Half the Country Sues to Stop Trump’s Restrictions on Green Cards

Twenty-two states and the District of Columbia are filing lawsuits against the Trump administration to prevent the Department of Homeland Security from changing the “public charge” rule, increasing the power of federal immigration officials to deny green card and visa applicants based on their potential future participation in federal aid programs.

A separate lawsuit was filed the same day on behalf of Democratic cities including New York, Chicago, San Francisco, and Seattle.

Traditionally, immigration officers look at whether applicants relied on programs like Supplemental Security Income and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families. But the Trump administration now wants to expand that to penalize applicants who are enrolled in Medicaid or receive food stamps.

“Under @POTUS Trump, DHS is restoring the basic principle that immigrants must be able to support themselves,” DHS announced earlier this summer, before the lawsuit was filed. “We are reaffirming the requirement of self-reliance, protecting public resources, and ending policies that encouraged dependency on hard-working American taxpayers.”

New York Attorney General Letitia James zeroed in on that “self-reliance” bit during a press conference on Monday.

“The rule would allow immigration officers to consider use of critical benefits like Medicaid and SNAP (the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program), and even participation in school meal programs, as part of an applicant’s circumstance,” said James. “That means immigrant New Yorkers may be forced to ask themselves impossible questions: ‘Will getting health insurance hurt my chances of getting a green card? Will accepting food assistance when I fall on hard times be held against me?’”

“Cruelty is the point.... Having a chilling effect on immigrants is the point. Letting individuals know that they are not welcome here is the point. Immigration animus is the point,” James continued. “The fact that you’re going to deny individuals who are sick and hungry and homeless benefits just is beyond the pale. And that’s why we are seeking in the state of New York to vacate this rule,” she said.

This rule change, if accepted, will also incur a massive chilling effect, leading green card and visa applicants and their families to avoid engaging with federal programs at all, even if they’re legal and needed.

“No family should have to choose between accessing health care and nutrition assistance today—or protecting their pathway to a green card tomorrow,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta said. “The Trump Administration is seeking to rewrite more than 100 years of law with its expansive new definition of who is considered a ‘public charge.’ In doing so, it is providing individual immigration officers with the discretion and power to punish families for lawfully accessing certain public benefits programs during short-term periods of need. This administration’s cruelty continues to know no bounds. We’re going to court on behalf of the millions of immigrants who call this state home—and we will fight to get this unlawful rule undone.”

The public charge policy change is scheduled to take effect on Friday.

America’s billionaire president is preaching to his followers that the threat of artificial intelligence is a “hoax.”

“Concerning AI, when, in the History of Business, did anyone see the Leaders of an Industry call for Regulation that, if strongly implemented, will drive them into oblivion and bankruptcy?” Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social Monday afternoon. “AI taking over the World, destroying Humanity, and all other things bad, is a HOAX.”

Trump compared the latest national furor over AI (sparked by industry insiders) to several other controversies that have plagued his presidency, including the investigation into Russian collusion in his 2016 presidential campaign, the Ukraine war, and both impeachment efforts against him.

The AI uproar is “no different from RUSSIA, RUSSIA, RUSSIA—UKRAINE, UKRAINE, UKRAINE—IMPEACHMENT HOAX #1—IMPEACHMENT HOAX #2—and all of the other HOAXES and SCAMS that America was forced to endure through the Destructionists’ and Deviants’ foul play and illegal conduct,” Trump wrote.

He added that he is “not happy” about the backlash, which he suggested has placed America in a backseat position amid the global race to dominate the burgeoning technology. He cited Google’s €13 billion deal with Finland to build out the company’s AI infrastructure, as well as Beijing’s recent dismissal of Silicon Valley’s urgent warnings to develop and implement AI safeguards (former Anthropic employee Jacob Coxon cautioned last week that, in private, the people building large language models have expressed it could be capable of killing all humans by the end of the decade.)

“AI, and Data Centers, will be the Greatest Economic Development Engine in History—Bigger than Oil, Gold, Diamonds, or even the Internet. It will not be stopped by brilliantly run Destructive Forces during the Term of President DONALD J. TRUMP!” he concluded.

