Taking away a person\u2019s U.S. citizenship is rare and, historically, hasn\u2019t been easy to do.<\/p>\n
President Donald Trump\u2019s administration nevertheless is pushing to denaturalize foreign-born American citizens accused of certain crimes.<\/p>\n
At the same time, his administration is slow-walking renewals and applications that threaten to put the future of two other groups of people at risk: young immigrant \u201cDreamers\u201d trying to re-up their temporary legal status and immigrants seeking asylum.<\/p>\n
The moves raise his already-expansive immigrant deportation program to a new level.<\/p>\n
The Justice Department recently announced<\/a> denaturalization cases in federal courts across the country against about a dozen U.S. citizens born overseas. Officials said they had committed serious crimes or immigration fraud, or had ties to terrorism.<\/p>\n Should the people be found guilty of such accusations, serious punishment would seem appropriate, even possibly losing their citizenship.<\/p>\n While that may not seem like a lot of cases, Trump has leaned into robust denaturalization campaigns before.<\/p>\n During the first Trump administration, there were approximately 170 cases of denaturalization, about 42 per year, according<\/a> to data from Hofstra University Law analyzed by the National Immigration Forum, while there were 64 cases, about 16 a year, when President Joe Biden was in the White House.<\/p>\n Between 1990 and 2017, the U.S. government filed just over 300 denaturalization cases \u2014 or an average of 11 per year, according to CBS News.<\/p>\n Among those targeted by the recently announced denaturalization crackdown are a Colombian-born Catholic priest convicted of sexually assaulting a minor; a man born in Morocco with alleged ties to al-Qaeda; a Somali immigrant who pleaded guilty to providing material support to al-Shabaab, a U.S.-designated terrorist group; and a former Gambian police officer allegedly involved in war crimes.<\/p>\n The group also includes individuals who allegedly used false identities to apply for immigration benefits and a man who allegedly entered into sham marriages to commit immigration fraud.<\/p>\n Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche this month told CBS he believes there are \u201ca lot of individuals who are citizens who shouldn\u2019t be.\u201d But he added that only \u201ca very small percentage\u201d of the approximately 24 million naturalized citizens should be concerned.<\/p>\n The others don\u2019t \u201chave anything to worry about,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n They might if they have been paying attention to what Trump has been saying and posting. The president earlier espoused a broader view of who should be targeted for denaturalization.<\/p>\n Last year, Trump directed the Department of Justice to \u201cmaximally pursue denaturalization proceedings.\u201d In a Thanksgiving Truth Social post, he said he would \u201cdenaturalize migrants who undermine domestic tranquility\u201d and people who are \u201cnon-compatible with Western Civilization,\u201d in addition to those who commit actual crimes.<\/p>\n He acknowledged he didn\u2019t know if he had the power to do that, and the law would seem to be against it.<\/p>\n Past Supreme Courts set a high bar for denaturalizations, according<\/a> to ABC News. In 1946, the court warned against the use of denaturalization as a \u201cready instrument for political persecutions.\u201d This came after the United States ramped up denaturalizations during World Wars I and II and during the subsequent second Red Scare era of heightened anti-communism.<\/p>\n Trump has long expressed interest in deporting certain foreigners or depriving them of certain rights and benefits. He\u2019s also trying to overturn birthright citizenship automatically granted to people born in the U.S. to undocumented immigrants and people with temporary legal status.<\/p>\n He has repeatedly said his deportation effort is aimed at serious criminals and people who threaten national security, or the \u201cworst of the worst,\u201d according to the administration. Yet the majority of people detained and deported have been neither serious nor violent criminals, according to studies by the Cato Institute<\/a> and others.<\/p>\n The difference between the stated goal of who should be removed from the country in the deportation campaign and who actually is being targeted should make everyone cautious about taking Blanche\u2019s narrow denaturalization criteria at face value.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, the Justice Department has made it easier to deport people in the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, which was created in 2012 under President Barak Obama to protect\u00a0certain people who came to the U.S. as children from deportation and provide them with renewable two-year work authorization.<\/p>\n In 2025, nearly 300 DACA recipients were detained nationwide, and about 90 were deported, according<\/a> to Ed Source, which said arrests have continued this year amid intensified targeting.<\/p>\n In addition, renewal wait times have increased to levels not seen since 2016 when there were significant technical issues, according<\/a> to The Associated Press.<\/p>\n Some of the program\u2019s more than 500,000 beneficiaries, often referred to as \u201cDreamers,\u201d have waited months for renewals, only to see the deadline pass. That means they lose their work authorization and possibly their driver\u2019s license, and their ability to stay in the country is threatened.<\/p>\n Trump has repeatedly expressed support for DACA recipients and the desire to \u201cwork something out\u201d for them, even as he has tried to end the program, a matter now pending in court.<\/p>\n