President Donald Trump’s administration is now screening for what it considers “anti-American activity” when deciding whether immigrants can legally live and work in the United States.
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced on Tuesday that “anti-American” activity — including social media posts and any perceived ideological affiliations — will be considered an “overwhelmingly negative factor” when deciding whether immigrants can stay in the country legally.
But it will be largely up to officers’ discretion to decide what “anti-American” means, relying on a 60-year-old immigration law that prohibits alleged communists or people who support “totalitarian” governments from entering the country.
“America’s benefits should not be given to those who despise the country and promote anti-American ideologies,” USCIS spokesperson Matthew Tragesser said in a statement Tuesday. “Immigration benefits — including to live and work in the United States — remain a privilege, not a right."
The agency’s policy manual was updated Tuesday to note that immigration authorities can deny citizenship, work permits, green cards and other lawful status to anyone it deems to have supported “anti-American ideologies” or “anti-American activities.”
The agency’s review of social media profiles will also screen for “anti-American activity,” USCIS announced.
The manual notes that the definition of “anti-American” relies on language in a section of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which doesn’t mention “anti-American” and largely focuses on communism.
That 1952 law was drafted at the height of red-scare hysteria, Senator Joseph McCarthy’s anti-communist crusade, and investigations under the House Committee on Un-American Activities, which investigated alleged disloyalty and subversive activities, including perceived communist sympathies.
The guidance comes just days after the Trump administration expanded a “good moral character” test for citizenship, with officers instructed to perform more than a “cursory mechanical review focused on the absence of wrongdoing.”
Immigration authorities must now consider “a holistic assessment of an alien’s behavior, adherence to societal norms, and positive contributions that affirmatively demonstrate good moral character.”
The Trump administration’s latest maneuvers join an expansive anti-immigration agenda defined by mass arrests, stripping legal status for tens of thousands of people, restricting who can enter the country — and who can be considered a citizen.
The president is seeking to unilaterally redefine birthright citizenship under the 14th Amendment while closing all points of entry for asylum seekers and cutting off legal protections for more than one million immigrants — radically expanding the pool of “undocumented” people now vulnerable for arrest and removal.
USCIS guidance announced on Tuesday also instructs authorities to screen whether applicants promote what they consider “antisemitic terrorism and antisemitic terrorist organizations” and “antisemitic ideologies.”
The new screening measures follow similar guidance from USCIS and other agencies as the Trump administration targets campus dissent against Israel’s war in Gaza, which officials broadly characterized as antisemitic.
In May, USCIS announced the agency was “immediately” reviewing immigrants’ social media accounts for what it considers “antisemitic activity” that could be used as evidence to deny them legal status in the United States.
“This will immediately affect aliens applying for lawful permanent resident status, foreign students and aliens affiliated with educational institutions linked to antisemitic activity,” according to the agency.
The following month, the State Department restarted interviews for student visa applicants and directed embassies and consulates to “conduct a comprehensive and thorough vetting, including online presence, of all student and exchange visitor applicants.
Those applicants’ social media privacy settings must also be “public” to be reviewed by immigration authorities, according to State Department orders.
Diplomats were ordered to review social media profiles for “any indications of hostility towards the citizens, culture, government, institutions or founding principles of the United States.”
They also were instructed to decide if applicants displayed any “advocacy for, aid or support for foreign terrorists and other threats to U.S. national security” and “support for unlawful antisemitic harassment or violence.”
