"The Voice of the New Due Process Army" ————– Musings on Events in U.S. Immigration Court, Immigration Law, Sports, and Other Random Topics by Retired United States Immigration Judge (Arlington, Virginia) and former Chairman of the Board of Immigration Appeals Paul Wickham Schmidt. To see my complete professional bio, just click on the link below.
“In sum, the BIA erred in finding that Chicas-Machado was not a refugee under the INA due to a lack of nexus to a protected ground, religion. Chicas-Machado demonstrated past persecution on account of religion, and is therefore entitled to the presumption of a well-founded fear of future persecution. See Qiao Hua Li, 405 F.3d at 176-77. Recognizing the BIA’s error, we grant the petition for review and remand the case for further proceedings. Upon remand, the BIA must determine whether the Government can rebut the presumption of a well-founded fear of future persecution. 8 If the BIA concludes that Chicas-Machado is eligible for asylum on remand, it should reconsider her withholding of removal claim. See Sorto-Guzman, 42 F.4th at 450. We decline to reach all other issues raised on appeal as to her asylum and withholding of removal claims, and direct the BIA to reevaluate those claims following its reconsideration of Chicas-Machado’s asylum application. See Arita-Deras v. Wilkinson, 990 F.3d 350, 361 n.10 (4th Cir. 2021) (declining to reach the merits of withholding of removal appeal after finding error in the BIA’s asylum analysis).”
“This petition raises important questions about proper notice in removal proceedings. Federal immigration law mandates that the government provide a noncitizen with a written notice to appear that contains certain critical details about her removal hearing, including the “time and place” of the proceedings. In a pair of recent decisions, the Supreme Court has clarified that the notice to appear must be a single document containing all statutorily required information. See Niz-Chavez v. Garland, 141 S. Ct. 1474 (2021); Pereira v. Sessions, 138 S. Ct. 2105 (2018). Petitioners Azucena Aracely Lazo-Gavidia and her minor son were ordered removed in absentia. The immigration judge denied their motion to reopen the removal proceedings and the Board of Immigration Appeals dismissed their appeal. Because Lazo-Gavidia and her son received defective notices to appear, we grant their petition, vacate the Board’s order dismissing their appeal, and remand for further proceedings.”
[Hats off to Glenn Fogle! Listen to the oral argument here.]
“Because an offender can be convicted under Nebraska’s shoplifting statute when he acts with an intent not encompassed by a generic theft offense, we hold that the statute sweeps more broadly than the generic federal offense. Accordingly, the BIA erred in finding that Thok was removable for having committed a theft offense—and, thus, an aggravated felony—based upon his Nebraska shoplifting convictions. … For the foregoing reasons, we grant the petition for review, vacate the BIA’s order, and remand the matter to the BIA for further proceedings consistent with this decision.”
“Mercy Naah, a native of Cameroon, was charged as removable from the United States. She applied for asylum, withholding of removal, and protection under the Convention Against Torture. Naah demonstrated that she is unable or unwilling to return to Cameroon because of past persecution on account of her political opinion. Accordingly, we grant her petition for review as to her asylum and withholding of removal claims and remand for proceedings consistent with this opinion.”
Hon. “Sir Jeffrey” Chase reports for the Round Table 🛡️⚔️:
5. Experts
Unpublished 1st Cir. Victory [Experts]
[T]o keep it brief, we were on the winning side in an unpublished 1st Cir. decision issued today in which the IJ and BIA wrongly gave little weight to an country expert’s opinion on the risk petitioner faced in a CAT case. Decision attached. The Round Table filed an amicus brief in this one. Another great win for SangYeob Kim, Gilles Bissonnette and the ACLU of New Hampshire!
More to follow. We continue to make a difference!
Best, Jeff
I have just learned that counsel is filing a motion to publish. There is good language regarding the evidentiary weight of one qualified as an expert who testifies credibly. The decision points out that an expert need not have personal knowledge of the facts underlying their opinion, as long as such opinion is based on sufficient facts or data;” that “An expert cannot be “undermined by his reliance on facts . . . that have not been disputed;” and that where an IJ makes factual findings not consistent with the expert’s opinion, it is important for the IJ to explain the reasons behind those findings.
Why do Dems routinely shoot themselves in the foot on immigration while driving a wedge between Dems in power and the immigration/social justice advocates who helped them get there?
In each of the 4th Circuit cases here, our Dem AG aligned himself with restrictionist positions advocated by dissenting Bush II and Trump appointees, while eschewing the far better-reasoned, more practical approaches advocated by expert advocates and adopted by the jurists in the majority who are committed to due process.
As the 4th Circuit majority in Chicas-Machado cogently points out, the BIA’s “excessively narrow reading” of nexus conflicts with both the statutory language and practical considerations regarding the motivation of persecutors (not to mention riding roughshod over existing, binding Circuit precedent). The BIA has a long and troubling history of ignoring “mixed motive” to deny asylum.
