⚖️👏😎 BREAKING: SUPREME RELIEF: Court Reaffirms Executive’s Authority To Set Sane Immigration Enforcement Policies! — “Standing” Key! — Baseless Attacks By GOP In Texas & Louisiana Thwarted (For Now)  — 8-1 Win For Administration, Opinion by Justice Kavanaugh, 3 Concurring, Alito Lone Dissenter! — U.S. v. Texas

Here’s a copy of the full decision:

 https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/22-58_i425.pdf

Here’s the syllabus (NOT part of the decision):

UNITED STATES ET AL. v. TEXAS ET AL. CERTIORARI BEFORE JUDGMENT TO THE UNITED STATES

COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 22–58. Argued November 29, 2022—Decided June 23, 2023

In 2021, the Secretary of Homeland Security promulgated new immigra- tion-enforcement guidelines (Guidelines for the Enforcement of Civil Immigration Law) that prioritize the arrest and removal from the United States of noncitizens who are suspected terrorists or dangerous criminals or who have unlawfully entered the country only recently, for example. The States of Texas and Louisiana claim that the Guide- lines contravene two federal statutes that they read to require the ar- rest of certain noncitizens upon their release from prison (8 U. S. C. §1226(c)) or entry of a final order of removal (§1231(a)(2)). The District Court found that the States would incur costs due to the Executive’s failure to comply with those alleged statutory mandates, and that the States had standing to sue based on those costs. On the merits, the District Court found the Guidelines unlawful and vacated them. The Fifth Circuit declined to stay the District Court’s judgment, and this Court granted certiorari before judgment.

Held: Texas and Louisiana lack Article III standing to challenge the Guidelines. Pp. 3–14.

(a) Under Article III, a plaintiff must have standing to sue. This bedrock constitutional requirement has its roots in the separation of powers. So the threshold question here is whether the States have standing to maintain this suit. Based on this Court’s precedents and longstanding historical practice, the answer is no.

To establish standing, a plaintiff must show an injury in fact caused by the defendant and redressable by a court order. The District Court found that the States would incur additional costs due to the chal- lenged arrest policy. And monetary costs are an injury. But this Court has stressed that the alleged injury must also “be legally and judicially cognizable.” Raines v. Byrd, 521 U. S. 811, 819. That requires that

2

UNITED STATES v. TEXAS Syllabus

the dispute is “traditionally thought to be capable of resolution through the judicial process.” Ibid. Here, the States cite no precedent, history, or tradition of federal courts entertaining lawsuits of this kind. On the contrary, this Court has previously ruled that a plaintiff lacks standing to bring such a suit “when he himself is neither prosecuted nor threatened with prosecution.” See Linda R. S. v. Richard D., 410 U. S. 614, 619. The Linda R. S. Article III standing principle remains the law today, and the States have pointed to no case or historical prac- tice holding otherwise. Pp. 3–6.

(b) There are good reasons why federal courts have not traditionally entertained lawsuits of this kind. For one, when the Executive Branch elects not to arrest or prosecute, it does not exercise coercive power over an individual’s liberty or property, and thus does not infringe upon interests that courts often are called upon to protect. Moreover, such lawsuits run up against the Executive’s Article II authority to decide “how to prioritize and how aggressively to pursue legal actions against defendants who violate the law.” TransUnion LLC v. Ramirez, 594 U. S. ___, ___. The principle of Executive Branch enforcement dis- cretion over arrests and prosecutions extends to the immigration con- text. Courts also generally lack meaningful standards for assessing the propriety of enforcement choices in this area, which are invariably affected by resource constraints and regularly changing public-safety and public-welfare needs. That is why this Court has recognized that federal courts are generally not the proper forum for resolving claims that the Executive Branch should make more arrests or bring more prosecutions. Pp. 6–9.

(c) This holding does not suggest that federal courts may never en- tertain cases involving the Executive Branch’s alleged failure to make more arrests or bring more prosecutions. First, the Court has adjudi- cated selective-prosecution claims under the Equal Protection Clause in which a plaintiff typically seeks to prevent his or her own prosecu- tion. Second, the standing analysis might differ when Congress ele- vates de facto injuries to the status of legally cognizable injuries re- dressable by a federal court. Third, the standing calculus might change if the Executive Branch wholly abandoned its statutory respon- sibilities to make arrests or bring prosecutions. Fourth, a challenge to an Executive Branch policy that involves both arrest or prosecution priorities and the provision of legal benefits or legal status could lead to a different standing analysis. Fifth, policies governing the contin- ued detention of noncitizens who have already been arrested arguably might raise a different standing question than arrest or prosecution policies. But this case presents none of those scenarios. Pp. 9–12.

