This is Brian Lairor's Daily Politics podcast from WNYC Studios.

It's Friday, February 20th.

I'm Cusha Navadar filling in for Brian today.

Happy Friday, everyone.

On Wednesday, the Trump administration issued

a memo directing immigration officers to detain lawful refugees who aren't yet permanent U.S.

residents. It's the latest policy to limit the legal pathways to naturalizations. In fact,

those legal pathways are themselves now ways in which

aspiring residents are targeted, arrested, detained, and potentially deported. Much of this work is

happening through an agency within the Department of Homeland Security called the U.S. Citizenship

and Immigration Services, or U.S. CIS.

For two decades, USCIS was seen as the friendlier side of DHS. It didn't make arrests or

participate in sweeps. U.S.C.I. officers filed immigration paperwork, conducted interviews,

and administered the pathways to citizenship

or permanent residency. But as my next guest has reported, the nature of that agency has changed.

Aspiring citizens and green card holders, including here in New York, appear at scheduled

meetings to move their process along, only to find out they are going

to be arrested.

So what is going on inside USCIS and are the legal pathways to citizenship still safe?

Joining us is Jonathan Blitzer, New Yorker, staff writer, and the author of Everyone Who

Is Gone is Here, the United States, Central America, and the

making of a crisis. Jonathan, you with me? Yes, I am. Wonderful. It's so nice to have you here.

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