☠️⚰️🤮🏴‍☠️ THE PARTY AT THE BOTTOM OF HUMANITY’S BARREL 🛢 — New Wave Of Fascist Cruelty & Stupidity @ The Border! — “Texas governor Greg Abbott is seated at the center of a long table surrounded by grim-faced White men, most of them elderly, in various postures of mental agita.” — The Border Chronicle

Melissa Del Bosque
Melissa Del Bosque
Border Reporter
PHOTO: Melissadelbosque.com

https://www.theborderchronicle.com/p/sinking-to-the-bottom?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

Melissa del Bosque reports for the Border Chronicle:

Both parties have doubled down on inhumane border policies, but it’s the GOP that is taking it to new depths in its race to the bottom over who can be more deliberately cruel.

It’s like some kind of grotesque Last Supper: In a publicity photo from last week’s press conference, Texas governor Greg Abbott is seated at the center of a long table surrounded by grim-faced White men, most of them elderly, in various postures of mental agita. Next to them is a large illustration on an easel board titled “Live Test of Attempt to Breach.” It shows a man with an inner tube (presumably an asylum seeker) clinging to a floating red buoy. Hundreds of these buoys Abbott announced, will be deployed on the Rio Grande near the town of Eagle Pass. The barrier will be 1,000 feet long, and its netting will extend underwater, catching anyone who tries to swim under it.

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“We don’t want anyone to get hurt,” said Steve McCraw, head of Texas’s Department of Public Safety, at the June 9 press conference. “We want to prevent people from drowning.”

The floating buoy barrier will persuade people not to cross, he said. “This is to deter them from even coming in the water.”

But we already know this isn’t true. Both McCraw and Abbott were parroting the same strategy, known as “prevention through deterrence,” introduced in the mid-1990s during the Clinton administration. It has turned our southern border into a graveyard. After nearly three decades of militarized border buildup that has pushed people into increasingly deadly terrain like the Sonoran Desert, people haven’t stopped coming. But thousands of them have died.

As Todd [Miller] recently wrote in his poignant piece about this deadly strategy, “On the cusp of summer, we can predict like clockwork that hundreds of otherwise healthy people will be dead by summer’s end. It has an aura of premeditated murder.”

These floating barriers, which, according to the manufacturer’s website, can also be reinforced with spikes, will only contribute to an already-skyrocketing death count. Abbott’s latest announcement has already spurred many human rights organizations to sound a warning. Jenn Budd, a former Border Patrol agent and now border human rights activist, along with fellow Texas-based activist Marianna Treviño Wright, released a bilingual video warning migrants of the deadly new policy.

All-in on Fascism

Abbott has long toyed with the idea of running for president. While it increasingly looks less likely that he will, Florida governor Ron DeSantis has already joined the fray. And he’s all-in on fascism. When he’s not treating fellow human beings like FedEx packages, he’s modeling himself after Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s authoritarian leader, and darling of the CPAC circuit. Last week DeSantis released “B-roll” of Florida state troopers surveying the Texas-Mexico border as they participate in Abbott’s Operation Lone Star. I suspect they didn’t include any audio in the B-roll because it would humanize the children and adults waving to the troopers from the Mexican side of the river, detracting from DeSantis’s threatening narrative of an invading army.

DeSantis’s campaign video begins with a Texas DPS officer, who sports an official DPS seal on his tactical face covering, unlocking a tiny metal door surrounded by razor wire. This is next-level border security theater, as comical as it is utterly surreal and tragic. Several other Republican-led states are also, once again, sending troopers and National Guard soldiers to the Texas border—as they did before the 2022 midterm—to wage war against the Biden White House before the election. Unfortunately, it’s border communities and migrants who are caught in the crossfire.

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For many years, I’ve documented border theater as it has ebbed and flowed depending on the political tide. But as I’ve been documenting in The Border Chronicle, we’ve reached an altogether different and deadly era of disinformation, with the GOP parroting invasion and great replacement rhetoric, and increasingly dehumanizing people, spurring mass shootings and political violence. This behavior is championed by a growing right-wing media ecosystem which in turn promotes more anti-democratic and extremist behavior.

I spoke with Sergio Muñoz, vice president of Media Matters for America, a nonprofit that has tracked conservative media for nearly two decades. I quoted Muñoz in a recent article, and wanted to include my full Q&A with him here. As Muñoz warns, the U.S. is in a “dangerous moment” as it approaches the 2024 presidential election.

. . . .

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Read Melissa’s full report, including the interview with Sergio Muñoz at the above link.

Yes, “deterrence gimmicks” directed at refugees have a decades-long proven record of failure. You can just look at the efforts of the EU to “bar the door” to refugees from Africa and the Middle
East. 

The boats continue to come, some sink, people drown. But, not surprisingly to those other than the “overprivileged and elitist White power class” like Abbott and DeSantis, desperate individuals forced from their homes are going continue to come — at any cost, even their own health, safety, and sometime lives. 

Most would rather “risk it all” on a shot — even a very long shot — at stability and a real life, rather than facing the certainty of wasting away without hope, freedom, or opportunity and having to watch the same thing happening to younger generations. Some, against all odds, continue to believe that rich, powerfu Western countries like the U.S. will eventually live up to their solemn legal obligations to protect refugees and asylum seekers!

While, as Melissa cogently points out, these inane, yet deadly, gimmicks do kill migrants, they don’t do so at a high enough rate to materially affect the flow. It’s just causing pain, suffering, and sometimes death for their own perverted sake.  

Border Death
This is a monument for those who have died attempting to cross the US-Mexican border. Each coffin represents a year and the number of dead. It is a protest against the effects of Operation Guardian. Taken at the Tijuana-San Diego border.
Tomas Castelazo
n order to comply with the use and licensing terms of this image, the following text must must be included with the image when published in any medium, failure to do so constitutes a violation of the licensing terms and copyright infringement: © Tomas Castelazo, www.tomascastelazo.com / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 3.0

Apparently, neo-fascists like Abbott, DeSantis, Trump, and their “role model” Stephen Miller just “get off on” watching others suffer unnecessarily. Bullies and cowards often get a kick out of observing the effects of their handiwork.

Meanwhile, the public money being wasted on these cruel, yet ultimately ineffective stunts (remember former AZ Gov. Ducey’s shipping containers arrayed and then disassembled at government expense), could much, much better be spent on providing representation, organized resettlement, and humanitarian assistance to asylum seekers.

As Melissa says, the GOP’s (and sometimes, unfortunately the Dems’) “uber-enforcement/deterrence gimmicks are “as comical as [they are] utterly surreal and tragic.” It’s time for decent Americans to “just say no” to these horrible folks and their failed and deadly policies of dehumanization and degradation!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-15-23

🤯 CAIR COALITION COGENTLY CONCLUDES: CANNED CLAPTRAP CAN’T CHANGE CRATERING CLOWN COURTS! 🤡

 

Kangaroos
“We don’t need immigration expertise to be hired, and now we don’t need it to deny cases either. Just have to slap any old attachment on it! EOIR is the ‘paint by numbers’ of judging!”
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rasputin243/
Creative Commons License

https://www.caircoalition.org/2023/06/12/breaking-attorneys-advocate-better-due-process-response-immigration-judges-making

BREAKING: Attorneys advocate for better due process in response to immigration judges making conveyor-belt deportation decisions

June 12, 2023

Immigration attorneys nationwide have witnessed a concerning increase in immigration judges issuing deportation decisions without individualized analysis. Instead, these barebones decisions often rely on boilerplate “form addenda,” which are standardized summaries of immigration law not specific to any noncitizen’s case.

This week, in response to these concerning practices, Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights (CAIR) Coalition and pro bono counsel O’Melveny & Myers, along with over 50 partner organizations, have submitted a letter advocating that the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) reform its policies governing the use of form addenda.

Because they are not specific to a person’s individual case and are instead just stapled to a deportation order as legal justification, the addenda usually include irrelevant issues and sometimes incorrect statements of the law. Plus, the noncitizen and their attorney often never see a copy of the addenda.

The sign-on letter urges EOIR to take multiple, concrete steps to change its policies governing the use of form addenda. These measures include increased training on addenda usage for immigration judges, making form addenda publicly accessible, and appointing an ombudsman to investigate addenda misuse.

“Due to the drastic consequences for immigrants in deportation cases—including family separation and possible persecution and death in people’s home countries—the law requires U.S. immigration judges to conduct an individualized analysis of each noncitizen’s case when deciding on their removal proceedings,” said Peter Alfredson, Senior Attorney at CAIR Coalition. “When the stakes are that high, noncitizens deserve to know that judges are taking their claims seriously—or even looking at their claims at all—and issuing decisions that reflect that responsibility.”  

“Immigration judges merely staple these form addenda to a removal order instead of doing their job to analyze each person’s case.” said Adina Appelbaum, Program Director of the Immigration Impact Lab at CAIR Coalition. “We need clearer policies from EOIR so that if judges use these addenda, they will do so in a way that is fair and respectful to the noncitizens whose lives are in their hands.” 

Adina Appelbaum
Adina Appelbaum
Director, Immigration Impact Lab
CAIR Coalition
Charter Member, NDPA
PHOTO: “30 Under 30” from Forbes

————-

Contact

Erin Barnaby, CAIR Coalition   |   erin@caircoalition.org

————-

About Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights Coalition

Through free legal, social, and litigation services, Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights (CAIR) works to ensure equal justice for immigrants in the Capital region who are at risk of detention and deportation.

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Crazy catastrophic courts can’t continue!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-14-23

🏴‍☠️ EOIR DENIES DUE PROCESS TO ASYLUM SEEKER, SAYS SLIT 9TH! — Dysfunctional Agency Renowned For “Aimless Docket Reshuffling” Of Scheduled, “Ready to Try” Cases Can’t Spare Time For Same-Day Filing By Newly Retained Counsel In “Life Or Death Matter!” — Arizmendi-Medina v. Garland

Kangaroos
“Deny, deny, deny, deter, deter, deter! ‘Fake efficiency’ over justice! Expediency over due process! Gee, it’s fun to be a ‘Deportation Judge’ @ EOIR! Much better than having to practice before this awful mess we’ve created! “
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rasputin243/
Creative Commons License

https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2023/06/07/21-298.pdfw

KEY QUOTE FROM CIRCUIT JUDGE RONALD LEE GILMAN’S MAJORITY OPINION:

. . . .