(d) The discrete standing question raised by this case rarely arises because federal statutes that purport to require the Executive Branch

Cite as: 599 U. S. ____ (2023) 3 Syllabus

to make arrests or bring prosecutions are rare. This case is different from those in which the Federal Judiciary decides justiciable cases in- volving statutory requirements or prohibitions on the Executive, be- cause it implicates the Executive Branch’s enforcement discretion and raises the distinct question of whether the Federal Judiciary may in effect order the Executive Branch to take enforcement actions. The Court’s decision does not indicate any view on whether the Executive is complying with its statutory obligations. Nor does the Court’s nar- row holding signal any change in the balance of powers between Con- gress and the Executive. Pp. 12–14.

606 F. Supp. 3d 437, reversed.

KAVANAUGH, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which ROBERTS, C. J., and SOTOMAYOR, KAGAN, and JACKSON, JJ., joined. GORSUCH, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment, in which THOMAS and BAR- RETT, JJ., joined. BARRETT, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judg- ment, in which GORSUCH, J., joined. ALITO, J., filed a dissenting opinion.

Key quotes from Justice Kavanaugh’s majority opinion:

In short, this Court’s precedents and longstanding

historical practice establish that the States’ suit here is not the kind redressable by a federal court.

B

Several good reasons explain why, as Linda R. S. held, federal courts have not traditionally entertained lawsuits of this kind.

To begin with, when the Executive Branch elects not to arrest or prosecute, it does not exercise coercive power over an individual’s liberty or property, and thus does not infringe upon interests that courts often are called upon to protect. See Lujan, 504 U. S., at 561–562. And for standing purposes, the absence of coercive power over the plaintiff makes a difference: When “a plaintiff’s asserted injury arises from the government’s allegedly unlawful regulation (or lack of regulation) of someone else, much more is needed” to establish standing. Id., at 562 (emphasis deleted).2

Moreover, lawsuits alleging that the Executive Branch has made an insufficient number of arrests or brought an insufficient number of prosecutions run up against the Executive’s Article II authority to enforce federal law. Article II of the Constitution assigns the “executive Power” to the President and provides that the President “shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.” U. S. Const., Art. II, §1, cl. 1; §3. Under Article II, the Executive Branch possesses authority to decide “how to prioritize and how aggressively to pursue legal actions against defendants who violate the law.” TransUnion LLC, 594 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 13); see Lujan, 504 U. S., at 576–578; Allen, 468

——————

2 By contrast, when “the plaintiff is himself an object of the action (or

forgone action) at issue,” “there is ordinarily little question that the action or inaction has caused him injury, and that a judgment preventing or requiring the action will redress it.” Lujan, 504 U. S., at 561–562.

Cite as: 599 U. S. ____ (2023) 7

Opinion of the Court

U.S., at 760–761. The Executive Branch—not the Judiciary—makes arrests and prosecutes offenses on behalf of the United States. See United States v. Nixon, 418 U. S. 683, 693 (1974) (“the Executive Branch has exclusive authority and absolute discretion to decide whether to prosecute a case”); Printz v. United States, 521 U. S. 898, 922–923 (1997) (Brady Act provisions held unconstitutional because, among other things, they transferred power to execute federal law to state officials); United States v. Armstrong, 517 U. S. 456, 464 (1996) (decisions about enforcement of “the Nation’s criminal laws” lie within the “special province of the Executive” (internal quotation marks omitted)); Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1, 138 (1976) (“A lawsuit is the ultimate remedy for a breach of the law, and it is to the President, and not to the Congress, that the Constitution entrusts the responsibility to ‘take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed’” (quoting U.S. Const., Art. II, §3)); see also United States v. Cox, 342 F. 2d 167, 171 (CA5 1965).

That principle of enforcement discretion over arrests and prosecutions extends to the immigration context, where the Court has stressed that the Executive’s enforcement discretion implicates not only “normal domestic law enforcement priorities” but also “foreign-policy objectives.” Reno v. American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Comm., 525 U. S. 471, 490–491 (1999). In line with those principles, this Court has declared that the Executive Branch also retains discretion over whether to remove a noncitizen from the United States. Arizona v. United States, 567 U. S. 387, 396 (2012) (“Federal officials, as an initial matter, must decide whether it makes sense to pursue removal at all”).

