The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has sent notices to legal United States citizens ordering them to leave the country.
“It is time for you to leave the United States,” read an email sent to Los Angeles immigration lawyer Harriet Steele, who was born in California. “Do not attempt to remain in the United States–the federal government will find you.”
An attorney born in Newton, Massachusetts, and a Pennsylvania-born physician also received the same note.
The notices were mailed after DHS Secretary Kristi Noem—known as “ICE Barbie” for dolling up and posing in front of imprisoned deportees for photo ops, among other PR stunts—revoked the residency status of nearly a million migrants who had legally entered the country during the Biden administration.
DHS said the message was sent by mistake because federal agents say Steele’s address was linked to a group of more than 900,000 people who were allowed into the country on a two-year work visa, according to the Los Angeles Times.
Former President Joe Biden introduced the work program using the CBP One app in January 2023. The Trump administration revoked it earlier this month.
“If a non-personal email—such as an American citizen contact—was provided by the alien, notices may have been sent to unintended recipients,” a DHS spokesperson said. “CBP is monitoring communications and will address any issues on a case-by-case basis.”
However, Steele told the Times she doesn’t represent anybody involved in the work program.
“The Trump administration operates, in many ways, on a mix of cruelty and incompetence. It’s hard to know what the exact process was by which I happened to receive that email in the middle of the night, East Coast time,” she said.
Lisa Anderson, a doctor based in Connecticut, said she had no idea why she received the letter last Friday telling her to leave the country.
“The language seemed pretty threatening to whomever it might actually apply to,” Anderson told NBC News.
Nicole Micheroni, a Massachusetts attorney, also got the email on Friday.
“At first I thought it was for a client, but I looked really closely and the only name on the email was mine,” she told NBC in Boston. “So it said my parole status had been terminated and I should leave the country within seven days. [It was] probably, hopefully, sent to me in error. But it’s a little concerning these are going out to U.S. citizens.”
“The language in the email is very threatening,” added the attorney, who specializes in immigration issues. “And it looks kind of like a sketchy spam email. It doesn’t look like an official government notice, but it is.”
She posted the email on Blue Sky and has had thousands of responses.
“I think it’s a scare tactic. I think they want people afraid of immigration,” she said.
“Canceling these paroles is a promise kept to the American people to secure our borders and protect national security,” the DHS media affairs unit said of the decision to end the Biden-era work parole program.
The post Ice Barbie’s Staff Tell U.S. Citizens to Self-Deport or Else appeared first on The Daily Beast.
