WASHINGTON, D.C. — On October 14, 2026, the Trump administration published a new interim final rule that will make it easier to strip resettled refugees of their status. We Are All America strongly denounces this cruel and unlawful policy, which risks sending people back to the dangers they fled from and represents the administration’s latest erosion of due process and the escalation of its mass deportation agenda.
This policy significantly reduces the number of days refugees have to challenge the termination of their refugee status from thirty days to ten. Ten days is not nearly enough time for a refugee to find counsel, submit evidence, and defend their status.. The rule also reaffirms that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) may place a refugee directly into removal proceedings without formally terminating their refugee status, bypassing even this shortened process.
Many of our cherished community members, who rebuilt their lives in this country and became business owners, health workers, students, and teachers, will lose their protection before they have the chance to fight for it. With this new rule, the administration continues to fail the people it promised to protect, and drifts further away from its promise of being a beacon of safety and opportunity.
Said Fatima Saidi, Director of We Are All America, “This interim rule is not an administrative adjustment; it is an engineered trap designed to strip lawfully resettled refugees of their legal rights before they even have time to open their mail. Compressing the timeline to just ten days, while simultaneously allowing USCIS to bypass formal termination and shove people directly into deportation proceedings, effectively dismantles due process. For decades, America promised safety to those fleeing war and persecution. Today, this administration is attempting to weaponize bureaucracy to convert a life-saving humanitarian program into an expedited deportation pipeline. We Are All America and our grassroots network across the nation will not stand by silently while our neighbors, families, and colleagues are targeted. We will continue to organize, defend our communities, and fight this unconscionable attack on humanitarian protection.”
Said Nicole Melaku, Executive Director of the National Partnership for New Americans, “Refugees came to the United States after surviving persecution and proving their case to our government before they ever set foot on our shores. They have since built their lives here as workers, students, parents, and neighbors, deeply committed to the communities that welcomed them. With this rule, the administration is stripping away the most basic guarantees of due process, giving refugees just ten days and no right to appeal before they can lose their status and their safety. This is a dangerous escalation of the administration’s mass deportation agenda, and we cannot stand by as it targets those our country promised to protect. On behalf of the National Partnership for New Americans and our network of immigrant and refugee rights organizations, we recommit ourselves to defending due process, dignity, and protection for all who call the United States home.”
Said Dauda Sesay, Executive Director of Louisiana Organization for Refugees and Immigrants (LORI) and member of We Are All America’s Refugee and Immigrant Leadership Table, “I know what it means to flee violence, lose everything, and spend years waiting for a country to offer you safety. When America welcomes a refugee, it makes a promise: that the person who escaped persecution will have a chance to rebuild their life in dignity and peace. That promise should not come with an expiration date. Giving refugees just ten days to defend their legal status is not justice; it is another way of denying vulnerable families a meaningful opportunity to be heard. These are our neighbors, parents, workers, and community leaders who have built their lives around the promise of protection. We cannot welcome people with one hand and threaten to send them back into danger with the other. Refugee protection is not a political favor. It is a humanitarian commitment, and America must honor it.”
Said Dr. Dmitri Daniel Glinski, President & CEO of Russian-speaking Community Council (RCC) and member of We Are All America’s Refugee and Immigrant Leadership Table. “The interim final rule targeting refugees is yet another step in this administration’s dismantling of the system of humanitarian protection, which was built over many decades, through bipartisan effort, on the basis of the United States’ foundational values and its legally binding international commitments. Given that the average length of time it takes to become a refugee in the US is two to three years, with extensive vetting internationally and in the US, reducing the time to contest a termination of this status to ten days is a mockery of justice. At RCC, which brings together refugees and de facto refugees from several ex-Soviet countries, we are committed to working with all other immigrant rights organizations in advocating with our elected representatives for the full restoration of humanitarian protection and the principle of welcoming the stranger which made America great domestically and internationally.”
###
We Are All America is a coalition of the National Partnership for New Americans, which works to uphold and strengthen our nation’s commitment to welcome and protect those seeking freedom, safety and refuge in the United States. We organize people across religious and cultural differences to build inclusive communities where we all belong. See our website for more information at weareallus.org