Third, the IJ was hardly inconvenienced at all. Arizmendi-Medina’s counsel offered to submit the application while the IJ was still on the bench. Although this might have required the IJ to recall Arizmendi-Medina’s case at the end of the IJ’s docket, this inconvenience was truly minimal. Cf. Jerezano, 169 F.3d at 615 (“While an IJ need not linger in the courtroom awaiting tardy litigants, so long as he is there on other business and the delay is short[,] …it is an abuse of discretion to treat a slightly late appearance as a nonappearance.”). Further, as discussed above, the December 18, 2018 hearing was a Master Calendar hearing, not a merits hearing. This means that the proceedings were ultimately not delayed at all.

And fourth, we consider the total number of continuances previously granted to Arizmendi-Medina. He received two very short continuances (only two weeks each) to find an attorney at the beginning of his immigration proceedings on July 31, 2018 and August 15, 2018. See Cruz Rendon, 603 F.3d at 1106–07, 1110 (finding that two one- month continuances were both “exceedingly short”). The proceedings were then reset at the hearing on August 29, 2018 because Arizmendi-Medina requested, and the IJ granted, a change of venue. The next hearing was scheduled for October 24, 2018 before a new IJ. Although this certainly gave Arizmendi-Medina more time to find an attorney, this delay was primarily due to the change of venue and getting the case calendared in a new court.

Finally, after Arizmendi-Medina was required to proceed pro se and was found removable at the hearing on October 24, 2018, the IJ granted another continuance so that Arizmendi-Medina could continue to look for an attorney and work on his relief application (which was presented to him for the first time at the October 24, 2018 hearing).

20 ARIZMENDI-MEDINA V. GARLAND

Arizmendi-Medina thus received only one continuance after he was found removable and presented with a relief application, and he received zero continuances after he finally secured an attorney. From start to finish, the proceedings against Arizmendi-Medina were delayed for less than five months, with nearly two months of that delay due to the change of venue.

Ultimately, all of the Ahmed factors weigh in favor of finding that the IJ abused his discretion in not granting a continuance so that Arizmendi-Medina’s recently-retained counsel could complete and submit the relief application on December 18, 2018. The abuse is especially apparent given the offer of Arizmendi-Medina’s counsel to submit the application later that same day. Such an abuse by the IJ counsels in favor of finding that Arizmendi-Medina was denied fundamental fairness. See id. at 1110 (finding that the IJ abused her discretion in part because the merits hearing was “less than one month after Cruz Rendon first appeared with counsel,” which contributed to the noncitizen’s difficulty in marshalling evidence in such a short time frame (emphasis in original)). This “prevented [Arizmendi-Medina] from reasonably presenting his case.” See Zetino, 622 F.3d at 1013 (quoting Ibarra-Flores, 439 F.3d 620-21).

. . . .

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

This faux “court” system has lost sight of its sole function: To provide due process hearings to individuals whose lives and futures are on the line!

In this case, the DOJ was obviously willing to spend more time and resources on denying the respondent his day in court than it would have taken to hold a merits asylum hearing! No wonder they have built an astounding, ever-growing 2 million case backlog! Don’t let Garland & company get away with blaming the private bar or respondents (that is, “the victims”) for DOJ’s continuing screw-ups at EOIR!

No real inconvenience or delay to the IJ! Life or death for the respondent! Attorney kept on a treadmill by EOIR’s unreasonable conduct! Who would take cases, particularly pro bono, under this type of tone-deaf “double standard.” (Would Trump-appointed dissenting Judge Danielle J. Forrest, who probably never has represented an individual in Immigration Court, REALLY practice law under these abusive circumstances?)

How many of you out there in “Courtside Land” have arrived on time for a scheduled merits hearing, with respondent and witnesses in tow, only to find out that your case had been “orbited” further out on the docket, with no or inadequate notice? How many have had long-prepared cases arbitrarily shuffled to a future year while having other cases where you were recently retained mindlessly “moved up” on the docket to satisfy EOIR’s latest “priority of the day?” Pretending like “every minute counts” in this hopelessly inefficient and bolloxed system is EOIR’s and DOJ’s way of deflecting attention and shifting the blame for their own, largely self-created failures!

In the “topsy turvy” fantasy world of EOIR, the dockets are overwhelming and totally screwed up! So much, that DHS recently took the unprecedented step of unilaterally declaring that (except for a small subset of “mandatory appearances”) THEY would decide which EOIR cases to staff with an Assistant Chief Counsel. See,  https://immigrationcourtside.com/2023/05/31/🤯-wacko-world-of-eoir-dhs-prosecutors-deliver-the-big-middle-finger-bmf-🖕to-garlands-feckless-immigration-courts-unilate/. Implicit in this “in your face” action is the assumption that Immigration Judges will also act as prosecutors in these cases (even though Immigration Judges clearly lack some of the authority of prosecutors, including the exercise of prosecutorial discretion and stipulation to issues or relief).

On the other hand, private attorneys are systemically jerked around by EOIR and subjected to the threat of discipline for even relatively minor transgressions. Talk about an “uneven playing field!” In a system where lack of representation and under-representation are daily threats to due process and fundamental fairness, how does EOIR’s one-sided, anti-attorney, anti-immigrant conduct encourage new generations to chip in their time pro bono or low bono to bridge the ever-present “representation gap?”

In short, it does just the opposite! Some experienced practitioners have “had enough” and reduced or eliminated their Immigration Court presence while others have changed to other areas of practice because of EOIR’s continuing dysfunction under Garland. This should be a “solvable” problem — particularly in a Dem Administration! Why isn’t it?

Why is Garland getting away with this nonsense? How can we “change the playing field” and demand that Garland finally bring the due process reforms and expert judicial and professional, common-sense administrative personnel to America’s worst and most life-threatening courts?

Thanks to attorney Shannon Englert of San Diego for taking on Garland’s dysfunctional DOJ immigration bureaucracy!

Shannon Englert, ESQ Founder DYADlaw Vista, CA PHOTO: Linkedin
Shannon Englert, ESQ Founder DYADlaw Vista, CA                  PHOTO: Linkedin

 

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-13-23

“`

🇺🇸🗽⚖️ INSPIRING AMERICA: From Tortured Dissident, To Refugee, To DePaul Law Grad! — The Saga Of Emad Mahou!

How he made it_ Syrian torture survivor becomes DePaul Law grad

Zareen Syed
Zareen Syed
Reporter
Chicago Tribune
PHOTO: Chicago Tribune website

Zareen Syed writes in the Chicago Tribune:

He says he can’t really describe torture or the night terrors that still creep up on him years later, but he’ll try. He starts out with a picture: a prison cell the size of a rug and a creaky door that he couldn’t help but stare at. Every time it opened, he knew he’d either be released or tortured once again.

When Emad Mahou tells the story of being imprisoned in Syria during the 2011 revolution, his voice has a heaviness, unlike the joy he exhibits when talking about not knowing how to order a Subway sandwich when he arrived in Chicago as a refugee.

Emad Mahou
Emad Mahoud 
PHOTO: DePaul Law

With his hands he demonstrates the ups and downs of the last 12 years — from being released and offered refuge in America to graduating from the DePaul University School of Law. As his wife, 8-year-old daughter and his father stood in the stands, he walked across the stage with hopes of practicing human rights law to help other refugees coming into the country.

 

Mahou’s father, Shirkou Mahou, flew in from Lebanon to attend the May 20 ceremony on a visit visa.

“I’m seeing a part of my dad I didn’t see before,” Mahou said. “He’s an old man. When I left he was much stronger, much younger.”

On a May afternoon, days before the graduation ceremony, Mahou’s dad was sitting next to him on a couch in one of DePaul’s Loop campus law buildings, wearing a brown suit, white shirt and a prayer hat on his head.

It’s his first time in America. His first time seeing his son’s new life up close — so different from the life he left at age 21.

He cried audibly every now and then, especially when Mahou would translate for him into Arabic parts of what he was sharing about the Syria of his childhood versus the Syria he left behind.

. . . .

Mahou’s memories of some of his arrests are blurry, except for one in which he was detained and tortured for three months. In June 2011, he said he spent 100 days in an underground cell the size of a rug. He didn’t know it when he was thrown in, but this would also be the last time he’d be imprisoned.

“The torture was really over the limit at that point. I was really struggling with the pain,” Mahou said. “It was daily, continuous, degrading. One day in particular, they took turns urinating on me. It got to a point where mentally I was broken. You smell yourself and I felt really, really bad. I am used to a nice life. I showered daily. I was in college to be an architect.”

Mahou stops and reminds himself that he had a full life in Zabadani, Syria, before the revolution. They all did.

“At that point, I was almost done with college and I had a whole future ahead of me. And I just looked at where I am now. That day was my weakest day mentally. I was shattered. The humiliation went too far — like they’re using you as a toilet … so I banged my head on the wall.”

. . . .

He started attending community college at Harry Truman toward a degree in computer science in the fall of 2013, before transferring to DeVry. In 2017, he got a job as a web developer for the board of trustees at DePaul University. There he met law professor Craig Mousin, who sat in an office across from Mahou.

Rev. Craig Mousin
Rev. Craig Mousin
Ombudsperson
Refugee and Forced Migration Studies, Grace School of Applied Diplomacy
DePaul University
PHOTO: DePaul Website

Mousin said when Mahou realized that he taught at the law school and that his specific area of teaching was asylum and refugee law, it piqued his interest.

“Emad has intimate knowledge of how governments can use all the power and authority they have to stifle dissent,” Mousin said. “And sometimes in doing asylum and human rights cases, there’s this built-in assumption that governments would not hurt their own citizens. And sometimes it’s very difficult for people in the United States who live with relative freedom to understand that. Emad’s felt the brunt of that failure.”

With Mousin’s guidance, Mahou tapped into his experience of standing up for freedom in Syria and what he calls “a rebel mentality” to figure out that what he actually wants to do isn’t web development, but rather become a lawyer. On May 20, he earned his juris doctorate.

