The Trump administration is engaging in an immigration crackdown in South Texas against people who have birth certificates showing they were born in the United States.
According to a Washington Post report published Wednesday by Kevin Sieff, immigration lawyers in the area are reporting that “hundreds, even thousands” of Latinos born near the border are being told that their birth certificates aren’t enough proof of US citizenship to get their passports approved or renewed.
They’re being subjected to document requests like baptismal records, and interview questions. Some are having their existing passports revoked and put into deportation proceedings, or even being barred from reentering the United States when they attempted to come back from Mexico.
The new wave of passport scrutiny is specifically targeted at Latinos in South Texas, born near the US-Mexico border in particular circumstances. State Department representatives told the Washington Post that “the U.S.-Mexico border region happens to be an area of the country where there has been a significant incidence of citizenship fraud.”
According to the attorneys the Post spoke to, there’s been a “surge” in new denials, as well as of people being actually put into deportation proceedings. Additionally, the government appears to have expanded its “suspicions” not just to birth certificates signed by midwives, but those signed by longtime South Texas obstetrician Jorge Treviño — who delivered thousands of babies, often in home births.
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