Trump administration reportedly misusing ‘death master file’ to target Biden-era immigrants

Trump administration has classified more than 6,000 living immigrants as deceased — stripping them of their legally obtained Social Security numbers and reportedly forcing them into “self-deportation”, per The New York Times.

The immigrants in question had entered the country through the CBP One mobile app, a Biden-era tool used by over 900,000 individuals from countries such as Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela Under these Biden-era initiatives, they were given two years of legal stay and work authorization under the presidential parole authority.

Now, for the Trump government, “the goal is to cut those people off from using crucial financial services like bank accounts and credit cards, along with their access to government benefits. The effort hinges on a surprising new tactic: repurposing Social Security’s ‘death master file,’ which for years has been used to track dead people who should no longer receive benefits, to include the names of living people who the government believes should be treated as if they are dead,” NYT noted in their April 11 article.

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US treating many immigrants as if they don’t exist

Social Security numbers — nine-digit identifiers issued by the federal government — are vital for almost every aspect of life in the US, from opening a bank account to securing housing or even getting a job.

The Trump administration has reportedly listed more than 6,300 names in the “death master file,” claiming these people are “suspected terrorists.”

On Monday, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officially revoked the legal status of many who used the app, stripping them of the protections they had under Biden’s policies.

However, a federal judge has already blocked an attempt to force hundreds of thousands of immigrants with temporary legal status to leave the country later this month.

“This president continues to engage in lawless behaviour, violating the law and abusing our systems of checks and balances,” Skye Perryman, President and CEO of Democracy Forward, told the Associated Press.

Interestingly, DHS has quietly inked a deal with the Treasury Department, giving Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) access to immigrant tax data via the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). The agreement allows ICE to cross-reference immigrant names and addresses with IRS tax filings.

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“Undocumented immigrants help fund teacher salaries, road and bridge repairs and other local quality-of-life improvements. They also pay into vital programs that make up our social safety net (including Social Security, Medicare and unemployment insurance) even though they will likely never see any benefits from these programs — because, in most circumstances, they are legally prohibited from accessing them,” Marco Guzman, a senior policy analyst at the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy told The Hill.