“I really want to learn about other people’s experiences in the system,” said Mahou, who now lives in Oak Park. “People who are fleeing persecution, traveling through dangerous paths to seek refuge, those are the people I want to help.”

Mahou said he’s now studying for the bar exam but was fortunate to get a taste of the kind of cases he would like to work on when he enrolled in DePaul’s Asylum and Immigration Law Clinic, where he helped put together an asylum petition for a family.

As Mahou recounts his tale, he shares that he’s seen his parents for a total of 20 days since 2011, during short visits to Lebanon. And now he was making up for lost time.

. . . .

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

Refugees have been making America great since before there was an America!

Thanks to my friend Processor Craig Mousin at DePaul Law for passing this along.

🇺🇸🗽⚖️ Due Process Forever!

PWS

6-12-23

🇺🇸 MAINE VOICES: A “Woke” America Is A Better America, Says Don Bessey Of Old Orchard Beach — Speak Out Against the Agenda Of Hate, Marginalization, & Dehumanization Being Touted By Right-Wing Politicos & Their Followers! — “These people should not be leading our wonderful country.”

Ron DeSantis Dave Grandlund PoliticalCartoons.com Republished under license Ron DeSantis and Donald Trump are “campaigning” on an agenda of racism, hate, and White Supremacist grievance not seen since the late Gov. George Wallace. Yet, mainstream media has largely “normalized” that which would have been unacceptable and unthinkable only a few years ago!
Ron DeSantis
Dave Grandlund
PoliticalCartoons.com
Republished under license
Ron DeSantis and Donald Trump are “campaigning” on an agenda of racism, hate, and White Supremacist grievance not seen since the late Gov. George Wallace. Yet, mainstream media has largely “normalized” that which would have been unacceptable and unthinkable only a few years ago!

https://www.pressherald.com/2023/06/10/maine-voices-woke-should-not-be-a-four-letter-word/

From the Portland Press Herald:

Maine Voices: ‘Woke’ should not be a four-letter word

Being aware of how we have treated and still treat other people in our society is so important to our society’s evolving that it should be honored, not vilified.

It is frustrating to see the continuous redefining of words and terms by the extremist conservative element in our society and government. One of these terms is “woke.” According to Merriam-Webster, the definition is “aware of and actively attentive to important societal facts and issues.” I will add in the qualification as well: “especially issues of ABOUT THE AUTHOR

For my entire life I have strived to embrace this philosophy, trying to listen to and understand other opinions, beliefs and religions, whether they agreed with mine or not, understanding that one cannot fully comprehend a point of view without appreciating the counterpoint. This certainly requires personal evolution and maturity. Being aware of the true history of our country, of how we have treated and still treat other people in our society, is so important to our society’s evolving that it should be honored, not vilified.

The term “woke” has now been unjustly transformed into a negative term. Let that sink in: Attention to important facts and issues, the truth, is something to avoid and discredit. Somehow, this makes sense to a significant number of our political leaders and fellow Americans. It appears that what is most troubling for those who would see “woke” as a vile four-letter word is the qualification above, that it applies to “issues of racial and social justice.”

One of the tag lines for objecting to this thought is that it may cause someone to feel uncomfortable or criticized by being confronted with these historical facts. Personally, I strongly desire to know the truth. I am delighted – admittedly, shocked sometimes – by learning about the history we were never taught, which was suppressed to a large extent for so many years by those who perpetrated many injustices. The historical truth has never made me feel bad about myself. In fact, it is enlightening. It expands my understanding of how and why we have come to this place in our evolution. It shows me how to be better and more empathetic, and it suggests the path forward.

I believe I do understand why this can be so threatening and discomforting to so many. I believe that the truth is like a mirror to them. They see their own racist views, their distrust of anyone they perceive as being “different” as a significant threat. I feel so sad for them, since in my life, through being open to other races, ethnicities, religions and thoughts, I have learned so much and have been blessed with a much more beautiful world, life and friends.

It is extremely troubling to see elected officials, the leaders of our political parties, and fellow Americans embracing and endorsing this philosophy of derision, division and hateful rhetoric that has its roots in the cesspool of white supremacist thought.  They are leading us into the abyss of an authoritarian kakistocracy, or government by the worst of us. We must all, every rational one of us, stand and reject this thinking. We must only, and always, embrace truth, the actual facts. These people should not be leading our wonderful country.

Don Bessey is an Air Force veteran of the Vietnam War and a resident of Old Orchard Beach.

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

Well said, Don! Thanks for speaking out so forcefully! 

Don’s views echo several previous postings from Courtside:

Walter Rhein: “When people say they are ‘anti-woke,’ I interrupt them and say ‘You mean ‘anti-black.’ They become enraged and act like they’re the victims (like racists always do).”https://wp.me/p8eeJm-8tJ

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As [Villanova University President] Father [Peter M.] Donohue said at yesterday’s celebration,  “‘Woke’ means social justice!” https://wp.me/p8eeJm-8vF

 

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-11-23

🤯🗽 AT THE REAL BORDER WITH TODD MILLER OF THE BORDER CHRONICLE: Less Due Process, More Robo-Dogs! — The “Bogus Invasion Of Due Process Seekers” Overhyped By The White Nationalist GOP, The Biden Administration, & An Indolent Media Never Came — But, “The Border Industrial Complex,” Well-Fed By Biden, Is Alive & Prospering As Never Before!

Todd Miller
Todd MIller
Border Correspondent
Border Chronicle
PHOTO: Coder Chron

https://www.theborderchronicle.com/p/the-real-border-surge-the-end-of?utm_medium=email

Todd writes in the Border Chron:

On May 11th, I was with a group of people at the bottom of the Paso del Norte bridge in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico. Suddenly, I realized that I didn’t have the small change needed to cross the bridge and return to El Paso, Texas, where I was attending the 16th annual Border Security Expo. Worse yet, this was just three hours before Title 42, the pandemic-era rapid-expulsion border policy instituted by the Trump administration, was set to expire. The media was already in overdrive on the subject, producing apocalyptic scenarios like one in the New York Post reporting that “hordes” of “illegals” were on their way toward the border.

While I searched for those coins, a woman approached me, dug 35 cents out of a small purse — precisely what it cost! — and handed the change to me. She then did so for the others in our group. When I pulled a 20-peso bill from my wallet to repay her, she kept her fist clenched and wouldn’t accept the money.

Having lived, reported, and traveled in Latin America for more than two decades, such generosity didn’t entirely surprise me, though it did contradict so much of the media-generated hype about what was going on at this historic border moment. Since Joe Biden took office in 2021, the pressure on his administration to rescind Trump’s Title 42 had only grown. Now, it was finally going to happen — and hell was on the horizon.

But at that expo in El Paso that brought together top brass from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), its border and immigration enforcement agencies, and private industry, I was learning that preparations for such a shift had been underway for years and — don’t be shocked! — the corporations attending planned to profit from it in a big-time fashion.

Seeing the phase-out of Title 42 through the lens of a growing border-industrial complex proved grimly illuminating. Border officials and industry representatives continued to insist that just on the other side of the border was a world of “cartels,” “adversaries,” and “criminals,” including, undoubtedly, this woman forcing change on me. By then, I had heard all too many warnings that, were the United States to let its guard down, however briefly, there would be an infernal “border surge.”

As I later stood in the halls of that expo, however, I became aware of another type of surge not being discussed either there or in the media. And I’m not just thinking about the extra members of the National Guard and other forces the Biden administration and Texas Governor Greg Abbott only recently sent to that very border. What I have in mind is the surge of ever higher budgets and record numbers of Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) contracts guaranteed to ensure that those borderlands will remain one of the most militarized and surveilled places on planet Earth.

. . . .

At $29.8 billion, the CBP/ICE portion of the DHS budget he praised was not just the highest ever but a $3 billion jump above 2022, including $2.7 billion for “new acquirements in our southwestern border.” In other words, the coming surge at the border was distinctly budgetary.

For context, when Donald Trump took office in 2017 his CBP/ICE budget was $21.2 billion. By 2020, it had gone up to $25.4 billion. In other words, it took him four years to do what the Biden administration essentially did in one. The last time there had been such a jump was from $9.4 billion in 2005 to $12.4 billion in 2007, including funding for huge projects like the Secure Fence Act that built nearly 650 miles of walls and barriers, SBInet which aimed to build a virtual wall at the border (with special thanks to the Boeing Corporation), and the largest hiring surge ever undertaken by the Border Patrol — 8,000 agentsin three years.

But if that’s what $3 billion meant in 2005-2007, what does it mean in 2023 and beyond? Gone was the Trump-era bravado about that “big, beautiful wall.” Hysen’s focus was on the Department of Homeland Security’s launching of an Artificial Intelligence Taskforce. A technocrat, Hysen spoke of harnessing “the power of AI to transform the department’s mission,” assuring the industry audience that “I follow technology very closely and I am more excited by the developments of AI this year than I have been about any technology since the first smartphones.”

Robo-Dog
This cuddly robo version of “man’s best friend” can be fully outfitted to “go into barracks and blow a motherfucker’s face off.” And, it can be triggered by an agent 30 miles away! How great is that! Sadly, in the midst of all this techno-warfare at the border, the Biden Administration can’t scrape together the resources to humanely resettle and fairly and timely process those asylum seekers they DO let into the country. It’s a question of priorities.
PHOTO: Border Chronicle
CAPTION BY COURTSIDE

That robo-dog in front of me caught the state of the border in 2023 and the trends that went with it perfectly. It could, after all, be controlled by an agent up to 33 miles away, according to the vendor, and apparently could even — thank you, AI — make decisions on its own.

The vendor showed me a video of just how such a dog would work if it were armed. It would use AI technology to find human forms. A red box would form around any human it detects on a tablet screen held by an agent. In other words, I asked, can the dog think?

I had in mind the way Bing’s Chatbox, the AI-powered search engine from Microsoft, had so infamously professed its love for New York Times reporter Kevin Roose. A human, using an Xbox-like controller, the vendor told me, will be able to target a specific person among those the dog detects. “But,” he reassured me, “it’s a human who ultimately pulls the trigger.”

