Overview

• Schmidt was detained on re-entry when officers seized his green card and held him without charge or access to legal counsel
• He spent over two months in a maximum-security facility near Boston under harsh conditions, including windowless cells and restricted contact with family
• Authorities revived a decade-old drug possession case that had been previously dismissed to justify his arrest
• During his detention, officials made daily attempts to persuade him to renounce his green card and accept deportation
• US jurist Sandra Navidi warned that the administration’s border policy operates in a “lawless” zone and may extend detentions of European citizens to Guantánamo