In addition to the Article II problems raised by judicial review of the Executive Branch’s arrest and prosecution policies, courts generally lack meaningful standards for assessing the propriety of enforcement choices in this area. After all, the Executive Branch must prioritize its

8 UNITED STATES v. TEXAS Opinion of the Court

enforcement efforts. See Wayte v. United States, 470 U. S. 598, 607–608 (1985). That is because the Executive Branch (i) invariably lacks the resources to arrest and prosecute every violator of every law and (ii) must constantly react and adjust to the ever-shifting public-safety and public- welfare needs of the American people.

This case illustrates the point. As the District Court found, the Executive Branch does not possess the resources necessary to arrest or remove all of the noncitizens covered by §1226(c) and §1231(a)(2). That reality is not an anomaly—it is a constant. For the last 27 years since §1226(c) and §1231(a)(2) were enacted in their current form, all five Presidential administrations have determined that resource constraints necessitated prioritization in making immigration arrests.

In light of inevitable resource constraints and regularly changing public-safety and public-welfare needs, the Executive Branch must balance many factors when devising arrest and prosecution policies. That complicated balancing process in turn leaves courts without meaningful standards for assessing those policies. Cf. Heckler v. Chaney, 470 U. S. 821, 830–832 (1985); Lincoln v. Vigil, 508 U. S. 182, 190–192 (1993). Therefore, in both Article III cases and Administrative Procedure Act cases, this Court has consistently recognized that federal courts are generally not the proper forum for resolving claims that the Executive Branch should make more arrests or bring more prosecutions. See Linda R. S., 410 U. S., at 619; cf. Heckler, 470 U. S., at 831 (recognizing the “general unsuitability for judicial review of agency decisions to refuse enforcement”); ICC v. Locomotive Engineers, 482 U. S. 270, 283 (1987) (“it is entirely clear that the refusal to prosecute cannot be the subject of judicial review”).3

——————

3 Also, the plaintiffs here are States, and federal courts must remain

mindful of bedrock Article III constraints in cases brought by States

Cite as: 599 U. S. ____ (2023) 9

Opinion of the Court

All of those considerations help explain why federal courts have not traditionally entertained lawsuits of this kind. By concluding that Texas and Louisiana lack standing here, we abide by and reinforce the proper role of the Federal Judiciary under Article III. The States’ novel standing argument, if accepted, would entail expansive judicial direction of the Department’s arrest policies. If the Court green-lighted this suit, we could anticipate complaints in future years about alleged Executive Branch under-enforcement of any similarly worded laws—whether they be drug laws, gun laws, obstruction of justice laws, or the like. We decline to start the Federal Judiciary down that uncharted path. Our constitutional system of separation of powers “contemplates a more restricted role for Article III courts.” Raines, 521 U. S., at 828.

C

In holding that Texas and Louisiana lack standing, we do not suggest that federal courts may never entertain cases involving the Executive Branch’s alleged failure to make more arrests or bring more prosecutions.

First, the Court has adjudicated selective-prosecution claims under the Equal Protection Clause. In those cases, however, a party typically seeks to prevent his or her own prosecution, not to mandate additional prosecutions

——————

against an executive agency or officer. To be sure, States sometimes have standing to sue the United States or an executive agency or officer. See, e.g., New York v. United States, 505 U. S. 144 (1992). But in our system of dual federal and state sovereignty, federal policies frequently generate indirect effects on state revenues or state spending. And when a State asserts, for example, that a federal law has produced only those kinds of indirect effects, the State’s claim for standing can become more attenuated. See Massachusetts v. Laird, 400 U. S. 886 (1970); Florida v. Mellon, 273 U. S. 12, 16–18 (1927); cf. Lujan, 504 U. S., at 561–562. In short, none of the various theories of standing asserted by the States in this case overcomes the fundamental Article III problem with this lawsuit.

10 UNITED STATES v. TEXAS Opinion of the Court

against other possible defendants. See, e.g., Wayte, 470 U. S., at 604; Armstrong, 517 U. S., at 459, 463.

Second, as the Solicitor General points out, the standing analysis might differ when Congress elevates defacto injuries to the status of legally cognizable injuries redressable by a federal court. See Brief for Petitioners 20, n. 3; cf. TransUnion LLC, 594 U. S., at ___–___ (slip op., at 10–11); Federal Election Comm’n v. Akins, 524 U. S. 11, 20 (1998); Raines, 521 U. S., at 820, n. 3; Lujan, 504 U. S., at 578; Linda R. S., 410 U. S., at 617, n. 3. For example, Congress might (i) specifically authorize suits against the Executive Branch by a defined set of plaintiffs who have suffered concrete harms from executive under-enforcement and (ii) specifically authorize the Judiciary to enter appropriate orders requiring additional arrests or prosecutions by the Executive Branch.