Trump has a lot to politically—and personally—gain from championing AI. Days into his second term, the president unveiled a $500 billion public-private venture to support AI development. The project was dubbed Stargate and backed by OpenAI, SoftBank, Oracle, and MGX, an AI investment firm owned by the United Arab Emirates.

The president’s 2026 financial disclosures also reveal that he’s invested a sizable sum in tech companies pursuing AI projects, spending millions of dollars on stock purchases for Oracle, Microsoft, Nvidia, Meta, Amazon, Apple, and Alphabet.

But Trump’s opinion on the matter is seriously at odds with that of the American public. Recent polling indicates that the vast majority of Americans, including Republicans, have no interest in permitting the tech industry to build AI facilities in their backyards. An August survey published by Heatmap revealed that 75 percent of the public opposes data center development in their communities.

The growing divide between the president’s sentiments and the reality lived by the American public should serve as a reminder that Trump—who is worth an estimated $6.5 billion and owns hundreds of business entities and properties around the world—has almost nothing in common with the rest of the country. Trump will never be hard pressed to find drinking water like the residents of Flint, Michigan; he apparently doesn’t have to buy (or even pronounce) America’s increasingly expensive “groceries”; and will never experience the crushing toll of the housing crisis (a “big yawn,” he called it in June, while profiting off it), or need to split the cost at the gas pump between credit cards.

Last month, Trump even went so far as to claim that anyone who opposes data center development is “backwards and poor,” a sobering reminder that Trump simply does not care about the average American.

Staff at Alligator Alcatraz called them “calming areas.” They were really cages.

A new report Monday revealed that the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of the Inspector General discovered two metal cages, roughly the size of a phone booth, where immigrant detainees were kept at Alligator Alcatraz, the Trump administration’s soft-sided concentration camp in the Florida Everglades.

Between the camp’s hasty construction in July 2025 and its official closure in January 2026, at least 79 detainees were held in these small outdoor cages, according to the report. Immigrant detainees would spend between seven minutes and two hours in the enclosures, each four feet three inches wide and seven feet nine inches tall.

Staff claimed that detainees would request time in these so-called “calming areas,” and that they were never even locked. Both cages, however, included locking mechanisms.

The OIG found one instance in which a “calming area” may have been used as a disciplinary tool. Documentation provided to the OIG noted that one detainee who spent 26 minutes in a small metal enclosure had “failed to comply with a lawful command.” Immigration and Customs Enforcement confirmed that the cages were used for “disciplinary issues, crisis intervention, housing changes, and conflicts among detainees,” according to the report.

In March, Democratic Senators Jon Ossoff and Dick Durbin wrote a letter to DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin and then–ICE Director Todd Lyons over concerns that immigrants were being kept in a small structure called “the box,” where they were “held in stress positions with hands and feet tightly shackled for hours at a time, in direct sunlight with no access to food or water.”

The OIG could not confirm these claims, but stated that the use of these cages was “highly unconventional” and did not align with the standards for humane treatment.

“Use of these small metal enclosures for any reason is unprecedented among ICE facilities inspected by OIG,” the report stated. “Confining individuals in small metal enclosures for any reason presents significant risks to detainee health and well-being.”

Alligator Alcatraz has been the source of dozens of disturbing reports of inhumane treatment. Detainees at the soft-sided facility reported flooding in the tents, worm-infested food, behemoth bugs, no access to running water, and widespread violations of immigrants’ legal rights.

A former corrections officer at Alligator Alcatraz previously claimed that detainees were being kept in a “human-sized kennel.” One detainee told CBS News: “We’re human beings; we’re not dogs. We’re like rats in an experiment.”

A coalition of NFL owners have deemed Macklemore unfit to perform in their stadiums.

The “Thrift Shop” rapper was slated to perform during 10 stops of Ed Sheeran’s Loop Tour. That plan was unexpectedly canned Monday, when Sheeran’s representatives announced that the tour would go on without Macklemore after several stadiums across the country banned him from performing.

“As the concert promoter for Ed Sheeran’s U.S. Loop Tour, we have been notified by venues on the upcoming U.S. tour dates that they will not allow a concert to take place with Macklemore on the lineup, which would result in the cancellation of the tour and impact hundreds of thousands of fans,” Messina Touring Group, the promoter of Sheeran’s U.S. tour, told Rolling Stone. “After discussions with stakeholders, Macklemore will not be performing on the remaining support dates.”

