Senate Democrats – Page 6 – immigrationcourtside.com

🏴‍☠️☠️⚰️🤮👎KAKISTOCRACY KORNER: Trump’s Malicious Incompetence Bankrupts Once-Profitable Immigration Agency — The Solution Is NOT More Public Assistance For The Regime’s Freeloaders!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trump-brings-atlantic-city-style-bankruptcy-to-americas-immigration-agency/2020/07/03/a4619ff8-bc04-11ea-bdaf-a129f921026f_story.html

From the WashPost Editorial Board:

By Editorial Board

July 4 at 8:30 AM ET

AS A business mogul in Atlantic City, Donald Trump ran casinos that teetered continually toward bankruptcy, costing gullible investors well over $1 billion. Now President Trump’s policies have bankrupted the federal government’s main agency overseeing legal immigration, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, which is on the brink of imposing furloughs on thousands of its employees and is begging Congress for a bailout.

USCIS, which handles green cards for permanent legal residents, manages citizenship procedures and vets visa applicants, depends for its operating revenue almost entirely on fees from “customers,” meaning immigrants. The business model Mr. Trump’s administration devised for USCIS was a recipe for financial ruin: deplete income by driving away fee-paying applicants and pile up expenses by hiring thousands of new employees. Little wonder that after three-and-a-half years, USCIS has gone hat in hand to Congress, pleading for $1.2 billion. Without the extra funds — for an agency meant to be self-sufficient — USCIS has said more than 13,000 employees, of some 20,000 total workers, will be furloughed without pay indefinitely, starting next month.

Under Mr. Trump, USCIS has become a model of dysfunction. Perversely, that may be just fine with a White House that has been intent on deterring not only undocumented migrants but legal immigrants as well. It has done the latter largely through a matrix of policies that have made the agency much less a means by which immigrants are connected with U.S. employers and reconnected with relatives living in this country, and much more a nearly impassable obstacle course.

Well before the pandemic, applications for an array of immigrant categories plummeted as word spread that layers of new rules and vetting were driving down approval rates, and even trivial mistakes such as typos in applications would trigger rejections. In-person interviews were added as requirements for applicants who had not previously needed them, including skilled workers already in the country who needed visa extensions. Green card applications slumped in the Trump administration’s first two years and might fall further as applicants learn they would be disqualified if deemed likely to need public benefits such as subsidized housing or food stamps. The pandemic accelerated the agency’s death spiral as revenue derived from fees has dropped by half since March.

The effect of a mass furlough of USCIS staff would be to throw even more grit into the bureaucratic gears, further slowing approvals for work permits, including for high-skilled immigrants, and green cards. If the administration is intent on breaking the nation’s complex immigration machinery, which has supplied American businesses with the talent and energy of millions of employees, it is on the right path.

Employers are alarmed at the prospect of such a breakdown, with good reason. Virtually every sector of the country’s economy depends on a steady supply of immigrants, which in itself is justification for Congress to reassess USCIS’s fee-based model. Immigrants have provided the spark, drive and muscle that have driven growth and success in the United States since its founding. Given their contributions, it seems a gratuitous burden that they are also required to shoulder the cost of their admission to the country.

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The solution is actually very simple. Congress should require DHS to reprogram the necessary funds to run USCIS from the unneeded wall, unnecessary and often illegal immigration detention, and counterproductive civil deportations. All private detention contracts should be terminated and the money repurposed to USCIS. There should be a moratorium on DHS removals until USCIS is back in full operation and has eliminated all backlogs. Fee increases should be barred.

Exceptions should be made allowing deportations for those convicted of “aggravated felonies” and those whom the DHS can show by clear and convincing evidence entered the U.S. illegally after the date of enactment, following an opportunity for a full and fair hearing before a U.S. Magistrate Judge at which they will have an opportunity to apply for asylum and other protections without regard to any regulation or precedent decision issued during the Trump Administration. Appeal from any adverse decision may be had by either party to the U.S. District Judge and from there to the Court of Appeals with an opportunity to petition the Supreme Court for review. U.S. District Judges shall have the option of designating sitting U.S. Immigration Judges (but not anyone who has served a BIA Appellate Immigration Judge) with five or more years of judicial experience to serve as a “Special U.S. Magistrate Judge” to hear such immigration cases.

