lived in the United States for 47 years, married a U.S. citizen and raised their daughter. She was gardening in the yard of her New Orleans home when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers handcuffed and took her away, her family said.

Kashanian arrived in 1978 on a student visa and applied for asylum, fearing retaliation for her father’s support of the U.S.-backed shah. She lost her bid, but she was allowied to remain with her husband and child if she checked in regularly with immigration officials, her husband and daughter said. She complied, once checking in from South Carolina during Hurricane Katrina. She is now being held at an immigration detention center in Basile, Louisiana, while her family tries to get information.

Other Iranians are also getting arrested by immigration authorities after decades in the United States. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security won’t say how many people they’ve arrested, but U.S. military strikes on Iran have fueled fears that there is more to come.

“Some level of vigilance, of course, makes sense, but what it seems like ICE has done is basically give out an order to round up as many Iranians as you can, whether or not they’re linked to any threat and then arrest them and deport them, which is very concerning,” said Ryan Costello, policy director of the National Iranian American Council, an advocacy group.

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But over four decades, Kashanian, 64, built a life in Louisiana. The couple met when she was bartending as a student in the late 1980s. They married and had a daughter. She volunteered with Habitat for Humanity, filmed Persian cooking tutorials on YouTube and was a grandmother figure to the children next door.

The fear of deportation always hung over the family, Milne said, but he said his wife did everything that was being asked of her.

“She’s meeting her obligations,” Milne said. “She’s retirement age. She’s not a threat. Who picks up a grandmother?”

While Iranians have been crossing the border illegally for years, especially since 2021, they have faced little risk of being deported to their home countries due to severed diplomatic relations with the U.S. That seems to no longer be the case.

After decades in the US, Iranians arrested in Trump’s deportation drive
Some Iranians are getting arrested by immigration authorities after living decades in the United States.

https://apnews.com/article/iran-immigration-arrests-us-trump-deportations-9a4136657bda3a277125738807848368

Newsweek: Marine veteran says wife detained by ICE at green card interview

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Agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detained the wife of a Marine veteran during a green card interview in New Orleans, according to the veteran and his attorney.

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Adrian and Paola Clouatre married in California in 2022. The Marine met his wife while in the last of five years of military service.

Now residing in Louisiana, they had been working through the legal process to secure Paola Clouatre’s U.S. residency. The couple, who have two young children including a 9-week-old daughter, were surprised by ICE’s intervention that stemmed from a years-old deportation order.

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Paola Clouatre, a Mexican national, entered the U.S. as a minor. She was 14 when she came to the country with her mother, who applied for asylum but failed to arrive for a trial on that claim two years later, according to NOLA.com.

The couple reportedly learned of this order days before their green card appointment in May, when they truthfully disclosed the situation on government forms.

“She knew she had to do it,” Adrian Clouatre told NOLA.com. “She was very fearful about all this, but also very hopeful.”

Near the end of his five-year service, he took her to a green card interview, where she was detained.

https://www.newsweek.com/marine-green-card-ice-immigration-detained-2086677

Esquire: Somehow Republicans Are Defending Kristi Noem After the Forceful Removal of Senator Alex Padilla

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I thought assaulting someone holding federal office was a crime. Not anymore, apparently.

So, apparently we’re bum-rushing US senators now. From The Guardian:

In video taken of the incident that has since gone viral on social media, Padilla is seen being restrained and removed from the room by Secret Service agents.“I’m Senator Alex Padilla. I have questions for the secretary,” Padilla shouts, as he struggles to move past the men removing him from the premises. “Hands off!” he says at one point.Emerging afterward, Padilla, who is the ranking member of the judiciary subcommittee on immigration, citizenship and border safety, said he and his colleagues had repeatedly asked DHS for more information on its “increasingly extreme immigration enforcement actions” but had not received a response to his inquiries.

This tinhorn governor of a state where nobody lives, this puppy-murdering hack whose political career outside of MAGA World was as dead as Custer, now gets to sic her black-shirted thugs on the senior senator of a state that she and her criminal boss and all their attendant lords have been lying about, and about which she had flown to Los Angeles to lie about some more.

Dumbass in a ballcap says what? She just admitted they’re blowing up the town to get rid of the mayor and governor. If the courts ever get their teeth back, this gaffe will figure prominently in many filings.

