The Biden administration is reportedly flying Cameroonian nationals previously deported by the Trump administration back into the United States.
According to The Washington Free Beacon, the asylum claims of between 80-90 deported Cameroonians between 2019 and 2021 had been deemed invalid. But some are now back in the U.S., current and former ICE officials told the outlet. The program through which the Biden administration is bringing them appears to have been developed following a 2022 Human Rights Watch report about their alleged mistreatment back home.
Internal memos reviewed by the Free Beacon show an ICE official working with outside nonprofits to help relocate the Cameroonians. One email from earlier this year reviewed by the Free Beacon shows the director of the Immigrant Rights Clinic at Texas A&M University, Fatma Marouf, informing an ICE official where one migrant will arrive.
In that incident, the migrant arrived at Washington-Dulles airport in Virginia. ICE officials familiar with the program say airports around the country are being used as ports of entry for the Cameroonians in an attempt to keep the public in the dark about the program and avoid concentrating the migrants in a single location.
Marouf did not respond to a request for comment.
The official rationale for the program, according to internal memos reviewed by the Free Beacon, is to avoid a "potential lawsuit." There is pending litigation in New York over documents related to alleged abuse of Cameroonian migrants, but no court has ordered their return. [...]
Both current and former ICE officials expressed alarm about whether this program will be a model for others in the future. (The Washington Free Beacon)
"These individuals were deported by the order of a court after they were afforded all due process rights," former ICE chief of staff Tom Blank told the Free Beacon. "For DHS to arbitrarily reverse court orders to satisfy complaints from an activist group makes a joke out of the entire legal immigration process. It looks like outside activist groups now run the DHS immigration process instead of the courts."
X users sounded off on the report.
"It's all by design," commented the Trump War Room account.
"Invasion by design," said Rep. Dan Bishop (R-NC).
"The Democrats believe America needs even MORE illegal immigrants," Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) argued.