⚒️👩🏾‍🌾🌾🇺🇸🗽 AN INSPIRING LABOR DAY MESSAGE FROM REV. CRAIG MOUSIN: Migrants Are The Backbone Of America & Those Who Fight For Migrant Justice Are Not Alone — A Special Podcast With Links To Music By John McCutcheon & Emma’s Revolution!

Dear Paul,

As we begin Labor Day weekend, I give thanks for the many ways your work and mission seek justice for all.

My latest podcast gives thanks to all of you who have worked to end Title 42 and to all those immigrants who have contributed to the common good.

As I end the podcast quoting Emma’s Revolution’s song, Bound for Freedom, I give thanks that we are not alone, but united in the struggle. Thank you.

https://blogs.depaul.edu/dmm/2022/09/02/lawful-assembly-podcast-episode-29-gratitude-for-those-who-labor-and-those-who-have-labored/

Have a great Labor Day weekend and Thank You.

Peace,

Craig

Rev. Craig B. Mousin

DePaul University

(mail) 1 East Jackson Boulevard

Chicago, Illinois 60604

(office) Suite 800H

14E. Jackson Blvd.

Chicago, Illinois 60604

312-362-8707 (voice)

312-362-5706 (confidential fax)

You can find some of my publications at either:

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=667812or

https://works.bepress.com/craig_mousin/

You can find my digital story at:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9VTkjhzIcI

You can follow the podcast Lawful Assembly at:https://lawfulassembly.buzzsprout.com

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

Thanks, Craig, for your “practical activism and scholarship!”

Takeaways:

Grass roots activism works to defeat the forces of darkness and White Nationalism (the defeat of the barrage of White Nationalist immigration amendments was covered on Courtside here: https://immigrationcourtside.com/2022/08/08/%f0%9f%87%ba%f0%9f%87%b8%f0%9f%97%bd%e2%9a%96%ef%b8%8fndpa-activists-help-beat-back-gop-nativist-spoiler-amendments-to-reconciliation-bill-dems-need-to-win-midterms-to-thwart-newest-gop-immi/);
The John McCutcheon version of Woodie Guthrie’s song “Deportees” shows how deeply ingrained “Dred Scottification” is in our country’s often unconstitutional, impractical, and sometimes immoral approach to immigration enforcement.“De-personification” of “the other’” — treating them as numbers, statistics, even “beds” or “apps” without names, faces or rights — and making up vile myths and lies about them, all while exploiting their labor — is still at the heart of the anti-American White Nationalist agenda!
Social justice activism is an important multi-disciplinary endeavor — here we see how law, education, religion, civics, history, broadcast journalism, performance art, music, technology, political science, economics, language, culture, & communication all work together to thwart hate and lies;
More undergraduate institutions need to be making these links and insisting that the true history of American Immigration — with all its triumphs and warts — becomes a staple of education;
Many of those tone-deaf (or worse) politicos pushing the far right agenda of hate, lies, and racism reflected in the defeated amendments are elitists masquerading as “bogus populists” who got the benefit of education at some of the top law schools and universities in the nation. Whatever happened to the teaching of basic legal ethics and responsibilities to society? The Jim Crow agendas of today differ little from those of the pre-civil rights era of the 20th Century. These are NOT debates between legitimate “differing viewpoints,” but essentially questions of truth vs. lies, hate v. tolerance, integration v. exploitation;
The White Nationalist Right is taking over school boards and local governance in the false name of “parents’ rights” — actually meaning the rights of far right parents to impose their minority religious doctrines and false social doctrines on others. The fight for social justice begins at the local level where where teaching of truth and legitimate debates are being drowned out by disgruntled, anti-democracy, empowered White Nationalist theocrats who claim they want liberty but actually are trying to impose autocracy and minority rule;
The fight for social justice never ends!

🇺🇸 Happy Labor Day, & Due Process Forever!

PWS

09-05-22

FROM ROE TO DOBBS, A HALF-CENTURY DECLINE IN THE US JUDICIARY! — From Blackmun’s “Profound Lyricism” To Alito’s Snarky Far-Right Pseudo-Religious Dogma Masquerading As “Law!” — Francine Prose in The Guardian

Francine Prose
American Writer
PHOTO: Luigi Novi (2009)
Creative Commons License

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/jul/01/roe-v-wade-1973-ruling-supreme-court?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

As one more reminder of what we’ve lost, the text of the 1973 Roe v Wade ruling is unlikely to console us. Even so, I recommend downloading the pdf. In the wake of its overturning, this beautifully written document – which reads like a long form essay – is not only interesting in itself but now seems like another sign of how much has changed over the last half century, in this case for the worse.

Drafted by Justice Harry Blackmun, the ruling includes a clear and persuasive summary of the history of abortion law. “At the time of the adoption of our Constitution, and throughout the major portion of the 19th century, a woman enjoyed a substantially broader right to terminate a pregnancy that she does in most States today.” It tracks the centuries-old debate over when life begins, and dismisses the argument that a fetus is a person guaranteed the protections afforded US citizens. Throughout, it strikes us as the careful explication and clarification of a law, of legal precedent, unlike Justice Alito’s ruling in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health, which seems more like an expression of religious conviction masquerading as an unbiased interpretation of the constitution.

The Roe ruling is not about states’ rights. It’s about power and control | Derecka Purnell

What’s most striking about Roe v Wade – and its difference from the ruling that overturned it – is its eloquence. Blackmun’s lucid, frequently graceful language reflects a commitment to decency and compassion. The judges are clear about the dangers of carrying an unwanted child or a high-risk pregnancy to term. They strive to see the issue from the perspective of those confronting a serious life crisis, and to imagine the devastating outcomes that pregnant women and their families may face.

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“Specific and direct harm medically diagnosable even in early pregnancy may be involved. Maternity, or additional offspring, may force upon the woman a distressful life and future. Psychological harm may be imminent. Mental and physical health may be taxed by childcare. There is also the distress, for all concerned, associated with the unwanted child, and there is the problem of bringing a child into a family already unable, psychologically and otherwise, to care for it.”

The passage I admire most is the one in which Blackmun, at once profound and lyrical, describes the atmosphere surrounding the issue of abortion, the way our opinions are formed, and the pressures that the law must acknowledge and keep in balance.

“We forthwith acknowledge our awareness of the sensitive and emotional nature of the abortion controversy, of the vigorous opposing views, even among physicians, and of the deep and seemingly absolute convictions that the subject inspires. One’s philosophy, one’s experiences, one’s exposure to the raw edges of human existence, one’s religious training, one’s attitudes toward life and family and their values, and the moral standards one establishes and seeks to observe, are all likely to influence and to color one’s thinking and conclusions about abortion. In addition, population growth, poverty, and racial overtones tend to complicate and not to simplify the problem.”

And there it is: a superbly rendered catalogue of the factors that come to mind when we consider the factors that will now determine whom Dobbs will hurt most: poverty, race, and life on the raw edges of human existence – an edge, one might say, on which every decision about abortion is made.

. . . .

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

Read the rest of Francine’s article at the link.

Let’s face it. The concern for human life of out of touch righty ideologues like Alito ends at birth. After that, the “others” are expendable — particularly if they are women or folks of color!

All their claimed concern about “personhood” ends at delivery — when it can no longer be used to threaten vulnerable pregnant women or medical professionals. After that, the GOP program for kids (whether wanted or not) consists of things like:

Valuing their lives below the “right” of every Tom, Dick, and Harriett in America to own and use military-style assault weapons (something that certainly wasn’t the “original intent” of the drafters of the 2d Amendment);
Cutting education budgets, “dumbing down” public school curriculums, and harassing teachers, school administrators, and school board members;
Imposing work requirements on public assistance without regard to the needs and availability of suitable child care;
Deporting their parents to far away countries without concern for the welfare of children (US citizen and others);
Declaring “war” on vulnerable kids who aren’t heterosexuals;
Opposing provisions that would expand the availability of health insurance to kids;
Spreading misinformation about life-saving vaccines for children;
Falsely denying climate change that threatens the world we will leave to our kids and future generations;
Spreading fear and terror in ethnic communities containing “mixed families” to discourage them from taking advantage of available community services;
Threatening the educational rights of non-citizen children currently guaranteed by Plyler v. Doe (but perhaps not for long, if the Clarence Thomases of the world have their way);
Treating kids in Immigration Court as less than “persons” entitled to full due process (for example, forcing toddlers to “represent themselves” in life or death asylum cases);
Separating families;
Detaining families and children in grossly substandard conditions;
Making it more difficult for people of color to vote and thus exercise their legal and political rights;
Being more concerned about BLM protests than in the loss of young black lives that generated them.

I could go on an on.

One essential starting place and training ground for a “new generation” of Federal Judges who will be committed to humane values, empathy, accurate historical understanding, due process, and equal justice for all is the “retail level” of our justice system — the U.S. Immigration Courts, currently controlled solely by AG Merrick Garland. That’s why Garland’s disturbing failure to instill progressive values and install scholarly progressive judges — the best, brightest, and most courageous — in his now-dysfunctional EOIR system should be of grave concern to advocates of individual choices and anyone who cares about equal justice for all and the future of our nation!

The GOP-dominated Federal Judiciary has become a tool of authoritarians and religious zealots who seek to wipe out established individual rights, reduce humanity, and insert themselves and their out of touch views into every aspect of human existence — ultimately threatening the very future of humanity!

The Dems, by contrast, are the party of individual rights and human freedom. Too bad they haven’t done a better job of selling, and sometimes of following and boldly acting upon, their own stated values!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

07-15-22

🚙🏞HEADING FOR THE HILLS: RADICAL ACTIVIST, RIGHTY, GOP SUPREMES EMPOWER GUNS, STRIP WOMEN OF RIGHTS, HEAD OUT FOR SUMMER VACATION, LEAVING BEHIND CHAOS & A DARK CLOUD HANGING OVER OUR DEMOCRACY’S FUTURE!😱

Dana Milbank @ WashPost:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/06/25/roe-guns-supreme-court-radicals-maximum-chaos/

Nobody should be surprised that the Supreme Court’s conservative justices on Friday jettisoned nearly 50 years of precedent upon precedent in overturning Roe v. Wade. Heck, they didn’t even honor their own precedent articulated 24 hours earlier.

In their opinion Thursday morning forcing New York and other densely populated states to allow more handguns in public, the conservative majority, led by Justice Clarence Thomas, argued that medieval law imposing arms restrictions — specifically, the 1328 Statute of Northampton — “has little bearing on the Second Amendment” because it was “enacted … more than 450 years before the ratification of the Constitution.”

Yet in their ruling Friday morning in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health, setting women’s rights back half a century (and cracking the door to banning same-sex marriage and contraception), the conservative justices, led by Samuel Alito (who was also in the guns majority) and joined by Thomas, argued precisely the opposite. They justified abortion bans by citing, among others, “Henry de Bracton’s 13th-century treatise.” That was written circa 1250 and referred to monsters, duels, burning at the stake — and to women as property, “inferior” to men.

The right-wing majority’s selective application of history reveals the larger fraud in this pair of landmark rulings: Their reasoning is not legal but political, not principled but partisan.

Still, there is a commonality to the rulings. Both decisions foment maximum chaos and were delivered with flagrant disregard for the instability and disorder they will cause.

Ruth Marcus: The radical conservative majority’s damage to the Supreme Court cannot be undone

The high court was meant to be the guarantor of law and order. But the conservative justices, intoxicated by their supermajority, have abandoned their solemn duty to promote stability in the law and are actively spreading real-world disruption.

Worse, this invitation to disorder comes as the nation is trying to restore the rule of law after a coup attempt led by a president who appointed three of the five justices in the abortion majority. The spouse of a fourth — Ginni Thomas, Clarence’s wife — aggressively pushed state legislators and the White House to overthrow the election. Yet Thomas, the senior associate justice, has refused to recuse himself from related cases.

After decades of crocodile tears over imagined “judicial activism,” the conservative supermajority has shed all judicial modesty and embraced radicalism. The liberal justices, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Stephen G. Breyer, wrote in their Dobbs dissent that the majority’s brazen rejection of stare decisis, respect for precedent, “breaches a core rule-of-law principle, designed to promote constancy in the law.”

Opinion: The Supreme Court’s radical abortion ruling begins a dangerous new era

Even Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who joined the gun ruling, scolded fellow conservatives for blithely overturning the Roe v. Wade super-precedent. “Surely we should adhere closely to principles of judicial restraint here, where the broader path the court chooses entails repudiating a constitutional right we have not only previously recognized, but also expressly reaffirmed,” Roberts wrote. The majority’s “dramatic and consequential ruling is unnecessary,” he said, “a serious jolt to the legal system” that could have been avoided with a narrower decision that would have been “markedly less unsettling.”

Alito, in his (characteristically) sneering opinion in the abortion case, dismissed Roberts as unprincipled and public opinion as an “extraneous” concern. He likewise dismissed the pain the ruling would cause, writing that “this Court is ill-equipped to assess ‘generalized assertions about the national psyche.’ ” He washed his hands of answering the “empirical question” of “the effect of the abortion right … on the lives of women.”