If Democrats can’t get a “veto proof majority” in both houses, they should just let the USCIS remain in bankruptcy until we get better Government. Like the rest of the Trump immigration kakistocracy, USCIS is a dysfunctional mess 🤮 that serves no useful purpose under current conditions.

Welfare Reform: We’ve identified the largest group of “welfare cheats” in U.S. history. Collectively, this gang of public benefits fraudsters is known as “The Trump Administration.” Its Members are worse than useless. We are actually paying them to pollute our environment, inhibit our voting, spread deadly disease, block access to health insurance, undermine scientific truth, destroy our justice system, defend Confederate statues, spread racism and hate, commit crimes against humanity, turn our nation into a despised international laughingstock, and often line their own pockets and pockets of their cronies with ill-gotten loot while doing it.

But we have it in our power to end these gross abuses of our public purse and to throw this dangerous band of indolent sponges on society off the public dole! This November, vote like your life and the future of our nation depend on it! Because they do!

PWS

07-06-20

WACKO-IN-CHIEF’S FINAL DESTRUCTION OF LEGAL IMMIGRATION SYSTEM BARS WORK VISAS FOR THOSE NEEDED FOR ECONOMIC RECOVERY — Xenophobic Move So Dumb & Counterproductive That Even Trump Tool L. Graham Forced to Feebly Dissent!

https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/503985-graham-trump-visa-order-will-have-a-chilling-effect-on-our-economic-recovery

Rebecca Klar reports for The Hill:

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said Monday that the order President Trump signed earlier in the day suspending, with some exceptions for health care and other “essential workers,” certain temporary work visas through the end of the year will have a “chilling effect” on the nation’s economic recovery amid the coronavirus pandemic.

“This decision, in my view, will have a chilling effect on our economic recovery at a time we should be doing all we can to restore the economy,” Graham said in a series of tweets.

. . . .

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Read Rebecca’s full article at the above link.

Of course, if Graham, Mitch, and their GOP buddies in the Senate and House really wanted to rein in Trump they could. Just get together with Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer and pass by veto-proof margins legislation countermanding or amending Trump’s order.

But, that would require action, not just babbling.

In the meantime, Trump has succeeded in totally destroying the U.S. legal immigration and refugee system that has taken decades to build. And, the institutions that could and should have stopped him failed.

PWS

06-23-22

NICOLE NAREA @ VOX: Sen. Booker Introduces Bill to Aid Migrant Health Care

https://apple.news/A-RCQm3FvRseAEFDQaZ6_Ug

Nicole writes:

New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker said he is planning to introduce legislation on Wednesday that would expand legal immigrants’ access to health care subsidy programs and allow unauthorized immigrants to buy health plans from federal insurance marketplaces.

The bill, known as the HEAL for Immigrant Women and Families Act, would permit legal immigrants to enroll in Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), provided that they meet the programs’ income requirements. Rep. Pramila Jayapal introduced the bill in the House in October 2019, but it would be the first time that the Senate would consider the legislation.

The bill isn’t likely to advance in a Republican-controlled Senate, where Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has already rejected relief for unauthorized immigrants. But it’s the latest effort by Democrats to rectify inequalities in access to health care laid bare by the coronavirus pandemic.

Only a fraction of immigrants is eligible for Medicaid and CHIP: naturalized citizens, green card holders who have lived in the US for at least five years, immigrants who come to the US on humanitarian grounds (such as receiving asylum), members of the military and their families, and, in certain states, children and pregnant women with lawful immigration status. But many other categories of immigrants — including temporary visa holders and young immigrants who have been allowed to live and work in the US under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program — would become eligible under Booker’s bill.

“Covid-19 has shined a punishing light on the unjust health care inequities that exist for communities of color broadly, and immigrant communities in particular,” Booker told Vox. “While we should always be working to expand access to health care for everyone, the dire current situation highlights the urgency of addressing these gaps in health care coverage. Health care is a right, and it shouldn’t depend on immigration status. We’re never going to be able to slow and stop the spread of the virus be if we continue to deny entire communities access to testing, treatment, or care.”

The bill also contains provisions expanding health care options for unauthorized immigrants, who are often uninsured and have so far been largely left out of Congress’s coronavirus relief efforts. Booker’s bill would allow them to buy health insurance on the Affordable Care Act marketplace, from which they’re currently barred. It would also allow unauthorized immigrants to become eligible for health care subsidies if they have purchased such an insurance plan and meet other criteria, including minimum income requirements.

