Video: Trump govt begins arresting foreigners with expired U.S. visas at airports

The administration of US President Donald Trump has expanded immigration enforcement at airports, with foreign nationals holding expired visas now being arrested while travelling through major airports across the country, according to a report by The New York Times.

The report said immigration agents in plain clothes have detained travelers at check-in counters, boarding gates and arrival areas in at least 15 US airports in recent weeks, marking a significant expansion of the administration’s mass deportation campaign.

Among those reportedly targeted are spouses of US citizens, professionals awaiting work visa extensions and former exchange programme participants.

Some of the arrests have taken place quietly, while others have been captured on video by fellow passengers and widely shared on social media.

According to The New York Times, the expanded operation builds on an existing arrangement between the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), under which airlines share passenger information with security officials. The programme had previously focused on individuals with existing deportation orders but has now been broadened to include people whose visas have expired.

The move significantly widens the pool of people eligible for detention, as hundreds of thousands of visitors and immigrants overstay their visas each year. Many of them are legally awaiting decisions on visa renewals or permanent residency applications and have valid work authorisations.

In the past, such individuals were generally not prioritised for deportation unless they had committed criminal offences. However, the Trump administration has adopted a tougher stance, treating all visa overstays as immigration violations subject to enforcement.

Responding to the report, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security said the administration was working to prevent undocumented immigrants from travelling domestically.

“This administration is working diligently to ensure that aliens in our country illegally can no longer fly unless it is out of our country to self-deport,” the spokesperson said, although the department did not confirm the reported expansion of the airport enforcement programme.

The department has not disclosed how many people have been detained under the initiative, but the arrests come as the White House pushes ICE to increase immigration enforcement nationwide. The administration has reportedly set a target of about 2,000 immigration arrests per day.

The report highlighted several recent cases, including a 27-year-old Ecuadorian woman, Chantal Morales Rojas, who was detained by plainclothes officers while boarding a domestic flight in Denver after spending the weekend with the family she had previously worked for as an au pair.

Another reported case involved a Ugandan woman with sickle cell anaemia who was travelling in a wheelchair despite having an active asylum application. An Australian national who overstayed his visa was also detained after authorities initially released him during an encounter at Las Vegas airport before arresting him the following day in Los Angeles.

The latest enforcement measures underscore the Trump administration’s intensified immigration crackdown, with airports increasingly becoming key locations for identifying and detaining individuals suspected of violating US immigration laws.

Vanguard News