WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration has moved to classify more than 6,000 living immigrants as dead, canceling their Social Security numbers and effectively wiping out their ability to work or receive benefits in an effort to get them to leave the country, according to two people familiar with the situation.
The move will make it much harder for those affected to use banks or other basic services where Social Security numbers are required. It’s part of a broader effort by President Donald Trump to crack down on immigrants who were allowed to enter and remain temporarily in the United States under programs instituted by his predecessor, Joe Biden.
The Trump administration is moving the immigrants' names and legally obtained Social Security numbers to a database that federal officials normally use to track the deceased, according to the two people familiar with the moves and their ramifications. They spoke on condition of anonymity Thursday night because the plans had not yet been publicly detailed.
The officials said stripping the immigrants of their Social Security numbers will cut them off from many financial services and encourage them to “self-deport” and abandon the U.S. for their birth countries.
It wasn't immediately clear how the 6,000-plus immigrants were chosen. But the Trump White House has targeted people in the country temporarily under Biden-era programs, including more than 900,000 immigrants who entered the U.S. using that administration's CBP One app.
On Monday, the Department of Homeland Security revoked the legal status of the immigrants who used that app. They had generally been allowed to remain in the U.S. for two years with work authorization under presidential parole authority during the Biden era, but are now expected to self-deport.
Meanwhile, a federal judge said Thursday that she was stopping the Trump administration from ordering hundreds of thousands of Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans with temporary legal status to leave the country later this month.
A representative from the Social Security Administration did not respond to a request for comment on the news that living immigrants were being classified as dead. The agency maintains the most complete federal database of individuals who have died, and the file contains more than 142 million records, which go back to 1899.
The Privacy Act allows the Social Security Administration to disclose information to law enforcement in limited circumstances, which includes when a violent crime has been committed or other criminal activity.
DHS and the Treasury Deprartment signed a deal this week that would allow the IRS to share immigrants’ tax data with Immigration and Customs Enforcement for the purpose of identifying and deporting people illegally in the U.S. The agreement will allow ICE to submit names and addresses of immigrants inside the U.S. illegally to the IRS for cross-verification against tax records.
The acting IRS commissioner, Melanie Krause, who had served in that capacity since February, stepped down over that deal.
In March, meanwhile, a federal judge temporarily blocked a team charged with cutting federal jobs and shrinking the government led by billionaire Elon Musk from Social Security systems that hold personal data on millions of Americans, calling their work there a “fishing expedition.”
Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, an advocacy group that has challenged various Trump administration efforts in court, said her organization would likely sue over the Social Security numbers as well, once more details become available.
“This President continues to engage in lawless behavior, violating the law and abusing our systems of checks and balances,” Perryman said.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent speaks to reporters outside the West Wing of the White House, Wednesday, April 9, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Six people who all knew each other were inside a vehicle when one, a man with an alleged gang connection, shot each of them in the head before fleeing, according to newly unsealed criminal charges in this week's mass shooting in Minneapolis.
Three victims died at the scene early Tuesday. Another succumbed to his wounds Thursday. One remains hospitalized after being shot in the face but was able to identify the shooter to police, according to the criminal complaint.
And investigators believe a fifth person was killed hours later in retaliation. A suspect in the first shooting was arrested Thursday and has been charged with murder.
Police say the victims were all Native Americans and the shooting was gang-related. The rash of violence has shaken one of the country’s largest urban Indigenous communities.
The first shooting happened on Tuesday just before midnight in a vehicle parked in the diverse residential and commercial neighborhood of Phillips in south Minneapolis. The county medical examiner's office on Friday said the three who died at the scene were Evan Ramon Denny, 27 of St. Paul; Joseph Douglas Goodwin, 17, of Minneapolis; and Merelle Joan White, 20, of Red Lake. Two had been shot multiple times.
A 20-year-old woman was shot in the face and hospitalized in critical condition, the complaint said. She said the shooter was sitting in the back seat when he opened fire on her and everyone else in the vehicle before fleeing on foot.
A 28-year-old man was hospitalized in grave condition but died shortly after the suspect was arrested on Thursday, police said. That victim's name was still being withheld Friday.
