> Reports abound of lawful immigrants who have been turned away, denied access to medication, and prevented from speaking to counsel. The Aziz brothers’ story is particularly stunning because, says Sandoval-Moshenberg, not only were they handcuffed while they were detained by CBP at Dulles, and not only were they turned away and sent to Ethiopia, but they were also made to sign a form, known as the I-407. In doing so, they surrendered their green cards, under the threat of being barred from the U.S. for the next five years if they did not. Sandoval-Moshenberg tells me he couldn’t quite believe the two young men “were straight-up bullied into having their green cards taken away.” They were at no point given copies of any of the documents they had signed.
By the way, the "oh boy, this looks like a lot of trouble, but it'll be much easier if you sign this form", and there goes your greencard, has been going on for a long time.
A friend of a friend traveled to the US with her newly born baby to see the grandparents, and was told at immigration that she hadn't been in the country for a while, and the greencard might have to be revoked, and she could either fly back or get a lawyer and fight it (while in no-man's-land) or sign a form, forfeit the greencard, but enter for now (as a tourist). This was last decade, and I might have the details wrong, but basically she signed, as the alternatives (with baby and all) were even less appealing, and the greencard was gone.
(Note that if she had been rich, at that point the exit tax would have kicked in, too.... fun fun fun)
It only took 5 minutes to get through this game, but it was an infuriating 5 minutes nonetheless — a perfect analog of what it sounds like is happening at airports right now.