Yet, instead of improving under Dems, the BIA’s abuse of nexus to wrongfully disqualify qualified refugees from protection has continued to metastasize under Garland! It’s all part of the anti-immigrant, “any reason to deny” culture at EOIR, promoted by Sessions and Barr and not effectively addressed by Garland.
Happy to see another Round Table victory on use of experts. But, the 1st Circuit should have published this instructive decision. Hopefully, they now will!
As we know, the BIA’s systemic mishandling of experts is a chronic problem, particularly as the BIA intentionally overcomplicates the law, as a “deterrent,” so experts are almost a requirement for success. (Even though it is well-known that many asylum applicants have difficulty just getting competent pro bono lawyers to represent them, let alone the services of “pro bono experts.”). Every example helps expose the BIA’s professional misconduct, for which Garland and his DOJ leadership have shown an unusual and disturbing tolerance.
If you don’t bring an expert, they deny for failure to sustain your B/P! If you do bring an expert, they minimize, misconstrue, or ignore their testimony!
“Catch 22” — the applicant loses either way!
Experts are also important because it’s an area where the Article IIIs’ experience with experts in civil litigation far exceeds the BIA’s. Therefore, they are apt to recognize the BIA’s sharp divergence from the weight and respect ordinarily given to experts in civil litigation. Hence, we have had substantial success with the Circuits in challenging the BIA’s continuing, inappropriately dismissive, treatment of experts.
The BIA routinely uses sloppy, often internally inconsistent, “boilerplate” in their decisions. Yet, they somehow find time to “nitpick” expert testimony looking for every minor or insignificant “omission” or “discrepancy” to discredit the expert! What a disgrace!
Finally, on Naah v. Garland, a special “shout out” to long-time NDPA stalwart and role model Danielle Beach-Oswald on her victory in a Cameroonian political persecution case in the 5th Circuit. As the decision reflects, asylum victories on non-procedural issues are hard to come by in the 5th. Danielle was a “Legacy Arlington Immigration Court regular” during my time on the bench. This just further cements her status as “one of the best in the business!”
Congrats, Danielle, and thanks for all you do!
Think how much better this system would function with a BIA of real subject-matter experts focused on due process and fundamental fairness — rather than helping out their “partners” at DHS enforcement and protecting their careers in the process! And, what if we also had a Dem AG focused on due process for immigrants in “his” courts, rather than being asleep at the switch and complicit in some of the worst, anti immigrant, biased, backlog building “jurisprudence” rolled out by the Federal “justice” system!
What if once in office, Dems actually courageously stood up for the immigrants, advocates, and values they claim to represent during elections?
Professor Erin Barbato Director, Immigrant Justice Clinic UW Law Photo source: UW Law
Good morning Judge Schmidt,
I hope this email finds you well. It is already getting chilly in Wisconsin but fall is one of my favorite seasons here. In case you are interested, this is a little piece that Newsy put together about a lovely family and Ngwa, an asylum seeker from Cameroon, who became part of their family. How a Cameroonian Immigrant Was Granted Asylum in the U.S. (VIDEO) (newsy.com) I do believe there are other families like this across the country willing to welcome people. The political use of humans seeking refuge is horrifying these days.
Thank you for all you do! I appreciate you.
Erin M. Barbato
Director Immigrant Justice Clinic
University of Wisconsin Law School
975 Bascom Mall
Madison, WI 53706
(608)262-2276
She/Her/Hers
The University of Wisconsin-Madison is built on the ancestral land of the Ho-Chunk Nation. In an 1832 treaty, the Ho-Chunk were forced to cede this territory. We respect the inherent sovereignty of the Ho-Chunk Nation, along with the eleven other First Nations of Wisconsin.
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View the video at the above link! Thanks, Erin, my friend for sending this in and for all that your and your wonderful students do for humanity and for Due Process in America! Many thanks to the Swandbys and other great American families for standing by refugees in need and being role models for the best in America at a time when so many of our politicians and their followers are “modeling bad behavior and lack of fundamental values!”
It’s always good to keep in mind that many Americans do have sound values and welcome asylum seekers and other immigrants, rather than using their situation to engineer political farces at the expense of vulnerable humans who have come here seeing legal refuge and are allowed to be in the US while pursuing their claims. As I have pointed out many times, any government official truly interested in addressing migration issues would prioritize spending money for 1) representation of asylum seekers, 2) orderly relocation to places where support systems are available and asylum claims are more likely to be fairly an timely adjudicated. But, that would take a thoughtful, cooperative, governing for the common good approach rather than wasteful political stunts.