Here, however, the relevant statutes do not supply such specific authorization. The statutes, even under the States’ own reading, simply say that the Department “shall” arrest certain noncitizens. Given the “deep-rooted nature of law- enforcement discretion,” a purported statutory arrest mandate, without more, does not entitle any particular plaintiff to enforce that mandate in federal court. Castle Rock, 545 U. S., at 761, 764–765, 767, n. 13; cf. Heckler, 470 U. S., at 835. For an arrest mandate to be enforceable in federal court, we would need at least a “stronger indication” from Congress that judicial review of enforcement discretion is appropriate—for example, specific authorization for particular plaintiffs to sue and for federal courts to order more arrests or prosecutions by the Executive. Castle Rock, 545 U. S., at 761. We do not take a position on whether such a statute would suffice for Article III purposes; our only point is that no such statute is present in this case.4

——————

4 As the Solicitor General noted, those kinds of statutes, by infringing

Cite as: 599 U. S. ____ (2023) 11 Opinion of the Court

Third, the standing calculus might change if the Executive Branch wholly abandoned its statutory responsibilities to make arrests or bring prosecutions. Under the Administrative Procedure Act, a plaintiff arguably could obtain review of agency non-enforcement if an agency “has consciously and expressly adopted a general policy that is so extreme as to amount to an abdication of its statutory responsibilities.” Heckler, 470 U. S., at 833, n. 4 (internal quotation marks omitted); see id., at 839 (Brennan, J., concurring); cf. 5 U. S. C. §706(1). So too, an extreme case of non-enforcement arguably could exceed the bounds of enforcement discretion and support Article III standing. But the States have not advanced a Heckler-style “abdication” argument in this case or argued that the Executive has entirely ceased enforcing the relevant statutes. Therefore, we do not analyze the standing ramifications of such a hypothetical scenario.

Fourth, a challenge to an Executive Branch policy that involves both the Executive Branch’s arrest or prosecution priorities and the Executive Branch’s provision of legal benefits or legal status could lead to a different standing analysis. That is because the challenged policy might implicate more than simply the Executive’s traditional enforcement discretion. Cf. Department of Homeland Security v. Regents of Univ. of Cal., 591 U. S. ___, ___–___ (2020) (slip op., at 11–12) (benefits such as work authorization and Medicare eligibility accompanied by non- enforcement meant that the policy was “more than simply a non-enforcement policy”); Texas v. United States, 809 F. 3d 134, 154 (CA5 2015) (Linda R. S. “concerned only nonprosecution,” which is distinct from “both nonprosecution and the conferral of benefits”), aff ’d by an equally divided Court, 579 U. S. 547 (2016). Again, we need

——————

on the Executive’s enforcement discretion, could also raise Article II issues. See Tr. of Oral Arg. 24–25.

12 UNITED STATES v. TEXAS Opinion of the Court

not resolve the Article III consequences of such a policy. Fifth, policies governing the continued detention of noncitizens who have already been arrested arguably might raise a different standing question than arrest or prosecution policies. Cf. Biden v. Texas, 597 U. S. ___ (2022). But this case does not concern a detention policy, so

we do not address the issue here.5

***************************************

Given the narrow resolution on standing grounds, and the reservations set forth in Section C of Justice Kavanaugh’s opinion, in addition to the somewhat different approach of the three concurring Justices, Gorsuch, Thomas, and Barrett, it’s unpredictable what this decision might mean if the DACA challenge now pending before U.S. District Judge Hanen eventually reaches the Supremes. In “point four” of “Section C,” Justice Kavanaugh goes to some length to distinguish a situation “that involves both the Executive Branch’s arrest or prosecution priorities and the Executive Branch’s provision of legal benefits or legal status,” citing the Court’s earlier decision in DHS v. Regents, involving a DACA challenge that was decided on APA technical grounds.

Still, this is a strong statement rejecting the attempt of GOP States and GOP lower Federal Court Judges to take over Federal immigration enforcement! And, with Immigration Courts overwhelmed with a largely artificially-inflated 2 million case backlog, many consisting of cases in which relief should be granted elsewhere (like at USCIS) or where removal would actually be detrimental to the interests of the U.S., a reaffirmation of the Executive’s historical authority to set reasonable, practical immigration enforcement priorities could not come soon enough. 

In that light, it’s curious why in a case where the ultimate result was lopsided, the Court DENIED the Administration’s motion for a stay pending review of the Fifth Circuit’s and USDC’s wrong orders! This unnecessarily created months of “enforcement chaos” which has been damaging both to individuals and to our national interests.

