☹️👎🏽BIDEN’S MUDDLED IMMIGRATION APPROACH WINS FEW FANS, WHILE CONTINUING TO TREAT HUMAN LIVES CALLOUSLY! — Weak AG, Underperforming VP, Fear Of The Right, Dysfunctional Immigration Courts, Failure To “Connect The Dots” Between Immigrant Justice & Racial Justice Appear To Have Led Administration To Treat Re-Establishing The Rule Of Law & Standing Up For Human Rights As “Bogus Policy Option” Rather Than The Legal & Moral Imperative It Is! — Tal Kopan Reports In The SF Chron!

Tal Kopan
Tal Kopan
Washington Reporter, SF Chronicle

https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/One-year-in-Biden-has-been-slow-to-unwind-Trump-16725642.php

One year in, Biden has been slow to unwind Trump immigration policies

WASHINGTON — As President Biden approaches a year in office, immigration advocates fear he may have learned some lessons from his predecessor, Donald Trump — and not the ones they would have wanted.

Most immigration advocates abhor virtually every policy in the sphere that Trump pursued, but they do give him credit for two things: showing how much change an administration can make quickly, and driving home the power of fully committing to a salient political message. But they fear that instead of using those lessons to enact Biden’s stated objective — a fair, orderly and humane immigration system — the president has borrowed too many of his predecessor’s policies and not enough of the fervor.

Biden has extended Trump’s policy turning away the vast majority of immigrants at the border ostensibly because of COVID. The administration has also, under court order, reinstated and expanded a policy forcing migrants to wait in Mexico for court hearings, despite Biden running against the policy in his campaign. And his Justice Department is defending some of Trump’s policies in court against challenges from immigrant advocates.

Several immigration groups worked together on what became known as the “Big Book,” a collection of more than 500 policy recommendations for the incoming Biden administration. The pro-immigration group Immigration Hub has tracked about 150 that have been implemented so far. Many of those were reversing Trump policies.

“What we don’t have is a White House that’s committed to moving forward on the stated Biden administration agenda in the way that the Trump White House was committed to moving forward on theirs, and as a result, we’re living in a world where a whole lot of those Trump policies are still around,” said Omar Jadwat, director of the Immigrants’ Rights Project with the American Civil Liberties Union.

A White House spokesperson objected to the notion that Biden has not delivered progress on immigration, citing actions in the early days of the administration to roll back some of Trump’s policies, extend protections to young undocumented immigrants who came to the U.S. as children and new protections for migrants whose home countries are in turmoil.

“This administration is committed to working day in and day out to provide relief to immigrants and bring our immigration system into the 21st century,” spokesperson Vedant Patel said.

During the presidential campaign, Biden ran on turning the page from Trump’s hardline immigration policies and talked up a plan to get a pathway to citizenship for the undocumented into law. He also emphasized the importance of letting asylum-seekers make their case to stay in the U.S., and said the Obama administration in which he served made a mistake in waiting too long to enact immigration reforms.

In his early days in office, Biden did introduce policies cheered by immigration advocates, including rescinding Trump’s travel bans and embracing an aggressive legislative strategy to legalize millions of undocumented immigrants through procedural maneuvers that would require only Democratic votes.

But he also kept in place a controversial policy known as Title 42 that essentially closed the southern border to virtually all immigrants. Then in the spring, when border crossings soared to historic levels, the Biden administration doubled down on deterring migration, vexing many advocates who saw that strategy as essentially an embrace of the right’s talking points. Others have pinned their hopes on Vice President Kamala Harris, who forged a strong progressive streak on immigration while serving as California’s senator. She has led administration efforts to improve conditions in Central America, but also adopted deterrence talking points, including urging would-be migrants directly while in Guatemala: “Do not come.”

 

More: https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/One-year-in-Biden-has-been-slow-to-unwind-Trump-16725642.php

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

As Tal and others have observed, the Trump Administration “hit the ground running” on its White Nationalist anti-immigrant agenda, which was a key part of it’s overall anti-democracy, neo-fascist program. 

The Biden Administration’s campaign pledges to undo the damage — not so much. In the end, lack of backbone, failure to leverage and use the expert talent available, not acting quickly, and treating values-based campaign promises as “fungible political capital” has left the Administration “wandering in the wilderness” on this key issue. Usually, standing for the right thing, even if risky, is a far better path than aimlessly wobbling around.

“Don’t come” is not part of our asylum law!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-03-22