In Mexico, when I walked to a spot where the Rio Grande flowed between the two countries, I ran into a small group of migrants camped out at the side of the road. Near them was a fire filled with charred wood over which a pot was cooking. A pregnant Colombian woman told me they were providing food to other migrants passing by. “Oh,” I asked, “so you sell food?” No, she responded, they gave it away for free. Before they had been camped out for months near the immigration detention center in Ciudad Juárez where a devastating fire in March killed 40 people. Now, they had moved closer to the border. And they were still waiting, still hoping to file applications for asylum themselves.

Behind where they sat, I could see the 20-foot border wall with coiling razor wire on top. There was nothing new about a hyper-militarized border here. After all, the El Paso build-up had begun 30 years ago with Operation Hold the Line in 1993. A desert camo Humvee sat below the wall on the U.S. side and a couple of figures (Border Patrol? National Guard?) stood at the edge of the Rio Grande shouting to a Mexican federal police agent on the other side.

The clock for the supposed Title 42 Armageddon was ticking down as I then crossed the bridge back to El Paso, where more barriers of razor wire had only recently been emplaced. There was also a slew of blue-uniformed CBP agents and several jeeps carrying camouflaged members of border units. Everyone was heavily armed as if about to go into battle.

At the Border Security Expo, Hysen pointed out that fear of a Title 42 surge had resulted in an even more fortified border, hard as that might be to imagine. Fifteen hundred National Guard troops had been added to the 2,500 already there, along with 2,000 extra private security personnel, and more than 1,000 volunteers from other agencies. Basically, he insisted, they had everything more than under control, whatever the media was saying.

. . . .

At the Edge of Everything — and Nothing At All

On the morning of May 12th, I was with border scholar Gabriella Sanchez at the very spot where the borders of Texas, New Mexico, and Chihuahua meet near El Paso. Title 42 had expired the night before and I asked her what she thought. She responded that she considered this the border norm: we’re regularly told something momentous and possibly terrible is going to happen and then nothing much happens at all.

And she was right, the predicted “surge” of migrants crossing the border actually decreased — and yet, in some sense, everything keeps happening in ways that only seem grimmer. Perhaps 100 yards from where we were standing, in fact, we soon noticed a lone man cross the international boundary and walk into the United States as if he were taking a morning stroll. Thirty seconds later, a truck sped past us kicking up gravel. For a moment, I thought it was just a coincidence, since it wasn’t an official Border Patrol vehicle.

Then, I noted an insignia on its side that included the U.S. and Mexican flags. The truck came to a skidding stop by the man. A rotund figure in a gray uniform jumped out and ran toward him while he raised his hands. Just then, a green-striped Border Patrol van also pulled up. I was surprised — though after that Border Security Expo I shouldn’t have been — when I realized that the initial arrest was being made by someone seemingly from a private security firm. (Remember, Hysen said that an extra 2,000 private security agents had been hired for the “surge.”)

In truth, that scene couldn’t have been more banal. You might have seen it on any May 12th in these years. That banality, by the way, included a sustained violence that’s intrinsically part of the modern border system, as geographer Reece Jones argues in his book Violent Borders: Refugees and the Right to Move. In the days following Title 42’s demise, an eight-year-old Honduran girl died in Border Patrol custody and a Tohono O’odham man was shot and killed by the Border Patrol. In April, 11 remains of dead border crossers were also recovered in Arizona’s Pima County desert alone (where it’s impossible to carry enough water for such a long trek).

In the wake of Donald Trump, everything on the border has officially changed, yet nothing has really changed. Nothing of note is happening, even as everything happens. And as Hysen said at that border expo meeting, big as the record 2023 border budget may be, in 2024 it’s likely to go “even further” into the stratosphere.

Put another way, at the border, we are eternally at the edge of everything — and nothing at all.

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

Read Todd’s complete report in the Border Chron at the link.

From Ike’s “Military-Industrial Complex” to Biden’s “Border-Industrial Complex” — my life has spanned it all! But, while Ike was trying to warn us about the dangers ahead, Biden (and the GOP) are trying to lull us into accepting unending and largely unaccountable border militarization as the inevitable wave of the future — even a good thing!

I’ve got nothing against technology! But, it should employed to make humanity better, not just for its own sake.  As I suggest below, the “Armed Robot-Dogs v. CBP One” (or EOIR’s venture into the virtual world) strongly suggest the lack of a healthy balance! 

Human migration is even older and more permanent than never-ending border militarization, industrialized cruelty, and dehumanization. The latter are now routinely practiced by the very Western nations who once, long ago, fought against Nazism and vowed, apparently somewhat disingenuously, “never again!”

Human migration was in motion long before the creation of the modern nation-state. It will be with us as long and there is life on earth.

Moreover, the realities of climate change and the future migrations and political reckonings it will force go well-beyond our already overly restrictive legal refugee regimes. Like it or not — and those of us fortunate to live in potential “receiving countries” shouldn’t fear it — there will be more, not less, human migration in the future.

In this context, I’m highly skeptical that “armed robo-dogs” — even those miracles of modern technology fully weaponized to “go into barracks and blow a motherfucker’s face off” — are the durable solutions to inevitable events that we need. 

It struck me that the woman who insisted that Todd keep her 35 cents, and the patient folks camped out around a wood cooking fire just south of the fence, waiting for appointments and hearings that might never come from the poor technology (how would an armed robo-dog react to the badly flawed “CBP One App” inflicted on human asylum seekers — state of the art technology seems rather one-sided at DHS, as most advocates would tell you) and our broken asylum legal system, probably are closer to having the answers to the future than any of the “hot air” politicos calling the shots or aspiring to do so.

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-10-23

🛡⚔️ THE ONGOING QUEST FOR THE “HOLY GRAIL OF JUSTICE” — Round Table Files Brief In Support Of Due Process, Rule of Law In East Bay Sanctuary v. Biden!

Knightess
Knightess of the Round Table

KEY EXCERPT:

INTRODUCTION

As former immigration judges and former members of the Board, we submit this amicus brief to ask the Northern District of California to strike down the Circumvention of Lawful Pathways Rule, 88 Fed. Reg. 31314 (May 11, 2023). The Rule, which came into effect in the immediate aftermath of Title 42s sunset and which applies to non-Mexican asylum-seekers at the U.S.-Mexico border, automatically forecloses a migrants asylum claim unless the person (i) arrives at an official port of entry having secured an immigration appointment through a complex mobile application, (ii) receives advance permission to travel to the U.S., or (iii) comes to the U.S. after applying for and being denied asylum in a transit country. Absent proof one of these narrow exceptions or a medical or other emergency, asylum-seekers will be unable to seek asylum regardless of whether they have compelling claims to relief.

Immigration judges serve an important role in the Congressionally-mandated process for reviewing the claims of asylum-seekers at or near the U.S.-Mexico border. This decades-old process, known as Expedited Removal, has its own flaws, but it does provide a credible fear review system that provides important protections for those seeking asylum. Specifically, and as explained in more detail below, the Expedited Removal statute requires that asylum-seekers, regardless of how they entered the United States, be interviewed by asylum officers to determine whether they have a credible fear of persecution and therefore can proceed to a full asylum hearing under Section 240 of the INA. The statute further mandates that immigration judges provide de novo review of asylum officersnegative credible fear determinations, and thus make the final decision about whether an asylum-seeker at the U.S.-Mexico border has shown a credible fear of persecution and will have the opportunity to progress to a full asylum hearing.

The Rule unlawfully undermines this statutory scheme. First, the Rule creates clear bars to asylum for most migrants, disingenuously labeling these as rebuttable presumptions.” As a result, almost all claims for asylum are pretermitted without the full asylum credible fear interviews required by the statutory Expedited Removal process. Rather, the credible fear interview will be turned into a reasonable fear” interview to determine whether the migrant can proceed to claim withholding of

removal or protection under the Convention Against Torture (CAT”), lesser forms of relief compared to asylum. Asylum-seekers are thus denied the opportunity to obtain full review of their asylum credible fear claims, including the de novo review by an immigration judge as required by Section 235 of the INA, 8 C.F.R. § 235.3. Instead, asylum-seekers may only seek review from an immigration judge as to the application of the narrow exceptions under the Rule or the lesser claims for relief. Accordingly, the Rule significantly and unlawfully curtails the role of immigration judges in asylum adjudication as set forth in the INA.

Moreover, the idea that the Rule heightens efficiency in the asylum adjudication process is an illusion. When an asylum-seeker is denied the ability to provide a credible fear of persecution, Expedited Removal still requires a review of potentially more complicated claims for withholding of removal and protection under the CAT. Thus, immigration judges on the one hand find their hands tied, unable to review the claims of bona fide asylum-seekers, but on the other hand are required to delve into the standards of withholding and CAT. Thus, the Rule turns a straightforward (and efficient) asylum credible fear review into a three-part analysis: the Rule exceptions, withholding, and CAT.

Finally, by creating exclusions that deny asylum to refugees who appear at the U.S.-Mexico border, the Rule violates U.S. obligations under the 1951 Refugee Convention. Longstanding canons of statutory and regulatory construction require consideration of international law; in this case, the Rule violates both the INA and international law.

. . . .

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

Read the complete brief skillfully prepared by our friend Ashley Vinson Crawford and her team at Akin Gump!

Ashley Vinson Crawford
Ashley Vinson Crawford, ESQ
Partner Akin Gump
San Francisco, CA
“Honorary Knightess of the Round Table”
PHOTO: Akin Gump

Our brief basically reiterates, expands, and applies points we made in our recent comments opposing the Biden Administration’s “Death to Asylum,” regulations! See https://immigrationcourtside.com/2023/03/27/⚔%EF%B8%8F🛡-round-table-joins-chorus-of-human-rights-experts-slamming-biden-administrations-abominable-death-to-asylum-seekers-☠%EF%B8%8F-proposed/

Rather than heeding our comments and those of many other experts, the Administration proceeded with its wrong-headed changes, rammed through a farcically truncated “comment period” that showed that process was little but a sham. This is the exact kind of mockery of justice and prejudgement that one might have expected from the Trump Administration. It’s also one of the many things concerning immigration that Biden and Harris “ran against” in 2020 but lacked the will and integrity to achieve in practice.