I also find it interesting that Justice Kavanaugh cited and in part relied upon the Executive’s Article II authority to enforce the law. This was also part of the rationale I used in a 1976 legal opinion written for then General Counsel Sam Bernsen reaffirming the “Legacy” INS’s authority to exercise prosecutorial discretion in designating some cases as “non priority.” 

That memo stated:

The ultimate source for the exercise of prosecutorial discretion in the Federal Government is the power of the President. Under Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution, the executive power is vested in the President. Article II, Section 3, states that the President “shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed.”

. . . .

The reasons for the exercise of prosecutorial discretion are both practical and humanitarian. There simply are not enough resources to enforce all of the laws and regulations presently on the books. As a practical matter, therefore, law enforcement officials have to make policy choices as to the most effective and desirable way in which to deploy their limited resources. Thus, for example, police and prosecutors may choose to concentrate on apprehension and prosecution of perpetrators of violent crimes, while choosing not to proceed against those committing so-called “victimless crimes,” such as certain consensual sex acts and possession of small amounts of marihuana. In addition, there are times when defects in the quality, quantity, or method of gathering evidence will make it difficult to prove the matter before a court.

Aside from purely practical considerations, it is also obvious that in enacting a statute the legislature cannot possibly contemplate all of the possible circumstances in which the statute may be applied. In some situations, application of the literal letter of the law would simply be unconscionable and would serve no useful purpose. For instance, a prosecutor may well decide not to proceed against a terminally ill individual, even in the presence of overwhelming evidence of guilt.

You can find a copy of that legal opinion here: https://wp.me/p8eeJm-260. Still relevant, after nearly half a century!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-23-23

😴NQRFPT: After A Year Of “Blowing Off” Recs Of Progressive Experts, Garland’s Dysfunctional Courts Appear Shockingly Unprepared To Handle Influx Of Kids!🆘 — Mike LaSusa Reports for Law360 Quoting Me, Among Others!

NQRFPT = “Not Quite Ready For Prime Time” — Unfortunately, it’s a more than apt descriptor for the Biden Administration’s overall inept and tone-deaf approach to due process and immigrants’ rights in the beyond dysfunctional and unjust “Immigration Courts” under EOIR @ Garalnd’s DOJ.

Mike LaSusa
Mike LaSusa
Legal and Natioanl Security Reporter
Law369
PHOTO: Twitter

Influx Of Solo Kids Poses Challenge For Immigration Courts

By Mike LaSusa

Law360 (March 31, 2022, 2:44 PM EDT) — Unaccompanied minors arriving in increasing numbers at the southern U.S. border are likely to face a tough time finding legal representation and navigating an overwhelmed immigration court system that has no special procedures for handling their cases.

The number of unaccompanied children encountered by U.S. Customs and Border Protection has risen sharply over the past year, to an average of more than 10,000 per month, according to CBP data. Those kids’ cases often end up in immigration court, where they are subject to the exact same treatment as adults, no matter their age.

“Nobody really thought of this when the laws were enacted,” said retired Immigration Judge Paul Wickham Schmidt, now an adjunct professor at Georgetown Law. “Everything dealing with kids is kind of an add-on,” he said, referring to special dockets for minors and other initiatives that aren’t expressly laid out in the law but have been tried in various courts over the years.

About a third of the immigration court cases started since October involve people under 18, and of those people, 40% are 4 or under, according to recent statistics from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Executive Office for Immigration Review, which operates the courts.

It’s unclear how many of those cases involve unaccompanied children and how many involve kids with adult relatives, and it’s hard to make historical comparisons because of changes in how the EOIR has tracked data on kids’ cases over the years.

But kids’ cases are indeed making up an increasing share of immigration court dockets, according to Jennifer Podkul, vice president of policy and advocacy for Kids in Need of Defense, or KIND, one of the main providers of legal services for migrant kids in the U.S.

“The cases are taking a lot longer because the backlog has increased so much,” Podkul said. Amid the crush of cases, attorneys can be hard to find.

. . . .

The immigration courts should consider “getting some real juvenile judges who actually understand asylum law and have real special training, not just a few hours of canned training, to deal with kids,” said Schmidt, the former immigration judge.

. . . .

***************************

Those with Law360 access can read Mike’s complete article at the link.

For what seems to be the millionth time with Garland, it’s not “rocket science.”🚀 He should have brought in Jen Podkul, her “boss,” Wendy Young of KIND, or a similar qualified leader from outside Government, to kick tail, roll some heads, clean out the deadwood, and set up a “Juvenile Division” of the Immigration Court staffed with well-qualified “real” judges, experts in asylum law, SIJ status, U & T visas, PD, and due process for vulnerable populations. 

Such judicial talent is out there. But, that’s the problem with Garland! The judicial and leadership talent remain largely “out there” while lesser qualified individuals continue to botch cases and screw up the justice system on a regular basis! Actions have consequences; so do inactions and failure to act decisively and courageously.

And, of course, Garland should have replaced the BIA with real judges — progressive practical scholars who wouldn’t tolerate some of the garbage inflicted on kids by the current out of control, undisciplined, “enforcement biased,” anti-immigrant EOIR system. 

Instead, Garland employs Miller “restrictionist enforcement guru” Tracy Short as his “Chief Immigration Judge” and another “Miller holdover” David Wetmore as BIA Chair. No immigration expert in America would deem either of these guys capable or qualified to insure due process for kids (or, for that matter anyone else) in Immgration Court. 

Yet, more than a year into the Biden Administration, there they are! It’s almost as if Stephen Miller just moved over to DOJ to join his buddy Gene Hamilton in abusing immigrants in Immigration Court. (Technically, Hamilton is gone, but it would be hard to tell from the way Garland and his equally tone-deaf lieutenants have messed up EOIR. Currently, he and Miller are officers of “America First Legal” a neo-fascist group engaged in “aiming to reinstate Trump-era policies that bar unaccompanied migrant children from entering the United States,” according to Wikipedia.)

Meanwhile, the folks with the expertise to solve problems and get the Immigration Courts back on track, like Jen & Wendy, are giving interviews and trying to fix Garland’s ungodly mess from the outside! What’s wrong with this picture? What’s wrong with this Administration?

We’re about to find out! Big time, as Garland’s broken, due-process denying “court” system continues it’s “death spiral,” ☠️ taking lots of kids and other human lives down with it!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

04-01-22

Two New Pieces From N. Rappaport: Perhaps “Lost In The Shuffle” — Trump’s Plans For An Expanded Travel Ban & “Super Expedited” Removals!

Nolan is one of the “hardest working op-ed writers”in the field! Here’s the intro to what he had to say in HuffPost about an expanded “travel ban.”

https://www.linkedin.com/redir/redirect?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Ehuffingtonpost%2Ecom%2Fentry%2F5894ed61e4b061551b3dfe64&urlhash=nmYz&_t=tracking_anet

“Too much attention is being paid to a 90-day travel ban in President Donald Trump’s Executive Order Protecting the Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States (Order). While it is a serious matter, the temporary suspension of admitting aliens from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen into the United States is just the tip of the iceberg. Other provisions in the Order may cause much more serious consequences.

Section 3(a) of the Order directs the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), in consultation with the Secretary of the Department of State (DOS) and the Director of National Intelligence, to determine what information is needed “from any country to adjudicate any visa, admission, or other benefit under the INA (adjudications) in order to determine that the individual seeking the benefit is who the individual claims to be and is not a security or public-safety threat.” This applies to all countries, not just the seven that are subject to the 90-day suspension.

Those officials have 30 days from the date of the Order to report their “determination of the information needed for adjudications and a list of countries that do not provide adequate information (emphasis supplied).”

Section 3(d) directs the Secretary of State to “request all foreign governments that do not supply such information to start providing such information regarding their nationals within 60 days of notification.” Section 3(e) explains the consequences of failing to comply with this request. Note that this also applies to all countries, not just the seven that are subject to the 90-day delay.

(e) After the 60-day period described in subsection (d) of this section expires, the Secretary of Homeland Security, in consultation with the Secretary of State, shall submit to the President a list of countries recommended for inclusion on a Presidential proclamation that would prohibit the entry of foreign nationals (excluding those foreign nationals traveling on diplomatic visas, …) from countries that do not provide the information requested pursuant to subsection (d) of this section until compliance occurs (emphasis supplied).

This is far more serious than the 90-day ban on immigration from the seven designated countries. With some exceptions, President Trump is going to stop immigration from every country in the world that refuses to provide the requested information. And this ban will continue until compliance occurs.

Does the President have the authority to do this? Yes, he does. The main source of the president’s authority to declare such suspensions can been found in section 212(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, the pertinent part of which reads as follows:

(f) Whenever the President finds that the entry of any aliens or of any class of aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, he may by proclamation, and for such period as he shall deem necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants, or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate.

The Order permits the Secretaries of DOS and DHS to waive the restrictions on a case-by-case basis when it is in the national interest.

DHS Secretary John Kelly has applied this waiver to the entry of lawful permanent residents. In a statement released on January 29, 2017, he says, “absent the receipt of significant derogatory information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, lawful permanent resident status will be a dispositive factor in our case-by-case determinations.”

