[chris]

A 21-year-old Wisconsin state trooper is facing possible deportation to South Africa after being taken into custody by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) while preparing to board a domestic flight.

Aaron Van Der Merwe was arrested Thursday at Dane County Regional Airport in Madison, according to his attorneys at Christopher & De León.

The law firm said Van Der Merwe informed immigration officers that he had a valid work permit and an asylum application awaiting a decision. Despite presenting that information, he was reportedly handcuffed, shackled and transported to an immigration detention facility in Dodge County.

ICE records indicate that Van Der Merwe is being held at a detention center in Juneau, Wisconsin.

According to his legal team, Van Der Merwe entered the United States legally from South Africa as a child. His asylum case has remained pending for seven years, and he has yet to receive an interview. His attorneys also say he holds a valid employment authorization document that does not expire until 2030.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) confirmed the arrest, describing it as part of a targeted immigration enforcement operation at the Madison airport.

Federal officials offered a different explanation for his immigration status, stating that Van Der Merwe arrived legally in March 2019 but was authorized to remain in the country only until September of that year.

DHS maintains that he overstayed his permitted admission period and will remain detained while immigration proceedings move forward. The agency also defended its enforcement policies, saying the Trump administration has tightened restrictions on domestic air travel for individuals it considers to be unlawfully present in the country.

Van Der Merwe's attorney, Marc Christopher, strongly criticized the arrest and announced plans to seek his client's release on bond.

Christopher argued that detaining a serving Wisconsin state trooper whose asylum application remains unresolved does nothing to improve public safety. He also called on Wisconsin's congressional representatives to intervene, seek answers from federal authorities and push for Van Der Merwe's release.

For now, Van Der Merwe remains in federal immigration custody as his legal team prepares to challenge his detention.

https://abcnews.com/US/wisconsin-sta...y?id=137922819

[tyroneslothrop]

Originally Posted by chris ↗

According to his legal team, Van Der Merwe entered the United States legally from South Africa as a child. His asylum case has remained pending for seven years, and he has yet to receive an interview.https://abcnews.com/US/wisconsin-sta...y?id=137922819

WTF! I thought white South Africans were the only ones getting asylum in the US these days?

[kellyhound]

Christopher argued that detaining a serving Wisconsin state trooper whose asylum application remains unresolved does nothing to improve public safety.

Instead of hunting illegals that actually have a job they should focus on joining homeland security to find illegals that are involved in crime imo and also according to latin voters who turned their back towards the right Trump government.

A primary argument from proponents of mass deportation, like the Trump administration, is that undocumented workers depress wages for low-skilled, native-born workers and reduce their labor force participation.

They argue that removing millions of unauthorized workers clears the labor market, forcing companies to compete for american workers. White House reports claim that industries like trucking and construction have seen blue-collar wages grow at the fastest clip in decades as a direct result of these tighter labor markets.

In reality economists point out a major caveat known as a composition effect meaning wages did not necessarily rise for individual workers because of deportations, instead, by removing millions of low-paid, undocumented workers from the data pool, the average statistical wage automatically looked higher.

Furthermore, studies from organizations like the National Bureau of Economic Research show that removing undocumented workers causes severe labor shortages that force businesses to scale back or shut down, which actually kills up to 44,000 U.S.-born jobs for every 500,000 immigrants removed.

The Trump administration also argues that the influx of millions of undocumented immigrants has driven up the cost of living by straining local resources, infrastructure and housing supply.

According to White House statements on mass deportations, removing undocumented populations frees up housing supply, claiming that home list prices have begun to decline and affordability has improved in metro areas with large unauthorized populations. They noted that home list prices declined year over year in 14 of the top 20 metro areas with large migrant populations.

While removing people temporarily reduces immediate demand for rental housing in specific neighborhoods but it has worsened the long-term housing crisis as undocumented immigrants make up roughly 23% of the total U.S. construction workforce.

Independent analyses, incl. reports from the Urban Institute, point out that mass deportations have stripped the construction sector of roughly 1.5 million workers.

This has severely slowed down new home building, spiked labor costs and is projected to drive home prices and rents higher in the long run due to a severe housing shortage.

The Trump administration also frequently frames the unauthorized crossing of borders and unlawful presence in the country as a fundamental threat to national sovereignty and public safety.

By utilizing ICE to implement zero-tolerance and ending what they label, catch and release policies, the administration argues it removes potential criminal threats before they can commit crimes on U.S. soil and creates a strong deterrent that stops future illegal immigration. They point to record-breaking drops in violent crime and murders in major cities (like Washington D.C. and Chicago) following enhanced ICE enforcement.

The drop in crime is a factual statistic, but criminologists strongly dispute that ICE deportations are the cause. Decades of data show that undocumented immigrants commit violent crimes at significantly lower rates than native-born U.S. citizens.

Most experts attribute the falling crime rates to localized police initiatives and a post-pandemic stabilization of community resources, rather than the removal of migrant populations.

also during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, the U.S. suffered a historic 29% spike in homicides and broad increases in violent crime.

