Is there evidence for ICE agents deporting people who legally entered the US, but are still within the process of aquiring the citizenship?
Executive summary
Available reporting shows clear evidence that ICE can and does detain and remove noncitizens who lawfully entered the United States — including lawful permanent residents and people with pending immigration applications — and that ICE has also, in documented cases, wrongly detained or even deported people later found to be U.S. citizens; sources do not provide a single neat category labeled “people who legally entered and were in process of acquiring citizenship” but do show the adjacent, relevant phenomena (detention/removal of LPRs and arrests of people with pending applications, plus documented wrongful deportations of citizens) [1] [2] [3] [4].
1. How the law treats lawful entrants who are not yet citizens
Federal immigration law distinguishes U.S. citizens (who cannot be removed) from noncitizens — including lawful permanent residents (green card holders) and other visa holders — who can be charged with deportability for certain criminal convictions, immigration violations, or inadmissibility grounds; ICE therefore has statutory authority to detain and remove many people who lawfully entered but have not become citizens [2] [5].
2. Evidence ICE is detaining and removing lawful permanent residents and visa holders
Multiple legal guides and law‑firm reporting explain that LPRs and visa holders remain vulnerable: the Immigration and Nationality Act contains broad grounds for inadmissibility and deportability that give CBP and ICE authority to stop or remove LPRs or visa holders deemed ineligible, and advocates and lawyers report arrests and removals of legal immigrants under recent enforcement priorities [2] [6] [7].
3. Arrests and removals while applications are pending
Advocacy organizations and community alerts document ICE arrests of people who have pending applications for asylum, green cards, or other status — including arrests at airports — demonstrating that having a pending USCIS filing does not categorically prevent ICE enforcement actions [3] [8]. These reports underscore that “in process” status is not an ironclad shield against detention or removal.
4. Mistaken detentions and wrongful deportations of people later shown to be citizens
Independent reviews and watchdog reporting have documented cases where ICE detained or deported people who were actually U.S. citizens — sometimes for years — because of misidentification, database errors, or failure to update records after a citizenship investigation concluded; the American Immigration Council and GAO‑cited reporting describe dozens of such cases and systemic data problems that contribute to wrongful targeting [4] [9].
5. What the reporting does and does not prove about “legally entered and acquiring citizenship”
The sources collectively prove three things: ICE can remove noncitizens who entered lawfully (LPRs/visa holders) [2], ICE has arrested people with pending applications [3], and ICE has in some cases wrongfully detained or deported people later established to be citizens [4]. What the sources do not supply is a catalogue of cases explicitly labeled “person lawfully entered, was in an active naturalization process, and was deported while that process remained valid” — reporting instead documents overlapping categories rather than that single, narrowly defined scenario [2] [3] [4].
6. Competing narratives, incentives and where to watch for bias
Government enforcement statements emphasize public‑safety rationales and statutory authority [10], while immigrant‑rights groups highlight wrongful deportations, canceled applications, and policy shifts that increase risk for legal immigrants [11] [3]; legal‑services literature urges carrying USCIS receipts and getting counsel because institutional incentives (databases, interagency data‑sharing, and enforcement priorities) and administrative errors can leave even lawfully present people exposed [8] [9]. Some local reporting uses charged language (“de‑documentation”) that reflects advocacy framing; cross‑checking with primary legal texts and government statements helps separate statutory authority from operational mistakes [2] [10].
7. Bottom line
There is documented, credible evidence that ICE detains and deports noncitizens who lawfully entered the U.S. (including LPRs and visa holders) and that ICE has in documented instances wrongly detained or deported people later proven to be U.S. citizens; there is also clear reporting that pending applications do not automatically prevent ICE arrests — but the available sources do not present a tidy, publicly documented set of cases limited precisely to people "lawfully admitted and actively in the naturalization process who were deported while that process remained pending," so that more case‑level documentation would be needed to establish the frequency of that exact scenario [2] [3] [4].