. . . .

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

Read the rest of Milbank’s op-ed at the link.

It would be tempting to breathe a “sigh of relief” that while off on their taxpayer-underwritten summer frolic, the “Gang of 6” can’t do any more damage to our Constitution, our nation, our institutions, or humanity. But, unfortunately, that’s not completely true. If and when their party calls on them, they can always go into “emergency session.”

So let’s hope that there will be no further “emergencies” this summer other than the disorder and divisions already caused by their disingenuous political decrees masquerading as (very thinly to tragicomically inept and inconsistent) “jurisprudence.”

Still, those who enjoy their humanity and their rights (other than gun rights) shouldn’t get too complacent. Vacation will end; the Supremes will be back at it in October — looking for more ways to turn back the clock and “Dred Scottify the other,” even though the majority of Americans actually are “some kind of other.” With a little help from their GOP friends, they will disenfranchise and dehumanize one group at a time until rights and political power look largely like they did in 1789 — when free White men of property ruled.

As for CJ Roberts, after years of trying to put a “genial spin” on the mockery of a fair, impartial, and qualified judiciary incubating at his Supremes, he has totally lost control of the far-right extremists appointed by his party and, in some cases, pushed through the process in a highly irregular manner. Hard to have much sympathy there.

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-27-22

⚖️🗽SOCIAL JUSTICE SUNDAY @ COURTSIDE WITH PROF/REV CRAIG MOUSIN OF DEPAUL LAW — 1) Restore The Refugee Act Of 1980 To Functionality; 2) Let Young People Read — Enforce the 1st Amendment Against Far-Right Book Burners!🔥📚👩‍🚒

Craig Mousin

cmousin@depaul.edu

Ombudsperson

Refugee and Forced Migration Studies, Grace School of Applied Diplomacy

Craig Mousin has been the University Ombudsperson at DePaul since 2001. He received a BS from Johns Hopkins University, a JD from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and an M Div from Chicago Theological Seminary. He joined the College of Law faculty in 1990, and served as the Executive Director of the Center for Church/State Studies until 2001, Acting Director until 2003, and co-director from 2004–2007. Mousin co-founded and continues to participate in the Center’s Interfaith Family Mediation Program. He has taught in DePaul’s School of Continuing and Professional Studies, the Religious Studies Department, the Grace School of Applied Diplomacy, and the Peace, Justice and Conflict Studies program. He has also taught as an adjunct faculty member at the University of Illinois College of Law and Chicago Theological Seminary .

Prior to DePaul, he began practicing labor law at Seyfarth, Shaw, Fairweather & Geraldson in 1978. In 1984, Mousin founded and directed the Midwest Immigrant Rights Center, a provider of legal assistance to refugees which has since become the National Immigrant Justice Center. He also directed legal services for Travelers & Immigrants Aid between 1986 and 1990. The United Church of Christ ordained him in 1989. At that time, Wellington Avenue U.C.C. called him as an Associate Pastor. He was a founding co-pastor of the DePaul Ecumenica l Gathering (1996-2001). Mousin serves as a Life Trustee of the Chicago Theological Seminary. In addition, he is a member of the Leadership Council of the National Immigrant Justice Center, a member of the Leadership Council of the Marjorie Kovler Center for Survivors of Torture, a former President and member of the Board of the Eco-Justice Collaborative, and a former President and Board member of the Immigration Project of downstate Illinois. Mousin is a current member of the ABA Dispute Resolution Section Ombuds Committee.

Craig writes:

Comment: Paul,

You might be interested in a short interview I did with Chicago FOX news on World Refugee Day. I tied the celebration in with the honoring of Juneteenth. See:

https://nam10.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.fox32chicago.com%2Fvideo%2F1083587&data=05%7C01%7CCMOUSIN%40depaul.edu%7C657c113c57fc4b47977008da54895361%7C750d3a3f1f464da28a647605e75ea2f9%7C0%7C0%7C637915246031565627%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=R4WzOvpSp5k92DO8NgWD2IQjGyHBoEyq7krkBY82ESY%3D&reserved=0

Also, I do not know if you subscribe to my podcast, Lawful Assembly, but my last post tied together censorship of books in public schools with anti-immigrant sentiments. You can listen at:

https://lawfulassembly.buzzsprout.com/1744949/10803534-episode-27-stop-the-burning

All the best,

Craig

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

Thanks, Craig, for all you do.

Today’s WashPost Outlook Section contained a highly relevant article by author Dave Eggers about how far-right zealots — many with no real stake in our public schools — have taken over at local levels and apply extreme censorship — even to books and concepts that have been successfully and routinely taught for years. https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2022/06/24/dave-eggers-book-bans-south-dakota/

In this case, it’s driving experienced teachers who believe in truth, freedom, and individual rights to flee in droves. So, what we’re really seeing is a shocking “dumbing down” of American education, libraries, and public discourse driven by far right fear-mongers seeking to impose their lack of values and intolerance on others.

We have seen this week how far-right activist extremists, from the Supremes to local politicians and school boards, have elevated guns that kill while gutting the individual rights to free speech, equal protection, and fundamental fairness guaranteed by the 1st, 5th, and 14th Amendments.

Justice Clarence Thomas is certainly a horrible jurist. But, in this instance he might be the only honest GOP appointee on the Supremes.

When Thomas says that immigrants’ human rights, gay rights, right to conception, marriage rights and most other meaningful individual rights guaranteed by the Constitution are on the chopping block, progressives had better believe him. Remember how “leaving things to the states” worked out for African Americans and other minorities attempting to exercise their fundamental rights, even after the Civil War and the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments. And, remember all those paeons to precedent and “not to worry” about Roe statements under oath from GOP Supremes’ candidates before they actually took their seats on the Court and started scheming to undo abortion rights for political, not legal, reasons!

“Social Justice Warriors” like Craig have been fighting the good fight for decades. But, at this point, it’s going to depend on the NDPA and other young progressive groups to take on the extremist right at the ballot box and to take back their individual rights — really all of our individual rights.

Otherwise, they will find themselves as a disempowered counterculture, hiding out and trying to keep ahead of Ray Bradbury’s firemen in Fahrenheit 451!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-26-22

🤯ADMINISTRATIONS CHANGE — EOIR “CULTURE” NOT SO MUCH! — “We’d Rather Fight Than Fix,” Remains Motto Of Garland’s Failed “Courts!”🤮

Tal Kopan @ SF Chron reports on latest public miscue:

A California lawyer tweeted what she saw in immigration court. The DOJ demanded she delete it

By Tal Kopan

WASHINGTON — On Feb. 1, attorney Monika Langarica was in a San Diego courtroom watching as the Biden administration resumed hearing cases on a controversial immigration policy that requires migrants to wait in Mexico while they plead their case to enter the U.S. That evening, she wrote a series of tweets describing what she saw.

The next day, she received an email from the Justice Department that shocked her: The administration asked her to delete the tweets. They claimed she violated a policy against making a record of immigration court proceedings and threatened potential criminal penalties if she committed “further violations.”

The Justice Department retracted its request and apologized to Langarica after The Chronicle inquired about the threat, saying further review confirmed she was not tweeting from the courtroom and thus did not violate any policies.

Still, the surprising episode raised several issues, including First Amendment concerns, issues of transparency in the often secretive immigration courts as well as criticisms of the policy at the heart of the dispute.

“It (was) shocking, because we are in our right to observe these proceedings, we are in our right to share with the public what is happening in these court rooms,” Langarica said in an interview before the apology had been issued. Langarica is an attorney with the UCLA Center for Immigration Law and Policy and formerly with the San Diego American Civil Liberties Union.

More here: https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/A-California-lawyer-tweeted-what-she-saw-in-16841515.php

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

Why would an agency with failure, problems, and valid criticism “coming out it ears” 👂 be wasting official time monitoring the Twitter accounts of court observers?

Assuming that were some legitimate reason, why wouldn’t the first reaction to Ms. Langarcia’s tweets be “Hey, let’s sit down with you and your friends and figure out how to fix this?”

Instead of having more “flackies” in their bloated bureaucracy to suppress the public trappings of failure and to “massage the message,” why not put the resources into getting better bodies out there to FIX THE MYRIAD OF PROBLEMS crippling the agency and making it a parody of justice? It’s going to take more than a band of public apologists in the PIO to outsmart brilliant, informed investigative reporters like Tal!

It’s little wonder that EOIR doesn’t want light shed on what’s really happening in their “Star Chambers!”

Star Chamber Justice — “Scream as loud as you want. Nobody’s going to hear you!”

Reminds me of one of my favorite “EOIR War Stories.” My Arlington colleague Judge Wayne “Tell It Like It Is” Iskra once truthfully said in open court said what most experts and his colleagues privately had been saying for ages: “This system is broken!” Unknown to Judge Iskra, however, a reporter was sitting in the audience and the comment received publicity, the thing that EOIR fears most!

Coming from a former two-time Chief Judge of the U.S. Army Criminal Courts, hardly known as a “bleeding heart liberal,” one would anticipate that Iskra’s blunt assessment might have spurred some immediate corrective action and internal reforms. But, the only action it created at EOIR was basically to tell Iskra to “sit down and shut up.”

As always, EOIR was more concerned about “protecting itself” from a judge speaking truth than dealing with the consequences of that truth. As a result, the system is even more broken now than it was when Iskra had the audacity to “speak truth to power!”

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

02-08-22

😎🗽⚖️👩‍⚖️ FLASH: JUDICIAL MAVEN HON. DANA LEIGH MARKS RETIRES, JOINS ROUND TABLE! 🛡⚔️ — “Founding Mother” Of U.S. Asylum Law Successfully Argued INS v. Cardoza-Fonseca @ Supremes, Led Immigration Judges’ Association, Spearheaded “Article I” Movement For Judicial Independence, Saved Thousands of Lives Over Career On Bench Spanning More Than Three Decades!

Hon. Diana Leigh Marks — Hon. Dana Leigh Marks
U.S. Immigration Judge (Ret.) One of the most influential, outspoken, and dynamic Federal Judges of the past half-century enters the next phase of her illustrious career, as a caregiver for her granddaughter and a “fighting knightess” of the Round Table, with typical optimism. “Decades of dealing with DOJ and EOIR management has given me the best possible toolbox to meet any challenges on the road ahead,” says “NanaDana.”

😎🇺🇸🗽⚖️👩‍⚖️ FLASH: JUDICIAL MAVEN HON. DANA LEIGH MARKS RETIRES, JOINS ROUND TABLE! 🛡⚔️ — “Founding Mother” Of U.S. Asylum Law Successfully Argued INS v. Cardoza-Fonseca @ Supremes, Led Immigration Judges’ Association, Spearheaded “Article I” Movement For Judicial Independence, Saved Thousands of Lives Over Career On Bench Spanning More Than Three Decades!

By Paul Wickham Schmidt

Courtside Exclusive

Jan. 9, 2022

Judge Dana Leigh Marks, one of America’s leading “applied scholars” and human rights jurists, joined the Round Table of Former Immigration Judges. Marks retired from the San Francisco Immigration Court on December 31, 2021, following an extraordinary nearly 35-year career on the bench. Round Table spokesperson Judge Jeffrey S. Chase announced Marks’s move in an e-mail yesterday to the group’s more than 50 members.

In addition to her “number one retirement priority” — helping care for her granddaughter — Marks told Courtside that she “looks forward to continuing the fight for Article I and due process for all in America, now without the disclaimers that DOJ requires.” It’s a mission and a sentiment shared by the group.

Long time colleague and fellow past president of the National Association of Immigration Judges (“NAIJ”), Judge John Gossart enthusiastically welcomed and recognized Marks’s fearless advocacy “for due process, fundamental fairness, the right to be heard, and an Article 1 Court.”

Other Round Table judges greeted their newest member with an avalanche of praise, appreciation, admiration, and love for Marks’s intellectual prowess, courage under pressure, and embodiment of the one-time vision of making the U.S. Immigration Courts “the world’s best tribunals, guaranteeing fairness and due process for all.” Over the last several decades, many experts say that noble vision was cashiered by Department of Justice (“DOJ”) politicos in favor of the “go along to get along” and “good enough for government work” aura that infects today’s broken and dysfunctional Immigration Court system. Those courts, now running an astounding, largely self-created backlog in excess of 1.5 million cases, are inappropriately located within the byzantine, politicized bureaucracy of a DOJ still reeling from four years of grotesque mismanagement and misdirection by the Trump group.

Marks graduated from Cal Berkeley in 1974 and received her J.D. from Hastings Law in 1977. She worked for almost ten years as an immigration lawyer in private practice, and was an active leader in AILA’s Northern California chapter during that time. In 1986, as a partner with Simmons & Ungar, then San Francisco’s premier immigration law specialty firm, Marks successfully argued the landmark case, INS v. Cardoza-Fonseca, 480 US 421 (1987).

There, the Supreme Court rejected the Government’s argument that asylum seekers must establish that their future persecution is “more likely than not” to happen. Instead, the Court adopted the much more generous international standard of a “well founded fear” of persecution. The Court thereby recognized that asylum could be granted where the fear was objectively reasonable, even if it were significantly less than “probable.”

Some also consider this to be the “high water mark” of the Court’s positive use of international law concepts in a human rights case involving immigration. Despite considerable internal resistance to fairly applying the more generous legal standard, Cardoza has undoubtedly saved the lives of tens of thousands of refugees and their families over the past three and one-half decades.

Shortly after submitting the brief (co-authored with Bill Ong Hing, Kip Steinberg and Susan Lydon), but prior to her Cardoza argument, Marks was selected for a judgeship by then Chief Immigration Judge, the late William R. Robie. Then Attorney General Ed Meese adopted Robie’s recommendation, and Marks was sworn in as a U.S. Immigration Judge for San Francisco in January, 1987, two months after the oral argument and two months prior to the decision being issued by the Court.

During her distinguished career on the immigration bench, Marks has been an outspoken fighter for professional treatment of her fellow Immigration Judges, for true judicial independence in the Immigration Courts, and for fair, humane, professional treatment of those coming before the courts. She served on a number of occasions as the President and Executive Vice President of the NAIJ, sometimes “swapping” leadership positions with her close friend Judge Denise Slavin, also President Emerita of NAIJ and now a “fearless fighting knightess” of the Round Table.

Marks and Slavin helped battle two DOJ attempts to “decertify” the NAIJ and thus silence the powerful voices that often exposed severe problems in the administration of the Immigration Courts. Indeed, Marks’s determination to speak “truth to power,” her outsized personality, and her willingness to “level” with the media often put her at odds with “handlers” in the court’s bloated bureaucracy and their DOJ overlords.

The latter often sought to divert the Immigration Courts from their due process mission to focus instead on “deterrence” of asylum seekers and fulfilling each Administration’s goals for immigration enforcement. Among other things, this led to a backlog-building phenomenon known as “Aimless Docket Reshuffling.”

In her writings, speeches, and interviews, Marks decried these glaring conflicts of interest and abuses of normal judicial ethics, not to mention common sense and human decency. She tirelessly advocates that the United States adhere more closely to international standards governing refugees and asylees, which was the clearly expressed legislative intent when the Refugee Act of 1980 was enacted.

Summing up her new life after Immigration Court, Marks said “I will enjoy my new day job of caring for my granddaughter, but will continue my hobby of telling truth about EOIR [the bureaucratic acronym for Immigration Courts] through NAIJ and the Roundtable. I am proud to be in such good company!” The feeling is mutual! Due process forever!

⚖️🗽GREAT NEWS FOR DUE PROCESS: NAIJ WINS RE-CERTIFICATION FROM DOJ! — “The immigration courts work best when judges are treated justly,” says NAIJ Prez Judge Mimi Tsankov! — A “Stunner” That Should Have Been A “No Brainer” For The Biden Administration!

Honorable Mimi Tsankov
U.S. Immigration Judge
President, National Association of Immigration Judges (“NAIJ”)

Judge Amiena Khan is the executive vice president of the National Association of Immigration Judges (NAIJ) — Judge Amiena Khan, Past President, National Association of Immigration Judges (NAIJ)

Hon. A. Ashlley Tabaddor — Hon. A. Ashley Tabaddor
Past President, National
Association of Immigration Judges (“NAIJ”)

From NAIJ President Judge Mimi Tsankov:

‘Finally, Some Justice for Immigration Judges Two-Year Union Busting Battle Ends as DOJ Reverses Course and Agrees to Recognize NAIJ’

Dear Friends of NAIJ,

We’re thrilled to announce that NAIJ has reached a settlement with EOIR: https://www.naij-usa.org/images/uploads/newsroom/NAIJ_Press_Release_on_ULP_Settlement.pdf. Thank you for standing by us over the past few years, especially, as we’ve stood up against the decertification effort. The unfair labor practice matters are now settled. What’s left for another day — resolution of the pending motion to reconsider awaiting a decision at the FLRA board.

Today, we celebrate this achievement, thank all those that have stood by us, and look forward to working with the Agency to improve working conditions at the Immigration Courts.

Sincerely,

Hon. Mimi Tsankov

President

National Association of Immigration Judges (NAIJ)

26 Federal Plaza

Room 1237

New York, NY 10278

(720) 837-8737 (Cell)

mimi.tsankov@gmail.com

DISCLAIMER: The author is the President of the National Association of Immigration Judges. The views expressed here do not necessarily represent the official position of the United States Department of Justice, the Attorney General, or the Executive Office for Immigration Review. The views represent the author’s personal opinions, which were formed after extensive consultation with the membership of NAIJ.

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

Also, great coverage by Alexandra Villarreal and Joanna Walters from The Guardian:

Victory for US immigration judges as Biden administration recognizes union

Settlement comes after judges accused president of ‘doubling down’ on Trump’s position

Alexandra Villarreal in Austin and Joanna Walters in New York

Published: 18:01 Tuesday, 07 December 2021

In a stunning victory, US immigration judges have settled a tense dispute with Joe Biden’s administration over their effort to restore union rights taken away from them under Donald Trump.

Biden’s Department of Justice agreed on Tuesday to recognize the union as the exclusive representative for the nation’s immigration judges and follow the terms of their collective bargaining agreement, at least for the time being.

Days before reaching the settlement, the head of the federal immigration judges’ union had accused the Biden administration of “doubling down” on its predecessor’s efforts to freeze out their association even as they struggle with a backlog of almost 1.5m court cases and staff shortages, which exacerbate due process concerns in their courts.

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Mimi Tsankov, president of the National Association of Immigration Judges (NAIJ), had declared herself “mystified” that Biden’s Department of Justice would not negotiate with her members despite the US president vocally and frequently touting his support for workers’ representation.

“This administration has really doubled down on maintaining the [Trump] position that we are not a valid union,” Tsankov said before the settlement.

Tsankov was appointed as an immigration judge in 2006 and is based in New York, where she also teaches at Fordham University School of Law. She spoke to the Guardian only in her union role.

Remain in Mexico: migrants face deadly peril as Biden restores Trump policy

After what she described as “decades” of relatively smooth relations between the NAIJ and the Department of Justice, Donald Trump capped four years of rightwing immigration policy by successfully petitioning to strip hundreds of immigration judges of their right to unionize.

The hostile move was decided by the Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA), an independent administrative federal agency that controls labor relations between the federal government and its employees, on 2 November 2020, the day before the presidential election.

Despite a Democratic victory and Joe Biden taking the White House pledging to undo damage done by Trump, the union remained shut out and silenced for more than a year, without a date set to hear its case attempting to restore its official status.

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“I cannot understand it … Working together, as the president has stated, working with federal employees, working with unions, achieves better results,” said Tsankov.

. . . .

Read the full report here: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/dec/07/us-immigration-judges-union-biden-administration

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

Congrats to Judge Tsankov and former NAIJ Presidents Judge Amiena Khan, Judge Ashley Tabaddor, and all of the others who courageously and steadfastly fought against this scurrilous retaliation by Billy Barr directed against those with the guts and integrity to “speak truth to power” about the due process disaster in our Immigration Courts!

Yes, it’s a great victory for the NAIJ and “good government.” But, I’m with Judge Tsankov here: Why on earth did it take so much time and wasted effort for the Garland DOJ to finally “do the right thing?”

This should have been “day one stuff” for Garland — a true “no brainer.” The real “stunner” here is that it took so long!

The NAIJ was and remains “the only game in town” when it comes to expert professional judicial training @ EOIR! The rest of EOIR’s professionalism and training program could be characterized as a shambles — that is, if it actually existed, which it effectively doesn’t.

Compare EOIR “management’s” pathetic attempts at training with what the “real pros” at NAIJ and the VIISTA Program at Villanova (training for non-attorney reps) under Professor Michele Pistone have developed over the past year. There is no comparison — NAIJ and VIISTA win, hands down!

Yet, rather than harnessing this available energy, talent, expertise, and creativity, “Team Garland” has dawdled away the time, making few material inroads into the toxic culture and broken pieces of our Immigration Courts. Ask almost any practitioner how much their life and the lives of their clients in Immigration Court have “improved” under Garland! You’ll get an “earful” — as I do on occasion.

A new group of progressive practical expert leaders at EOIR should have made NAIJ, representatives of the private bar and NGOs, and representatives of ICE OPLA part of an “expert advisory team” working cooperatively to reform EOIR, institute merit-based hiring practices, and reduce the backlog without more wasteful gimmicks and in full compliance with due process.

Instead, most of the first year of Garland’s DOJ tenure has been wasted fighting battles that never should have been fought, irrationally alienating would-be allies who could have provided creative solutions to endemic problems, and engaging in yet more “Aimless Docket Reshuffling” even while continuing to build unnecessary backlog. The actual state of due process at EOIR has remained deplorable, morale at record lows, and the frustration and anger of attorneys subjected to Garland’s ongoing mess growing.

Even the “lowest of low-hanging fruit” — speedy approvals of applications for recognition and accreditation of non-attorney representatives involving graduates of VIISTA and other top NGO programs have been inexplicably allowed to languish. A process that should easily be completed in 30-60 days in most cases delayed for months, perhaps years, under unrealistically low staffing and “low priority” assigned by habitually negligent and unresponsive to public needs “EOIR Management.” This, at a time when there is a dire crisis in representation that VIISTA and other “top drawer NGOs” are fighting and innovating to solve.

(Remember, of course, that former EOIR Director James McHenry improperly “took over” the R&A program, which has become less, rather than more, functional and timely as a result. That’s a good measure of how inane EOIR “management” became under Trump. But, although McHenry is gone, it’s not that there has been drastic improvement under Garland. The lack at EOIR HQ of those who truly understand the Immigration Court process and could solve problems and “make the trains run on time,” without stomping on anyone’s rights, is simply mind-boggling!)

But, however bad EOIR is and remains, the “real buck stops with Garland” who has miserably failed to address in a timely, professional, systemic, rational manner the ongoing mess in his “EOIR Star Chambers!”

Four Horsemen — BIA Asylum Panel In Action
Albrecht Dürer, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The public deserves better — much better!

FULL DISCLOSURE: I am a proud retired member of the NAIJ.

👍🏼🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

12-08-21

AS TOTALLY DYSFUNCTIONAL IMMIGRATION COURTS 👎🏽 CONTINUE THEIR DESCENT INTO THE ABYSS, 80 EXPERTS AND ORGANIZATIONS ASK GARLAND TO UNDO BARR’S ILLEGAL “BANISHMENT” OF THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF IMMIGRATION JUDGES (“NAIJ”)🧑🏽‍⚖️

June 7, 2021

The Honorable Merrick Garland Attorney General

U.S. Department of Justice Washington, DC 20500

RE: Department of Justice Should Support the National Association of Immigration Judges and Withdraw the Petition to Decertify its Union

Dear Attorney General Garland,

We, the undersigned unions, organizations, immigration law professors and scholars, and other immigration court stakeholders call your attention to the urgent need to preserve and protect the National Association of Immigration Judges (NAIJ) and support collective bargaining by Department of Justice (DOJ) career civil servants. We are heartened by President Biden’s announcements on January 22, 2021, that both overturned his predecessor’s policies limiting employee rights to collectively bargain and also implement a wide-ranging policy to protect, empower, and rebuild the career federal workforce. President Biden’s announcements specifically encourage union organizing and collective bargaining.1

After four relentless years of union-busting, decisive leadership is needed to refortify the federal workforce. NAIJ and its 500+ bargaining unit members—immigration judges who are DOJ attorney employees—are in need of protection right now! NAIJ has been the collective bargaining representative for immigration judges since 1979. Yet, in 2019, the Trump administration filed a petition to strip immigration judges of their statutory right to be represented by a union and decertify NAIJ.

The Trump administration targeted NAIJ in retaliation for NAIJ’s criticism of both the unreasonable working conditions that DOJ managers imposed on its members and the sweeping curtailment of due process rights in immigration court.

While the decertification attempt was initially and thoroughly rejected in a decision by a career employee of the Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA), the decision was abruptly reversed

1 Executive Order 14003, on Protecting the Federal Workforce. 1

in a politically-motivated decision by the FLRA. That FLRA decision ignored the detailed fact-finding of the career employee and reversed long-standing FLRA precedent that 20 years earlier had found that immigration judges were not in a position to influence agency policy.

The FLRA decision is devoid of any reasoned analysis and creates an extremely dangerous precedent for professional workers throughout the federal government. Future administrations could wield this decision like a sword to preclude other professional employees such as physicians, scientists, engineers, and others from unionizing. Indeed, this ill-conceived anti-union precedent could have devastating repercussions for decades to come.

At this moment, a motion to reconsider is currently pending at the FLRA, and we call on the DOJ to withdraw its opposition to that motion, withdraw its decertification petition, and take all steps to restore collective bargaining rights for NAIJ members. President Biden has committed to restoring labor unions and fair working conditions for federal employees. We ask the DOJ to do its part in supporting that objective by taking all necessary actions to ensure that the NAIJ remains a union so that it can continue to represent its members in support of fair working conditions. Doing so will be a service to Immigration Court stakeholders and the public at large.

We seek your immediate review and leadership in this matter. Sincerely,

Amiena Khan

Amiena Khan, President

National Association of Immigration Judges

Unions: AFL-CIO

American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), AFL-CIO American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), Local 511

American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), Local 3525

American Federation of State, County & Municipal Employees American Federation of Teachers

Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance, AFL-CIO

Association of Flight Attendants-CWA

2

Communications Workers of America (CWA)

Department for Professional Employees, AFL-CIO

Federal Education Association

International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers (IFPTE) International Union of Painters and Allied Trades

Labor Council for Latin American Advancement National Association of Government Employees National Education Association

National Federation of Federal Employees National Nurses United

National Treasury Employees Union

National Weather Service Employees Organization Patent Office Professional Association

Service Employees International Union (SEIU) The International Brotherhood of Teamsters UNITE HERE

United Mine Workers of America

United Power Trades Organization

Organizations:

African Services Committee

Alliance for Justice

American Immigration Lawyers Association AsylumWorks

3

Bellevue Program for Survivors of Torture Brooklyn Law School Safe Harbor Project Catholic Labor Network

Catholic Legal Services, Archdiocese of Miami Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc. Center for Gender & Refugee Studies

Columbia Law School Immigrants’ Rights Clinic Disciples Immigration Legal Counsel

Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project Immigrant Defenders Law Group

The Legal Aid Society

Migrant Center for Human Rights

Minnesota Interfaith Coalition on Immigration Mississippi Center for Justice

National Immigration Law Center

National Network for Immigrant & Refugee Rights The Right to Immigration Institute

Round Table of Former Immigration Judges

Law Professors and Scholars with Institutional Affiliation for Identification Purposes only:

Sabi Ardalan

Clinical Professor of Law

Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinical Program Harvard Law School*

Roxana C. Bacon

4

Adjunct Professor of Law Arizona State University* University of Arizona* University of Miami*

David Baluarte

Associate Clinical Professor of Law Washington & Lee University School of Law*

Jon Bauer

Clinical Professor of Law and Richard D. Tulisano ’69 Scholar in Human Rights University of Connecticut School of Law*

Lenni B. Benson

Distinguished Chair of Immigration and Human Rights Law New York Law School*

Matthew Boaz

Professor

Washington & Lee School of Law*

Stacy Caplow

Associate Dean of Experiential Education & Professor of Law Brooklyn Law School*

Rose Cuison-Villazor

Vice Dean and Professor of Law Rutgers Law School*

Ingrid Eagly

Professor of Law

University of California Los Angeles School of Law*

Lauren Gilbert

Professor

St. Thomas University College of Law*

Lindsay M. Harris

Associate Professor & Director, Immigration & Human Rights Clinic University of the District of Columbia, David A. Clarke School of Law*

Katie Herbert Meyer

Associate Professor of Practice and Director of the Immigration Law Clinic Washington University*

Geoffrey Hoffman

Clinical Professor and Immigration Clinic Director

5

University of Houston Law Center*

Alan Hyde

Distinguished Professor of Law and Sidney Reitman Scholar Rutgers Law School*

Erin Jacobsen

Professor and Director at Vermont Law School’s South Royalton Legal Clinic Vermont Immigrant Assistance

Vermont Law School*

Hiroko Kusuda

Clinic Professor and Director of Immigration Law Section

Loyola University New Orleans College of Law*

Stuart H. Smith Law Clinic and Center for Center for Social Justice

Vanessa Merton

Professor of Law

Immigration Justice Clinic Elizabeth Haub School of Law*

Karen Musalo

Professor and Founding Director, Center for Gender & Refugee Studies and the Refugee and Human Rights Clinic

U.C. Hastings College of the Law*

Lori A. Nessel

Professor

Seton Hall University School of Law*

Michael A. Olivas

Wm B. Bates Distinguished Chair (Emeritus) University of Law Center*

Maria Mercedes Pabon Professor of Law

Loyola University New Orleans*

Carrie Rosenbaum

Lecturer in Legal Studies University of California, Berkeley*

Faiza Sayed

Visiting Professor of Clinical Law and Co-Director Safe Harbor Clinic

6

Brooklyn Law School*

Gemma Solimene

Clinical Associate Professor of Law Fordham University School of Law*

Elissa Steglich

Clinical Professor and Co-director Immigration Clinic University of Texas School of Law*

Mark E. Steiner

Professor of Law

South Texas College of Law Houston*

Enid Trucios-Haynes Brandeis School of Law University of Louisville*

Irene Scharf

Professor

Immigration Law Clinic University of Massachusetts*

Doug Smith

Lecturer in Legal Studies Brandeis University*

Paul Wickham Schmidt Immigrationcourtside.com

Erica B. Schommer

Clinical Professor of Law

St. Mary’s University School of Law*

Michael J. Wishnie

William O. Douglas Clinical Professor of Law Yale Law School*

*Institutional affiliation for identification purposes only

7

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

FULL DISCLOSURE: I am a retired member of the NAIJ.

Thanks to my friend Judge Amiena Khan and the rest of her leadership group at the NAIJ for all they do to fight for due process for individuals in Immigration Court!

To date, Garland and his team have been busy defending Billy Barr’s and Trump’s corruption from legal accountability, appointing Barr’s hand-picked “judges” to their overtly non-progressive judiciary, attempting to intimidate the press (until the White House finally had to intervene), and carrying out pre-existing Stephen Miller inspired precedents and policies. Oh yeah, and engaging in their own mindless unilateral round of “Aimless Docket Reshuffling” (a/k/a yet another designed to fail “Dedicated Docket”) in Immigration Court while continuing to build on the pre-existing 1.3 million case backlog. They have also been occupied with ignoring every progressive and expert suggestion and NOT appointing progressives to leadership and judicial positions. Wow! That’s a very full plate (of unappetizing food)!

So, I’m not holding my breath for a favorable response to the latest request for the injection of some legality, common sense, and decency into EOIR. Nor am I expecting Biden and Harris to honor their commitment to Federal Employee Unions, after watching their performance to date on immigration and human rights. Additionally, given the continuing abysmal performance of EOIR and its ongoing waste and incompetence, I doubt whether they want any “internal critics” speaking truth to power.

So far, Garland is on course to be “Billy Barr, Jr.” While that might help Barr to avoid legal accountability for his corrupt administration of justice @ Justice, it’s not so good for progressives who would like to see (and once believed they would see) some “justice from Justice” particularly for racial minorities, women, children, asylum seekers, and other migrants.

They also would like to see at least minimally professional and respectful treatment of those appearing and representing individuals in Immigration Court. While Garland, Monaco, Gupta, and Clarke are all being paid comfortable “top of the line” USG salaries for ignoring long-overdue progressive reforms @ EOIR, many attorneys representing individuals in their “Star Chambers” are operating pro bono or low bono in their attempts to keep Garland’s failing and flailing system afloat.

Just more reasons why we need an independent Article I Immigration Court to deliver due process, racial, and gender justice to individuals, regardless of status.

Barr Departs — Lowering The Barr by Randall Enos, Easton, CT
Republished By License. Guess Garland forgot to flush!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-08-21

🏴‍☠️👎🏽🤮PARODY OF JUSTICE @ “JUSTICE” — EOIR’s ETHICAL WASTELAND EXPOSED BY FOIA: The Only “Surprise” Here Is Garland’s Failure To “Clean House” @ EOIR, Remove Unethical Lawyers @ DOJ, & Demand Accountability For Ethically Challenged DHS Attorneys!🦨

EYORE — “Eyore In Distress” — Ethics have long been “on vacation” at EOIR. Sitting judges are muzzled from speaking publicly and can be disciplined for minor transgressions. But, some judges accused of serious misconduct get away scott free under an intentionally opaque process that operates without public input or oversight. Meanwhile DOJ politicos and EOIR Senior Execs operate in open violation of 5th Amendment Due Process and the most basic conflict of interest requirements. The end result is that individuals systematically are denied the “fair and impartial adjudicator” that our Constitution requires!
Once A Symbol of Fairness, Due Process, & Best Practices, Now Gone “Belly Up”

Kangaroos — “Let’s hop on over to ICE and see what our “partner” Kent Frederick wants us to do today to help out our masters at DHS enforcement!”
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rasputin243/
Creative Commons License

Hon. “Sir Jeffrey” Chase reports to the Round Table:

From: Frederick, Kent

Sent: Friday, June 01, 2018 12:59 PM

To: Weil, Jack (EOIR)

Subject: Matter of Castro-Tum/ IJMorley

Dear Judge Weil:

Just for reference, here is the portion of the decision that 1.1Morley violated:

Matter of Castro-Tum, 27 l&N Dec. 271 (AG 2018), which explicitly directed the matter be remanded “to the Board with instructions to remand to the Immigration Judge to issue a new Notice of Hearing within 14 days of the date of this order. If the respondent again fails to appear, the Immigration Judge should proceed according to 8 U.S.C. §

1229a(b)(5).”) Matter of Castro-Tum, 27 l&N Dec_ at 294. Moreover, the Attorney General explicitly rejected the option to terminate or continue this matter on remand if Castro-Tum again failed to appear. Castro-Tum,27l&N Dec.at291 n.12 (“DHS adequately alleged that it provided sufficient notice because the Notice to Appear informed the respondent of all statutorily required information about the proceedings…. DHS also adequately alleged that the form of the notice was sufficient. DHS personally served the Notice to Appear on the respondent and mailed the Notice of Hearing to the address the respondent repeatedly provided the government.”(internal citations omitted)).

Kent J. Frederick

Chief Counsel

Office of the Chief Counsel

U.S. Deportment of Homeland Security immigration and Customs Enforcement 900 Market Street, (b)(6).(b)(7)(C) Philadelphia, PA 19107

(267) 479 —___(2_622_479-3456 (fax)

(b)(6),(b)(7XC)

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

Thanks to Judge Sue Roy for forwarding this:

[Above] please find a redacted email obtained through a FOIA request by private attorney Matthew Hoppock. It is a private email between Kent Frederick, the ICE District Counsel in Philadelphia, and Jack Weil, who at the time was the Philadelphia court’s ACIJ. Although the first part of the email is redacted, in the second part, the ICE District Counsel provides Jack with the basis that led to removing Castro-Tum from the case’s proper IJ, Steve Morley.

It should be noted that this is not a motion with service on opposing counsel; this is a private email between ICE and the ACIJ about the handling of a particular case.

While the Chief Immigration Judge should be taking steps to prohibit these types of communications, it bears noting that the present Chief Immigration Judge is the former Atlanta ICE District Counsel.

Best, Jeff

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

Thanks to NDPA warrior Matthew Hoppock for once again having the perseverance to use the FOIA to document and “out” misconduct @ DOJ, EOIR, and DHS! What’s the purpose of an “appeals process” if DHS can just raise its dis-satisfaction with legal issues to their “partners” in EOIR “administration” and ask them to take action? For the record, Judge Morley eventually was removed from the case and replaced with an Assistant Chief Immigration Judge who carried out Sessions’s wishes.

I think this is EXACTLY the type of misconduct that “Gonzo” Sessions intended to promote when he unethically exhorted “his judges” to “partner with DHS” to deny due process, target refugee women for abuse, torture, and death, and speed up removals. (However, because Sessions’s undeniable maliciousness was accompanied by mind-boggling and resource squandering incompetence, the overall result was to exponentially increase backlogs while institutionalizing injustice, unethically endangering the lives of migrants, and falsely smearing the professional reputations of their attorneys.)

Sessions, unethically acting as a “quasi-judicial official,” in violation of every ethical rule of judicial disqualification for overt bias, prejudgement, lack of impartiality (every case in which “Gonzo” Sessions participated is a grotesque violation of this — a man whose overt racism once led HIS OWN PARTY to find him unqualified for a Federal Judgeship!), appearance of conflict, and actual conflict of interest, unleashed a torrent of gross unethical behavior at DOJ and DHS. But, there were plenty of lawyers already “on the payroll” who were perfectly happy to engage in unethical conduct in support of the Trump kakistocracy’s White Nationalist, racist, xenophobic, misogynist agenda.

I’ll let the various comments I have received speak for themselves:

When I was an IJ . . . I complained about this practice to Chief IJ Creppy at an open forum at the IJ conference involving an ex parte complaint Frederick had lodged against . . . . Creppy just brushed it off as interagency cooperation.

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

At the least, these two should be referred to their state bars for disciplinary proceedings for engaging in impermissible ex parte communication.

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

WOW! This is crazy.

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

Wow! Just WOW! We always knew it was happening, but this is pretty blatant evidence!

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

Utterly unacceptable! It may seem ludicrous or petty, but it is far more than an objectionable practice. It optimizes a fundamental violation of due process that is routinely accepted and even expected.

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

Shameful, what happened to the appeal process Mr. Fredrick!

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

Is anyone really surprised?

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

Disappointed, but not surprised.

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

And has been happening ever since I started practicing in the mid-eighties. I agree it is totally unacceptable.

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

Jack has been nothing but a profound disappointment. I’m sure you all remember his arrogant and almost insane boast that he. could teach constitutional law to a child respondent. This email is both unethical and stupid: what kind of intellect allows for this response to him to put in writing? I never expect much from an ICE official, but I am always go smacked when a judge acts like a Watergate miscreant.

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

Completely shameful, but not surprising. We frequently suspected this kind of thing went on.

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

The conduct of “Gonzo” Sessions, then-Director McHenry (still on the EOIR payroll, although thankfully removed from participation in the Immigration Courts), and the EOIR and DOJ officials involved in this sorry incident is reprehensible.

BUT, HERE’S THE REAL PROBLEM: AG Merrick Garland, a respected Article III Judge and one-time Supreme Court nominee, was appointed by President Biden supposedly to clean up the ungodly mess at Justice left by the Trump kakistocracy. He isn’t getting the job done! Not even close!

EOIR requires immediate due process reforms, competent administration, a complete “housecleaning,” and, most of all, progressive leadership by “practical scholars.”

Yet, after three months in office Garland has nary lifted a finger to institute even rudimentary progressive reforms to restore due process at EOIR. Things are just as bad in our disgracefully dysfunctional Immigration Courts as they were on Jan. 20, 2021, in some cases even worse!

Beyond this indolence, Garland outrageously affirmatively appointed 17 non-expert, non-diverse, non-progressive “judges” who were recruited and hand-picked by Billy Barr. Along with Gonzo Sessions, Barr is one of the most unethical, unqualified, un-indicted (yet) AGs in American history. Garland’s lack of awareness, absence of immigration expertise, disrespect for progressive “practical scholars,” and trashing of humane values is super-damaging to our nation!

Of course, nobody can be an “expert” in every legal subject. But, the job of an effective leader is to pick folks who are experts to manage and staff these areas. I don’t see that type of expertise at today’s DOJ or EOIR Headquarters (although there are some well-qualified progressive Immigration Judges on local courts who could have been immediately detailed to EOIR HQ to stabilize the out of control situation).

Garland presides over a massive, deadly, systemic failure and chaotic “Clown Show” 🤡 @ EOIR that threatens the entire U.S. Justice system. I’ve actually known excellent Immigration Judges who have been suspended, docked pay, or threatened with removal for ex parte communications far, far, far less serious than that described above.

How do we teach ethics to an upcoming generation of lawyers when AG Garland and his senior managers are unwilling to hold accountable those who participated in the Trump White Nationalist kakistocracy @ Justice?

Team Garland daily mocks justice by not instituting standards that require demonstrated subject matter expertise, unswerving commitment to due process, fundamental fairness, and a record of ethical behavior from those appointed to, and continuing to serve in, Immigration Judgeships.

Under Garland, EOIR is a life threatening, democracy destroying “disaster zone.” “Team Garland’s” inexcusable failure to appoint qualified progressive experts and to undertake the “no brainer” immediate reforms essential to get the EOIR system back on track has, sadly, become a major problem for the Biden Administration and our nation.

It’s all so unnecessary, so aggravating, so damaging to humanity and American democracy. It’s even worse because the “complicit culprits” are folks (Biden appointees) who were “supposed to know better” and had the incredible, unprecedented advantages of potentially drawing on years of exceptionally high quality research, overwhelming documentation, smart, creative, practical recommendations, and extraordinarily qualified progressive “practical scholars and advocates” ready to solve problems from “inside Government.”

But, they can’t solve the problems solely “from the outside.” It takes an unrelenting combination of progressive experts pushing from the outside and receptive progressive judges and officials on the inside to make the radical changes necessary to save our nation!

Garland’s disrespectful, indolent, and tone deaf treatment of migrants, progressives, and simple human dignity, as well as his gross misunderstanding and diminution of what continues to drive racial and social injustice in America, will certainly come back to haunt the Biden Administration!

Let me reiterate: There will be neither racial justice nor social justice in America as long as our Immigration Courts operate as White Nationalist enforcers of “Dred Scottification of the other.” Immigration/human rights are where “the rubber meets the road” for racial and social justice in America! Immigrants’ rights are human rights, are civil rights, are constitutional rights! As MLK, Jr., said “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere!”

🇺🇸🇺🇸⚖️🗽Due Process Forever!

PWS

05-22-21

CHARLES M. BLOW @ NYT BEGS TO DIFFER WITH GOP SENs SCOTT & GRAHAM: “However, it is important to remember that nearly half the country just voted for a full-on racist in Donald Trump, and they did so by either denying his racism, becoming apologists for it, or applauding it. What do you call a country thus composed?”

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/02/opinion/america-racism.html?referringSource=articleShare

. . . .

I personally don’t make much of Scott’s ability to reason. This is the same man who said in March that “woke supremacy,” whatever that is, “is as bad as white supremacy.” There is no world in which recent efforts at enlightenment can be equated to enslavement, lynching and mass incarceration. None.

Colfax

It seems to me that the disingenuousness on the question of racism is largely a question of language. The question turns on another question: “What, to you, is America?” Is America the people who now inhabit the land, divorced from its systems and its history? Or, is the meaning of America inclusive of those systems and history?

When people say that America is a racist country, they don’t necessarily mean that all or even most Americans are consciously racist. However, it is important to remember that nearly half the country just voted for a full-on racist in Donald Trump, and they did so by either denying his racism, becoming apologists for it, or applauding it. What do you call a country thus composed?

Historically, however, there is no question that the country was founded by racists and white supremacists, and that much of the early wealth of this country was built on the backs of enslaved Africans, and much of the early expansion came at the expense of the massacre of the land’s Indigenous people and broken treaties with them.

Eight of the first 10 presidents personally enslaved Africans. In 1856, the chief justice of the United States wrote in the infamous ruling on the Dred Scott case that Black people “had for more than a century before been regarded as beings of an inferior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, either in social or political relations; and so far inferior, that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect.”

The country went on to fight a Civil War over whether some states could maintain slavery as they wished. Even some of the people arguing for, and fighting for, an end to slavery had expressed their white supremacist beliefs.

Abraham Lincoln said during his famous debates against Stephen A. Douglas in 1858 that among white people and Black ones “there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I, as much as any other man, am in favor of the superior position being assigned to the white man.”

Some will concede the historical point and insist on the progress point, arguing that was then and this is now, that racism simply doesn’t exist now as it did then. I would agree. American racism has evolved and become less blunt, but it has not become less effective. The knife has simply been sharpened. Now systems do the work that once required the overt actions of masses of individual racists.

. . . .

As Mark Twain once put it: “The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter. ’Tis the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning.”

Being imprecise or undecided with our language on this subject contributes to the murkiness — and to the myth that the question of whether America is racist is difficult to answer and therefore the subject of genuine debate among honest intellectuals.

Saying that America is racist is not a radical statement. If that requires a longer explanation or definition, so be it. The fact, in the end, is not altered.

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

Read Blow’s full article at the link.

Four things that are clear to me:

The “history” that most of us in my generation learned in high school was “whitewashed;”
The monumental achievements of non-white Americans, women, and children which allowed this country to exist, prosper, and flourish have consistently been ignored or downplayed;
America still has race issues;
The GOP, in particular, has failed to come to grips with the issue of race in 21st century America (apologists Scott & Graham notwithstanding).

🇺🇸⚖️🗽Due Process For All Persons Under Law, Forever!

PWS

05-03-21

CRIME BLOTTER: CHILD ABUSE🤮☠️⚰️🦹🏿‍♀️: DOJ IG REPORT CONFIRMS WHAT COURTSIDE & OTHERS KNEW FROM THE START: Trump, Sessions, Miller, Rosenstein, Hamilton Are Cowards🐓, Lying 🤥 Criminals, Child Abusers🦹🏿‍♀️, Who Belong Behind Bars For Intentionally Abusing Asylum Seeking Families & Kids & Then Having Their Sleazy DOJ Lawyers Lie To Federal Judges! — What Happened To “Due Diligence” As An Ethical Requirement For Government Lawyers?

Sessions in a cage — Jeff Sessions’ Cage by J.D. Crowe, Alabama Media Group/AL.com
Republished under license

Jeff “Gonzo Apocalypto” Sessions
“Police Brutality? What Police Brutality?”

Attribution: Stephen Miller Monster by Peter Kuper, PoliticalCartoons.com, Republished under license

Stephen Miller Cartoon — Stephen Miller & Count Olaf
Evil Twins, Notorious Child Abusers

Stephen Miller & Wife — “Gauleiter Muller & Eva Braun” Yuck it Up In The Comfort Of “Public Welfare Dole” While Looking Forward to Planning Together for More “Crimes Against Humanity,” Abusing Children, Dehumanizing Persons of Color, Spreading Lies & False Narratives, & Targeting World’s Most Vulnerable Refugees 🤮☠️⚰️🦹🏿‍♂️ — Sure Looks Like “Welfare Fraud” to Me!

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=newssearch&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjByaGq6p7uAhVwuVkKHXiFC34QxfQBCFMwBA&url=https%3A%2F%2Fkval.com%2Fnewsletter-daily%2Fmerkley-calls-for-prosecution-of-trump-officials-after-report-on-child-separation-policy&usg=AOvVaw1vnWzv2UxSmymy6iLrVQ-o

By KVAL CBS (Eugene, OR) News Staff:

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon has called for the investigation and prosecution of current and former Trump administration officials after the Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General released “a disturbing report confirming that the Trump administration knew their zero tolerance policy would lead to family separations,” the Oregon Democrat said in a statement.

“We finally have more answers about how this diabolical plan came to be,” Merkley said. “It is crystal clear that Jeff Sessions, Stephen Miller, Chad Wolf, Kirstjen Nielsen and other senior Trump administration officials were not only fully aware that their policy would have traumatizing impacts on families, but also that their intention was to inflict that trauma as a means to deter people from coming to America in search of a better life.”

The senator added “it’s now confirmed that they committed perjury by lying to Congress about their intentions and actions in order to avoid accountability for their monstrous initiative.”

In June 2018, Merkley traveled to Texas and attempted to enter a child detention center in a former Walmart, calling attention to the practice of separating and detaining children apart from their families.

“The intentional infliction of harm on innocent children is unforgivable and has no place on our soil,” Merkley said Thursday. “The architects should be investigated and prosecuted to the full extent of the law for any crimes connected with both the atrocities and the cover-up.”

Merkley returned to the border 6 more times and advocated for families to be reunited – and for people seeking refuge “from gang violence, murder, rape, and extortion in their home countries” be allowed to make their case – something the senator alleges the Trump adminitration has not allowed in keeping with the law.

“America is at its strongest when we embrace our historic role as a beacon of hope for persecuted people from around the world,” Merkley said. “I am determined to work with the Biden administration to ensure that we turn that vision into a reality, and to hold the perpetrators of the Trump administration’s cruelty fully accountable.”

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

Couldn’t have said it better myself, Senator! Right on! Remarkable how all it takes is an armed insurrection against our Capitol and our democracy generated by the Traitor Prez and supported by far, far too many cowardly, anti-American members of his “Party of Treason” to get folks “thinking like Courtside.”

Even if the criminals described by the IG escape prosecution for their crimes, the new IG Report and the additional documents that certainly will come to light once the Trump kakistocracy is removed should provide enough evidence to keep these wretched fascist creatures and their families tied up in civil litigation for the rest of their miserable and worthless lives!

To date, only Senator James Langford (R-OK) has had the decency to apologize for his role in supporting Trump’s beyond bogus, treasonous, insurrectionist claims of “election fraud” or a stolen election. Where are the apologies from the rest of the cowardly GOP traitors and toadies who supported and/or enabled Trump and his band of racist thugs over the past four years? Why is scumbag Rep. Jim Jordan walking around with a bogus “Medal of Freedom” for spreading lies and encouraging sedition, rather than sitting in a jail cell awaiting trial?

WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

“Gonzo Apocalypto” Sessions. Child abuser and racist plotter remains at large, after having the shameless audacity to run for the U.S. Senate again, being defeated by Magamoron “Coach Tubby Traitorville” (a blithering idiot who obviously got hit by one too many flying tackling dummy).

“Gauleiter Stepan Muller.” Hiding out on the public dole in the seat of corruption and insurrection (formerly and soon again to be known as the “White House”) with his repulsive “Eva Braun substitute” and carrying out more “crimes against humanity” to the end.

Rod Rosenstein. Hiding out, hanging his head in (belated, fake) shame and making the big bucks at King & Spaulding. Will need them after he is dismissed from his law firm, disbarred, and has to pay legal fees and damages to the families he traumatized.