Meanwhile, Padilla is hauled into a backroom and driven to the floor and handcuffed.

And not for nothing, but threatening and/or assaulting the holder of any federal office is a felony and could draw you five to ten in the pokey. And these goons are pretty identifiable.

And, of course, the administration’s prevarication mill went into full operation almost instantly. From The New Republic via Yahoo:

In posts on X, the official DHS account and Assistant DHS Secretary Tricia McLaughlin released a statement attempting to justify wrestling Padilla to the ground and handcuffing him. “Senator Padilla chose disrespectful political theatre and interrupted a live press conference without identifying himself or having his Senate security pin on as he lunged toward Secretary Noem,” the statement read.

Tricia learned to lie like this at the AEI’s Leadership Institute.

But in a video of the altercation from Padilla’s office, the senator could be heard clearly identifying himself. “Hands off! I’m Senator Alex Padilla, and I have questions for the secretary,” said the California Democrat as a security guard pushed him out of the room.

It’s clear that the goons looked at him and just saw another angry brown face. And by their reactions, Tricia and her boss are similarly afflicted.

This is also all my bollocks. Noem knows who Padilla is and, if she doesn’t, she should, and he did identify himself. Third-rate hack with a fourth-rate alibi.

And what about Speaker Moses? What did you expect?

That sanctimonious sumbitch wants Padilla censured. And he spent the afternoon hiding. If he’s a Christian, I’m an Ostrogoth.

The day was not without its burlesque, however. In a House Oversight Committee hearing, Rep. Maxwell Frost asked Chairman James (Jughead) Comer to issue a subpoena for Noem regarding the events of the day. Comer, of course, refused, probably because Padilla was not carrying Hunter Biden’s laptop at the time. And then we were off.

Somehow Republicans Are Defending Kristi Noem After the Forceful Removal of Senator Alex Padilla
I thought assaulting someone holding federal office was a crime. Not anymore, apparently.

https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a65058840/senator-padilla-kristi-noem-james-comer-marjorie-taylor-greene

Associated Press: Family of 2-year-old US citizen deported to Honduras drops lawsuit against Trump administration

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A federal judge in Louisiana had raised questions about the girl’s deportation, saying the government did not prove it had done so properly.

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Lawyers for the girl’s father insisted he wanted the girl to remain with him in the U.S., while ICE said the mother had wanted the girl to be deported with her to Honduras.

In a court filing, lawyers for the father said ICE indicated that it was holding the girl in a bid to induce the father to turn himself in.

ICE holding a two-year-old girl hostage for leverage against her father? Nothing would surprise me.

Family of 2-year-old US citizen deported to Honduras drops lawsuit against Trump administration
Lawyers for the 2-year-old U.S. citizen who was deported with her mother to Honduras confirmed that the family is lifting its lawsuit against the administration of U.S.

https://apnews.com/article/honduras-deported-child-lawsuit-dropped-d15e3cfa8d44f8eca9c87cb640f92422

Independent: More than half of Americans tell Trump to stay away from colleges and disapprove of his higher education attacks

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A new AP-NORC poll finds that the majority of Americans disapprove of President Donald Trump’s stance on colleges and universities as he intensifies threats to cut federal funding unless schools comply with his political agenda.

More than half of Americans, 56 percent, disapprove of the Trump administration’s approach to higher education, while about four in 10 approve, reflecting his overall job approval ratings.

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This targeting of universities appears out of step with the wider American public, which sees such institutions as key to scientific research, new ideas, and innovation.

More than half of Americans tell Trump to back off colleges and their funding
Targeting of universities is out of step with the wider American public, which sees such institutions as key to scientific research, new ideas, and innovation, according to new research

https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-harvard-university-funding-poll-b2748586.html

Blavity: Trump’s DOJ Lifts School Desegregation Order From The Civil Rights Era

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This is a giant — and unnecessary — step backwards. Resegragation or — even worse — a return to “separate but equal” days may well follow.

“It probably means the opposite — that the school district remains segregated,” who worked in the DOJ Civil Rights Division during the Joe Biden administration, told the Associated Press. “And in fact, most of these districts are now more segregated today than they were in 1954.”

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“It’s really just signaling that the backsliding that has started some time ago is complete,” antidiscrimination law professor at Tulane University Law School in New Orleans, Robert Westley said. “The United States government doesn’t really care anymore of dealing with problems of racial discrimination in the schools. It’s over.”

