ILAP Community Update: March 13, 2026
March 13, 2026
Dear Community,
ILAP is proud and grateful to report to you that 19 of the people served in our emergency legal programming during ICE’s operation in January are now home, though the effects on them, their lives, and families, will remain. At the same time, our work is far from over. Others from the January operation — as well as people arrested by immigration officers in Maine before and after the operation — remain detained and are enduring egregious and inhumane conditions in ICE facilities across the country. We continue to fight for their release.
During ICE’s enhanced operation in January, they heavily used the ICE facility in Burlington, Massachusetts to hold Maine residents. ILAP’s team received numerous reports of extreme overcrowding, little food, no access to medication, little access to showers, and more. The Burlington facility is not designed to hold large numbers of people for extended periods but was used anyway.
ILAP applauds Maine’s Representative Pingree for using her Congressional oversight powers to access the Burlington ICE facility as quickly as possible. This was Representative Pingree’s second oversight visit to an ICE facility in a matter of months. In a briefing after the visit, Representative Pingree reported to the public on what she found, including that ICE had rapidly cleaned up the space to conceal what had happened there.
As we continue to call on Congress to use its legislative and appropriations powers to hold the administration accountable for its senseless violence against immigrant communities, oversight is also key. We know so many of you are reaching out to Maine’s Congressional delegation frequently, and we encourage you to include asks for oversight in your messages. ICE must not be allowed to operate in the dark.
In solidarity,
ILAP Team
Immigration Law & Policy Updates
ILAP is committed to helping our community make sense of immigration news and its impact. Below is a summary of some key immigration law and policy developments from the past few weeks. All updates are subject to rapid change.
NOTE: Immigrants in Maine with questions about the below updates or otherwise in need of immigration legal help can request an appointment with ILAP: https://ilapmaine.org/get-legal-help.
Announcement:
Administration proposes new rule to limit access to asylum seeker work permits
What it Means:
The administration has proposed a new rule which would severely impact asylum seekers’ ability to work while their cases are pending.
Under the proposal, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services will not process any new work permits for asylum seekers until it can process asylum applications within 6 months. In the proposal, it says this could take anywhere from 14 to 173 years.
The rule would also give the government wide discretion to deny renewal work permit applications for asylum seekers, including if there is “reason to believe” applicants committed certain crimes.
If this proposed rule goes into effect, asylum seekers will lose the ability to support themselves while they are following lawful processes under U.S. law. It would have significant overall impacts on the U.S. workforce, especially in a place like Maine.
Administration issues new policy to subject certain refugees to mandatory detention
The Department of Homeland Security announced a new policy in late February that would subject resettled refugees in the U.S. to mandatory ICE detention if they did not apply for a green card within one year of arriving.
Refugees are people who have been found to be persecuted or at risk of persecution with no other option for their safety than resettlement in a new country. There are many reasons why resettled refugees in the U.S. may not have taken this step to apply for a green card within a year, including lack of information and resources as well as the challenges of trying to build a new life in a new country after facing traumatic circumstances.
Refugees and organizations have challenged this policy in a new lawsuit, citing the baselessness of subjecting people to mandatory detention when the “government has no reason to believe that they are deportable or have committed any criminal violation.”
Department of Homeland Security (DHS) appropriations negotiations continue
The Department of Homeland Security remains shut down as Senate Democrats continue to call for reforms before the agency receives any additional taxpayer dollars for immigration enforcement.
Just last year, Homeland Security received $190 billion, including $75 billion for ICE, for a four-year period.
Congress has the ability to fund other Department of Homeland Security components like the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) and Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) without funding mass deportation. Such a measure has been proposed.
Department of Homeland Security Secretary (DHS) Noem fired
The president announced that Homeland Security Secretary Noem has been fired and he is seeking to replace her with Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin.
While Noem has played a massive role in implementing the administration’s mass deportation agenda, a change in DHS leadership is not expected to impact overall immigration policy.
Administration terminates Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Yemen
The administration terminated TPS for Yemen, which continues to be experiencing one of the largest humanitarian crises in the world. More than 18 million people in Yemen are in need of humanitarian aid.
Nearly 1,400 people in the U.S. are affected by this decision, which strips away work permits and people’s protection from deportation to Yemen’s conflict.
The Catholic Legal Immigration Network pointed out that the administration’s termination of TPS protection (which claims people can safely return to Yemen) comes at the same time as U.S. citizens in Yemen have been told to evacuate as war with Iran escalates in the region, factors that should be considered in a TPS decision.
Know Your Rights
ILAP's Know Your Rights page has trusted resources and links to more information. We encourage you to share these resources broadly.
[English] Know Your Rights:
https://ilapmaine.org/know-your-rights[Français] Connaitre Ses Droits:
https://ilapmaine.org/know-your-rights-french[Português] Conheça Seus Direitos:
https://ilapmaine.org/know-your-rights-portuguese[Español] Conozca Sus Derechos:
https://ilapmaine.org/know-your-rights-spanish[Kreyòl Ayisyen] Konnen Dwa Ou:
https://ilapmaine.org/know-your-rights-haitian-creole
ILAP provides free immigration legal help to people who were arrested by ICE in Maine.
Learn how to request help for a person detained by immigration officials and what types of immigration detention cases ILAP can help with.
For previous updates from ILAP, check out the links below:
January 30, 2026: Golden Door
January 16, 2026: Community Update
Stay Connected:
Follow ILAP @ilapmaine on social media for the latest updates:
