Is Internment Next?

The Trump Administration could easily order the internment of US citizens from "enemy" nations.

By the time that you read this, the Trump Administration will have released its notification requiring all non-citizens in the United States who are present here for a period greater than 30 days to register with the Government and provide fingerprints. Failure to do so can lead to the initiation of deportation proceedings against the individual. This notification has been issued under the Alien Registration Act which has been established law in the United States but which is not generally enforced. The last time it was enforced was immediately after 9/11.

(Executive Order that put Japanese Americans in internment camps)

This news came at the heels of President Trump’s invocation of Alien Enemies Act of 1798. He did this to issue a mass deportation order against 300 Venezuelan citizens who were sent to El Salvador without ever being provided a hearing. That Act was passed to provide the President with the power to deport the citizens of enemy countries during wartime so that they would not pose a threat to national security. That Act is also the basis for Executive Order 9066 passed by President Frederick Roosevelt in 1942 that mandated the incarceration of Japanese-Americans or Japanese internment. It must be remembered that the Japanese Americans interned in camps during this time were full American citizens. Despite having been loyal to the United States they were banished. In the words of one Kiyp Sato “There’s not a more lonely feeling than to be banished by my own country”

As the mayhem of the past several weeks has unfolded, I have joked with some of my white friends that they will have to save me from the camps. There is more fear in my words than many may realize. In the past several weeks, the crackdown has been systematic. The initial phase targeted the most vulnerable migrants-this meant the undocumented who were working all the menial, low paying jobs that everyone else refuses to do. The initial stories were of parents being carted off while children were at school, of workplaces raided, of Hispanic and Latino people being asked to produce papers on public buses, on city streets and even in hospitals.

Then they came for legal visa holders. The case in point here is of Dr Rasha Alawieh a 34 year old transplant surgeon at Brown University whose lawful H-1B visa was revoked when she tried to return to the United States after a trip to her native Lebanon. ICE has claimed that Alawieh was vocal against the Administration’s foreign policy. Because of this they revoked the via. Alawieh was sent back despite a judge’s order that she be allowed to stay.

Then they came for the green card holders. The case of Mahmoud Khalil-a student activist who is currently in detention despite being a lawful permanent resident or green card holder. The sudden appearance of men who are not in uniform and refuse to identity themselves as they take him away in front of his crying wife is haunting. Here is a video: https://www.nytimes.com/video/us/politics/100000010054472/mahmoud-khalils-arrest.html

The noose is tightening. Everyday, the Administration is grabbing ever greater power for itself. The possibility of an internment like situation for those that oppose the Administration’s policies is entirely possible. Over the weekend, Trump’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to deport hundreds of Venezuelan migrants without due process should terrify everyone. This statute allows for the deportation of any male over age fourteen who is determined to have come from an enemy nation. In their deportation order the Trump Administration declared that the Venezeulan gang Trende Aragua an enemy of the United States. Despite a judge ordering a halt to the deportation-the men had all claimed asylum likely to get away from the gang that they were accused of belonging to-the Administration continued with the deportation.

One of the most chilling impacts of all of this is that the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 was the legal basis for the Executive Order signed by FDR putting Japanese Americans in detention. This makes it entirely possible that US citizens from countries that support terrorism could be declared members of an enemy nation and interned on that basis.

I plan to use this substack to create a record of what the Administration is doing but I am also requesting that you bear witness with to what is happening in our country. With these sorts of fears circulating what will become of dissent, of free speech, of any act that in any way opposes what the Administration is doing.