Trump’s DOJ Lifts School Desegregation Order From The Civil Rights Era
The Department of Justice has lifted a decades-old school desegregation order in Louisiana this week.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/trump-s-doj-lifts-school-desegregation-order-from-the-civil-rights-era/ar-AA1E4vVf

ACLU: ICE Deports 3 U.S. Citizen Children Held Incommunicado Prior to the Deportation

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Families disappeared and isolated without legal access; one child with cancer deported without medication and pregnant mother deported as well

Today, in the early hours of the morning, the New Orleans Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Field Office deported at least two families, including two mothers and their minor children – three of whom are U.S. citizen children aged 2, 4, and 7. One of the mothers is currently pregnant. The families, who had lived in the United States for years and had deep ties to their communities, were deported from the U.S. under deeply troubling circumstances that raise serious due process concerns.

ICE detained the first family on Tuesday, April 22, and the second family on Thursday, April 24. In both cases, ICE held the families incommunicado, refusing or failing to respond to multiple attempts by attorneys and family members to contact them. In one instance, a mother was granted less than one minute on the phone before the call was abruptly terminated when her spouse tried to provide legal counsel’s phone number.

As a result, the families were completely isolated during critical moments when decisions were being made about the welfare of their minor children. This included decisions with serious implications for the health, safety, and legal rights of the children involved–without any opportunity to coordinate with caretakers or consult with legal representatives.

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Both families have possible immigration relief, but because ICE denied them access to their attorneys, legal counsel was unable to assist and advise them in time. With one family, government attorneys had assured legal counsel that a legal call would be arranged within 24-48 hours, as well as a call with a family member. Instead, just after close of business and after courts closed for the day, ICE suddenly reversed course and informed counsel that the family would be deported at 6am the next morning–before the court reopened.

ICE Deports 3 U.S. Citizen Children Held Incommunicado Prior to the Deportation | American Civil Liberties Union
Families disappeared and isolated without legal access; one child with cancer deported without medication and pregnant mother deported as well
ICE Deports 3 U.S. Citizen Children Held Incommunicado Prior to the Deportation

Washington Post: Khalil ruling to test Trump deportation tactic of sending detainees to Louisiana

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Columbia University student Mahmoud Khalil’s attorneys were stunned when an immigration judge in Jena, Louisiana, announced this week that she would rule on whether he should be deported on Friday — three days after his initial court appearance.

“That is, in my opinion, contrary to every notion of due process,” Marc Van Der Hout, one of his attorneys, told reporters Thursday.

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Though they remain detained in Louisiana as their immigration court proceedings move forward, Khalil and Ozturk successfully blocked the Trump administration’s attempts to establish federal court jurisdiction in that state. Their attorneys argued that the government secretly arrested the scholars and shuttled them between locations without public disclosure to make it more difficult for them to file habeas corpus petitions in courts closer to home.

A federal judge in New York ruled last month that Khalil’s lawsuit alleging the government violated his constitutional rights to free speech should take place in New Jersey, where he was briefly held before being transferred. His attorneys said that even if the immigration judge in Louisiana rules he can be deported, his federal court challenge could stop his removal if they are victorious.

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The administration’s strategy “is to isolate the individuals from their communities, their legal support, their families, in hopes that media attention and mobilization around their cases dies down,” said Ramzi Kassem, co-director at CLEAR, a legal nonprofit and clinic at City University of New York that is representing Khalil and Ozturk.

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The unusual aspect of the Trump administration’s approach, Sandweg said, is how quickly federal authorities relocated the university scholars. Detainee transfers can take up to two weeks, he said, but the Trump administration moved them within days.

Pointing to Khalil’s case, Sandweg said it raises “very complicated questions of the First Amendment. If you know this case is headed to the courts well in advance, the speed in which he was taken to Louisiana so quickly is unusual. That means they were thinking about those legal issues before the operation and had a plan to get him on the plane to Louisiana.”

Khalil ruling tests Trump deportation tactic of sending detainees to Louisiana
Attorneys have contended the Trump administration is purposely holding detained students in ICE facilities in conservative judicial districts.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/politics/government/khalil-ruling-to-test-trump-deportation-tactic-of-sending-detainees-to-louisiana/ar-AA1CJ2QI