People are naive if they think this has nothing to do with Trump. I know friends and relatives whose visa applications are now being routinely denied for no reason. The executive branch provides guidance on how to implement laws that are pretty vague. So they have wide discretion and control over the behavior of the border agent. Let's face it, the tough guy border agent is a mall cop. Once you tell him that your priority right now is to do "extreme vetting" of foreigners they are going to step over their boundaries. This is only the start of such stories and there will be more to come. Yesterday I read that a computer scientist from Nigeria was similarly detained and asked to write code. There is an excellent NYT story about how ICE has been empowered to make wide arrests and I am pretty sure they are routinely violating civil rights and Constitution every day now