. . . .

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Read the rest of Nicole’s always outstanding and accessible analysis at the above link.

Good luck with getting this through the Senate with Moscow Mitch and the GOP in charge! Not going to happen. And, Booker knows it!

Few groups in America have been as screwed over as migrants, regardless of status, in this pandemic. They perform some of the most difficult and essential jobs that have kept us going through this crisis. But, when it comes to safety, stimulus, health care, unemployment and pretty much anything else they are left out in the cold by the GOP nativists.

Get back to work: no PPE, social distancing, hazard pay, testing, unemployment benefits, home computers, or health care for you! This isn’t the “GOP playing Soup Nazi” – it’s the real deal, the 21^st Century version of completely expendable workers and intentional “dehumanization” of the “other.” Already, xenophobic GOP nativists are whining about the very modest economic emergency money that the State of California has provided to their migrant residents, many “essential workers,” regardless of status.

But, Booker’s HEAL bill is a significant “ready for prime-time marker” if we get regime change! Health care and immigration are huge issues in the Hispanic community. Biden needs to get out the Hispanic vote and having legislation like this “ready to roll” on “Day 1” will be key in energizing voters to “work through the obstacles” and vote Trump & the GOP Senators out in the key states to finally get some much needed aid out to the American Hispanic community and others, including folks in rural areas of so-called “Red States,” and disproportionately adversely affected African-American communities in need who are excluded from “Trump’s America” (except, of course, when the chips are down and we need workers for thankless jobs or when Trump needs votes). You can also add in Asian Americans who have been working hard for America but face a barrage of racist-inspired incidents. There’s a “community of interest” there that the Dems’ should be able to attract and build upon with “good government” that furthers the common interests.

This November, vote like your life depends on it. Because it does!

PWS

05-20-20

Judge Mimi Tsankov @ ABA JOURNAL: 🆘 Immigration Courts Now A Human Rights Catastrophe Threatening The Heart ❤️ & Soul 😇 Of American Justice!

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

https://www.americanbar.org/groups/crsj/publications/human_rights_magazine_home/immigration/human-rights-at-risk/

Judge Tsankov writes solely in her capacity as Eastern Region Vice President with the National Association of Immigration Judges (“NAIJ”) in the ABA Journal:

April 28, 2020 HUMAN RIGHTS

Human Rights at Risk: The Immigration Courts Are in Need of an Overhaul

The views expressed here do not represent the official position of the United States Department of Justice, the attorney general, or the Executive Office for Immigration Review. The views represent the author’s personal opinions, which were formed after extensive consultation with the membership of NAIJ.

by Hon. Mimi Tsankov

Share this:

“While immigration courts reside within the executive branch, they should not be merely a tool to achieve desired policy outcomes.”

—Senator Sheldon Whitehouse

So wrote Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) in his February 13, 2020, letter to Attorney General William Barr, in which he and eight members of the Senate Judiciary Committee called upon Barr to take action against, what he termed, an increasingly troubling politicization of the immigration court adjudication process.

The stakes couldn’t be higher for those seeking human rights protection in the form of asylum and other forms of relief from persecution and torture. Individual liberty and personal safety interests are often at stake in immigration court proceedings where immigration judges have the authority to grant protection from persecution. Id.; see also, 8 U.S.C. 1158. Whitehouse gave voice to what is becoming an alarming trend—the increasing political influence over individual immigration cases. This action, he explained, is undermining the public’s confidence in the immigration courts and creating an impression that “cases are being decided based on political considerations rather than the relevant facts and law. The appearance of bias alone is corrosive to the public trust.” Whitehouse Letter, supra, at 5; see also, 8 U.S.C. Section 1229a(b)(4)(A) and (B); 8 C.F.R. 1003.10(b).

Whitehouse recounted a sentiment articulated previously by a host of legal community leaders for more than a decade, not the least of which was ABA President Judy Perry Martinez, who in a recent statement before the U.S. Congress explained that housing a court within a law enforcement agency has exacerbated an inherent conflict of interest undermining “the basic structural and procedural safeguards that we take for granted in other areas of our justice system.” See, Am. Bar. Assoc., 2019 Update Report: Reforming the Immigration System, Proposals to Promote Independence, Fairness, Efficiency, and Professionalism in the Adjudication of Removal Cases (Mar. 2019). As she explained, “this structural flaw leaves Immigration Judges particularly vulnerable to political pressure and interference in case management.” Martinez Testimony, supra, at 1.

