The latest deportation order against foreign students in the United States has sparked a heated debate on the legitimacy of these actions. The Trump administration has made no secret of its disguise, and many are facing evacuation due to pro-Palestinian advocacy.

In recent months, the State Council has revoked hundreds of visas for foreign students, with little explanation. On April 25, 2025, the government restored the legal status of many students, but warned that the probation was only temporary.

Due to its fragile legal status in the United States, immigration activists are vulnerable to attacks by governments seeking to stifle dissent.

Trump administration critics have questioned the legitimacy of these dismissal orders, believing that they violated constitutional protection rights, including freedom of speech and due process.

The government asserts that the administration has almost the absolute power to evacuate immigrants. The White House cited legislation passed during the peak of the country's Cold War hysteria, such as the McCarran-Walter Act of 1952, which expanded the government's expulsion power.

I am an immigrant, a historian of American Empire and Asian American studies. The current dismissal order against student activists is related to the long and pathetic past of the United States, because of their race or what they say or believe, or all three are imprisoned and deported immigrants.

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Where to start

As the state exercises federal control over immigration, the current deportation process in the United States traces its roots back to the late 19th century.

The driving force behind this transformation was anti-China racism, which reached the craze during this period and eventually reached the passage of laws that restrict Chinese immigration.

Originally promoted the influx of Chinese immigrants to the West Coast by the mid-19th century, the Gold Rush accused Chinese immigrants of engaging in theft. It also claims that because of their racial distinction, they pose a cultural threat to American society.

The 1892 Geary Act requires Chinese people living in the United States to register with the federal government or face deportation.

In Fong Yue Ting v. United States, the Supreme Court talked about the constitutionality of these regulations of 1893. Three plaintiffs claimed that anti-China legislation was discriminatory, violated constitutional protections that prohibit searches and seizures, and violated due process and equal protection guarantees.

The Supreme Court confirmed the deportation process for Geary Act and formulated a new legal precept called the doctrine of all powers, which remains the main purpose of today's U.S. immigration law.

Court confirms law

The doctrine includes two key claims.

First, the federal government's power to exclude and expel foreigners is an inherent and unqualified characteristic of American sovereignty. Second, immigration enforcement is the exclusive area of ​​Congress and the executive branch that is accused of protecting the state from foreign threats.

The court also ruled that the legal deportation of immigrants in the country is a civil, not a criminal matter, meaning constitutional protections like due process do not apply.

Driven by wartime xenophobia, the government stepped up its deportation after World War I. U.S. officials selected foreign-born militants for deportation, accusing them of being unfaithful.

Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer ordered a mass arrest of so-called communists, promising to “rip the radical seeds of Americans who have been entangled in the toxic theory of the United States” and cancel “foreign criminals in this country who are directly responsible for spreading the unclean teachings of Bolshevikism.”

This period marked a new era of relocation, mainly based on ideological reasons. Jews and other immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe were disproportionate in their targets, emphasizing the cultural affinity between flyback and racial and national chauvinism.

"Foreign" inciteer

In the 1940s and 1950s, the movement to which so-called subversives took root in the United States was supercharged by anti-communist Crusader Senator Joseph McCarthy and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover.

In these debates, the ghosts of foreign agitators pollute American political culture. Attorney General Tom Clark testified in Congress in 1950 that 91.4% of the leaders of the Communist Party of America "were either foreign stocks or married people in foreign stocks."

During this period, Congress passed a series of laws requiring subverted organizations to register with the government. They also expanded the power of the executive branch to expel individuals whom people believe are "biased against national security", blurring the line between punishing people for illegal acts such as espionage and bombing - a belief that the government considers illegal, such as members of the Communist Party.

The expulsion of militants born abroad has received public support, but the expulsion of immigrants due to their political beliefs has raised important constitutional issues.

Prosecution or persecution?

In a landmark case in 1945, Wixon v. Bridges, the Supreme Court did declare the authority to expel someone without a fair hearing.

The case involved Australian-born President Harry Bridges and the Warehouse Union. Bridges is a left-wing coalition leader who planned many successful strikes on the West Coast. Under his leadership, the union also took a gradual stance on civil rights and American militarism.

The decision in the case depends on whether the government can prove that the bridge is a member of the Communist Party, which will put him under the expulsion of the Smith Act, which prohibits members in the Communist Party.

As there is no evidence of bridge membership, the government relies on cunning witnesses and assertions that Bridges is in line with the party because he holds some political status. The allegations of “alliance” with controversial political groups are similar to the allegations against foreign students at risk of deportation by the Trump administration.

The Supreme Court evacuated Bridges' expulsion order, declaring the government's "affiliation" with the Communist Party was too vaguely defined and constituted the association's guilt.

With excessive abuse and abuse in the McCarthy era exposed, they conducted a greater scrutiny on the dangers of unchecked enforcement rights. Some of the tougher regulations, such as the Smith Act, were overhauled. The narrow and free interpretation of the federal court's applicability of the Constitution to deported immigrants - reflecting the boundaries of competitive visions and liberal democracy in the United States.

From union leaders to foreign students

There are some striking similarities between the boundaries of civil liberties during the Cold War and President Donald Trump’s opposition to the crusades of foreign students who respect democratic freedoms.

Foreign students appear to have replaced the leaders of the Immigration Alliance in the 1950s as the target of government repression. The guilt based on the claim that hyperbolic affiliation with the Communist Party has been replaced by allegations that are consistent with Hamas.

As in the past, these national security invocations provide excuses for government efforts to stifle dissent and force political consistency.