Notably, we’re not the only group of “concerned experts” weighing in against the Biden Administration’s ill-advised rules. The union representing the USCIS Asylum Officers were among the many expert organizations and individuals filing in support of the plaintiffs in East Bay Santuary. See, e.g., Asylum Officers, Ex-Judges Back Suit On Biden Asylum Rule – Law360.

Among other choice commentary, the Asylum Officers argue that the rule “effectively eliminates asylum” at the southern border! What on earth is a Dem Administration doing betraying  due process and the rule of law in favor of the most scurrilous type of nativist anti-asylum pandering — stuff right out of the “Stephen Miller playbook?” Who would have thought that we would get rid of Miller & company in 2020, yet still have to deal with his ghost in a Biden/Harris Administration that clearly and beyond any reasonable doubt has “lost its way” on immigration, human rights, racial justice, and the rule of  law?

As Round Table spokesperson “Sir Jeffrey” Chase says, “We are in very good company!” Too bad that the Biden Administration has wandered off course into the morally vacant, disingenuous “never-never land” of anti-asylum, racially-driven nativism! It certainly did not have to be this way had effective, principled, expert leadership taken hold at the beginning.

🇺🇸  Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-09-23

🇺🇸🗽😎 FACED WITH GOP GOV’S CRUEL STUNTS, BIDEN ADMINISTRATION’S INDIFFERENCE TO HUMAN RIGHTS, GOOD FOLKS IN SACRAMENTO JUST “DO THE RIGHT THING” & WELCOME MIGRANTS — “I’m hoping to have a good life here and I was welcomed with open arms,” one woman wrote. “I want to work and serve. We are here to help.”

Mackenzie Mays
Mackenzie Mays
Politics & Government Reporter
LA Times
PHOTO: Twitter

http://enewspaper.latimes.com/infinity/article_share.aspx?guid=fbb1f5c1-f13f-4dac-b153-d626bff1ae79

Mackenzie Mays reports for the LA Times:

With clothing, food and shelter, church groups aid people flown to California on chartered flights arranged by Florida officials, which many in this state call a political stunt

By Mackenzie Mays

SACRAMENTO — On the same day that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration took responsibility for sending dozens of migrants seeking asylum to California, the volunteers and organizers inside the Trinity Episcopal Cathedral of Sacramento refused to say the Republican politician’s name.

Instead, they wanted to talk about the 36 men and women they’ve cared for this week, who they say were left exhausted, confused and afraid at the doorstep of a local church in what California officials have called a political stunt.

Gabby Trejo, executive director of Sacramento Area Congregations Together, said the migrants she took to church with her on Sunday — some who had walked thousands of miles over the course of several months from Venezuela to the U.S. — reached into their pockets to offer a dollar for the collection plate.

“I said, no, you need it more than our church does today. But they didn’t care. They still put it in the plate,” Trejo said. “In that moment, our new neighbors showed me what it means for them to also be able to contribute to our community.”

Cecila Flores, who has supported the migrants since the first group arrived by plane on Friday, wiped away tears at a news conference on Tuesday.

In their 20s and 30s, most of the migrants are the first in their families to make it to the U.S. and are eager to work, she said. Some are married. One brought along a dog named Gieco.

When she asks them simple questions like what they want for dinner, they are timid. Anything is fine, they always say.

“It’s been years since I’ve been able to pick my own clothes,” one man told Flores, an organizer at Sacramento ACT, after a volunteer took him to the thrift store.

The identities of the migrants, who also came from countries including Colombia and Guatemala, remain undisclosed as the California Department of Justice investigates the incident. Meanwhile, Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom has threatened conservative presidential hopeful DeSantis with kidnapping charges.

Organizers said Tuesday that the migrants had arrived at the Texas border, where they were met by people claiming to be with a relocation program, promising housing and jobs. They were then shuttled to New Mexico and flown to Sacramento on a chartered plane.

. . . .

The people working on the ground with them in Sacramento said that the migrants had no idea where they were headed. Their “American dream” quickly became “a nightmare,” Trejo said, adding they were deceived.

Along with city and county officials, local church leaders and nonprofits have scrambled to help them.

. . . .

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

Where is the leadership, competence, and “good government” the Biden Administration promised during the 2020 campaign?

California needs affordable housing and workers, particularly in agriculture, child care, and health care. Migrants can help with this. They are eager to contribute.

The key is to get them represented, through the system with grants of asylum or other protection that many are eligible for, work authorized, and on their way to durable legal status. 

Stunts like De Santis’s, misplaced “deterrence,” lack of creativity, and poor leadership by the Administration and Dems in DC are wasting resources and time that could be used to solve problems, not aggravate them! 

Once again, the Biden Administration has left the job of making the flawed immigration system work to individuals without sufficient Federal support or coordination. Yet, they disdain the advice and counsel of these “grass roots experts” in favor of mindless, half-baked deterrence gimmicks derived from Stephen Miller and other GOP neo-fascists! Why?

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-97-23

🏴‍☠️🤯 112 NGOs BLAST BIDEN ADMINISTRATION’S BAD APPROACH TO CREDIBLE FEAR, DEMAND IMMEDIATE END (Good Luck With That)! “ — “These policies punish people seeking safety and prioritize political optics over the administration’s stated aim of working to ‘restore and strengthen our own asylum system, which has been badly damaged by policies enacted over the last four years that contravened our values and caused needless human suffering.’”

Border Detention
Due process and fundamental fairness are elusive in DHS’s “New American Gulag!” Administration policy wonks absent themselves from the border to avoid witnessing the unnecessary human trauma and suffering their illegal and ill-advised policies cause.
PHOTO: Public Realm

https://www.refugeesinternational.org/reports/2023/6/5/the-biden-administration-must-immediately-stop-conducting-credible-fear-interviews-in-cbp-custody

Refugees International June 5, 2023

 The Honorable Alejandro N. Mayorkas

Secretary

U.S. Department of Homeland Security

2707 Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue, SE

Washington, D.C. 20528

 

Ur M. Jaddou

Director

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services

5900 Capital Gateway Drive

Camp Springs, Maryland 20588

 

Troy A. Miller

Acting Commissioner

U.S. Customs and Border Protection

1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW

Washington, D.C. 20229

 

David L. Neal

Director

Executive Office for Immigration Review

5107 Leesburg Pike

Falls Church, VA 22041

 

Dear Secretary Mayorkas, Director Jaddou, Acting Commissioner Miller, and Director Neal,

We, the undersigned 112 civil, human rights, faith-based, and immigration groups write to express our deep concern with your return to the Trump-era policy of forcing asylum seekers to explain by phone the life-threatening harms they’re fleeing mere hours after arriving in the U.S., while being held in Customs and Border Protection (CBP) detention, and essentially cut off from legal help. In March 2023, nearly 100 organizations reminded President Biden of his commitment to end the Trump policy, urging him not to rush back to the broken, anti-asylum policies that this administration rightly terminated. We are incredibly disappointed that this administration has chosen to move forward, full steam ahead. We call on the Biden administration to immediately cease conducting credible fear interviews (CFIs) in CBP custody and instead ensure that asylum seekers are given full and fair access to the U.S. asylum system, including meaningful access to counsel.

Since taking effect, President Biden’s iteration of this policy has produced systemic due process barriers similar to its predecessor policy, with asylum seekers being rushed through CFIs and immigration judge reviews with little to no access to counsel. President Biden’s asylum ban, another iteration of Trump-era policies, is further exacerbating these mass due process violations and fueling the systematic deportation of individuals who may qualify for protection in the U.S., in violation of the non-derogable principle of non-refoulement.

The Biden administration is effectively denying asylum seekers any meaningful chance to consult with counsel and rushing them through a sham process to quickly deport them, including by:

  • Conducting CFIs shortly upon an individual’s arrival in CBP detention without providing or allowing them to access the time and resources needed to recover from their journey or the harm they survived;
  • Barring attorneys from entering the CBP facilities where asylum seekers are jailed and CFIs are conducted;
  • Truncating the minimum time period individuals have to attempt to telephonically consult with an attorney to a mere 24 hours after receiving notice of the credible fear process. This change is especially absurd given that new policies, such as the asylum ban and the return of certain nationalities to Mexico, expand the content about which an individual may need to consult an attorney;
  • Failing to provide asylum seekers hard copies of the M-444 Information About Credible Fear Interview in contravention of 8 CFR § 208.30(d)(2), hard copies of the list of pro bono legal service providers, and advanced written notice of the CFI;
  • Heightening the standard for requests to reschedule a CFI to a showing of “extraordinary circumstances,” likely making it nearly impossible for asylum seekers to reschedule a CFI in order to secure representation or prepare for the interview;
  • Restricting asylum seekers’ access to telephones, in contravention of 8 CFR § 208.30(d)(4), and denying them writing utensils, in effect forcing them to attempt to commit key information to memory, including their attorney’s contact information and information about the CFI process;
  • Requiring an applicant’s signature on the Form G-28 for attorneys to enter an appearance with the Asylum Office, which often cannot be timely obtained by attorneys who are remotely representing jailed clients, thereby obstructing their ability to obtain information about their clients;
  • Conducting CFIs, including outside of normal business hours and on weekends, without the attorney of record present, in contravention of 8 CFR § 208.30(d)(4);
  • Failing to provide advance written notice to attorneys of record prior to a scheduled CFI or immigration court review hearing, including by not updating the EOIR Cases and Appeals System (ECAS) to reflect upcoming court hearings;
  • Failing to afford individuals time and opportunity following negative fear determinations to consult with counsel who could advise them about their rights and the review process;
  • Failing to serve asylum seekers and their attorneys with their record of credible fear determinations in contravention of 8 CFR § 208.30(g)(1);
  • Blocking attorneys from entering an appearance with the immigration court, including by not docketing immigration court review cases in a timely manner, thereby preventing them from representing their clients;
  • Refusing to permit attorneys to actively participate in immigration court reviews and rejecting evidence submitted in advance of the immigration court review; and
  • Conducting Immigration Judge reviews of negative credible fear findings without the attorney of record present.

