An Immigration Attorney And Naturalized U.S. Citizen Was Ordered to Self-Deport: DHS Says It Was a 'Glitch'

For more than a decade, Carlos Trujillo, a Venezuelan-born attorney, has practiced immigration law in Salt Lake City, Utah, serving the local community. Trujillo moved to the United States at age 18 and later became a naturalized U.S. citizen. Despite that, he recently received an email from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) ordering him to self-deport within seven days.

"It's time for you to leave," read the opening line of the email, sent to Trujillo on April 11.

Trujillo moved to the U.S. about 24 years ago and has been a naturalized citizen for almost a decade. Despite this, he was one of hundreds of thousands of people across the country that received a letter from DHS ordering them to self-deport.

"I know the laws of this country," Trujillo told KTVX. "I am not leaving. I am not deportable. But I do want everybody to know that these kinds of things are happening."

He added that the "threatening language" in the email bothered him, and encouraged the immigrant community to be aware of any changes in immigration laws. Trujillo also told the outlet that many people who received the email are in the country under legal circumstances and recommended them to know their rights.

According to the Associated Press, the emails sent by DHS were "an apparent glitch" in the Trump administration's move to end a Biden-era policies allowing people to live and work in the country temporarily.

Similarly to Trujillo's case, Nicole Micheroni, a Massachusetts-born immigration attorney, received an identical email earlier this month, despite being a lifelong U.S. citizen. Micheroni posted the message to Bluesky, showing it threatened federal pursuit if she remained in the country past a seven-day deadline.

A senior DHS official later admitted to HuffPost that some citizens may have received the notices due to clerical mistakes—specifically when non-citizens list an incorrect or shared email address on their immigration applications. DHS says it is reviewing such incidents on a case-by-case basis, but no formal apology or correction has been issued to the affected individuals as of yet.

"I don't want to believe or draw conclusions that this is something personal against me or because of the work that I do with the community," Trujillo said. "It's just simply a mistake."

The immigration attorney said the state of Utah counts with "very respectful" judges and officers involved in immigration cases, but just as other similar experiences throughout the country, decisions over immigration are coming from a federal level.

"We're seeing all these uniform characterizations that make no sense because our communities are diverse," Trujillo said. "Our communities are ... respectful of the law. Our communities are hardworking people."

For Jim McConkie, another immigration attorney in Utah, the letter send out by the government can be seen as a scare tactic to get people out of the country.

"It's a letter which misrepresents what's actually going on," he said. "Using threats of fines and incarceration. It's wrong morally, it's wrong legally, and it needs to be challenged."