Gene (No Relation to Alex) Hamilton. Still grifting on public welfare at the DOJ until next Wednesday. First cowardly “Waffern SS Member” to publicly take the “Nuremberg defense:” “I was only following Der Fuhrer’s orders.” But, he won’t be the last.

Donald J. “Big Loser/Traitor” Trump. Hiding out in White House basement and planning flight from DC after initiating botched coup attempt against his own Government.

Victims of Failed Regime’s “Crimes Against Humanity.” Already sentenced to a lifetime of pain, suffering, and trauma by Large Banana Republic that shirked its legal and moral duties.

Accountability for this “gang of White Nationalist thugs” is important!

Also, Judge Garland needs to look into the conduct of the DOJ lawyers who defended the regime’s transparent lies and false claims that there was “no child separation policy.” These turkeys 🦃 took no responsibility for their clients’ ongoing crimes and cover ups. Indeed, outrageously, they got away with making it the burden of the plaintiffs’ lawyers to reunite families the Government intentionally and illegally separated without any plans for reunification.

The invidious racist, unconstitutional motives of criminals like Trump, Miller, Sessions, Hamilton, and Rosenstein was no secret. Except for the degree of Rosenstein’s involvement, it was widely reported at the time. Trump was a well-established liar whose public statements and rationales should have been assumed false until proven true. (Ask yourself what would happen to a corporate lawyer who took at face value and presented to a court as “facts” or a “defense” in a civil suit false statements by a corrupt CEO with a long-standing record of fraud, racism, and dishonesty.)

Also, what was the a racist hack like Sessions (the report also reveals that he was as totally incompetent as a lawyer as he was devoid of human decency) doing running border enforcement programs that had intentionally been removed from the AG’s portfolio by Congress when DHS was created? How does that fit with “Gonzo’s” transparently unethical and unconstitutional actions as a “quasi-judicial officer” in interfering with due process at the EOIR Clown Show🤡/Star Chamber🦹🏿‍♂️?

This IG report is just the “tip of the iceberg” of the institutionalized racism and systemic misconduct that polluted the immigration kakistocracy at DOJ and DHS during the Trump regime. The failings of the U.S. Justice system from top to bottom, starting with the Supremes’ consistent failure to critically examine the regime’s transparent pattern of unconstitutional, racist, biased behavior culminating in an insurrection can’t be “swept under the carpet.”

Nor can their enabling of the White Nationalist immigration agenda of “Dred Scottification” pushed by unethical SG Noel Francisco! In a well-functioning democracy, the Trumpist thugs’ child abuse should have been stopped in its tracks. Thanks to the failure of legal, ethical, and moral leadership by Roberts and his righty GOP buddies, it wasn’t!

The entire beyond disgraceful and patently illegal “zero tolerance program” instituted by Gonzo was a grotesque misuse of public funds and abuse of prosecutorial discretion. Real crimes (the Trump regime has been an absolute boon to serious criminals from the Oval Office on down) went un-prosecuted and un-investigated. The conduct of U.S. Attorneys, Federal Judges, and U.S. Magistrate Judges along the border who shirked their duties and participated in the legal farce taking place in our criminal justice system also needs to be examined.

Those of us who lived through Watergate can see that this time around, under extraordinarily poor leadership generated by an anti-American GOP, the response of all three branches of our Federal Government to the overt threats to our Constitution and democracy posed by a dishonest Executive fell disturbingly below the bipartisan levels that saved our nation from Nixon.

That’s why the critical democratic standard of a “peaceful and orderly transfer of power” has fallen by the wayside and the Biden-Harris Inauguration will take place in an armed camp. Ironically, the man administering the oath to President Biden, Chief Justice John Roberts and his GOP colleagues on the Supremes bear a major responsibility for democracy’s peril and the pain and suffering of those like separated families whom they failed to protect from Executive abuses!

As I’ve said before, although it won’t happen, the resignations of Roberts and his fellow GOP Justices should be on President Biden’s desk on the morning of January 21. That would be a real start on healing, restoring democracy, and reinstituting human decency and respect for human lives and the rule of law in America.

(Let’s not forget that ethics-challenged Justices Thomas and Coney Barrett showed up at what essentially was a “MAGA campaign rally” at the White House on the eve of the election that eventually resulted in impeachable acts of insurrection and sedition by a patently dishonest and dangerous Chief Executive whose unfitness to govern was more than clear by that time. Honestly, it’s going to take more than a black robe to cover the shame of these dudes who stand for protecting and enabling tyranny and against justice for the people. If nothing else, it’s high time for a Democrat-led Congress to impose at least some minimal ethical standards on the Supremes, since they appear to have none to mention. That’s, of course, after they come to grips with the treason of GOP guys like Cruz and Hawley who should be expelled and barred from public “service” (treason?) for life.)

🇺🇸⚖️🗽👎🏻Due Process Forever! Cowardly thugs, 🥷🏻magamorons, 🦹🏿‍♂️ and their enablers, never!

PWS

01-16-21

THE GIBSON REPORT 01-11-21 — THE DISHONOR 👎🏻 ROLL🧻: Immigration Kakistocracy Attempts To Keep Rolling Out The “Crimes Against Humanity,”☠️🤮 Even As Neo-Nazi Regime ☠️⚰️ & GOP Apologists Disintegrate Into A Failed Insurrection 🏴‍☠️Against America! — Biden Must Restore Integrity, Competence, & Loyalty To Government 🇺🇸⚖️☠️ — EOIR “Clown Show” Must Be One Of The First (But Certainly Not Last) 🤡🦹🏿‍♂️ To Go — DHS also Needs Top To Bottom “Clean Out!”🧹🪠

Elizabeth Gibson
Attorney, NY Legal Assistance Group
Publisher of “The Gibson Report”

COVID-19

Note: Policies are rapidly changing, so please verify information on the relevant government websites and with colleagues as best you can.

EOIR Status Overview & EOIR Court Status Map/List: Hearings in non-detained cases at courts without an announced date are postponed through, and including, February 5, 2021. NYC non-detained remains closed for hearings.

TOP NEWS

Judge blocks wide-ranging asylum limits, finding DHS chief did not have authority to issue them

CBS: Another federal judge on Friday ruled that Chad Wolf was likely unlawfully appointed to his position at the helm of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), issuing a decision that blocked a set of broad asylum limits slated to take effect Monday.

Trump Announced He Withdrew The Nomination Of Chad Wolf To Run DHS After He’d Criticized The Capitol Riot

Buzzfeed: White House officials said the withdrawal, taking place two weeks before the end of Trump’s term, was not connected to Wolf’s statement.

Trump’s refugee resettlement policy blocked by federal appeals court

WaPo: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit said the administration’s policy undermines the national resettlement program created four decades ago by Congress.

Biden plans to nominate Merrick Garland as his attorney general

WaPo: President-elect Joe Biden plans to nominate federal judge Merrick B. Garland, a Democratic casualty of the bitter partisan divide in Washington, to be the next attorney general, tasked with restoring the Justice Department’s independence and credibility, according to people familiar with the decision.

Despite Senate Wins, Broad Immigration Reform Still Far Off

Law360: Democratic victories in Georgia’s heated Senate runoffs gave the party a slim majority in Congress, but without enough votes to end a filibuster.

To stay or to go?

WaPo: More than 2,500 detainees, most with no serious criminal history, have given up their cases since March, according to records from the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a research group at Syracuse University. Those records also show that detainees put in deportation proceedings in July 2020 were twice as likely to opt for voluntary departure than those from a year before.

First new DACA applications approved in final weeks of 2020

WaPo: Over 170 new applicants have become the first individuals in several years to win approval to the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program for immigrants brought to the U.S. as young people, the U.S. government revealed in a court filing Monday.

Honduras president took bribes from drug traffickers, US prosecutors say

Guardian: US federal prosecutors have filed motions saying the Honduran president, Juan Orlando Hernández, took bribes from drug traffickers and had the country’s armed forces protect a cocaine laboratory and shipments to the US.

Governor Cuomo Outlines 2021 Agenda: Reimagine | Rebuild | Renew

NY: This year, Governor Cuomo will continue to support the Liberty Defense Project to keep fighting for immigrants seeking a better life for themselves and their families. New York’s strength, character, and pride are found in the diversity and rich culture that makes us the Empire State.

LITIGATION/CASELAW/RULES/MEMOS

District Court Issues Nationwide Preliminary Injunction Against New Asylum Regulations

A federal district court in California preliminarily enjoined the government from implementing, enforcing, or applying the 12/11/20 final rule, “Procedures for Asylum and Withholding of Removal; Credible Fear and Reasonable Fear Review.” (Pangea Legal Services, et al. v. DHS, et al., 1/8/21) AILA Doc. No. 21011107

EOIR Issues Policy Memo on Continuances

EOIR issued a memo (PM 21-13) updating and replacing OPPM 17-01, Continuances, to account for legal and policy developments subsequent to its issuance. The memo provides a non-exhaustive list of legal and policy principles as an aid to adjudicators considering common types of continuance requests. AILA Doc. No. 21011101

High Court Nixes 9th Circ. On Asylum-Seekers’ Bond Hearings

Law360: The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday threw out a Ninth Circuit ruling that detained asylum seekers who clear an initial fear screening must be given a prompt bond hearing, sending the case back to the appeals court for reconsideration.

SCOTUS grants cert in TPS case

SCOTUSblog: The case asks whether a grant of Temporary Protected Status authorizes eligible noncitizens to obtain lawful-permanent-resident status if those noncitizens originally entered the United States without being “inspected and admitted” – a term of art referring to lawful entry and authorization by an immigration officer.

The Solicitor General’s Extraordinary Push to Place Even More Immigration Cases on the Supreme Court Docket

ImmProf: There are four immigration related cases set to be considered, with three being petitions by the government (more SG petitions on distinct immigration issues than one would usually expect in the course of an entire year), and the other involving a case in which the SG is agreeing that certiorari is appropriate (also a rare position for the SG). The SG’s position in each of these cases shows an unusual aggressiveness towards the role of the Supreme Court.

BIA Rules on Adverse Credibility Findings Based on Fraudulent Documents

The BIA found that IJs may find a document to be fraudulent without forensic analysis if it contains obvious defects or readily identifiable hallmarks of fraud, and the party submitting the document is given an opportunity to explain the defects. Matter of O-M-O-, 28 I&N Dec. 191 (BIA 2021) AILA Doc. No. 21010801

CA3 Holds That Conspiracy to Commit Fraud of Over $10,000 in Intended Losses Is an Aggravated Felony

The court held that a conspiracy or attempt to commit fraud or deceit involving over $10,000 in intended losses is an aggravated felony, and remanded to determine whether petitioner’s convictions under 18 USC §1037(a) reflected over $10,000 in intended losses. (Rad v. Att’y Gen., 12/21/20) AILA Doc. No. 21010500

CA3 Finds Conferral of TPS Does Not Constitute an Admission

The court reversed the district court opinion and disagreed with CA6 and CA9 interpretations of the statute, by holding that a grant of TPS does not constitute an “admission” into the United States under INA §1255. (Sanchez v. Wolf, 7/22/20) AILA Doc. No. 21011100

CA8 Upholds Denial of Petitioner’s Motion to Reopen Removal Proceedings Based on Changed Country Conditions in Somalia

The court upheld the BIA’s denial of petitioner’s motion to reopen based on changed country conditions in Somalia, finding that the BIA did not fail to consider al-Shabaab’s increase in power or ISIS-Somalia’s emergence and growing violence from 2011 to 2018. (Mohamed v. Barr, 12/23/20) AILA Doc. No. 21010502

CA9 Finds Petitioner’s Proposed Social Group of “Known Drug Users” Lacked Particularity

The court held that the Vietnamese petitioner had waived review of the BIA’s discretionary denial of asylum relief, and that his proposed social group comprised of “known drug users” was not legally cognizable because it lacked particularity. (Nguyen v. Barr, 12/21/20) AILA Doc. No. 21010503

CA9 Upholds Presidential Authority to Issue Healthcare Insurance Proclamation

The court reversed an injunction of PP 9945, which requires IV applicants to demonstrate acquisition of health insurance or ability to pay for future healthcare costs. The court found the proclamation within the president’s executive authority. (Doe, et al., v. Trump, et al., 12/31/20) AILA Doc. No. 21010436

President Trump Issues Memorandum on Inadmissibility of Persons Affiliated with Antifa Based on Organized Criminal Activity

President Trump issued a memorandum directing the Secretary of State to assess whether to classify Antifa as a terrorist organization under 8 USC §1182(a)(3)(B)(vi), and to take steps to consider listing Antifa in 9 FAM 302.5-4(B)(2)(U), Aliens Who Are Members of an Identified Criminal Organization. AILA Doc. No. 21010635

USCIS Provides Update on Receipt Notice Delays for Forms Filed with USCIS Lockbox