It is important to note that these concerns are being expressed on the heels of what some see as growing impunity within the executive branch, focused almost single-mindedly on the speed of removal hearings at the risk of diminished due process. See Statement of Jeremy McKinney, Secretary, American Immigration Lawyer’s Association, NPR, Justice Department Rolls Out Quotas for Immigration Judges (April 3, 2018). The Justice Department is being charged with implementing a host of policies that diminish the primary responsibility of ensuring a fair hearing. For the past three years, the attorney general has used a process known as “certification,” a power historically used sparingly, to overrule decisions made by the Board of Immigration Appeals and set binding precedent. Id. Some have argued that the frequency with which this procedure has recently been employed borders on abuse as it seeks to severely limit the number of immigrants who can remain in the United States. Whitehouse Letter, supra, at 5. Equally troubling is the charge that the attorney general is using certification as a way to overrule immigration judges whose decisions don’t align with the administration’s immigration agenda. Id.

One area of particular concern is the recent encroachment by the agency into judicial independence. The National Association of Immigration Judges (NAIJ), which is the union representing sitting immigration judges, argues, alongside many others in the legal community, that these incursions into judicial independence are part of a broader effort to fundamentally alter how immigration removal cases are adjudicated, and that such actions are having deleterious effects. See Statement of Judge A. Ashley Tabaddor, President of the National Association of Immigration Judges, Before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Border Security and Immigration Subcommittee Hearing on “Strengthening and Reforming America’s Immigration Court System” 2 (Apr. 18, 2018).

An overcrowded, fenced area holds families at a border patrol station in McAllen, Texas.

Thomas Cizauskas from Flickr

Among the new measures implemented by the Justice Department are unrealistic and impractical one-size-fits-all case quotas and deadlines that squeeze immigration judges where they are most vulnerable—their status as “employees.” If an immigration judge provides one too many case continuances, even though related to a valid due process concern, she risks being terminated. Every pause for judicial reflection, or break for much needed legal research, risks slowing down the “deportation machinery” that the adjudication process is veering toward and threatens to eviscerate procedural due process, even though such due process is mandated by the U.S. Constitution. Id.

These controversial new policies have become so pervasive and so threatening to judicial independence that they have raised alarms. What began in 2018 as a few dramatic instances involving the abrupt removal and reassignment of cases from an immigration judge’s docket previewed the agency’s more recent alarming actions where the shuffling of scores of cases and entire dockets sometimes multiple times within a single day has become the norm. The endless docket shuffling, and the chasing of performance “completions” that correspond to a job-preserving metric, seems designed to make political statements rather than ensuring victims of human rights abuses are afforded due process. A complex, multi-witness, multi-issue hearing is afforded the same value as an order of removal for failure to appear at a hearing. See Mimi Tsankov, Judicial Independence Sidelined: Just One More Symptom of an Immigration System Reeling, 55 Cal. W. L. Rev. 2 (2019).

. . . .

Mimi Tsankov serves as eastern region vice president with the National Association of Immigration Judges and has been a full-time immigration judge since 2006.

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Read Judge Tsankov’s complete article at the link.Thanks Judge Tsankov. You are a “True American Hero!” 🗽🎖👩‍⚖️👍🏼

The situation in the Immigration Courts is totally out of control and unacceptable. Both Congress and the Article III Courts have failed in their duties to require and enforce the “fair and impartial adjudication” required by the Fifth Amendment to our Constitution.

These grotesque derelictions of duty are inexcusable. They call not just for an independent Immigration Court but also for “regime change” in both the Executive and the Senate and a total rethinking of what qualities should be required for the privilege of serving for life in the Article III Judiciary.

