A United States citizen was mistakenly looped into a Department of Homeland Security email that ordered her to self-deport from the U.S. “immediately.”
Nicole Micheroni, an immigration attorney and partner at the Massachusetts firm Cameron Micheroni & Silvia, was stunned by the official email Friday morning and initially believed it was intended for one of her clients.
“It took me a couple of minutes to realize it was sent to me instead of someone I represent,” Micheroni told the Boston Globe.
The notification was written simply in the subject line as “Notification of Termination of Parole” and did not state a client name or case number.
It has now materialized that the message was sent by mistake, the DHS confirmed.
The memo was genuine and is part of the fresh crackdown ordered by President Donald Trump to remove thousands of undocumented immigrants.
The measures that inadvertently targeted Micheroni are a reaction to the Biden-era reconciliation bill that granted nearly 7 million undocumented people the right to work and live temporarily in the U.S., according to Pew Research.
“DHS is terminating your parole,” the body of the email read.
The message continued, “Do not attempt to remain in the United States—the federal government will find you."
Micheroni, who has practiced immigration law for 12 years, told The Globe she had never before seen immigration parole terminated by email.
Last year, Micheroni and her firm helped Francisco Rodriguez Guardado, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology janitor originally from El Salvador, avoid deportation to his homeland, “where he faced repeated threats to his life from organized criminal elements.”
Guardado was detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement authorities in Boston in 2017 “with the intent of immediately returning him to El Salvador despite the threats to his life.”
Meanwhile, Micheroni said that Friday’s email was not something that alarmed her personally.
Rather, she was now concerned for other immigrants who were next in line to be targeted by ICE officials.
“It’s meant to be an intimidation tactic to get people to leave the country,” Micheroni said.
“In some ways, I don’t think they really care who they reach, as long as the message is being received.”
In March, over 500,000 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans had their temporary legal status revoked by the Trump administration — meaning that they could now be in line for deportations this month.
“It is terrifying for people to get a letter like this,” Jeff Thielman, president of the International Institute of New England, a humanitarian relief service for immigrants in Massachusetts, told The Globe.
“They followed all the rules, did everything they were supposed to do, reported whereabouts and location to the government, and now they’re getting punished for it,” he added.
Sarah Sherman-Stokes, an associate director of the Immigrants’ Rights and Human Trafficking Clinic at Boston University School of Law, told The Globe that DHS appears to be clamping down on asylum seekers who used the CPB One app.
A senior DHS official said the mistake could have been caused by an asylum seeker who had included the email address in their contact information.
“[Customs and Border Protection] is monitoring communications and will address any issues on a case-by-case basis,” the DHS statement to The Globe said.
The Independent contacted DHS and Nicole Micheroni for comment.
