Trump administration uses Colorado suspect’s status to push deportation agenda

The immigration status of the man who allegedly attacked people with a makeshift flamethrower and other incendiary devices at an event for Israeli hostages in Boulder, Colorado, has become further fodder for the Trump administration’s deportation agenda.

Mohamed Sabry Soliman, a 45-year-old who came to the US in 2022 from Egypt and overstayed his initial tourist visa, according to the US government, allegedly planned his attack on the event specifically to target Zionists, federal authorities said. He shouted “Free Palestine” while carrying out the attack, which the FBI has called an “act of terrorism”, and he was charged on Monday with a federal hate crime.

The attack combines two frequent enemies of the right – anti-Israel speech and actions, and illegal immigration – and is already being used on the right to garner support for more deportations. The response stands in contrast to how the right has reacted to attacks against Palestinians and Muslims in the US and to the conservative response to the war in Gaza. The Trump administration has also used support for Palestinians as an underpinning for deportations among college students.

The Gateway Pundit, a rightwing outlet, is referring to Soliman as “Biden’s Illegal Alien from Egypt”. Stephen Miller, Donald Trump’s deputy chief of staff, said the “terror attack” was committed by an “illegal alien”.

“He was granted a tourist visa by the Biden Administration and then he illegally overstayed that visa. In response, the Biden Administration gave him a work permit,” Miller wrote on X. “Suicidal migration must be fully reversed.”

In a post on Truth Social, Trump blamed the attack on Biden’s “ridiculous Open Border Policy”.

“He must go out under ‘TRUMP’ Policy,” Trump wrote. “Acts of Terrorism will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the Law. This is yet another example of why we must keep our Borders SECURE, and deport Illegal, Anti-American Radicals from our Homeland.”

The attack occurred in Colorado soon after the Trump administration listed the state and many of its cities and counties, including Boulder, as “sanctuary” jurisdictions that won’t aid law enforcement in deportation activities, though that list was subsequently removed after pushback from places it included. These policies have come up in rightwing coverage of the attack.

For some rightwing commentators, the attack underscored the need for restrictions similar to what Trump attempted in his first term: a Muslim travel ban. (Soliman’s religious affiliation is not clear.)

“Notice how the GOP narrative around Mohamed Soliman is that he is an ‘illegal alien,’” rightwing commentator Laura Loomer wrote on X in one of several posts calling for a crackdown on “Islamic terrorism”. “We are being gaslit by the GOP to only care about Soliman’s immigration status as opposed to his Islamic ideology which is more of a problem than his immigration status as it relates to the MOTIVE of the terrorist attack.”

It was the second recent attack in which the perpetrator called for a free Palestine, though the first shooting in DC was carried out by a US citizen and did not become cause for calls to increase deportations. These attacks come amid a rise in support for using violence to achieve political goals, including around the Gaza war.

Studies have shown that immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than US-born citizens. The National Institute of Justice has recently taken down a webpage on about how undocumented people are less likely to commit crimes – a note indicates that it is one of many websites and materials being reviewed for compliance with Trump executive orders.

Some studies don’t differentiate between documented and undocumented immigrants when assessing crime rates because the data can be difficult to parse, an NIJ study said. But, this study said, it analyzed Texas criminal records from 2012 to 2018 and found undocumented immigrants “had the lowest offending rates” compared with documented immigrants and US-born citizens, who had the highest rates.