Voters in both Florida and Texas will have a chance to remove their “stuntmen” in November. Unfortunately, however, it’s not clear that will happen.
We also shouldn’t let the Biden administration “off the hook” for: 1) failing to put in place a reasonable program for resettling asylum seekers away from stressed border communities; 2) the abject failure of the Immigration Court’s asylum adjudication process which is driving much of the haphazard response to legal asylum seekers; 3) the failure to achieve meaningful reforms, training, and appropriate staffing of the USCIS Asylum Offices (even assuming that the “new asylum regulations” were the answer, the implementation has been inexcusable, inept, and ineffective, just as many experts predicted); 4) the gross failure to establish a robust, generous, realistic refugee admission system for the Western Hemisphere to process refugees for admission before they are forced to come to our borders; and 5) their overall failure of leadership on refugee and asylum issues in both the national and international arenas.
“Elvis Njenula Yahm, a citizen of Cameroon facing removal, sought asylum, withholding of removal, and relief under the Convention Against Torture (CAT) based on his pro-Anglophone political opinion. An immigration judge denied all three avenues for relief, and the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) dismissed Yahm’s appeal. … A recent decision supports Yahm’s view that an adverse credibility finding does not relieve the agency of its obligation to also consider documentary support for a CAT claim. See Arulnanthy v. Garland, 17 F.4th 586 (5th Cir. 2021). … Because Yahm offered nontestimonial evidence of country conditions in Cameroon, the BIA erred by not considering it in the context of his CAT claim and instead treating Yahm’s lack of credibility as dispositive. See Arulnanthy, 17 F.4th at 598. Yahm’s petition for review is GRANTED and these proceedings are REMANDED for the BIA to address the CAT claim consistent with Arulnanthy.”
Way to go, Keith! Congrats! Winning justice for asylum seekers in the 5th Circuit is no mean feat!
The 5th Circuit decision in Arulnanthy sounds very much like the 4th Circuit’s decision in Camara v. Ashcroft, 378 F. 3d 361 (4th Cir. 2004). Camara actually changed for the better the preparation, presentation, and most of all results in asylum cases in the 4th Circuit.
I consider it the “precursor” to the REAL ID provision now incorporated in the INA requiring IJ’s and the BIA to consider the “the totality of the circumstances, and all relevant factors,” in making credibility determinations. If that is actually done, which it isn’t in far too many cases in today’s broken Immigration Courts, the results are likely to be far more positive for asylum seekers and other respondents seeking relief in Immigration Court.
The “Camara effect” was real. For example, in 2004, on the “eve of Camara,” the asylum denial rate at the Arlington Immigration Court, where I sat, in the 4th Circuit, was in excess of 70%. By the time I retired in 2016, it was the polar opposite. The asylum grant rate exceeded 70%! SOURCE: TRAC Immigration.
Of course, no one factor is responsible for that positive change. And, I acknowledge that in the Charlotte Immigration Court, also in the 4th Circuit, where several judges were reknowned for their hard-core anti-asylum attitudes, the denial rates remained disturbingly above the national average. And, of course, the “institutionalized anti-asylum bias” ushered in and promoted at EOIR by the Trump regime resulted in another dramatic, totally unjustified, downturn in asylum grants by EOIR across America after 2016.
Nevertheless, positive appellate guidance on asylum is a major factor in establishing and maintaining due process in the Immigration Courts. Unfortunately, almost none of that expert positive guidance on asylum and other forms of relief comes from Garland’s BIA precedents. Additionally, although some of his appointments have been welcome, overall, Garland has done a very poor job of bringing in dynamic progressive expert leaders and judges to reverse the anti-asylum, anti-due-process, anti-immigrant “culture” that continues to haunt EOIR at all levels.
The “results” of his dysfunctional courts speak for themselves. Backlogs build, Circuit Courts struggle with EOIR’s poor “haste makes waste” work product, and decisional consistency on asylum is shockingly, “tragicomically” lacking!
In almost all ways, this system has seriously regressed in the past decade, even while eating up more resources! That’s about as much of an “engineered lose-lose” as one can imagine! Yet, Biden, Harris, and Garland appear impervious to this glaring, “fixable” problem that threatens our entire justice system!
Shouldn’t racial justice advocates be all over Garland, Monaco, Gupta, and Clarke for the EOIR’s disgraceful performance on asylum claims involving Cameroonians and other applicants of color! If not, why not? The entire “progressive social justice community” should be expressing “collective outrage” to the Biden Administration about the Garland DOJ’s disgraceful performance at EOIR and on other human rights issues involving race and immigration.
It’s also worthy noting, as my Round Table colleague retired Judge Jeffrey Chase has pointed out before, that the Biden Administration has granted TPS to Cameroonians in the U.S.So, there is really no issue about the truly miserable human rights conditions there. That is, apparently, except in Garland’s Immigration Courts where the “programmed to deny” and “good enough for government work” mentalities continue to prevail — even where the stakes are life or death!