Macklemore was more explicit in a post on his Instagram account, claiming that he was booted from the tour after billionaire New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft deemed the musician’s brief pro-Palestine speech at New Jersey’s Metlife Stadium too risqué.

“Last Monday, in the middle of all the media attention surrounding P!nk and what I said at Metlife, Ed told me that Robert Kraft called him,” Macklemore wrote.

Kraft owns Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts, where Macklemore and Sheeran were scheduled to perform on September 25.

“Ed told me that Kraft said I would not be allowed to perform in his stadium,” Macklemore continued. “Ed also told me that Kraft had rallied some of the other stadium owners and collectively they gave him an ultimatum: if Macklemore stays on the tour, you will not be allowed to play in our venues.”

Macklemore said he had a tough conversation with Sheeran, during which Sheeran insisted on maintaining his apolitical image.

“Taking a side can cost you. Money, brand deals, sponsorships, festivals, private shows, relationships, and access. I’ve lost all those things,” Macklemore continued. “But there is no neutral position between the oppressor and the oppressed.”

Besides Metlife and Gillette Stadiums, Macklemore was scheduled to play alongside Sheeran at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia; Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta,; AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas; Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Florida; Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens, Florida; Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California; SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles; and Lumen Field in Seattle. Nearly all of the stadiums are owned by NFL-affiliated groups or maintain enormous contracts with the football league.

“What I said at Metlife I have been saying on stages around the world for almost three years,” Macklemore continued. “So why is it an issue now? Because I’m sharing a stage with one of the biggest artists in the world, in some of the biggest stadiums in America. At a certain level of exposure, ‘Free Palestine’ becomes too much of a risk.”

No other artist in recent memory has kicked up such a firestorm from the NFL’s powerful billionaire owners. Earlier this year, Ye—better known by his former name, Kanye West—performed at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles and Raymond James Stadium without issue, despite his affinities for Adolf Hitler, the Nazi regime, and his long history of antisemitic remarks.

Chris Brown too has been performing in the same stadiums across the country, despite the fact that he has been accused—and found guilty of—brutalizing multiple people, including his then-girlfriend Rihanna in 2009. Representative Jasmine Crockett even honored Brown onstage during his performance Saturday at AT&T Stadium.

Pro-Palestine activist Mahmoud Khalil is suing his alma mater, Columbia University, for failing to protect him and other students from harassment over their activism against Israel’s war in Gaza.

Khalil and other former Columbia students filed a lawsuit against the university in federal court Monday, alleging that Columbia’s administrators ignored their pleas for help against repeated threats as part of a pattern of “deliberate indifference” even before the attacks of October 7, 2023, The New York Times reports.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested Khalil in March 2025 at his university apartment building despite the fact that he was a legal permanent resident and had not committed any crimes. He was detained for 104 days and missed the birth of his first child.

“I’m not suing Columbia for what ICE did,” Khalil told the Times. “I’m suing Columbia for creating the conditions for ICE to do what it did.”

The lawsuit says that Columbia didn’t do anything about the harassment faced by members of the SIPA Palestine Working Group, which Khalil led while studying at Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs. The group, formed in 2018 to “encourage a more holistic understanding of Palestine,” hosted discussions and lectures and also sponsored annual study trips to the Palestinian territories.

Allegedly, the lawsuit states, the university did little, if anything at all, to stop Islamophobic or anti-Palestinian rhetoric against the group’s members, and didn’t act when the group’s event flyers were torn down. After October 7, 2023, a pro-Israel organization, Accuracy in Media, acquired photographs and the names of the group’s leaders, which are only accessible to people with Columbia University passwords, and doxxed the students. Their names and faces were plastered on a truck circling campus with the words “Columbia’s Leading Antisemites.”

“It felt like they didn’t bother to look or do the bare minimum,” Bhavana Bellamkonda, one of the other students suing the university, said to the Times.

The latest lawsuit comes after Khalil used the KKK Act of 1871 to sue the Trump administration in July, alleging that the White House conspired with right-wing Zionist organizations to intimidate, arrest, and deport pro-Palestine activists including himself. Since then, however, the Trump administration has redoubled its efforts to deport Khalil and other foreign students who disagree with the U.S. government’s stance on Israel and Palestine.

This story has been updated.