While there are many Article III derelictions of duty out there (and some courageous performances, particularly among the ranks of U.S. District Judges), I’m specifically highlighting the disgraceful performance of the “J.R. Five” ☠️🤮👎🏻 on the Supremes, who have been AWOL on Due Process, immigration, human rights, and humanity itself when our country needs them most. Never again! We need a better Supreme Court, one that lives up to its role as America’s highest tribunal entrusted with protecting our Constitutional, individual, and human rights! John Marshall must be turning over in his grave with the wimpy performance of John Roberts in the face of Executive tyranny and contempt for our Constitution!

Due Process Forever! Complicit Courts & Star Chambers, Never!

This November, vote like your life depends on it! Because it does!

PWS

05-02-20

JIM CROW WINS, AMERICA LOSES, AGAIN — WHITE NATIONALIST CLOWN-IN-CHIEF 🤡 HALTS IMMIGRATION TO DIVERT ATTENTION FROM MASSIVE FAILURE OF GOVERNANCE, AS FECKLESS DEMS PROTEST! — Announced By Tweet At Time When Borders Closed Anyway — A “pathetic attempt to shift blame from his Visible Incompetence to an Invisible Enemy,” Says Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA) 😰👎🏻

By Paul Wickham Schmidt

Courtside Exclusive

April 21, 2020. Migrants didn’t bring coronavirus to the U.S. Inevitable as its arrival was, U.S. travelers returning from abroad hastened the infection. The Trump regime ignored advanced warnings, wasted time, failed to prepare, and intentionally misled the public into believing that the problem was minor and under control. As we know, it was neither. No wonder the “Chief Clown” needs to shift attention to “the usual suspects.”

Rather than being a threat, courageous, talented, hard-working migrants of all types have been at the forefront of our battle against coronavirus. They put their own lives at risk to provide health care, medical research, food, sanitation, delivery, stocking, transportation, cleaning, technology, and other essential services. Their reward from Trump, Miller, and the other regime racists: to be scapegoated and further dehumanized by those whose “malicious incompetence” actually threatens the health and safety of all Americans.

Nobody knows what the U.S. economy will look like post-COVID-19. But, we can be sure that migrants will play a key role in our future. And, of course, permanent legal immigrants are carefully screened and required to undergo health examination before being admitted.

Meanwhile, Democrats complain, but show show no sign of actually using their leverage to halt the regime’s invidious assault on migrants. They weren’t even to get all taxpaying immigrant families included in the initial stimulus payments nor have they been able to require immigration authorities to comply with best health practices for detained migrants. Nor does it look like the needs of migrants will be addressed by the latest proposed legislation, although exact details are still pending. So, their bluster is just that —bluster.

Undoubtedly, the brave lawyers of the New Due Process Army will mount legal challenges to this latest assault on the rule of law. While some challenges might succeed in the lower Federal Courts, to date the “J.R. Five” on the Supremes have shown no inclination to look critically at any of the regime’s many misuses and abuses of so-called “emergency” and “national security” rationales, even when they are transparently bogus “pretexts” for xenophobia, religious bigotry, and racism.

Perhaps it’s largely a moot point right now. Market forces affect immigration. With worldwide travel restrictions, borders closed, and 22 million out of work in the U.S., the allure of migration to the U.S. should be sharply reduced.

The Trump regime’s open hostility to immigrants plus our chaotic response to COVID-19, perhaps the world’s worst overall at this point, might make the U.S. a less attractive place for future immigration, particularly for legal migrants who have other choices. Demand for migration is normally a sign of economic and social health. As America fades into disorder under the kakistocracy, so might our ability to attract migrants, particularly those we claim to prize.

According to James Hohmann at the Washington Post, senior officials at the DHS were surprised by Trump’s late night tweet announcing the impending action. As Hohmann noted, that’s an indication of the deep thought, analysis, and preparation that went into this action. Trump has normalized incompetence and dumb decisions made based on a racist political agenda to the point where they barley cause a ripple in our distorted national discussion anymore. I’d say it was like being “goverened” by a five-year-old, but that would be a supreme insult to most five-year-olds I know.

While the “Chief Clown” can’t move fast enough to reopen the economy, even in the face of solid evidence that the it’s premature in most areas, don’t expect the bogus “immigration emergency” to end as long as this regime is in power. Crisis becomes yet another opportunity for the “worst of the worst among us” — the kakistocracy — to act on their biases and prejudices and get away with it.