Additionally, the regulations implementing the Convention Against Torture (“CAT”) at EOIR initially became effective on Mar. 22, 1999 — over two decades ago. I remember that at one of the next Immigration Judge Conferences, probably in 1999 or 2000, the training specifically instructed that because of the country-conditions related nature of CAT, adverse credibility rulings against a respondent were not determinative of CAT claims.
Yet, more than two decades later, Immigration Judges and, worse yet, the BIA are still making that same fundamental error! How does this make the idea that EOIR is an “expert court” or that “constitutional due process is being protected at EOIR” anything other than a “sick joke.” Yet, the mockery of justice continues and nobody at Justice, from the top down, is being held accountable for stomping on life-determining legal and Constitutional rights! Why?
What fun, sending Black Cameroonian refugees back to rape, torture, and possible death! We don’t need to know much asylum law or real country conditions here at EOIR. We make it up as we go along. And, Judge Garland just lets us keep on playing “refugee roulette,” our favorite game! https://www.flickr.com/photos/rasputin243/ Creative Commons License
Nearly all of the deported people interviewed had fled Cameroon between 2017 and 2020 for reasons linked to the crisis in the Anglophone regions. Human Rights Watch research indicates that many had credible asylum claims, but due process concerns, fact-finding inaccuracies, and other issues contributed to unfair asylum decisions. Lack of impartiality by US immigration judges – who are part of the executive branch, not the independent judiciary – appeared to play a role. Nearly all of the deported Cameroonians interviewed – 35 of 41 – were assigned to judges with asylum denial rates 10 to 30 percentage points higher than the national average.
. . . .
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The complete report gives a totally damning account of EOIR’s incompetence, ignorance of asylum law, poor decision making, “rigged” assignment of bad judges, and systemic bias directed against asylum seekers, primarily people of color. Although human rights conditions have continued to deteriorate in Cameroon, asylum grant rates have fluctuated dramatically depending on how the political winds at DOJ are blowing.
For example, judges denying asylum because of imaginary “improved conditions” in Cameroon falls within the realm of the absurd. No asylum expert would say that conditions have improved.
Yet, in a catastrophic ethical and legal failure, there is no BIA precedent “calling out” such grotesque errors and serving notice to the judges that it is unacceptable judicial conduct! There are hardly any recent BIA published precedents on granting asylum at all — prima facie evidence of the anti-asylum culture and institutional bias in favor of DHS Enforcement that Sessions and Barr actively cultivated and encouraged!
Even more outrageously, these same members of the “asylum deniers club” remain in their influential appellate positions under Garland! As inexplicable as it is inexcusable!
The HRF report details the wide range of dishonest devices used by EOIR to cut off valid asylum claims: bogus adverse credibility determinations; unreasonable corroboration requirements; claiming “no nexus” when the causal connection is obvious; failing to put the burden on the DHS in countrywide persecution involving the government or past persecution; bogus findings that the presence of relatives in the country negates persecution; ridiculous findings that severe harm doesn’t “rise to the level of persecution,” failure to listen to favorable evidence or rebuttal; ignoring the limitations on representation and inherent coercion involved in intentionally substandard and health threatening ICE detention, to name just some. While these corrupt methods of denying protection might be “business as usual” at EOIR “denial factories,” they have been condemned by human rights experts and many appellate courts. Yet Garland continues to act as if nothing were amiss in his “star chambers.”
This bench needs to be cleared of incompetence and anti-asylum bias and replaced with experts committed to due process and fair, impartial, and ethical applications of asylum principles. There was nothing stopping Sessions and Barr from “packing” the BIA and the trial courts with unqualified selections perceived to be willing and able to carry out their White Nationalist agenda! Likewise, there is nothing stopping Garland from “unpacking:” “cleaning house,” restoring competence, scholarly excellence, and “due process first” judging to his shattered system!
“It’s not rocket science, but ‘unpacking’ the Immigration Courts appears beyond Garland’s skill set!” “Unpacking” Photo by John Keogh Creative Commons License
All that’s missing are the will and the guts to get the job done! Perhaps that’s not unusual for yet another Dem Administration bumbling its way through immigration policy with no guiding principles, failing to connect the dots to racial justice, betraying promises to supporters, and leaving a trail of broken human lives and bodies of the innocent in its wake. But, it’s unacceptable! Totally!
To prevail on a motion to reopen alleging changed country conditions where the persecution claim was previously denied based on an adverse credibility finding in the underlying proceedings, the respondent must either overcome the prior determination or show that the new claim is independent of the evidence that was found to be not credible.
