It’s the kind of message you’d expect in a spam folder; blunt, impersonal, and threatening. But when Dr. Lisa Anderson opened her inbox and read the first line, “It is time for you to leave the United States,” she was left stunned. This wasn’t phishing, it was from the Department of Homeland Security.
So far, Trump’s second term has been marked by a string of aggressive, and at times reckless, deportation efforts. And as if that wasn’t alarming enough, now even U.S.-born citizens are receiving threatening removal notices in their inboxes!
A physician from Cromwell, Connecticut, Anderson has never crossed paths with law enforcement, never applied for a visa, and has never held citizenship outside of the United States. She was born in Pennsylvania.
“The language seemed pretty threatening to whomever it might actually apply to,” Anderson told NBC Connecticut, which first reported the incident. At first, she assumed it was some kind of scam, but when she investigated further, she discovered the email was authentic.
The startling message came from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and told Anderson, a U.S. citizen with no immigration history, that her time in the country had run out.
“I really have no idea how my email ended up on that list unless someone else was using that as a false email,” Anderson said.
Since receiving the email, she’s begun carrying her passport at all times and is now searching for an immigration attorney, something she never imagined needing.
“I don’t have anything to do with immigration and I never thought that I would have needed the services of an immigration attorney either, and that’s where I find myself,” she said.
Anderson’s disturbing experience is not an isolated one. Just days before, two immigration lawyers in Massachusetts, also U.S. citizens, reported receiving similarly worded emails from DHS. The apparent glitch is raising serious questions about the reliability of federal databases, especially as the Trump administration’s deportation efforts grow more aggressive.
ICE is demanding doctor leave U.S. immediately—she is U.S. citizen born in Pennsylvania.
Unlike 2 immigration lawyers who received email—the doctor never had anything to do with immigration in her life.
“I really have no idea how my email got on that list” unless it was fraud.… pic.twitter.com/Vp0PUb3ew5
— LongTime🤓FirstTime👨💻 (@LongTimeHistory) April 17, 2025
Under Trump’s second term, deportation policy has taken the most chaotic turn. Just last month, Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland father and protected status holder, was mistakenly deported to a high-security El Salvador prison in what DHS later admitted was an “administrative error.”
In another alarming case, Palestinian advocacy leader Mohsen Mahdawi was detained at a Vermont ICE office after being tricked into attending a citizenship interview. He had been a legal permanent resident since 2015.
When asked about the email debacle, a senior DHS official told NBC Boston that messages may have gone out to unintended recipients if their contact details were linked to someone flagged for removal. “If a non-personal email, such as an American citizen contact provided by the alien—[was used], notices may have been sent to unintended recipients,” they explained. “CBP is monitoring communications and will address any issues on a case-by-case basis.”
But for people like Dr. Anderson, that explanation doesn’t undo the damage, or the fear.
“It does make me concerned there’re a lot more people out there like me who probably also thought this was spam, who probably didn’t realize, ‘I have a problem,’” she said.
Anderson now hopes to connect with the Boston attorneys who experienced the same bizarre mix-up. NBC Connecticut reached out to DHS for clarification but has not yet received a response.
WOAH! Judge Boasberg just said that the evidence in Trump’s deportation case shows “willful disregard [by the Trump administration] of its order” which the court concludes is probable cause to find the Trump administration “in CRIMINAL CONTEMPT” because he did not turn the plane… pic.twitter.com/KIdzjCzpCv
— Ed Krassenstein (@EdKrassen) April 16, 2025
Local leaders have condemned the incident. Cromwell Mayor James Demetriades called it a “clear administrative error” that “must be immediately remedied.”
“We can all agree that this Cromwell doctor has been incorrectly targeted and the federal government must issue an immediate rescission of their letter,” he said.
Senator Matt Lesser (D-Middletown) also weighed in and called the action “shocking and outrageous.” “She’s an American citizen who was born in Pennsylvania. A stunning violation of the Constitution,” he said.
As Trump continues to ramp up deportation efforts with increasingly questionable tactics, cases like Anderson’s raise an unsettling question. Just how safe are American citizens from the system itself?