USCIS provided additional updates about lockbox operations, noting that applicants may face delays of four to six weeks in receiving receipt notices for some applications and petitions filed at a USCIS lockbox facility. Delays may vary among form types and lockbox locations. AILA Doc. No. 20121534

RESOURCES

AILA: Trump Policies That May Be Finalized Before Inauguration Day 2021

AILA: Practice Alert: Form I-485 Rejections for Employment-Based Derivative Applicants

AILA: Emotional Intelligence for Lawyers: An Introduction and Resources

AILA: Policy Brief: Increase in Indefinite ICE Detention Without Foreseeable Removal Dates During COVID-19 Pandemic

AILA: Screaming Into the Void: Five Reasons to Always Comment on Proposed Regulations

AILA: Frequently Asked Questions on Ethics During the Pandemic

AILA: Practical and Ethical Considerations in Detention Cases

ILRC: Document Gathering Guide for VAWA Self-Petitioners

ILRC: Practice Alert: Temporary Changes to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) in Response to COVID-19

Toolkit for Informing LPRs about the Status of Fee Waivers and Naturalization Fees

ICE Air Flights December and December Year-to-Date 2020

EVENTS

1/12/21 Unemployment Insurance

1/12/21-2/26/21 Comprehensive Overview of Immigration Law

1/13/21 Office of the Citizenship and Immigration Services Ombudsman’s Webinar Series: How the Department of Homeland Security is Combatting Human Trafficking and Forced Labor in Imported Goods

1/13/21 Practical Tips for Preparing Cover Letters, Memos, and Client Statements

1/14/21 USCIS Webinar: 2020 Revised Naturalization Civics Test

1/14/21 Documentary: “Searching for Disappeared Migrants”

1/14/21 COVID Flexibility Provisions with Form I-9 and E-Verify

1/21/21 Forever Virtual: Positive and Ethical Virtual Changes to Your Practice During and After the Pandemic

1/21/21 Immigration in 2021: Anticipating Changes under a New Administration

1/22/21 Immigrant eligibility for public benefits in New York State

1/25/21-2/8/21 Three-Part Webinar Series: All About Public Charge Inadmissibility

1/26/21 Entries, Exits, Re-entries: Dealing with 212(a)(9) Inadmissibility Issues

1/28/21 3rd Annual Western New York Refugee Film Festival

1/28/21-03/11/21 Case Management Techniques and Strategies

1/29/21 Nuts and Bolts of DACA Filings in 2021

2/1/21 Current Status of the USCIS Fee Rule and Fee Waivers

2/2/21 Post-Inauguration: An Immigration Update

2/4/21 Basic Immigration Law 2021: Business, Family, Naturalization and Related Areas

2/5/21-2/6/21 2021 New York Asylum & Immigration Conference

2/5/21 Asylum, Special Immigrant Juvenile Status, Crime Victim, and Other Immigration Relief 2021

2/5/21 Addressing Domestic Violence 2021: Remote Family and Immigration Law Practice During Pandemic or Disaster

2/9/21 What Every Lawyer Should Know About U.S. Immigration Law

2/10/21 Public Charge Emerging Issues

2/10/21 All About DOJ Recognition and Accreditation

2/16/21 DACA: Updates and Changes to the Program

2/25/21-4/8/21 Introduction to Family-Based Immigration Law

3/2/21 SIJS-based Adjustment of Status before EOIR

3/4/21 TPS Updates

3/12/21 Strategies and Tactics for Successful Immigration Appeals

3/16/21 Representing Immigrants in Family Court

3/23/21 Understanding the Conditional Permanent Residence Petition (Form I-751)

3/30/21 Public Charge and the Affidavit of Support

4/15/21 DACA

4/20/21 Hot Topics in Naturalization Adjudications

4/21/21 Working with Domestic Violence Immigrant Survivors: The Intersection of Basic Family Law, Immigration, Benefits, and Housing Issues in California 2021

4/28/21 Community Defense: Legal Service Partnerships with Organizers

5/4/21 Public Charge: Current State of Play

5/6/21 Hot Topics in Asylum Law

5/13/21 Marijuana and Immigrants

5/18/21 Ethics in Representing Family Members in U Visa, U AOS/929, and VAWA Cases

5/26/21 Hot Topics in Removal Defense

6/1/21 VAWA Adjustment of Status Fundamentals

6/9/21 Hot topics: Adjudication and Enforcement Trends

6/10/21 Public Charge and Hot Topics in Consular Processing

6/15/21 U Visa Hot Topics

6/22/21 Defending Immigration Removal Proceedings 2021

6/30/21 Immigration Update – June 2021

ImmProf

Monday, January 11, 2021

Why Immigrants With Strong Ties to the US Should Be Allowed to Stay by Emma Winger

Daniel Black: The Capitol attack was White supremacy, plain and simple

Supreme Court VGRs Another Expedited Removal Case

Biden’s law enforcement priorities on Border Criminologies

Trump’s “victory tour” headed to U.S./Mexico Border this Week

Sunday, January 10, 2021

Now Streaming: Coyote

Saturday, January 9, 2021

Biden’s AG will be Merrick Garland

Supreme Court to Review Adjustment of Status/TPS Case

FEDERAL JUDGE BLOCKS TRUMP ADMINISTRATION’S “DEATH TO ASYLUM” RULE

Immigration Article of the Day: Deconstructing Invisible Walls: Sotomayor’s Dissents in Era of Immigration Exceptionalism by Karla Mari McKanders

Friday, January 8, 2021

Immigration Article of the Day: Entry Denied: COVID-19, Race, Migration, and Global Health by Matiangaly V. S. Sirleaf

President Withdraws Nomination of Chad Wolf for DHS Secretary

Thursday, January 7, 2021

AALS 2021: New Voices in Immigration Law

On the unprecedented events at the U.S. Capitol

Case preview: Justices will confront statutory puzzle on bond eligibility for noncitizens contesting deportation — Might Chevron deference be reconsidered?

A White Supremacist Insurrection? “Trump’s white supremacist insurrection overtakes the Capitol”

Columbia Law Honors Hong Yen Chang

Wednesday, January 6, 2021

Job Announcement: Rutgers Immigrant Rights Clinic seeks Staff Attorney or Senior Staff Attorney

New America National Fellowships

Podcast: Undocumented Momhood

“Remain in Mexico” Harms Children, Families Two Years into Program, Thousands Face Violence, Trauma, Uncertainty

Tuesday, January 5, 2021

Why Are We Talking About Denying Vaccines to Undocumented Meatpackers in NE?

Guest Post Nancy Morawetz: The Solicitor General’s Extraordinary Push to Place Even More Immigration Cases on the Supreme Court Docket

At the Movies in the Age of Coronavirus: Moonstruck (1987)

Virtual Book Launch: You Are Not American: Citizenship Stripping from Dred Scott to the Dreamers by Amanda Frost

Nolan Rappaport: Could we learn from how Canada manages its foreign workers?

From the Bookshelves: Immigrant California: Understanding the Past, Present, and Future of U.S. Policy. Edited by David Scott FitzGerald and John D. Skrentny

Monday, January 4, 2021

Immigrant of the Day: Judge David Bernhard

Administrative Law Review Podcast: Racism in Immigration Law

Position Opening: President and CEO, Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights

Immigration Article of the Day: Labor Unions and Undocumented Immigrants by Els de Graauw and Shannon Gleeson

Immigration Article of the Day: Asylum Under Attack: Is It Time for A Constitutional Right? by Stephen Meili

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

Thanks, Elizabeth!😎

I sure hope that Judge Garland and Secretary-Designate Mayorkas are paying close attention!

Because unless they take some immediate forceful action to disable the “regime’s immigration kakistocracy” and make the radical bureaucratic changes necessary to regain control, their “dream jobs” are going to turn into “Nightmare on Elm Street” overnight!

Human rights are being violated and taxpayer funds (in an already “over budget” USG) are being poured down the toilet 🚽 by the minute by the out of control, maliciously incompetent kakistocrats at EOIR, DHS, and in the SG’s Office to name just a few of the most obvious “national disgraces” that need an immediate fix!

The defeated anti-American, neo-Nazi regime was “not normal” and neither Garland nor Mayorkas can afford to treat the wreckage of democracy and human decency and those who did the regime’s bidding at DOJ and DHS as “acceptable” for another minute!

🇺🇸⚖️🗽Due Process Forever! Kakistocracy ☠️🤮 Never!

PWS

01-13-21

☠️FASCISM: GOP PARTY OF TREASON, TRAITOR TRUMP BRING “KRISTALLNACHT” TO CAPITOL IN OVERT ACT OF NEO-NAZISM — Listen To Arnold “The Terminator” On How This Is, In Fact, “Nazism In Action” Led By Traitor Prez, Promoted By Cruz, Hawley, & McCarthy, & Endorsed By GOP Silence, Denial, Equivocation, & Cowardly Butt Covering In The Face Of Terrorist🥷🏻🏴‍☠️☠️ Anti-American Insurrection! — This Attack On Democracy Was Aided & Abetted By Spineless GOP Supremes Unwilling To Stand Up For Our Constitution & Humanity In The Face Of Clear Tyranny & The Groundwork For Subversion!

Watch here on YouTube, courtesy of The Guardian:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/10/capitol-riot-schwarzenegger-rebukes-trump-kristallnacht?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

https://youtu.be/x_P-0I6sAck

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

How do you I know your country is in “deep dodo?” When Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jessie Ventura become the “voices of reason” and the “President” and his party are the “voices of treason.”

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwil59_mnJTuAhUswlkKHQJrBpAQglR6BAgCEAc&url=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitter.com%2FGovJVentura%2Fstatus%2F1346932652931219457%3Fref_src%3Dtwsrc%255Egoogle%257Ctwcamp%255Eserp%257Ctwgr%255Etweet&usg=AOvVaw1kp-sHirIW5ahJwlV_VMkm

It’s likely that the movement to hold accountable and remove from Congress traitors like Cruz, Hawley, McCarthy, and the other Republicans who shamelessly and seditiously continued to support the anti-American lies, racist false narratives, and conspiracy theories that fueled Trump’s insurrection and domestic terrorism will die out over time. But, it shouldn’t!

As I write this, the GOP treasonists in the House are blocking what should be a unanimous resolution to invoke the 25th Amendment to remove this dangerous, unhinged, traitor/moron from the office he has abused and disgraced from Day One!

One reason why our democracy is on the ropes is that there hasn’t been any accountability whatsoever for Trump and his kakistocracy of thugs on the public payroll or for the GOP White Nationalist traitors and enablers in Congress who have furthered their grotesque abuses of humanity and our democratic institutions.

The lack of accountability is particularly glaring and disgusting for Trump’s lawyers, both in and out of Government, who have lied, misrepresented, and totally jettisoned ethics and “due diligence” in supporting and furthering Trump’s attacks on our democracy. Why is Rudy Giuliani, who led a coast to coast “conspiracy of lies and treason” in Federal and State Courts, before calling for armed rebellion against our Government, still walking free and “practicing” law? Why are Billy Barr, Gonzo Sessions, Don McGhan, Noel Francisco, and a host of others who lied, misrepresented, and abused their ethical obligations as well as their oaths of office happily ensconced in the private sector rather than being held accountable for their “crimes against humanity?”

Contrary to all the total BS 💩being spread by GOP Trump toadies, the unconstitutional, racist, illegal, violent, anti-democracy agenda of Trump, Miller, and the rest of of the Thugocracy/Kakistocracy was apparent from the “git go.”

And, Chief Justice Roberts and the other GOP Justices who helped roll out and encourage “Kristallnacht” by rubber-stamping the “Muslim ban,” “Let ‘Em Die In Mexico,” the “Bogus Wall of Misappropriated Funds,” stripping legal migrants of life-saving and health preserving benefits, helping fuel a DHS “reign of terror” directed at ethnic communities, and other neo-Nazi travesties should also tender their resignations to President Biden as of Jan 21, 2021! Intellectual dishonesty by judges and bad, righty biased (non)jurisprudence have real life consequences!

Trump and Miller told the Supremes precisely what their invidious racist, religiously biased, politically pandering intent was in all of these cases and the GOP Justices ignored it in favor of bogus, fabricated, right wing, authoritarian, racist driven, anti-democracy agendas thinly camouflaged by legal gobbledygook.

People die and lives are ruined forever when judges who are supposed to protect them instead “take a dive” for the forces of tyranny and cruelty! “Dred Scottification” (“dehumanization”) of Blacks, Latinos, Immigrants, and other People of Color by our highest Court is neither acceptable nor should it be “swept under the rug” as has happened all too often when the Supremes fail democracy and align themselves with anti-democracy racists and authoritarians.

For four years, the GOP Justices on the Supremes have treated due process, democratic institutions, and the lives of asylum seekers and other migrants (and to some extent their pro bono lawyers) as “jokes.” That’s because 1) neither they nor their families are rotting in Mexico or facing torture and death in El Salvador or some other failed state; and 2) this time, the right wing thugs they enable were across the street trashing our Capitol rather than storming the Supremes. Better Justices and Better Federal Judges for a Better America!