Just what this totally dysfunctional system needs: More ideas on how to deny asylum! The only question: Will Respondents lose every case in Volume 18? Don’t bet against it!
4th CIR. NABS BIA VIOLATING DUE PROCESS, AGAIN: Yes, Guys, Believe It Or Not You Should Allow the Respondent To Actually TESTIFY Before Sustaining An “Adverse Credibility” Finding! — Atemnkeng v. Barr – Plus, Bonus Mini-Essay: “When Will Life-Tenured Judges Stop Enabling The Arrogant Trashing Of Due Process By Our Authoritarian Regime?”
Atemnkeng v. Barr, 4th Cir. Jan. 24, 2020, published
PANEL: GREGORY, Chief Judge, WYNN, and THACKER, Circuit Judges.
OPINION BY: Chief Judge Gregory
KEY QUOTE:
Ngawung Atemnkeng, a citizen of Cameroon, fled her country after participating in
anti-government meetings and protests, getting arrested and was detained without trial several times, being tortured and beaten by government officers, and receiving numerous death threats. An immigration judge (“IJ”) initially noted some inconsistencies in Atemnkeng’s application, but nevertheless found her credible and her explanations plausible, and granted her asylum application. On appeal, the Board of Immigration Appeals (“BIA”) reversed the IJ’s determination and instructed the IJ, in reviewing the asylum application a second time, to afford Atemnkeng an opportunity to explain any inconsistencies.
On remand, Atemnkeng has now relocated to Baltimore and the new IJ (“Baltimore IJ”) permitted her to submit additional documents in support of her asylum application and scheduled a master calendar hearing. Approximately one month prior to the hearing, however, the Baltimore IJ issued a written ruling denying Atemnkeng’s applications for asylum and other reliefs. The Baltimore IJ concluded, without Atemnkeng’s new testimony, that she was not credible in light of inconsistencies in her story. On a second appeal to the BIA, the Baltimore IJ’s ruling was affirmed without an opinion. Atemnkeng now petitions for review of the BIA’s summary affirmance of the Baltimore IJ’s rulings.
In her petition for review, she raises several claims, most notably, that her due process rights were violated when the Baltimore IJ deprived her of an opportunity to testify on remand. Concluding that Atemnkeng’s claim related to her ability to testify is
meritorious, we grant the petition for review, vacate the BIA’s affirmance, and remand for 2
further proceedings. In light of our conclusion that the Baltimore IJ failed to give Atemnkeng an opportunity to testify and weigh the relevance of that testimony in conjunction with the entire record, we decline to address whether the adverse credibility determination and denials of Atemnkeng’s applications for withholding of removal and relief under the Convention Against Torture (“CAT”) were erroneous.
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When Will Life-Tenured Judges Stop Enabling The Arrogant Trashing Of Due Process By Our Authoritarian Regime?”
By Paul Wickham Schmidt
“Courtside” Exclusive
Jan. 1, 2020
Giving someone a chance to testify in person and explain apparent discrepancies, particularly when the case was for remanded for just that reason, seems like “Law 101.” It’s so elementary, I wouldn’t even include it on a final exam!
After all, simple logic, unclouded by a philosophy of treating migrants as a subclass whose legal rights judges often parrot but seldom enforce, would say that “Due Process is at its zenith” when human lives are at stake, as was the case here. It’s also required not only by the Constitution, but by BIA precedents like Matter of A-S-. So, how does this “go south” at EOIR?
Following precedents where it might help a respondent, be it a BIA or a Circuit precedent, seems to have become largely “optional” in the Immigration Courts these days, as I have previously observed. Instead, with constant encouragement from a White Nationalist, xenophobic regime, and lots of complicit judges at all levels, Due Process has largely been wiped out in Immigration Court.
Thank goodness this respondent, represented by long-time practitioner Ronald Richey (an Arlington Immigration Court regular” during my tenure), had the wherewithal to get to the Fourth Circuit and to draw a panel of judges interested in setting things right.
Think about what might have happened if she had landed in a complicit, largely “Decency Free Zone” like the Fifth or Eleventh Circuits, known for “going along to get along” with almost any abuse of migrants’ rights by the Government.
When are all Article III Judges going to start “connecting the dots” and asking why a supposedly “expert tribunal” whose one and only job should be to painstakingly insure that nobody is denied relief and removed from the United States, particularly to potential torture or death, without full Due Process and fundamental fairness is making fundamental mistakes in churning out removal orders.
Once upon a time, EOIR, the “home” of the Immigration Courts set out to use “teamwork and innovation to become the world’s best administrative tribunals, guaranteeing fairness and due process for all.”Not only has that “noble vision” been totally trashed, but the exact opposite has become institutionalized at EOIR: “Worst practices,” badly skewed pro-prosecutor hiring, inadequate professional training, lack of expertise, speed and expediency elevated over quality and care, intentional institutionalization of anti-immigrant, anti-asylum, pro-DHS bias, demeaning treatment of respondents and their lawyers, and the extermination of judicial independence and public accountability.