The ACLU Executive Director, Anthony D. Romero, claims that the Order is “a Muslim ban wrapped in a paper-thin national security rationale.”

********************************************

I understand Nolan’s point that President Trump could be within his rights to invoke the travel ban.  Nevertheless, in a recent blog on this site, former State Department visa officer Jeff Gorsky pointed out that historically the section 212(f) sanction of suspension of visa issuance has been used in a very narrow and focused manner. http://wp.me/p8eeJm-Hr

The prospect of large-scale visa suspensions in the current context also seems like unusual policy to me. Let’s take the most obvious example: Iran, a country with which we have famously strained relations.

Why would Iran want to provide us with any useful information about its nationals? And, if they did, why would we trust it?

For example, if there is a real “Iranian spy” out there I’m sure the Iranian Government will give him or her a “clean bill of health.” On the flip side, if there are some Iranian democracy advocates who are annoying to the Iranian Government but want to travel to the U.S., Iran would likely plant false information to make us believe they were “terrorists.

Hopefully, in Iranian visa cases we are getting our “vetting” information largely from sources other than the Iranian Government. Consequently, like so many of the Trump Administration’s actions, it is hard to take a threat to ban visa issuance as a serious effort to protect national security. It’s likely that national security is just a “smokescreen” for other possible motives. Who knows?

I’m incurred to think that if Trump decides to “go big” with 212(f) visa suspensions, at least some lower Federal Courts are likely to adopt the “Gorsky view” that “he can’t do that.”

You should read Nolan’s complete article in HuffPost at the above link!

******************************************

Next, Nolan writes about the Administration’s “expedited removal campaign” in The Hill:

http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/immigration/332110-on-illegal-immigration-trump-puts-an-end-to-obamas-home-free

As of the end of January 2017, the immigrant court’s backlog was 542,411 cases.  Even if no additional cases are filed, it would take the court two-and-a-half years to catch up with its backlog.

President Trump finessed his way around this problem by expanding the use of expedited removal proceedings with his Executive Order, Border Security and Immigration Enforcement Improvements.

In expedited removal proceedings, which are conducted by immigration officers, an alien who lacks proper documentation or has committed fraud or a willful misrepresentation to enter the country, will be deported without a hearing before an immigration judge, unless he requests an asylum hearing.

 

Asylum hearings, which are conducted by immigration judges, are available to aliens who establish a credible fear of persecution.  An asylum officer determines whether the alien has a credible fear of persecution.

The alien cannot have assistance from an attorney in these proceedings, and, because detention is mandatory, his ability to gather evidence in support of his case is severely restricted.

Moreover, Section 208(a)(2)(B) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) limits asylum to aliens who have been in the United States for less than a year (with some exceptions).

If the asylum officer rejects the credible fear claim, the alien can request an expedited review of his credible fear case by an immigration judge, which usually is held within 24 hours but in no case later than seven days after the adverse credible fear determination.

Federal court review is available, but it is restricted to cases in which the alien makes a sufficient claim to being a United States citizen, to having lawful permanent resident status, or to having been admitted previously as a refugee or an asylee.

A federal judge recently held that asylum denials in expedited removal proceedings are not reviewable in federal court and the Supreme Court let the decision stand.

Previous administrations limited expedited removal proceedings to aliens at the border and aliens who had entered without inspection but were apprehended no more than 100 miles from the border after spending less than 14 days in the country.

The Executive Order expands expedited removal proceedings to the full extent of the law. Section 235(b)(1)(A)(iii)(ll) of the INA authorizes expedited removal proceedings for aliens who have been physically present in the United States for up to two years.

It is likely to be very difficult for aliens to establish physical presence of more than two years, and if they do, they will be faced with the one year deadline for asylum applications, which in many cases is the only form of relief available to an undocumented alien.

President Trump will be able to use expedited removal proceedings to deport millions of undocumented aliens without hearings before an immigration judge.

The only way to stop him is to find a way to work with him on a comprehensive immigration reform bill that meets the political needs of both parties, and time is running out.”

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I’m all for comprehensive immigration reform. But, if it doesn’t happen, I’m not so sure that Trump, Sessions & Co. won’t “push the envelope” on expedited removal to the point where  the Supremes “just say no.” After all, even noted conservative chief Justice John Roberts seemed unenthusiastic about giving the DHS total prosecutorial discretion in a recent citizenship case. See this earlier blog: http://wp.me/p8eeJm-Lv.

PWS

05-076-17

Former State Department Visa Guru Jeff Gorsky Says Travel Ban Exceeds President’s Statutory Authority — “No Precedent” For This Type Of Overly Inclusive Use!

https://www.lexisnexis.com/legalnewsroom/immigration/b/outsidenews/archive/2017/04/11/jeffrey-gorsky-an-alternative-legal-argument-against-trump-39-s-travel-ban.aspx?Redirected=true

From Lexis NexIs:

There is, however, another legal argument against the travel ban that does not require looking at evidence outside of the judicial record: The scope of the ban on its face is overly broad and exceeds the president’s legal authority under the Immigration and Nationality Act. Although the plaintiffs in the Hawaii case posed this argument, at this point none of the courts that have ruled on the legality of the executive order have analyzed this issue. The statutory authority for the travel ban derives from INA Section 212(f), 8 USC 1182(f), which authorizes the president by proclamation to suspend the entry or impose restrictions on the entry of any aliens or class of aliens to the United States. This is not a plenary grant of authority, but requires a finding that the entry of such aliens is “detrimental to the interests of the United States.” A ban that covers an entire nationality based on a concern that a few of those nationals pose a security or criminal threat to U.S. interest exceeds the statutory authority because there is no evidence or reasonable basis to believe that the entry of some or most of the nationals in the ban would be detrimental to U.S. interests.

During my 30-year career at the U.S. Department of State, I was involved in numerous 212(f) determinations. All were supported by carefully drafted memos and cited specific evidence of detriment to U.S. interests. The Trump travel bans do not. There is no dispute that the president has longstanding authority to deny or restrict the admission of certain aliens by proclamation; it is one of the oldest immigration provisions in U.S. law. The first law to authorize the president to limit immigration based on proclamation was the Alien Enemies Acts of 1798, one of the Alien and Sedition Acts enacted in the John Adams administration. That act empowered the president by public proclamation during a state of war to exclude enemy aliens as “necessary for public safety”.

This authority was not invoked until the 20th century, with the advent of World War I. An act of May 22, 1918, provided for the president to establish by proclamation immigration restrictions during a time of war for the purpose of public safety. Based on the Alien Enemies Act and the 1918 act, President Woodrow Wilson made a number of proclamations involving enemy aliens. While not a total ban on admission of aliens with Austrian-Hungarian nationality, these proclamations significantly restricted the admission of these enemy aliens.

This authority was revived during World War II, following the declaration of a national emergency on May 27, 1941. An amendment to the act provided that the president might, upon finding that the interests of the United States required it, impose additional restrictions and prohibitions on the entry into and departure of persons from the United States during the national emergency. This provision was upheld by the Supreme Court in the case United States ex rel. Knauff v. Shaughnessy, 338 U.S. 537.

The 1950 “Report of the Senate Judiciary Committee,” the primary background document on the McCarran-Walter Act of 1952, discussed the history of the enemy aliens provisions at length, and concluded that this was a necessary authority. This authority was carried over into Section 212(e) (now f) and Section 215 of the INA.

In the past 35 years, this authority has been used 43 times but never as broad as with Trump’s executive orders. Most actions were limited to officials of foreign governments who engaged in specified policies considered detrimental to U.S. foreign policy or other U.S. interests — not blanket bans based solely on nationality.

The current travel ban, therefore, is unprecedented in its scope. Even if it is accepted that the specified countries pose a threat to the United States, the inclusion in the ban of all nationals from those countries is not reasonable, since there is no evidence that the admission of many or most such aliens would be detrimental to U.S. interests. For example, the ban includes babies and minor children, although they have neither the physical or legal capacity to commit acts of terrorism or criminality that would be detrimental to U.S. interests. While the executive order allows for a case-by-case discretionary waiver for minors, the availability of a discretionary waiver requiring a finding that the admission of such alien “would be in the national interest” does not cure the underlying lack of legal authority under 212(f) to bar persons such as young children who do not pose a credible threat to U.S. interests.

If the president can bar all nationals of a country based on speculative and vague concerns, absent any evidence relating to the specific individual who is barred admission, the president would have virtually absolute authority to bar all aliens from admission to the U.S. Every country in the world, including countries that would not normally be considered to pose a security threat to the U.S., like Japan and the United Kingdom, have some nationals who could theoretically pose a terrorist or criminal threat that could be used as a pretext to ban all nationals from that country. Such sweeping plenary authority does not exist in any other portion of the INA. In the over 200 years in which the president has had authority to limit the admission of aliens by proclamation, no president has ever before claimed this broad an authority.”

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In prior lives, I had the pleasure of working with Jeff on a number of issues. Smart guy, nice guy, always very helpful. Doesn’t mean he’s right or wrong on this, but his point makes sense to me.

PWS

04-13-17