According to final data from the FBI, nationwide violent crime began its initial descent in 2022 under the Biden administration. It then plummeted at a historic pace through 2023 and 2024, including a massive 14.5% single-year drop in murders in 2024 alone.

Statistics compiled by the Council on Criminal Justice and major urban police departments show that the historic crime declines successfully spanned across the transition from the Biden administration directly into the Trump administration so not a crime drop solely due to ICE being present.

Through the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, the federal government delivered a historic $350 billion in emergency aid to state, local and tribal governments. Of that massive pot, state and local governments allocated at least $10 billion specifically toward public safety and violence reduction initiatives.

The Trump administration also contends that non-restrictive immigration policies allow migrants to clog immigration courts with fraudulent asylum requests.

By aggressively detaining and deporting individuals through ICE, Trump aims to restore the rule of law, ensuring that federal systems, databases,and public funds are reserved strictly for legal residents and citizens.

The Trump administration succeeded in lowering border crossings and increasing removals (over 600,000 deportations and a massive wave of self-deportations).

However, the rule of law has come at an extraordinary fiscal cost to American taxpayers. Research from the Penn Wharton Budget Model shows that the enforcement, detention infrastructure and legal processing for this agenda have added hundreds of billions of dollars to the primary national deficit.

The process of arresting, detaining, legally processing, and removing individuals is estimated by PWBM to cost an average of $70,236 per deportee. This creates an additional net enforcement cost of roughly $900 billion over 10 years, which vastly exceeds the operational funding initially appropriated by legislation like the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

Brookings Institution data shows that restrictive immigration policies shaved an estimated 0.2 to 0.3 percentage points off total GDP growth. The economy still rises, but it is effectively operating with the emergency brake pulled.

According to data from the TRAC Immigration Detention Quick Facts, the majority of individuals held in ICE detention, roughly 70%, have no criminal convictions. Those who do are often convicted of minor offenses, such as traffic violations.

In fact, undocumented immigrants, who make up the largest portion of non-criminal ICE detainees, have some of the highest employment and labor force participation rates in the U.S.

Undocumented men have a labor force participation rate of roughly 92%. This is significantly higher than native-born American men (about 81%). Because they do not qualify for federal welfare, unemployment benefits or public assistance, working is an immediate economic necessity.

Undocumented women have a participation rate of around 60%, often due to taking on childcare responsibilities within their communities to avoid high commercial daycare costs.

The non-criminals caught in ICE sweeps or collateral arrests are heavily concentrated in essential, labor-intensive industries.

According to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, they primarily work in construction & trades, making up an estimated 23% of all drywall installers, roofers and brickmasons nationwide.

Agriculture & farming accounting for nearly 40% to 50% of the entire U.S. agricultural workforce (crop harvesting, dairy farming, and meatpacking).

Service & hospitality, working as cooks, dishwashers, hotel housekeepers and building cleaners.

And building & grounds maintenance, landscaping and residential services.

Businesses struggle to fill these vacant roles with American-born workers as the native-born population is aging, birth rates are declining and older generations (like Baby Boomers) are retiring rapidly.

There are simply not enough native-born workers entering the labor market to fill the millions of manual labor jobs left vacant. In industries like agriculture and construction, the average native-born worker is much older and retiring faster than the younger, foreign-born workforce replacing them.

Undocumented labor is heavily concentrated where the work is. In agriculture, crops are grown in rural areas (like California’s Central Valley or rural Georgia). Most unemployed American-born workers live in urban or suburban centers.

Unemployed Americans rarely pack up their lives and move to remote, rural fields for temporary, seasonal work that only lasts a few months out of the year.

Jobs in crop harvesting, meatpacking, roofing, and commercial dishwashing are among the most physically grueling, hazardous, and grueling jobs in the economy.

Economists use this term to describe the minimum wage a worker requires to accept a specific job. Because American citizens have access to a safety net (like unemployment insurance, family support or better job alternatives), their "reservation wage" for a grueling job like picking tomatoes in 100-degree heat is incredibly high, often far higher than the agricultural industry can afford to pay while keeping food affordable.

Also the vast majority of native-born Americans hold at least a high school diploma, and a massive percentage attend college.

Native-born workers naturally seek jobs with upward mobility, career paths, health insurance, and 401(k) benefits.

Many of these crucial entry-level roles (like hotel housekeeping or landscaping) are dead-end, low-prestige jobs that native-born workers actively avoid if they have any alternative.

History shows that even when wages are raised significantly, Americans rarely apply for these jobs.

In 2011, Georgia passed a strict anti-illegal immigration law (HB 87) that scared off thousands of undocumented farmworkers. Facing an immediate labor crisis, farmers offered higher wages and the state even tried to replace the workers with Americans on probation or parole.

The experiment failed completely as the native-born workers quit within days because the work was too physically demanding and millions of dollars worth of crops rotted in the fields.

And like we all know when wages increases in low paid jobs the prices go up for restaurant meals, groceries etc.