Today’s EOIR is truly a grim place, particularly for those whose lives are being destroyed by its substandard performance and also for the attorneys trying desperately to save them. Obviously, most Article IIIs have insulated themselves from the practical humanitarian disasters unfolding in Immigration Courts every day under their auspices.
What do they think happens to folks who can’t afford to be represented by Ronald Richey or one of his colleagues and whose access to pro bono counsel is intentionally hampered or impeded by EOIR? Think they have any chance whatsoever of a “fundamentally fair hearing” that complies with Due Process? Hearings for unrepresented individuals in detention are so grotesquely ridiculous that EOIR and DHS have gone to extreme lengths to impede public access so their abuses will take place in secret. Just ask my friendLaura Lynch over at AILA or my colleague Judge Ilyce Shugall of our Round Table what it’s like simply trying to get EOIR and DHS to comply with their own rules.
Listen folks, I helped formulate and implement the Refugee Act of 1980 as a Senior Executive in the “Legacy INS” during the Carter and Reagan Administrations. I even represented a few asylum applicants in private practice, something most Article III Judges and even many Immigraton Judges have never done. In 21 years on the “Immigration Bench” at both the trial and appellate levels, I personally listened to, read, or reviewed on appeal more asylum cases than any sitting Article III Judge of whom I’m aware.
The various parodies and travesties of justice in today’s Immigration Courts are eerily similar to, or in some cases the same, as I used to hear and read about in some of the third-world dictatorships, banana republics, and authoritarian tyrannies I dealt with on a regular basis. It’s simply infuriating, and beyond my understanding, that privileged, life-tenured, Article III Judges in our country, sworn to uphold our laws and Constitution, can continue to permit and so “glibly gloss over” these violations of law and gross perversions of human decency.
And, that goes right up to the Supremes’ intentional, disingenuous “tone deaf” approach to ignoring the real unconstitutional, invidious motives and fabrications behind the Administration’s original “Travel Ban.” All of the fatal legal defects were carefully documented and explained by various lower court judges trying conscientiously to uphold their oaths of office and “do the right thing.” Instead they were “dissed” by the Supremes and their hard work was ignored and denigrated. Fake, exaggerated, or “trumped up” “national security” pretexts for abusive treatment of “others” and political or religious opponents is a staple of persecuting regimes everywhere, as it now has become a judicially-enable staple of our current regime.
It’s long past time for the Article IIIs to wake up and put an end to the systemic nonsense that is literally killing people in our dysfunctional Immigration Court system. Is this the type of system to which you would entrust YOUR life, judges? If not, and I severely doubt that it is, why does it pass for “Due Process” for some of the most vulnerable among us? Think about it?
The panel granted in part a petition for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ decision affirming an immigration judge’s denial of asylum, withholding of removal, and protection under the Convention Against Torture to a citizen of Cameroon, and remanded.
The panel rejected petitioner’s contention that she was deprived of her due process right to a full and fair hearing based on the denial of her right to retained counsel and an unbiased fact finder. The panel held that the IJ in this case provided petitioner reasonable time to locate an attorney, where the IJ provided several continuances so she could do so, warned her repeatedly that he would not grant further continuances, and attempted to call her attorney when he failed to appear on the day of her merits hearing. The panel also held that although the IJ was rude and harsh with petitioner, petitioner failed to establish that the IJ’s conduct prejudiced her, where the IJ held a complete hearing and made a thorough decision that fully examined the underlying factual matters, and any potential prejudice caused by the IJ’s questionable adverse credibility determination was cured by the Board’s subsequent decision assuming the credibility of petitioner’s testimony in full.
The panel held that the Board committed three legal errors in its application of the firm resettlement bar, which precludes asylum relief if an applicant was firmly resettled in another country prior to arriving in the United States. First, the panel held that the Board erred by failing to consider whether the conditions of petitioner’s offer of resettlement in South Africa were too restricted for her to be firmly resettled. Second, the panel held that the Board erred by applying the firm resettlement rule not as a mandatory bar to petitioner’s asylum claim, but instead as a limitation on the evidence the Board considered in support of her claim for relief from removal to Cameroon, thus causing the Board to improperly ignore evidence of the abuse petitioner suffered in Cameroon before fleeing to South Africa, as well as evidence of the nature of her relationship with her abuser. Third, the panel held that the Board erred by applying the firm resettlement bar to petitioner’s withholding of removal claim, which is not subject to the firm resettlement bar.
Turning to petitioner’s CAT claim, the panel held that substantial evidence did not support the Board’s determination that petitioner could avoid future harm through internal relocation in Cameroon.