About 13 hours later and a few blocks away, a man was killed near an apartment building that happens to house the Minneapolis office of the Red Lake Nation, one of the state's largest tribes. The medical examiner identified him Friday as Tiago Antonio Gilbert, 34, of Minneapolis. He died of multiple gunshot wounds.
The Minneapolis police chief said Thursday it was “entirely probable” this second shooting was revenge for the first. But a police spokesman, Sgt. Garrett Parten, said investigators were still working to determine if there was a link.
Police have released few other details about that homicide.
A makeshift memorial had sprung up by Friday at the site of the first shooting. Red, silver and black balloons were tied to a tree where a plush eagle toy was also attached. At the base were candles, fresh flowers and a bottle of tequila.
The state’s 11 sovereign tribal nations issued a joint statement Thursday, mourning the deaths and urging anyone with information to contact city law enforcement or their own tribal police.
“As native peoples, we have always known grief,” the statement said. “But we have also always experienced the strength that comes afterward. We are here because our ancestors cared for one another. That is how you are even here — because someone before you chose love, protection, and community over despair.”
The complaint against James Duane Ortley, 34, of Minneapolis, alleges that he and members of his family are associated with a gang known as the Native Mob, which operates in the city’s south and other parts of Minnesota.
The gang was the subject of a multiyear federal investigation over a decade ago that resulted in the convictions of 28 people. Its alleged leader at the time was sentenced in 2014 to 43 years in prison.
The U.S. Marshals Service said its local fugitive task force and an FBI SWAT team arrested Ortley on Thursday afternoon. He was charged a day earlier with second-degree murder and being a felon in possession of a firearm.
Ortley has a felony assault conviction on his record from 2021, which the complaint said prohibits him from possessing guns or ammunition. Court records show he completed his probation in 2023. When police interviewed him in 2023 in a separate homicide investigation, the complaint said, he acknowledged that his street name was “Baby James.”
Ortley remained jailed Friday, and court records didn’t list an attorney who could comment on his behalf. His first court appearance is scheduled for Monday. The chief public defender for Hennepin County, Michael Berger, said his office probably won’t learn if it’s representing Ortley until Monday. Messages were left with several potential relatives of Ortley's.
The victim who survived told police the shooter went by the street names “Baby J,” “Little J” and “Little James,” and was a friend of one of the victims, according to the complaint filed in Hennepin County District Court.
Relatives of one victim told police that the victims were all together at a family friend's residence in Minneapolis but left around 9:30 p.m. with plans to pick up “Baby J,” who was known to be a “close family friend” of the victims. The family member identified “Baby J” as the defendant.
Other law enforcement sources told investigators that Ortley was “an associate” of more than one victim, the complaint said.
A surveillance video was consistent with the survivor's account, the complaint said. It shows one person matching Ortley's description exiting the vehicle and fleeing before police arrived.
The complaint gave no details on what might have prompted the shootings.
“This is a bittersweet day,” Police Chief Brian O’Hara said in a statement Friday. “While this arrest represents meaningful progress toward justice, that progress is overshadowed by the heartbreaking loss of another life. Our thoughts remain with the victims’ families, their loved ones, and a community that continues to grieve.”
This story had been updated to correct in the headline that he has been charged in four homicides, instead of charged with four homicides.
Associated Press reporters Mark Vancleave in Minneapolis and John Hanna in Topeka, Kansas, contributed.
Items are placed as a memorial at the site of a late Tuesday fatal shooting, on Friday, May 2, 2025 in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Mark Vancleave)
Items are placed as a memorial at the site of a late Tuesday fatal shooting, on Friday, May 2, 2025 in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Mark Vancleave)
A police officer works on the scene as a bystander is shook up by the homicide in front of 2107 Cedar Ave S in Minneapolis, Minn., on Wednesday, April 30, 2025. (Richard Tsong-Taatarii/Star Tribune via AP)
Police work on the scene as a bystander is shook up by the homicide in front of 2107 Cedar Ave S in Minneapolis, Minn., on Wednesday, April 30, 2025. (Richard Tsong-Taatarii/Star Tribune via AP)