🇺🇸🗽⚖️👍🏼Due Process Forever!

Best

PWS

01-11-21

🏴‍☠️HISTORY & THE GOP PARTY OF TREASON — “The lie outlasts the liar.” — Historian Professor Timothy Snyder On Why The GOP Is, & Will Remain, A Repudiation Of & An Existential Threat To Truth & Our Democracy!

Timothy Snyder (Professor für Geschichte, Yale University), Foto: www.stephan-roehl.de — Timothy Snyder (Professor of History, Yale University), Photo: www.stephan-roehl.de
Creative Commons License

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/09/magazine/trump-coup.html?referringSource=articleShare

From The NY Times:
. . . . .

The lie outlasts the liar.

The idea that Germany lost the First World War in 1918 because of a Jewish “stab in the back” was 15 years old when Hitler came to power. How will Trump’s myth of victimhood function in American life 15 years from now? And to whose benefit?

On Jan. 7, Trump called for a peaceful transition of power, implicitly conceding that his putsch had failed. Even then, though, he repeated and even amplified his electoral fiction: It was now a sacred cause for which people had sacrificed. Trump’s imagined stab in the back will live on chiefly thanks to its endorsement by members of Congress. In November and December 2020, Republicans repeated it, giving it a life it would not otherwise have had. In retrospect, it now seems as though the last shaky compromise between the gamers and the breakers was the idea that Trump should have every chance to prove that wrong had been done to him. That position implicitly endorsed the big lie for Trump supporters who were inclined to believe it. It failed to restrain Trump, whose big lie only grew bigger.

The breakers and the gamers then saw a different world ahead, where the big lie was either a treasure to be had or a danger to be avoided. The breakers had no choice but to rush to be first to claim to believe in it. Because the breakers Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz must compete to claim the brimstone and bile, the gamers were forced to reveal their own hand, and the division within the Republican coalition became visible on Jan. 6. The invasion of the Capitol only reinforced this division. To be sure, a few senators withdrew their objections, but Cruz and Hawley moved forward anyway, along with six other senators. More than 100 representatives doubled down on the big lie. Some, like Matt Gaetz, even added their own flourishes, such as the claim that the mob was led not by Trump’s supporters but by his opponents.

Trump is, for now, the martyr in chief, the high priest of the big lie. He is the leader of the breakers, at least in the minds of his supporters. By now, the gamers do not want Trump around. Discredited in his last weeks, he is useless; shorn of the obligations of the presidency, he will become embarrassing again, much as he was in 2015. Unable to provide cover for their gamesmanship, he will be irrelevant to their daily purposes. But the breakers have an even stronger reason to see Trump disappear: It is impossible to inherit from someone who is still around. Seizing Trump’s big lie might appear to be a gesture of support. In fact it expresses a wish for his political death. Transforming the myth from one about Trump to one about the nation will be easier when he is out of the way.

As Cruz and Hawley may learn, to tell the big lie is to be owned by it. Just because you have sold your soul does not mean that you have driven a hard bargain. Hawley shies from no level of hypocrisy; the son of a banker, educated at Stanford University and Yale Law School, he denounces elites. Insofar as Cruz was thought to have a principle, it was that of states’ rights, which Trump’s calls to action brazenly violated. A joint statement Cruz issued about the senators’ challenge to the vote nicely captured the post-truth aspect of the whole: It never alleged that there was fraud, only that there were allegations of fraud. Allegations of allegations, allegations all the way down.

Image

The big lie requires commitment. When Republican gamers do not exhibit enough of that, Republican breakers call them “RINOs”: Republicans in name only. This term once suggested a lack of ideological commitment. It now means an unwillingness to throw away an election. The gamers, in response, close ranks around the Constitution and speak of principles and traditions. The breakers must all know (with the possible exception of the Alabama senator Tommy Tuberville) that they are participating in a sham, but they will have an audience of tens of millions who do not.

If Trump remains present in American political life, he will surely repeat his big lie incessantly. Hawley and Cruz and the other breakers share responsibility for where this leads. Cruz and Hawley seem to be running for president. Yet what does it mean to be a candidate for office and denounce voting? If you claim that the other side has cheated, and your supporters believe you, they will expect you to cheat yourself. By defending Trump’s big lie on Jan. 6, they set a precedent: A Republican presidential candidate who loses an election should be appointed anyway by Congress. Republicans in the future, at least breaker candidates for president, will presumably have a Plan A, to win and win, and a Plan B, to lose and win. No fraud is necessary; only allegations that there are allegations of fraud. Truth is to be replaced by spectacle, facts by faith.

Trump’s coup attempt of 2020-21, like other failed coup attempts, is a warning for those who care about the rule of law and a lesson for those who do not. His pre-fascism revealed a possibility for American politics. For a coup to work in 2024, the breakers will require something that Trump never quite had: an angry minority, organized for nationwide violence, ready to add intimidation to an election. Four years of amplifying a big lie just might get them this. To claim that the other side stole an election is to promise to steal one yourself. It is also to claim that the other side deserves to be punished.

Informed observers inside and outside government agree that right-wing white supremacism is the greatest terrorist threat to the United States. Gun sales in 2020 hit an astonishing high. History shows that political violence follows when prominent leaders of major political parties openly embrace paranoia.

Our big lie is typically American, wrapped in our odd electoral system, depending upon our particular traditions of racism. Yet our big lie is also structurally fascist, with its extreme mendacity, its conspiratorial thinking, its reversal of perpetrators and victims and its implication that the world is divided into us and them. To keep it going for four years courts terrorism and assassination.

When that violence comes, the breakers will have to react. If they embrace it, they become the fascist faction. The Republican Party will be divided, at least for a time. One can of course imagine a dismal reunification: A breaker candidate loses a narrow presidential election in November 2024 and cries fraud, the Republicans win both houses of Congress and rioters in the street, educated by four years of the big lie, demand what they see as justice. Would the gamers stand on principle if those were the circumstances of Jan. 6, 2025?

To be sure, this moment is also a chance. It is possible that a divided Republican Party might better serve American democracy; that the gamers, separated from the breakers, might start to think of policy as a way to win elections. It is very likely that the Biden-Harris administration will have an easier first few months than expected; perhaps obstructionism will give way, at least among a few Republicans and for a short time, to a moment of self-questioning. Politicians who want Trumpism to end have a simple way forward: Tell the truth about the election.

America will not survive the big lie just because a liar is separated from power. It will need a thoughtful repluralization of media and a commitment to facts as a public good. The racism structured into every aspect of the coup attempt is a call to heed our own history. Serious attention to the past helps us to see risks but also suggests future possibility. We cannot be a democratic republic if we tell lies about race, big or small. We cannot be a democratic republic if we tell lies about race, big or small. Democracy is not about minimizing the vote nor ignoring it, neither a matter of gaming nor of breaking a system, but of accepting the equality of others, heeding their voices and counting their votes.

Timothy Snyder is the Levin professor of history at Yale University and the author of histories of political atrocity including “Bloodlands” and “Black Earth,” as well as the book “On Tyranny,” on America’s turn toward authoritarianism. His most recent book is “Our Malady,” a memoir of his own near-fatal illness reflecting on the relationship between health and freedom. Ashley Gilbertson is an Australian photojournalist with the VII Photo Agency living in New York. Gilbertson has covered migration and conflict internationally for over 20 years.

**********

Read Professor Snyder’s entire, rather lengthy, analysis at the link.

Democracy is under attack from one of our two major parties. It will take a concerted effort, determination, and courage by the majority of us to preserve our nation in the face of GOP led and enabled treason and insurrection that is fueled by their web of lies, racism, selfishness, and false narratives,

Tour the Holocaust Museum for a glimpse of the future of our nation if the GOP prevails!

Also, remember that as all the GOP-induced distracting disorder of this week roil Washington, 4,000 plus Americans a day, disproportionately African Americans and Latinos, continue to die, many unnecessarily, as a result of the “malicious incompetence,” false narratives, and anti-science, anti-American lies actively promoted and endorsed by Trump and his GOP party of treason!

Professor Snyder’s last sentence encapsulates my own view of what 21st Century American Democracy should look and act like:

We cannot be a democratic republic if we tell lies about race, big or small. Democracy is not about minimizing the vote nor ignoring it, neither a matter of gaming nor of breaking a system, but of accepting the equality of others, heeding their voices and counting their votes.

I still hear GOP politicos falsely claim that “nobody could see this coming.” What total unadulterated BS! 💩 Trump planned and instigated this insurrection of thugs in public, even while his goons Cruz, Hawley, and McCarthy were actively promoting it in Congress and Moscow Mitch was more or less “in his shell” looking the other way. Many of us have been “calling out” GOP fascism for the last four years. A party that thrives on lies can’t survive truth!

🇺🇸🗽⚖️Due Process Forever! The GOP 🥷🏻⚰️☠️Never!

PWS

01-11-21

🤮NO PEACE ON EARTH GOODWILL TOWARD MEN (WOMEN, OR ESPECIALLY CHILDREN) FROM REGIME OF “BAD SANTAS” 🦹🏿‍♂️🎅🏻— Illegally Separated Families Continue To Suffer Irreparable Trauma, 😰 Volunteer Groups 😇🗽⚖️ Left To Pick Up Pieces — A Reminder That Defeated Regime Has Mocked, Disparaged, & Trashed Christ’s Values & Assaulted Humanity Over Four Christmases!🏴‍☠️🤮☠️⚰️👎🏻

Jacob Soboroff reports for NBC News:

Inside the effort to provide mental health care to migrant families

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COPIED

Seneca Family of Agencies provides mental health care to migrant families separated by the Trump administration. NBC News’ Jacob Soboroff reports on the obstacles faced by the nonprofit in locating families.

Dec. 22, 2020

Watch Jacob’s report here.

https://www.nbcnews.com/nightly-news/video/inside-the-effort-to-provide-mental-health-care-to-migrant-families-98295877800

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

Jacob and his terrific NBC News colleague Julia Edwards Ainsley have been at the forefront of exposing the irreparable human carnage and lasting trauma caused by the regime’s unlawful, racist, White Nationalist immigration policies (some of which were unconscionably “greenlighted” by an immoral and irresponsible Supremes GOP majority that views themselves and their rotten to the core, inhumane, right-wing ideology as above the needless human suffering they further and encourage).

The “perps” like,”Gonzo” Sessions, Grauleiter Miller, Kirstjen Nielsen, “Big Mac With Lies” McAleenan, Noel Francisco, Rod Rosenstein, et al, walk free while the victims continue to suffer and others, like the Christ-like folks at Seneca Family of Agencies, are left to pick up the pieces! How is this “justice?”

Our national policies have truly abandoned Christ’s values of self-sacrifice, mercy, generosity in spirit and deed, courage in the face of oppression, human compassion, justice, and assistance for the most vulnerable among us under the perverted and immoral “leadership” of a man and his party without humane values or respect for truth who stand for absolutely nothing that is decent in the world.

As Americans suffer and die from the pandemic he mocked, downplayed, and mishandled; unemployed Americans are dissed and shortchanged by his party of underachieving, out of touch fat cats, liars, cowards, and truth deniers; asylum seekers needlessly suffer in squalid camps in Mexico; refugees scorned, unlawfully and immorally abandoned and abused by the world’s richest country face persecution, torture, despair, and death; and non-criminals rot in DHS’s “New American Gulag,” the immoral Grifter-in-Chief lives it up at taxpayer expense for one last Christmas at his Florida resort; fumes about a fair and square election that he lost big time; savors a rash of holiday executions; delays bipartisan COVID relief; ferments treason against our republic; and pardons a wide range of scumbags, felons, war criminals, family members, cronies, fraudsters, and other totally undeserving characters.

But, there is hope for our world at Christmas: 27 days and counting to the end of the kakistocracy, expulsion of the unqualified con-man and his motley crew of criminals and cronies, and the ascension of a real President and Vice President, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, to lead us, and perhaps our world, out of the current mess to a kinder, brighter future. That might be the best present of all this Christmas.

Due Process Forever!⚖️🗽👍🏼

PWS🎅🏻🎄😎

12-24-20

Thanks, Craig, for your “practical activism and scholarship!”

🇺🇸 Happy Labor Day, & Due Process Forever!

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Dana Milbank @ WashPost:

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Craig Mousin

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Tal Kopan @ SF Chron reports on latest public miscue:

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By Paul Wickham Schmidt

Courtside Exclusive

Jan. 9, 2022

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From NAIJ President Judge Mimi Tsankov:

Also, great coverage by Alexandra Villarreal and Joanna Walters from The Guardian:

Victory for US immigration judges as Biden administration recognizes union

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👍🏼🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

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FULL DISCLOSURE: I am a retired member of the NAIJ.

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Hon. “Sir Jeffrey” Chase reports to the Round Table:

🇺🇸🇺🇸⚖️🗽Due Process Forever!

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