The panel remanded petitioner’s asylum, withholding, and CAT claims for further proceedings consistent with its opinion.
** This summary constitutes no part of the opinion of the court. It has been prepared by court staff for the convenience of the reader.
PANEL: Ronald M. Gould and Marsha S. Berzon, Circuit Judges, and Frederic Block,* District Judge.
* The Honorable Frederic Block, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of New York, sitting by designation.
OPINION BY: Judge Gould
KEY QUOTE:
Petitioner Delphine Arrey petitions for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ (“BIA” or “Board”) decision dismissing her appeal of an immigration judge’s (“IJ”) denial of her application for asylum, withholding of removal, and relief under the Convention Against Torture (“CAT”). We conclude that the IJ did not deny Arrey her due process rights to counsel and an unbiased factfinder. As to Arrey’s asylum and withholding of removal claims, we conclude that the Board erred as a matter of law in its analysis and application of the “firm resettlement” rule. As to Arrey’s claim for relief under CAT, we conclude that substantial evidence does not support the Board’s determination that Arrey could safely relocate in another area of Cameroon. We grant the petition in part and remand for reconsideration of Arrey’s claims consistent with our opinion.
Even the 9th Circuit “blew” the fundamental issue here: No matter how annoying the respondent’s conduct might have been, there was no way to conduct a fair hearing in a case of this complexity without counsel present.
From this recitation of facts, it’s pretty obvious that the respondent had no idea what “firm resettlement” was or how the process for proving or disproving it worked. Going ahead with the hearing created a miscarriage of justice that simply wasted time by going all the way the 9th Circuit and then being returned for competent judicial adjudication applying the correct standards. Haste makes waste.
And the overwhelming backlog that obviously was on the judge’s mind here was not created by this respondent and her attorney; no, it primarily results from “aimless docket reshuffling,” poor administration, Congressional neglect, and “designed to fail policies” by politicos in the DOJ (under the improper and unethical political influence of the DHS) which went into “overdrive” under Sessions.
Getting to the merits, beyond apparently correctly setting forth the respondent’s name and “A number,” the Immigration Judge and the BIA got largely everything else in this case wrong! The basic errors range from a “clearly erroneous” adverse credibility ruling, to a legally incorrect standard for “firm resettlement,” to an idiotically nonsensical ruling that “threats and one attempted assault of rape” did not “rise to the level of persecution” (cases involving these facts were routinely granted by the BIA during my tenure and, to my knowledge, were uniformly granted by IJs in Arlington; indeed, I can’t even imagine an ICE Assistant Chief Counsel during my tenure in Arlington arguing the contrary), to wrong evidentiary determinations, to another completely nonsensical finding on internal relocation.
In other words, this was a “rubber stamp” by BIA “judges” of a staff attorney’s writeup with canned “any reason to deny” language. It was not a fair and impartial adjudication by an “expert” group of appellate judges.
Far from it. If a student had turned this in as an exam answer to a hypothetical case on my Georgetown Law final exam, it would have received “zero credit.” So, how is it “OK” to have a system where individuals in what are supposed to be senior judicial positions, requiring great expertise in immigration, asylum, and human rights law, perform in a manner that would have been deemed unacceptable for L2s and L3s?
It isn’t; and it’s up to the Article III Courts and Congress to get some backbone and some integrity and put an end to this travesty. Yeah, this is “only one case.” But, it involves a human life. Cameroon is a horrible country; credible Cameroonian asylum cases were routinely granted in the Arlington Immigration Court, normally without appeal by ICE.
And for every case where a respondent is lucky enough to get a “Court of Appeals intervention,” dozens of individuals, many without lawyers or the faintest knowledge of what’s happening, are “railroaded” through this fundamentally unfair and constitutionally defective system. This, rather than the bogus wall, or an influx of desperate refugee families seeking asylum, is our true “national emergency” involving immigration: The disdain by our current Administration for the rule of law, human rights, judicial quality, simple human decency, and Due Process of Law under our Constitution!
Congrats to Attorney Ron Richey, an “Arlington Immigration Court regular,” who appeared before me many times, for fighting for due process and justice in another jurisdiction. You are an inspiration to all of us in the “New Due Process Army!”
As Trump Rages About Immigrants, They Go to the Ivy League
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American sisters born in Cameroon, from left, Ella, Chris and Xaviera.CreditVictor J. Blue for The New York Times
Ten years ago, a family arrived in the Bronx from Yaoundé, Cameroon, not speaking a word of English. This Christmas, they are celebrating a feat that would be impressive for any family: Three of the family’s five daughters have been accepted to Ivy League universities.
In a year in which our nativist president would have you believe that immigrants are, at best, a job-stealing drain and at worst, criminals, rapists and people with AIDS, these three remarkable sisters are worth paying attention to. Not just because they are inspiring — they are — but because they are far better ambassadors for this country and exponents of its ideals than the 45th president.