Here’s a report from Rebecca Shabad @ NBC News:

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/xenophobe-chief-democrats-blast-trump-s-plan-suspend-immigration-u-n1188551

WASHINGTON — Congressional Democrats slammed President Donald Trump after he announced that he plans to suspend immigration to the United States, arguing that such a move does nothing to protect Americans from the coronavirus and deflects attention away from his handling of the outbreak.

House Democratic Caucus Chairman Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., tweeted that Trump is the “xenophobe. In. chief.”

“This action is not only an attempt to divert attention away from Trump’s failure to stop the spread of the coronavirus and save lives, but an authoritarian-like move to take advantage of a crisis and advance his anti-immigrant agenda. We must come together to reject his division,” tweeted Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-Texas, chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.

Shortly after 10 p.m. ET on Monday, Trump announced in a tweet, “In light of the attack from the Invisible Enemy, as well as the need to protect the jobs of our GREAT American Citizens, I will be signing an Executive Order to temporarily suspend immigration into the United States!”

There were no additional details. A senior administration official said Trump could sign the executive order as early as this week.

The tweet came as the death toll in the U.S. from COVID-19 topped 42,000 people, according to Johns Hopkins’ Coronavirus Resource Center.

Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., Democrats’ 2016 vice presidential nominee, called it a “pathetic attempt to shift blame from his Visible Incompetence to an Invisible Enemy.”

. . . .

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Read Rebecca’s full article at the link.

Due Process Forever. The White Nationalist Kakistocracy Never!

PWS

04-21-20

NATION WITHOUT LAWS: With The Supremes’ “J.R. Five” Firmly In His Pocket, Trump Suspends The Constitution, The Rule Of Law, & International Treaties To “Orbit” Asylum Seekers To Who Knows Where! — Contempt For Humanity On Full Display During Time of Plague!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/trump-administration-has-expelled-10000-migrants-at-the-border-during-coronavirus-outbreak/2020/04/09/b177c534-7a7b-11ea-8cec-530b4044a458_story.html

Nick Miroff reports for the WashPost:

The Trump administration has carried out nearly 10,000 summary deportations or “expulsions” since March 21, using emergency public health measures that have given U.S. Customs and Border Protection broad authority to bypass immigration laws, CBP officials said Thursday.

The measures have allowed the agency to quickly turn away most unauthorized migrants — sending them back across the Mexican border. The moves have dramatically slashed the number of detainees held in border stations, where they fear the coronavirus could spread, the officials said. CBP currently has fewer than 100 detainees in custody, down from nearly 20,000 at this time last year during last year’s border crisis, officials said.

[[Under coronavirus immigration measures, U.S. is expelling border-crossers to Mexico in an average of 96 minutes]]

Since the implementation of the rapid expulsions, unlawful border crossings have dropped 56 percent, said acting CBP commissioner Mark Morgan. Morgan also acknowledged that the United States has all but closed its borders to asylum seekers who are fleeing persecution, including those who attempt to enter legally at U.S. ports of entry.

“Those who are undocumented or don’t have documents or authorization are turned away,” Morgan said.

Democratic lawmakers have accused the administration of defying U.S. laws and exceeding the authority of the coronavirus public health order, but Morgan defended the emergency measures as a necessary step to stop the spread of the disease.

“This is not about immigration,” Morgan said. “This is about public health. This is about putting forth aggressive mitigation and containment strategies.”

[[Sign up for our Coronavirus Updates newsletter to track the outbreak. All stories linked in the newsletter are free to access.]]

CBP said the number of migrants detained at the border fell to 33,937 in March, down 7 percent from February. Single adults from Mexico accounted for 70 percent to 75 percent of those taken into custody, and most of the remainder were from Central America’s Northern Triangle countries: Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras.

The Mexican government has agreed to accept the rapid return of migrants from those nations at the border under an agreement reached with the Trump administration last month.

The recent expulsions include children who would otherwise be protected from rapid removal by U.S. anti-trafficking laws. Since the emergency order took effect, the United States has expelled nearly 400 underage migrants, according to the most recent tally by the Reuters news agency. The minors were released into Mexico or boarded onto planes and flown back to Central America without being transferred to the care of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

. . . .

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

It’s going to take more than a letter from Sen. Pat Leahy (D-VT) and other Dems to restore the Constitution and the rule of law. Indeed, with the help of J.R. and his Trumpist GOP majority on the Supremes, I would expect that asylum laws, like voting rights, Due Process, and other individual rights will remain a “dead letter” until we get both 1) regime change; and 2) reform in the appointment of Article III Judges.