Forcing asylum seekers in CBP detention to proceed with their CFIs while facing nearly insurmountable barriers to legal counsel –while also subjecting them to an asylum ban – upends any notion of fairness. Instead, it is an evisceration of our asylum system. The installation of new phone booths, which you claim differentiate Biden’s program from the Trump policy, fails entirely to address any of these systemic obstacles. Additionally, the Biden administration’s decision to conduct immigration court reviews immediately following these lightning-fast CFIs, while the individual is still in CBP custody, unacceptably further heightens the due process barriers asylum seekers must overcome to avoid summary deportation.

We have also received troubling reports of the terrible conditions that asylum seekers face in CBP custody while awaiting their CFIs, in line with years of reports of abusive, dehumanizing, and sometimes life-threatening conditions that include medical neglect, inedible food and water, and lack of access to showers and other basic hygiene. It has been less than a month since the unforgivable death of eight-year-old Anadith Tanay Reyes Álvarez, who was jailed in one of the CBP facilities where your administration conducts CFIs. We are horrified that the administration has systematized the detention of asylum seekers in these same deadly conditions while rushing them through fear screenings.

Notably, the administration has a choice: it is not required to use expedited removal and has the authority to refer people for full asylum hearings, rather than subjecting them to rushed CFIs in dehumanizing CBP detention while cut off from legal help. Sacrificing fairness for speed by jailing people fleeing persecution and torture, subjecting them to a ban on asylum, and forcing them to proceed with a life-or-death interview without meaningful access to counsel must not be this administration’s response to people wishing to exercise their fundamental human right to seek asylum. These policies punish people seeking safety and prioritize political optics over the administration’s stated aim of working to “restore and strengthen our own asylum system, which has been badly damaged by policies enacted over the last four years that contravened our values and caused needless human suffering.”

Respectfully,

Acacia Center for Justice

Afghans For A Better Tomorrow

African Human Rights Coalition

Al Otro Lado

Alianza Americas

Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, ACCE

American Friends Service Committee (AFSC)

American Gateways

American Immigration Council

Americans for Immigrant Justice (AI Justice)

Amnesty International USA

Angry Tias and Abuelas

Asian Americans Advancing Justice | AAJC

Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project (ASAP)

Bend the Arc: Jewish Action

Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI)

Bridges Faith Initiative

Border Kindness

Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights Coalition

Center for Constitutional Rights

Center for Gender & Refugee Studies

Center for Victims of Torture

Central American Resource Center of Northern CA – CARECEN SF

Church World Service

Cleveland Jobs with Justice

Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights (CHIRLA)

Community Action Board of Santa Cruz County, Inc. (CAB)

Community Legal Services in East Palo Alto (CLSEPA)

Diocesan Migrant and Refugee Services Inc.

Dorcas International Institute of RI

Fellowship Southwest

First Focus on Children

Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project

Franciscan Action Network

Freedom Network USA

Greater Boston Legal Services

Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinical Program

HIAS

Houston Immigration Legal Services Collaborative

Human Rights First

Human Rights Initiative of North Texas

Immigrant Defenders Law Center

Immigrant Legal Resource Center

Immigration Equality

Immigration Law & Justice Network

Immigration Hub

Innovation Law Lab

Interfaith-RISE

Interfaith Welcome Coalition – San Antonio

International Center of Kentucky

International Institute of Los Angeles

International Institute of New England

International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP)

ISLA: Immigration Services and Legal Advocacy

JAMAAT – Jews and Muslims and Allies Acting Together

Jewish Family Service of San Diego

Jewish Vocational Service of Kansas City

Just Neighbors

Justice in Motion

Kino Border Initiative

Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center

Latino Community Foundation

Lawyers for Good Government

Legal Aid Justice Center

Lost and Found Church of the Nazarene

Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services

Mariposa Legal, program of COMMON Foundation

Massachusetts Law Reform Institute

Metrowest Legal Services

Minnestoa Freedom Fund

MLPB

Mujeres Unidas y Activas

Muslim Advocates

National Employment Law Project

National Immigrant Justice Center

National Immigration Law Center

National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights

National Partnership for New Americans

NCLR (National Center for Lesbian Rights)

Northeastern University School of Law Immigrant Justice Clinic

Open Immigration Legal Services

Oromo Center for Civil and Political Rights

Oxfam America

Phoenix Legal Action Network

Physicians for Human Rights

Public Law Center

RAICES

Refugees International

Resource Center Matamoros / Asylum Seeker Network of Support, Inc.

Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights

Rocky Mountain Immigrant Advocacy Network

SIREN, Services Immigrant Rights and Education Network

Southwest Asylum & Migration Institute (“SAMI”)

Student Clinic for Immigrant Justice

Survivors of Torture, International

Team Brownsville

Tennessee Justice for Our Neighbors

The Advocates for Human Rights

The Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc.

The Reformed Church of Highland Park

UC Davis Immigration Law Clinic

Unitarian Universalists for Social Justice

Unitarian Universalist Service Committee

United Sikhs

U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (USCRI)

USAHello

Vera Institute of Justice

Washington Office on Latin America

Wind of the Spirit Immigrant Resource Center

Witness at the Border

Women’s Refugee Commission

Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights

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

Interesting way for a Dem Administration to treat human rights, due process, and fundamental fairness! Remarkable rejection of values that got them elected! Is “dismissive dissing” of the views of the “folks who brought you to the dance” really the key to future success?

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-07-23

⚖️👩‍⚖️ NAIJ PREZ/EXPERT JUDGE MIMI TSANKOV TAKES YOU “INSIDE EOIR” FOR A LOOK AT THE PROS & CONS OF TELEVIDEO IN IMMIGRATION COURT — A LAW360 Special!

 

https://www.law360.com/articles/1509443/inside-immigration-court-the-pros-cons-of-remote-hearings

Series

Inside Immigration Court: The Pros, Cons Of Remote Hearings

By Mimi Tsankov | June 2, 2023, 6:05 PM EDT ·

Listen to article

In this Expert Analysis series, immigration judges discuss best practices for attorneys who appear before them and important developments in immigration court practice for cases involving asylum, detention, deportation and adjustment to lawful permanent resident status.

Hon. Mimi Tsankov
Hon. Mimi Tsankov
President,NAIJ

Mimi Tsankov

The pandemic has reset settled expectations about how we interact in the workplace, and that transformation has hurled the nation’s immigration courts on a technological voyage into the 21st century.

Despite record congressional appropriations over the past few cycles targeted, in part, on technological advances, the court has relied historically on physical files, paper communications and traditional, in-person exchanges.[1]

Although video teleconferencing has been in limited use at the immigration court since the mid-1990s, those hearings were most often in detained settings, relying typically on judges, attorneys, interpreters and legal staff who were physically present in the courthouse.[2]

Not so post-September 2021, when pandemic restraints required the U.S. Department of Justice‘s Executive Office for Immigration Review, or EOIR, home to the immigration court system, to rethink the basics of how we interact.

During the pandemic, with court staff hamstrung for months, struggling to process mountains of court-paper filings, and judges in some jurisdictions unable to hold hearings, EOIR rolled out about 100 specially equipped laptops with digital audio recording applications installed and connected to a commercially available video conferencing application called Cisco Webex.

These so-called DAR laptops enable the parties, the witnesses, the public and even the judge to appear at hearings virtually because the laptops can digitally record the video hearings in the same way as a judge in a courtroom.[3]

This powerful advance was made all the more effective with the introduction of the EOIR Courts and Appeals System, or ECAS, an online tool for filing and maintaining records of proceeding that is now operational throughout the entire immigration court system.[4]

. . . .

With improvements sure to be made as technological capabilities advance in the years ahead, the OIG has recommended that immigration courts “[c]ontinue the deployment of remote kits to immigration judges to ensure that immigration judges have the equipment necessary to adjudicate hearings efficiently from non-court settings.” This way, judges can more easily assist courts in areas overwhelmed by new cases, and mitigate health- and safety-related court cancelations.

Expansion of the remote judge corps program offers obvious efficiencies, especially if the court is able to speed up and optimize digitization of our backlogged files. Although there are some courts that are reducing reliance on the remote hearing program, as of February that appears to be an anomaly given the overwhelming support nationwide for the program.[14]

With the trial immigration judges poised to adapt and adopt these advances, it will be up to EOIR management to lead the way in determining how quickly and effectively these and other stakeholder-identified challenges can be addressed.

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

Thanks, Mimi, for all you do for due process and American justice! The above link will take you to the full article, complete with citations and disclaimer.

Sadly, my friend, waiting for “EOIR management to lead the way,” is likely to be “Waiting for Godot.”

Waiting for Godot
Immigration practitioners waiting for EOIR “Management” to show. It could be a long wait. Very long!
Naseer’s Motley Group in The Rose Bowl
Merlaysamuel
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0
Waiting for Godot in Doon School.jpg Copy
[[File:Waiting for Godot in Doon School.jpg|Waiting_for_Godot_in_Doon_School]]
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December 8, 2011

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-06-23

⚖️🧑‍⚖️ THERE’S STILL TIME (BUT NOT MUCH) TO REGISTER FOR CMS’S “DEEP DIVE” INTO EOIR’S DYSFUNCTION, WITH TRUE EXPERTS

 

TOMORROW, June 6 at 12:30pm ET, the Center for Migration Studies of New York (CMS) will host a webinar and discussion on its latest paper entitled, The US Immigration Courts, Dumping Ground for the Nation’s Systemic Immigration Failures: The Causes, Composition, and Politically Difficult Solutions to the Court Backlog, by Donald Kerwin and Evin Millet.

Experts on the immigration court system will highlight the systemic problems in the US immigration system that have caused and sustained the backlog, and offer recommendations for reversing the backlog.

Speakers include:

  • Donald Kerwin, former executive director of CMS and Editor of the Journal of Migration and Human Security
  • Mimi Tsankov, President, National Association of Immigration Judges and member, Expert Advisory Group
  • Richard A. Boswell, Professor of Law, UC College of Law, San Francisco, and member, Expert Advisory Group

As well as additional members of the Expert Advisory Group:

  • Gregory Chen, Senior Director of Government Relations, American Immigration Lawyers Association
  • Anna Gallagher, Executive Director, Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc.
  • Karen T. Grisez, Pro Bono Counsel, Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver, and Jacobsen, LLP
  • Hon. Dana Leigh Marks (retired), President Emerita, National Association of Immigration Judges (in her personal capacity)
  • Michele Pistone, Professor of Law, Villanova University
  • Andrew Schoenholtz, Professor from Practice, Georgetown University Law Center
  • Denise Noonan Slavin, retired judge, Adjunct Professor, St. Thomas University School of Law
  • Charles Wheeler, Senior Attorney/Director Emeritus, Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc.
Click the button below to register for FREE!
REGISTER
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The Center for Migration Studies (CMS) is a New York-based educational institute devoted to the study of international migration, to the promotion of understanding between immigrants and receiving communities, and to public policies that safeguard the dignity and rights of migrants, refugees, and newcomers. For more information, please visit www.cmsny.org.

Copyright © 2023 Center for Migration Studies, New York, All rights reserved.

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Center for Migration Studies, New York · 307 East 60th Street · New York, NY 10022 · USA

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

To be bluntly honest, this panel of experts appears to be the group that an Administration seriously committed to restoring due process, fundamental fairness, and best practices to the “retail level” of U.S. justice would have hired in January 2021, to clean house 🧹 and institute lasting institutional reforms at America’s worst courts!

They have been “hiding in plain sight” for the past 2.5 years while Garland has been flailing and failing to bring order and long-overdue reforms to his tragically broken system!

Clown Car
Isn’t it time to finally get the “EOIR Clown Show” off the road before it causes more fatalities? Many experts think so!
PHOTO CREDIT: Ellin Beltz, 07-04-16, Creative Commons License, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/. Creator not responsible for above caption.

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-05-23

☹️ WRONG AGAIN: 1st Cir. KO’s 🥊 BIA On Firearms! — Portillo v. DHS

Dan Kowalski
Dan Kowalski
Online Editor of the LexisNexis Immigration Law Community (ILC)

Dan Kowalski reports for LexisNexis immigration:

https://www.lexisnexis.com/community/insights/legal/immigration/b/insidenews/posts/ca1-on-realistic-probability-portillo-v-dhs#

CA1 on Realistic Probability: Portillo v. DHS

May 31, 2023

(1 min read)

Portillo v. DHS

“Gerardo A. Portillo petitions for review of a decision of the Board of Immigration Appeals (“BIA”) affirming his order of removal and denying his application for adjustment of status. Because we find that a conviction under Massachusetts General Laws (“MGL”) ch. 269, § 11C is not categorically a firearm offense as defined by 8 U.S.C. § 1227(a)(2)(C), we grant the petition for review, vacate the decision below, and remand for further proceedings. … Accordingly, without resorting to “legal imagination,” we conclude that MGL ch. 269, § 11C sweeps more broadly than the federal offense, and Portillo need not produce an actual case to demonstrate that overbreadth. … For the reasons stated above, we grant the petition for review, vacate the BIA’s opinion, and remand for further proceedings consistent with this decision.”

[Hats off to Jennifer Klein, Susan Brooks Church and Kathleen Marie Gillespie!  Audio of the oral argument here.]

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

Congrats to the NDPA “litigation team” of Klein, Church, & Gillespie!

Notably, the unanimous 1st Circuit did a detailed 24-page analysis to get this one right. This is the type of scholarship and effort one might expect, but doesn’t consistently get, from the BIA.

Remarkably, this case has now been pending for more than six years at EOIR. Now, largely as a consequence of EOIR’s, toxic “how can we get to no” bias, present over the past several Administrations, it’s back to “square one” with no end in sight.

THAT’S how a system builds uncontrollable backlog! Maybe pruning out the “deadwood” and bringing in “practical scholar-experts” as judges at the appellate and trial levels wouldn’t solve all the problems that have been building up for decades at EOIR. But, it sure would be a great start on a better future!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-05-23

📊 THE ECONOMY & SOCIETY W/ CATHERINE RAMPELL @ WASHPOST: Immigrants & Women “Punch Above Their Weight” — “[L]et’s celebrate the underdogs helping supercharge our economy to date.”

Catherine Rampell
Catherine Rampell
Opinion Columnist
Washington Post

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/06/02/jobs-boom-immigrants-

. . . .

To be clear, immigrants remain a small share of the labor market. They account for less than one-fifth of employment overall. But they are more than punching above their weight in this recovery, particularly as (disproportionately older) native-born Americans retire. Increased immigration may be helping resolve some other economic challenges, too. It’s unclear how many forecasters have been incorporating these improvements in the functioning of the immigration system into their models.

Another group unexpectedly punching above its weight: women.

. . . .

To be sure, there are reasons to fear that all those pessimistic forecasts we’ve heard for months — about more layoffs, and possible recession — haven’t been wrong, exactly. They may just have been early. Those dour predictions are partly a product of the sharp interest rate hikes and tightening financial conditions we’ve seen recently. These factors historically have been followed by recessions. We may not have yet seen their full effects this time around, and there are signs of financial stress emerging.

In the meantime, though, let’s celebrate the underdogs helping supercharge our economy to date.

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

Read Catherine’s full article at the link.

As I’ve said before, immigrants of all types are a great story. Unfortunately, many in the GOP are determined to deny, distort, and dehumanize immigration for perceived political gain. 

At the same time, the Biden Administration and too many Democrats seem unwilling or reluctant to embrace and tout the truth about migration. They appear to be hoping that migration will just disappear as a political and societal issue (which it hasn’t, and won’t).

That leaves immigrants and their advocates to just keep plugging away and working hard to improve a society that too often either ignores or fails to appreciate their disproportionately substantial achievements and huge potential for creating a better future for all. 

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-04-23

🇺🇸⚖️🗽🦸🏻 AMERICAN HERO: Round Table 🛡⚔️ Judge (Ret.) Ilyce Shugall Reflects On Two Decades Of Promoting Justice & Resisting Evil: “While United States detention policies and conditions were cruel when I worked at ProBAR, they are exponentially worse today.”

Ilyce Shugall
Hon. Ilyce Shugall
U.S Immigration Judge (Ret)
Managing Attorney at ILD and Senior Counsel in the Immigration Program at Community Legal Services in East Palo Alto, CA
Adjunct Professor, VIISTA Villanova
Member, Round Table of Former Immigration Judges
PHOTO: VIISTA Villanova

Published by the ABA:

https://www.americanbar.org/groups/public_interest/immigration/generating_justice_blog/probar-then-and-now/

I started my post-law school immigration law career at ProBAR in Harlingen, Texas, as an Equal Justice Works Fellow from September 1999 to September 2001.  In May, 2023, I had the privilege of returning to ProBAR as a volunteer with the ABA Commission on Immigration (COI) to engage in a week of pro bono service.  I have been a Commission member for almost three years.  My return, over twenty years after I left the Rio Grande Valley, provided me perspective, and caused me to reflect on the many changes as well as the constants in the South Texas border region, where I learned how to be a fierce immigration advocate.  I was privileged to spend the week with welcoming ProBAR staff, COI colleagues, and the COI director, Meredith Linsky, who was my boss and mentor at ProBAR, a hero to the immigrants’ rights movement, and is someone I am proud to call a colleague and friend.

Our first day of our pro bono week began at the new ProBAR office.  When I walked into the office, I felt like I was in a different world!  ProBAR’s new office space is large, spacious, beautiful, and inviting.  It is clear that much thought went into the design and structure of the office, considering the need for private office space, open collaborative space, large quiet spaces, conference rooms, outdoor space, and a gym and yoga room to ensure staff can decompress and energize before, during, or after long, challenging, and emotionally draining days.  The office is a sharp contrast to the ProBAR office where I worked—two rooms on the second floor of an old, pest-infested house.  The new office is equipped with state-of-the-art technology, another contrast from my experience, where we used dial up internet and unplugged the fax machine before we could access the internet.  We learned that ProBAR now has a staff of 270 people.  In 1999 when I started, we were a staff of three—the ProBAR director, the volunteer paralegal, and me.  I am thrilled to see the investment in the staff through hiring and creating a livable workspace.  Comfortable, functional, supportive workspace is crucial to the sustainability of the demanding work.

Our schedule for the week included meeting with partner organizations in Brownsville and Matamoros, meeting with individuals detained at the Port Isabel Detention Center (PIDC), touring children’s shelters, and visiting La Posada Providencia, a welcoming shelter for many immigrants and refugees.  I was impressed by the resiliency and responsiveness of organizations in the region.  The increase in resources for noncitizens in the Rio Grande Valley was striking and is unquestionably due to necessity.  The humanitarian crisis at the border is unlike anything I saw between 1999 and 2001 and the need has increased exponentially.  I was impressed by the partnerships established by the ProBAR team.  The increased staffing has allowed ProBAR to form and maintain crucial partnerships throughout the Rio Grande Valley.  During my time at ProBAR, we relied on trusted partnerships; however, due to our limited staffing, we were unable to engage in outreach or foster relationships with many organizations.  The current partnerships with shelters and other social services organizations are crucial to ProBAR’s ability to meet the needs to the community they serve.

ProBAR’s presence in Brownsville is remarkable.  We utilized ProBAR’s small office close to the border.  This space was crucial when the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) program was still in place, as ProBAR staff served clients facing removal proceedings in the tent courts.  The office space on the border continues to provide essential access to clients and the social services agencies that serve them.  It allows the ProBAR staff to do outreach, education, and intake at the non-legal organizations that serve mutual clients.  For example, while in Brownsville, we provided legal consultations to numerous individuals staying at a Brownsville shelter.  We also visited one of the unaccompanied children’s shelters in Brownsville, where ProBAR staff provide services.

During our pro bono week, we had the opportunity to travel to PIDC twice to provide consultations to recently arrived asylum seekers.  It was bittersweet to return to the detention center I frequented from 1999 to 2001, when I traveled daily to what was then called Port Isabel Service Processing Center (PISPC) – PIDC is a more appropriate name.  PIDC has not changed much.  The entrance, lobby, attorney visitation area, and court space have been remodeled.  I recall a dingy dirty lobby with a pay phone I used regularly to call the ProBAR office after long afternoons of presentations and consultations.  The lobby is now clean, spacious, and the pay phone is gone.  However, the interior of the detention center remains the same- a jail with razor wire, barbed wire, and no freedom of movement.  Also similar was ProBAR’s access to the facility due to the reputation the agency has built over the years.  When I went to PISPC daily, I felt respected by guards and government officials.  I learned the importance of building those relationships to ensure access to those who needed the services.  ProBAR’s reputation endures, and the relationships remain strong.  ProBAR’s continued ability to provide Know Your Rights presentations and consultations in the facility is crucial to serving the needs of thousands of individuals every year.

In the two days I conducted consultations with noncitizens at PIDC, I met men from Venezuela, Honduras, and Guatemala.  The nationalities of individuals detained have shifted over the years, but the reasons they have fled their homes remains constant.  They are fleeing political violence and oppression, gang violence, cartel violence, and government instability.  The men detained at PIDC endured exceptional hardship, danger, and suffering to arrive at the United States border to seek refuge.  While United States detention policies and conditions were cruel when I worked at ProBAR, they are exponentially worse today.  Currently, noncitizens are forced to stay in unsanitary and unsafe refugee camps in Matamoros often for months while trying to request protection in the United States.  They face disease, kidnapping, rape, and torture in Matamoros while the United States and Mexican governments turn a blind eye and collaborate to keep them from crossing the bridge into Brownsville.  When those lucky enough to find a way into the United States arrive, many are forced to remain detained in Customs and Border Protection custody for weeks, sleeping on the floor with limited to no access to showers and in freezing rooms or cells.  They then must navigate the new confusing and complex asylum rule without counsel.  While we were unable to provide representation, the men we met with were grateful for our explanation of the legal process, as well as the pro bono legal consultations we provided.

As part of our trip, we also had the opportunity to go to Matamoros and meet with partners at the Sidewalk School.  The plan to walk over the bridge, meet with Sidewalk School staff, and tour one of the refugee shelters took much time and coordination on the part of ProBAR and ABA staff.  Unlike when I lived and worked in Harlingen, when going to Matamoros was often a spur of the moment decision to have dinner or go shopping, today, numerous considerations must be assessed.  Matamoros was a safe city when I crossed regularly.  However, today, due to the United States’ and Mexico’s war on drugs, Matamoros is often dangerous, particularly for refugees hoping to reach the United States.  I appreciate the care, planning, and coordination that went into our day in Matamoros.  Witnessing the situation at the base of the bridge as well as the refugee camp was crucial to gaining a true understanding of the consequences of United States immigration law and policy changes over the last several years.  Photos of the bridge and the camp provide a glimpse into the reality that refugees are living.  However, the photos did not prepare me for what I saw and experienced.  Walking into and around the shelter full of makeshift tents, no sanitation, no services, in 90+ degree temperatures with soaring humidity was horrifying.  People approached us for information and help, desperate to access medical care and safety.  I fought back tears the entire time we were in the camp.  No one should live in these conditions, and no one who lives in the camps is there by choice.  Refugees tolerate the dangerous, unsanitary conditions that are making them sick because they were forced to leave their homes.  Their flight was not voluntary.  Seeing the camp provided me even greater perspective on the situations they fled.  I left feeling sad, horrified, and angry at the United States government policies that created the humanitarian crisis in Matamoros.  It is avoidable.  It can be changed for the better.  Instead, the United States government recently finalized a rule to make it harder for those seeking protection to access the United States asylum system.  This rule will exacerbate the problems in Matamoros and has caused and will continue to cause greater human suffering on both sides of the border.

I am thankful for my week with ProBAR.  I appreciated starting my days as I started many days when I lived in Harlingen decades ago, running on the path along the Arroyo Colorado in the heat and humidity, among the beautiful lush green plants, chirping birds, and adorable bunnies.  I found peace and energy running on the path, which carried me through the days of the harsh realities of human suffering and unfair laws and policies.  My time at ProBAR reminded me why I continue to work as an immigration attorney, why I work at another amazing nonprofit, Immigrant Legal Defense, to provide free legal services to underserved communities, including noncitizens in ICE detention.

Author

Ilyce Shugall

Managing Attorney at Immigrant Legal Defense

Ilyce is currently a Managing Attorney at ILD and Senior Counsel in the Immigration Program at Community Legal Services in East Palo Alto (CLSEPA).  She was an adjunct professor in the Villanova Interdisciplinary Immigration Studies Training for Advocates from January 2021 to December 2021.  She was previously the Director of the Immigrant Legal Defense Program at the Justice and Diversity Center of the Bar Association of San Francisco. Prior to joining JDC, Ilyce served for 18 months as an immigration judge in the San Francisco Immigration Court. Prior to serving as an immigration judge, Ilyce was the Directing Attorney of the Immigration Program at CLSEPA from 2012-2017. Under Ilyce’s leadership, CLSEPA’s immigration staff grew from four to twenty.  Ilyce also served temporarily as the first legal director for the San Francisco Immigrant Legal Defense Collaborative at the Bar Association of San Francisco in 2015. For 10 years, Ilyce was an attorney at Van Der Hout, LLP. Three of those years she spent as a partner. Before joining the private sector, she worked at the South Texas Pro Bono Asylum Representation Project (ProBAR) as a National Association of Public Interest Law/Equal Justice Fellow. Ilyce received the 2016 National Pro Bono Services Award from the American Immigration Lawyers Association; and was a 2015 Silicon Valley Business Journal’s “Women of Influence” awardee.  Ilyce is a commissioner on the American Bar Association’s Commission on Immigration and previously served as a commissioner on the State Bar of California Commission on Immigration and Nationality Law. She was NIPNLG’s update editor for Immigration Law and the Family from 2012-2017, and has published numerous articles on immigration law. Ilyce is an active member of the Round Table of Former Immigration Judges.  Ilyce holds a JD from DePaul University College of Law, and a BA from the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

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

Talk about a professional career spent on the “front lines” of fighting for due process and humanity! Thanks for all you do and for being such an inspiring role model, my friend (and fellow Badger). It’s an honor to be your colleague on the Round Table and the VIISTA Villanova Program!

I was detailed to the Port Isabel Detention Center shortly before my retirement. I remember it pretty much as Ilyce describes it today.

The facility and court personnel were nice and helpful. But, there was an aura of grimness, despair, and wastefulness hanging over everything that just couldn’t be dispelled. Leaving the facility every night have me a sense of relief.

I think that all so-called policy makers in the Biden Administration should be required to experience a week in one of their immigration prisons as a prerequisite for obtaining or retaining their jobs. Sadly, and inexcusably, we now have folks making life or death decisions about immigration and human rights policy and the future of our nation who know less and have less perspective than Ilyce and others had after completing their one-year EJW Fellowships! The lack of expertise, compassion, creativity, and common sense in the Biden Administration’s immigration hierarchy/bureaucracy shows!

To quote Ilyce, about the largely self-created “humanitarian crisis” at the border: “It is avoidable.  It can be changed for the better.” My question is why isn’t a Democratic Administration that many voted for to solve problems and make things better at the border getting the job done?

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-03-23

☠️🤮 THE TRUTH ABOUT BIDEN’S CURRENT BORDER POLICIES IS DISGUSTING, PERPLEXING, & BEYOND UGLY! — It’s Also Totally Unrelated To Scurrilous, Racist Border Myths Being Pedaled By GOP Govs Like Virginia’s Glenn “The Junkman” Youngkin! — Lindsay Toczylowski in The San Diego Union Tribune!

Lindsay Toczylowski
Lindsay Toczylowski
Executive Director, Immigrant Defenders
“ I always tell the new immigration attorneys at Immigrant Defenders Law Center to never forget just how stacked against our clients the odds are in immigration court.“

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/opinion/commentary/story/2023-05-24/opinion-joe-bidens-migrants-title-42-failure-broken-immigration-system-asylum-seekers

Toczylowski is executive director of Immigrant Defenders Law Center, a nonprofit legal organization working along the U.S.-Mexico border and throughout Southern California, and lives in Los Angeles.

The lifting of Title 42 — the policy that shut down the U.S. asylum system for three years — should have been an inflection point leading to a more humane and orderly system for processing asylum seekers. Instead, the Biden administration doubled down on the politics of exclusion, introducing new restrictive measures, including an asylum ban, that keep asylum out of reach for those who need protection the most.

. . . .

When asylum seekers are finally able to ask for protection, they are often met not with compassion but with cruelty. Just days ago in San Ysidro, I saw mothers with children sleeping on dirt while in Customs and Border Protection custody, sharing one port-a-potty for more than 500 people. Good Samaritans handed out supplies because CBP did not provide sufficient food, water or medicine.

. . . .

President Biden has perpetuated these failed deterrence policies despite his campaign promises to restore humanity at our border. The administration has turned its back on asylum seekers. These are real people. They deserve our protection. They deserve to be safe.

. . . .

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

Read Lindsay’s complete op-ed at the link.

These cruel, unnecessary, cowardly, and illegal policies are a disgrace to America and an embarrassment to the Democratic Party!

Meanwhile, dangerous lies are being promoted by Gov. Glenn “Junkman” Youngkin (R-VA) and other GOP Governors responding to Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s racist/nativist call for further National Guard infusions to militarize the border. See, e.g., https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/05/31/virginia-youngkin-national-guard-border/.

You don’t have to be either an immigration expert or very smart to recognize that desperate individuals trying to turn themselves in to CBP agents at or near the border, to exercise their legal rights to seek protection, are NOT going to be a meaningful source of fentanyl smuggling. That trade is controlled by cartels who basically smuggle product through ports of entry in large quantities disguised as or mingled with legitimate commercial commerce. 

Indeed, the preoccupation of CBP with improperly “deterring,” “discouraging,” and “punishing” legal asylum seekers not only empowers cartels, but significantly detracts from actual law enforcement against drug smugglers. And, the millions of dollars being misappropriated and wasted by Junkman and others on bogus National Guard deployments could much better and more appropriately be spent on humanitarian aid, coordinated, orderly resettlement programs for asylum seekers and asylees, and securing them legal representation to aid in the fair and timely processing of asylum claims. 

However, the repetition of bogus and deliberately fabricated narratives like the “Junkman’s” latest wasteful stunt creates a “guilt by repetition” syndrome that feeds and enables the racist agenda of today’s GOP as well as the spineless “rollover” response of the Biden Administration, and, sadly, some other so-called Democrats.

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-02-23