WASHINGTON: The Trump administration has given immigration officers broader powers to detain legal refugees awaiting a green card to ensure they are “re-vetted”, an apparent expansion of the president’s wide-ranging crackdown on legal and illegal immigration, according to a government memo.

The US Department of Homeland Security, in a memo dated Feb 18 and submitted in a federal court filing, said refugees must return to government custody for “inspection and examination” a year after their admission into the United States.

“This detain-and-inspect requirement ensures that refugees are re-vetted after one year, aligns post-admission vetting with that applied to other applicants for admission, and promotes public safety,” the department said in the memo.

Under US law, refugees must apply for lawful permanent resident status one year after their arrival in the country. The new memo authorises immigration authorities to detain individuals for the duration of the re-inspection process.

Judge throws out immigration board’s ruling endorsing president’s mass detention policy

Refugee rights

The new policy is a shift from the earlier 2010 memorandum, which stated that failure to obtain lawful permanent resident status was not a “basis” for removal from the country and not a “proper basis” for detention. The decision has prompted criticism from refugee advocacy groups.

AfghanEvac’s president Shawn VanDiver called the directive “a reckless reversal of long-standing policy” and said it “breaks faith with people the United States lawfully admitted and promised protection.” HIAS, formerly known as the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, said the “move will cause grave harm to thousands of people who were welcomed to the United States after fleeing violence and persecution.” Under President Donald Trump, the number of people in ICE detention reached about 68,000 this month, up about 75pc from when he took office last year.

Trump’s hardline immigration agenda was a potent campaign issue that helped him win the 2024 election.

Trump policy blocked

A federal judge threw out on Wednesday an administrative board’s decision endorsing the Trump administration’s policy of subjecting thousands of people arrested during its immigration crackdown to mandatory detention.

US District Judge Sunshine Sykes in Riverside, California, vacated the decision by the Board of Immigration Appeals after finding the administration had failed to comply with her earlier order declaring unlawful the underlying policy of denying detainees the chance to seek release on bond.

Sykes’ Wednesday ruling, in a class action lawsuit that covers migrants nationwide, is more sweeping than decisions by hundreds of other US judges holding the policy is unlawful and ordering detainees to be freed or given bond hearings.

Sykes, appointed by former Democratic President Joe Biden, called the administration’s actions “shameless” and accused it of trying to continue its “campaign of illegal action” by still refusing bond hearings despite her prior ruling. “Respondents have far crossed the boundaries of constitutional conduct,” Sykes wrote.

The US Department of Homeland Security and the US Department of Justice, which oversees the board, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Sykes’ ruling means the board’s decision can no longer be used by immigration judges to deny bond hearings, said Niels Frenzen, a professor at the University of Southern California’s Gould School of Law who represented the plaintiffs.

“We hope that DHS and the immigration courts will now comply with the court’s orders to provide bond hearings to the thousands of noncitizens who have been arrested,” he said in a statement.

Federal immigration law prescribes mandatory detention for “applicants for admission” to the United States, while their cases proceed in immigration courts and they are ineligible for bond hearings.

Published in Dawn, February 20th, 2026