There is little, if any, data right now to support the view that asylum seekers at the Southern Border have been a significant source for the initial spread of coronavirus in the U.S.; however, their arbitrary removal to other countries might have helped the worldwide spread of the disease.

Moreover, as COVID-19 spreads into the Gulag and the Immigration Courts from the rest of America, infections in those locations could help spread the virus, given the lawyers, Government employees, and contractors exposed at those dangerous locations. Nor were Asian Americans responsible.

We do, however, have some data to show that U.S. citizens and other travelers returning from Europe were inadvertently a source of the virus’s spread in New York, and that Trump’s ineptness and failure to heed early warnings contributed to the spread.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/08/science/new-york-coronavirus-cases-europe-genomes.html?referringSource=articleShare

But, science and truth seldom have any meaning for Trump and his toadies. And, we also know that while Trump often falsely claims “victories” that are either fabricated or largely someone’s else’s, he never takes responsibility for his own many mistakes and shortcomings.

PWS

04-09-20

VOTE ‘EM OUT: Selfish GOP Politicos Spent Years Dismantling The Already-Inadequate U.S. Safety Net & Distributing The Spoils To Their Fat Cat Buddies Through Unnecessary Tax Cuts (a/k/a “Welfare For The Rich”) & Misdirection Of Money To Wasteful Spending — Now They Need It To Save Their Sorry Political Butts — But, Don’t Expect A Long Term Change Of Heart From A Party Of Selfish Elites & Their Wannabe Enablers!

“Vote ‘Em Out”

By Willie Nelson

If you don’t like who’s in there, vote ’em out
That’s what Election Day is all about
The biggest gun we’ve got
Is called “the ballot box”
So if you don’t like who’s in there, vote ’em out

Vote ’em out (vote ’em out)
Vote ’em out (vote ’em out)
And when they’re gone we’ll sing and dance and shout
Bring some new ones in
And we’ll start that show again
And if you don’t like who’s in there, vote ’em out

If it’s a bunch of clowns you voted in
Election Day is comin’ ’round again
If you don’t like it now
If it’s more than you’ll allow
If you don’t like who’s in there, vote ’em out

Listen to Willie here:

https://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/willienelson/voteemout.html

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/03/25/trillion-dollar-stimulus-checks/

Tracy Jan reports for the WashPost:

Conservatives gutted the social safety net. Now, in a crisis, they’re embracing it.

By Tracy Jan

March 25 at 10:00 AM ET

Throughout his term, President Trump has chipped away at the social safety net, proposing budgets that gutted housing assistance, food stamps and health insurance for the poorest Americans. When Congress rejected those cuts, the Trump administration enacted rules to make it harder to access federal benefits, such as requiring recipients to work.

Now, with businesses shuttered, workers laid off, and scores more worrying about buying groceries, being evicted and getting sick, the swelling need for federal assistance has forced even conservative lawmakers to embrace government protections in a series of sweeping stimulus bills.

Under the $2 trillion stimulus deal reached in the Senate early Wednesday, Republicans are proposing sending direct cash payments of $1,200 to individual Americans, an idea that, on the surface, echoes former Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang’s universal basic income platform. They want to bolster the unemployment insurance system after many GOP-led states spent years enacting restrictive criteria and reducing benefits.

“Anybody who is a moderate-wage worker who just experienced an economic lockdown in their state is in distress. Most people don’t have savings,” said Robert Rector, a research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank that guides much of the Trump administration’s policymaking.

[Facing eviction as millions shelter in place]

Rector, an architect of the 1996 federal welfare overhaul that instituted work requirements under President Bill Clinton, generally opposes safety net measures that do not promote work and marriage. But he would like to see more-generous benefits for individuals and cities in crisis in response to the coronavirus — for a finite period of time.

“Quite frankly, I’m willing to spend more money right now,” he said. “It’s a very different thing in an emergency.”

[[Sign up for our Coronavirus Updates newsletter to track the outbreak. All stories linked in the newsletter are free to access.]]

The $100-billion-plus Families First coronavirus response package Trump signed last week dramatically expands paid sick leave and family medical leave for tens of millions of workers, provisions aimed at blunting the economic impact of the pandemic.

