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December 16, 2025

3 entries on this date.

DOJ withdrew a 1997 opinion, cutting some lawful immigrants off from federal benefit programs

On December 16, 2025, the Department of Justice's Office of Legal Counsel withdrew a 1997 opinion that had let authorized noncitizens access federal programs funded through discretionary spending despite a 1996 welfare-reform law generally barring their eligibility. The new opinion holds that any federal benefit determined by income or need counts as a restricted "means-tested" benefit regardless of funding source, newly excluding lawful permanent residents and other qualified noncitizens from programs including Medicaid, SNAP, and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families for five years after entry.

Trump orders unilateral "complete blockade" of sanctioned oil tankers off Venezuela

On December 16, 2025, President Trump announced via Truth Social that he had ordered a "complete blockade" of all U.S.-sanctioned oil tankers going to and from Venezuela, declaring the country "completely surrounded by the largest Armada ever assembled in the History of South America." The unilateral order — issued without congressional authorization — became the operational basis for a wave of Coast Guard tanker seizures and interdictions off Venezuela in the days and weeks that followed.

ICE awarded GEO Group and 12 other firms up to $1.2 billion to locate immigrants, supplying contractors 50,000 names a month

On December 16, 2025, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement awarded indefinite-delivery "skip tracing" contracts worth up to $1.2 billion over two years to 13 private companies, among them B.I. Incorporated, the wholly owned subsidiary of private-prison operator GEO Group, whose award is valued at up to $121 million. Under the contracts ICE furnishes each contractor with roughly 50,000 people's last known addresses and identifying information every month, and the contractors mine commercial databases and physically observe those people, returning time-stamped photographs of homes and workplaces. Reporting by The Intercept, Source Material and Bloomberg News established that the program reaches people on ICE's non-detained docket nationwide and that the agency told contractors a report may be followed by "an enforcement action."