“We brought the girls to this country because there are better opportunities here,” says Flore Kengmeni, their mother, who works as a nurse. “I don’t know of another country where you can try hard, work hard and get somewhere. Where you are given the opportunity to fulfill your potential.”
“This country is built on immigrants,” Francois de Paul Silatchom, their father, a professor of economics at SUNY, starts to say, before his middle daughter, Ella, a sophomore at Yale, interjects: “Our experience as a family is what America is.”
That experience is marked by hard work, optimism, resilience and a persistent sense of gratitude even to have the opportunity.
All three girls admit it wasn’t easy. They recall sitting in class during their first year in America and not understanding what their teachers and classmates were saying. They remember being made fun of, but not really knowing why.
“Everyone spoke so fast and I guess we speak that fast now, too,” says Xaviera, the youngest of the three, who was accepted to Harvard earlier this month.
They turned to books for guidance. Their parents got the girls library cards and made reading mandatory — “Education is the most valuable asset,” the parents say repeatedly when we meet. The sisters were encouraged to read broadly, from “The Magic School Bus” to “Harry Potter,” and they practiced English as a family in their two-bedroom apartment in the Bronx’s Pelham Parkway neighborhood.
By the end of their first year at their local public schools, the girls had learned enough English to take the state exams, and were excelling in their classes. But their parents were alarmed that they were finishing their homework during the school day and coming home bored. They asked teachers to assign their daughters more homework. But even that wasn’t enough.
“Something was wrong,” Mr. de Paul Silatchom says. “I started looking for schools that would challenge them and keep them busy. At a school fair, we learned about Democracy Prep.”
At Democracy Prep, a public charter school in Harlem where I met them one recent afternoon, the day begins at 7:45 a.m. and ends at 5 p.m. Longer school days, many argue, allow teachers to spend more time on subjects other than math and English, and keep students out of trouble.
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Francois de Paul Silatchom, left, poses for a portrait with his daughters (left to right) Xaviera, 17, Ella, 19, and Chris, 20, and their mother Flore Kengmeni, center, at their church on the Upper East Side.CreditVictor J. Blue for The New York Times
Through the school’s Korean language program, the sisters were exposed to a culture completely different from their own, which sparked an interest in global affairs for all of them. Civics is a core part of the school’s curriculum, which Xaviera says showed her that, “Regardless of how disadvantaged you are in society, you have an advantage if you understand how our system of government works.”
“I learned so much here,” Ella says of the school. “And between that and our parents, my work ethic — our work ethic — really developed. Our parents required us to do an extracurricular, so sports or choir or whatever and that was for after 5 o’clock. That was normal for us.”
When the oldest, Chris, now a junior at Dartmouth, got into the college in 2014, friends and family were elated, but her parents made it clear that the work wasn’t over.
“The night I got into Dartmouth, Mom asked me, ‘Have you done the dishes?’ Getting in was exciting and I knew she was proud, but it was just a regular day,” Chris says.
“They haven’t ‘arrived,’ as people like to say, just because they are into Ivy League schools,” Mr. de Paul Silatchom says. “It’s a good start and a platform of opportunity.”
When speaking, the sisters transition seamlessly between New York-accented English and French, their first language. The irony that they landed at a school called Democracy Prep after immigrating from one of the world’s least democratic countries is not lost on them.
It’s something they’ve spent a lot of time thinking about as President Trump has rolled out various cruel immigration policies, from his proposed travel ban to, in September, rescinding the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA — an Obama-era program that protected the country’s approximately 800,000 undocumented youth raised in the country from being deported.
“It’s scary to see because this is not the country we know,” says Chris, who along with her sisters, became an American citizen in 2016. “America at its core is principled on immigrants. We came to this country to improve our futures and I feel as American as anyone born here.”
“These girls are more American than Cameroonian,” their mother says. “Can you imagine being undocumented? We were very lucky,” Xaviera adds.
Watching videos of immigration agents separating families in recent months has been particularly difficult for Ms. Kengmeni and Mr. de Paul Silatchom. “I can’t imagine what it’s been like for these children who go to school in the morning knowing they might come home at the end of the day to no parents,” Ms. Kengmeni says.
This year, Christmas break involves running around to pack for Chris’s semester abroad and attending three Christmas Masses, but the family is grateful to be all together, even if it’s for just a few days. They know they are the lucky ones.
Forty percent of Fortune 500 companies were founded or co-founded by immigrants or the children of immigrants. Watching Ella, Chris and Xaviera, I’d bet good money that they will join those ranks of these world-class leaders. But the question I find myself asking as I leave their school: Who are the young women the Trump administration is currently keeping out?
