US President's mass deportations appear to be too swift and opaque to be halted legally
WASHINGTON, DC – As Donald Trump continues to engage in actions that are broadly aligned with the interests of Vladimir Putin, his next step may be to order the fast-tracked deportation of 240,000 Ukrainians who fled the country and sought refuge in the United States following the Russian invasion.
Specifically, Trump is reportedly planning to revoke the temporary legal status offered to the fleeing Ukrainians by his predecessor Joe Biden. The move could come as early as next month, according to Reuters, which first reported the news.
A senior Trump official told the news agency that the plan to deport the Ukrainians was set in train before last Friday’s disastrous Oval Office meeting between Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky. But it is possible that the plan is now being advanced more rapidly in light of the communications breakdown between the two leaders. Once any executive order is signed, ICE, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement division of the Department of Homeland Security, would be empowered to begin the immediate roundup of people affected by the ruling.
The Trump administration has already targeted refugees from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela for removal from the United States as part of the mass deportation programme being implemented by Deputy White House Chief of Staff Stephen Miller. On 20 January, inauguration day itself, Trump signed an executive order revoking a humanitarian effort that allowed up to 30,000 people from those countries to enter the United States legally every month, and then temporarily settle for up to two years.
Now, in addition to the 530,000 Latin Americans who have benefited from that government programme, people who have fled the war in Ukraine may find themselves in the same boat. There are fears that 70,000 Afghans who fled the Taliban’s takeover of Kabul in August 2021 may also be targeted soon by the White House.
For a nation built by immigrants, many of whom – in earlier times – viewed their first sighting of the Statue of Liberty as the moment they found salvation, Trump’s anticipated move will create fresh rifts not only with Kyiv but also with Europe. An estimated 5.2 million Ukrainians have fled the country since Russia’s invasion in February 2022, and most of them were offered sanctuary in Europe. Around 4 per cent of the total entered the UK, with 210,000 people finding safety in Britain thanks to the Ukraine Family and Sponsorship Scheme.
People gather during a rally in support of Ukraine near Philadelphia City Hall, ahead of US President Donald Trump's address to a joint session of Congress, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on March 4, 2025. (Photo by Matthew Hatcher / AFP) (Photo by MATTHEW HATCHER/AFP via Getty Images)
People gather during a rally in support of Ukraine in Philadelphia ahead of Trump’s address to Congress, on 4 March (Photo: Matthew Hatcher / AFP)
Any move to target the Ukrainians already granted temporary status in the United States would be met with immediate legal action. But the courts are already struggling to keep up with the pace and opaque nature of the Trump administration’s mass deportation programme. Raids on workplaces, community centres, residences and even schools are not announced ahead of time by ICE, leaving human rights activists scrambling to respond. At Trump’s command, all flights bringing refugees into the United States have been grounded since January, even for those already cleared for travel to America.
Those moves have had a chilling impact on community efforts by Americans engaged in refugee assistance. Many grassroots activities have been forced underground. One volunteer in America’s Midwest who has previously helped resettled refugees from Ukraine and other nations told The i Paper that the Trump administration’s existing orders had left migrant communities “in fear and living in terror” with regard to their long-term prospects. The activist described any threat to Ukrainian refugees as a “tragedy” that would “devastate communities” where families have already established roots since their arrival.
Last month, the Migration Policy Institute, a Washington-based non-governmental organisation, accused the White House of building “a fundamentally new, all-of-government machinery” to fulfil Trump’s campaign promise of mass deportations. The institute accused Trump of “an iron-fist approach” that sought to make “co-operation on immigration a high priority in foreign affairs”.
There are enormous practical questions that neither the White House nor the Ukrainian government is currently willing to answer publicly. Would Ukraine agree to receive any deportation flights of citizens from the United States? What efforts, if any, would Washington take to ensure that those flights would be safe from Russian attack? Would returning Ukrainians, many of whom have avoided military service in the country, be forced to the battlefield? And has the White House in any way promised to deport the Ukrainians as part of the negotiations about the conflict between US and Kremlin officials?
Making life potentially more threatening for the Ukrainians, Trump is reportedly dissatisfied with the pace of mass deportations so far. At a time when he is seeking to up the ante against immigrants specifically, and Kyiv generally, the Ukrainians who sought a new life in America may soon find themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time.