A caller pleaded to a Fox host to protect Ukrainians who fled to America to escape war. Now, the Trump administration is reportedly planning on revoking their legal status.

Written by John Whitehouse

Published

On  the radio show of Fox’s Mark Levin, one Republican caller worried about the effects of revoking parole for Ukrainians fleeing war, sharing his concern for his Ukrainian fiancée and her family. Now, the Trump administration is reportedly planning on rolling back those protections.

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  • Trump administration reportedly planning to roll back parole for Ukrainians who fled the war after Russia invaded

    Reuters reports today that the Trump administration is planning on revoking the legal status of hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians who fled war with Russia, with one source noting that the rollback was planned before the Oval Office meeting between President Donald Trump and President Volodymyr Zelensky.

    U.S. President Donald Trump's administration is planning to revoke temporary legal status for some 240,000 Ukrainians who fled the conflict with Russia, a senior Trump official and three sources familiar with the matter said, potentially putting them on a fast-track to deportation.

    The move, expected as soon as April, would be a stunning reversal of the welcome Ukrainians received under President Joe Biden's administration.

    The planned rollback of protections for Ukrainians was underway before Trump publicly feuded with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy last week. It is part of a broader Trump administration effort to strip legal status from more than 1.8 million migrants allowed to enter the U.S. under temporary humanitarian parole programs launched under the Biden administration, the sources said.

    A White House spokesperson has denied this reporting.

    Among the Trump administration’s first actions was pausing programs granting parole. There are already lawsuits challenging the Trump administration’s actions revoking parole. As the AP reported on March 1, one lawsuit “seeks to reinstate humanitarian parole programs that allowed in 875,000 migrants from Ukraine, Afghanistan, Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela.”

  • A Fox News host had called for “ending the abuse of humanitarian parole"

    Rolling back parole for people fleeing war was a priority for right-wing media. In response to a clip of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) warning that the Trump administration would be revoking papers of legal immigrants to make them undocumented and deport them — essentially what the Trump administration is now doing — Fox’s Laura Ingraham on January 22 called for “ending the abuse of humanitarian parole."

    From the January 22, 2025, edition of Fox News' The Ingraham Angle

  • Republican caller to Mark Levin's radio show expressed concern about parole for Ukrainians weeks ago

    It’s clear that this position is alarming some Americans who supported Trump.

    On February 19, a Republican caller to the radio show of Fox News host Mark Levin pleaded for assistance, noting that his fiancée and her family were at risk. Levin was unable to offer any assurances.

    Mark Levin takes caller concerned with his fiancé's immigration status

    Mark Levin screenshot

    From the February 19, 2025, edition of Westwood One's The Mark Levin Show

    MARK LEVIN (HOST): Let's take a few calls, shall we? Yes. We can. Let's go to Joe in Pennsylvania, XM Satellite. Joe, go right ahead, please.

    CALLER: Yeah. I'm — this is actually the first time I've been on the show. It's a great honor to be on your show. My father has been on your show in the past for a few years.

    …

    LEVIN: Go ahead. Yes, sir.

    CALLER: So I just wanted to talk about, I've actually been to Ukraine during the war. My fiancée is Ukrainian. I filed the paperwork for her to come over here because we actually were just friends at the time, but we became more with time. And, she's been here because her city gets bombed usually every day. And it just — it — it's very concerning to me.

    I've been a Republican, ever since I could vote and same with my family. And, so her family's here. I'm here.

    LEVIN: Let me guess, you're gonna say, what is this animus against Ukraine and this either open or backdoor support for a mass murderer like Putin? That's your question. Right?

    CALLER: Yes. And also my other question is, you know, her parents are here and she is here and her daughter and we've been planning on getting married now for a few months. And it seems like I've read on the news now that, if you were paroled into the United States, you can't file any forms for immigration.

    LEVIN: I'd have to be honest with you. I'm not an immigration lawyer, and I don't know what the status is of firing — filing for parole. So I can't really help you with that.

    CALLER: It wouldn't be filing for parole. It would be filing because we've been planning on getting married for a while.

    LEVIN: I know. But I said I — I'm not really up on this right now. I'm certainly not up to what's up on what's going on right now.

    CALLER: It seems like though it's crazy to me how much isolationism is going around. There's so much talk. It seems like people — it's flipped. They hate Ukraine now. I've never.

    LEVIN: Yeah, I don't get that at all. You won't hear that from me. Some of these other people, they're gonna have to explain themselves. They never wanna come on here and debate me. I tried to do that once with one of them, and it was really kinda silly.

    But, no, I don't get it. I really don't get it at all. You're talking to somebody who's mostly of Russian ancestry, some Ukraine, but mostly Russian, and I don't really care. We've spent trillions of dollars since the end of World War II to protect ourselves from enemies and primarily the Soviet Union, and now it includes, of course, Russia, China, and others. We talk about spending money.

    That's a lot of money. That's number one. That doesn't mean we should be wasteful or frivolous with our money with any country, Ukraine or otherwise. But, you know, a lot of us see what Ukraine is facing, that Ukraine was invaded, that Ukraine is actually the good guy here. Putin's actually the bad guy.

    He's an assassin. He's KGB. He was an enforcer in East Germany in the day. The mentality remains the same. They talk about an election. That guy has been ruling that country for 24 years and his elections are a joke. I mean, if elections are the standards, we have to go all throughout the Middle East. Why are we dealing with Saudi Arabia? Why are we dealing with Jordan? Why are we dealing with Egypt?

    All those — none of them have elections. For that matter, why are we dealing with New York, which has lousy elections? That's a joke. Look. I'm sympathetic to your view, Joe, and so we'll see how this plays out.

    Thank you for your call. Best to your father. We'll keep going here.

    We’ve seen more callers to right-wing talk shows sound the alarm about Trump’s actions — including on the subject of Ukraine and Russia.