The United States lags behind other developed countries when it comes to providing universal health care as well as paid leave for sick workers and those who have to care for family members.

“Here we had this ‘strong economy’ and all of a sudden the bubble has burst, and policymakers are scrambling to put into place basic protections other societies have,” said Rebecca Vallas, a senior fellow at the left-leaning Center for American Progress.

[As layoffs skyrocket, the holes in America’s safety net are becoming apparent]

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Read Tracy’s full article at the link.

We recently went through a period of sustained economic growth and high employment that started under Obama and continued under Trump, until now. A wise nation might have used increased tax revenues to shore up the safety net, repair infrastructure, reduce spending on futile wars and defense overruns, invest for the future, and/or reduce deficit. Instead, the GOP frittered away the opportunity by mindless Government shutdowns and unnecessary tax cuts that lined the pockets of the already well-off while doing little to help the long term situation of the average American family. Indeed companies were encouraged to cut benefits to workers to pay out more to shareholders and to their executives, without much regard to the competence or value to the company of the latter.

Now, the embarrassing inadequacies and gaps of our safety net are being exposed every day. Even the GOP has turned, albeit somewhat reluctantly, to throwing several trillion into the breach, as long as it all doesn’t all go to those who need it most. Natural disasters have become the “new normal.” But, under Trump and his kakistocracy, America has consistently been underprepared to meet them.

That the hardest hit Americans get a substantial chunk of this emergency funding is a tribute to Pelosi, Schumer, and the Dems. Left to their own devices, Trump, Mitch, and the GOP would have basically mailed a modest check (or checks) to most Americans (other than the poorest) and funneled the rest into the pockets of their businesses buddies and state cronies with little oversight or accountability. Can you imagine the Grifter-in-Chief and his toadies being allowed to divvy up the loot, in secret, no less?

This emergency is unusual in nature. But, emergencies come and emergencies go. Presidents come and they (thankfully) go. What doesn’t go away is the need for a strong well-developed safety net that covers basic health care, unemployment, income assistance, and retirement benefits for all Americans, not just the wealthy. History has shown that’s not likely to happen as long as the GOP grifters remain in power.

We have a chance to save America and put ourselves on a better course for the future. Vote Trump and his GOP out in November. Your future and that of future generations will depend on it.

PWS

03-25-20

DEM SENATORS & NAIJ CONTINUE TO “BRING THE HEAT” ON EOIR “CLOWN COURTS” 🤡 🤡 FOR CLUELESS CORONAVIRUS RESPONSE TO DATE! – Two Items From Dan Kowalski @ LexisNexis

https://www.lexisnexis.com/legalnewsroom/immigration/b/outsidenews/posts/senators-ask-eoir-about-covid-19-signage-immigration-court-scheduling

Mar. 11, 2020 letter from Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Sen. Edward Markey to EOIR Director McHenry:

“…We therefore urge EOIR to require the posting of the CDC signage, in English and Spanish, as well as any other relevant languages, in courtrooms and waiting areas to raise awareness of COVID-19 and how to avoid transmitting and contracting it. In addition, we request answers to the following questions by March 18, 2020:

Why were immigration judges and immigration court administrators instructed to remove the CDC COVID-19 posters? What “authority” did they purportedly lack to place the posters?

Who told Acting Chief Immigration Judge Christopher Santoro to issue the directive? Who in “leadership” was Judge Santoro referring to in his email regarding the posters?

Did EOIR consult with qualified public health authorities before issuing its directive to remove the posters?

Why was the directive reversed? Did negative publicity play any role in the decision?

What steps is EOIR taking to protect immigration judges, support staff, immigrants, attorneys, and the public from the spread ofCOVID-19? A. Are sick employees and members of the public being told to go home? B. Are cleaning and disinfectant supplies being provided to all employees and to members of the public who come to the courts?

How is EOIR coordinating with the rest of the Department of Justice about how to respond to COVID-19? Is it receiving guidance from any other federal agencies, such as CDC?

In light of the public health concerns posed by COVID-19, will EOIR instruct immigration judges to allow immigrant respondents the opportunity to reschedule immigration court proceedings as necessary?”

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https://www.lexisnexis.com/LegalNewsRoom/immigration/b/insidenews/posts/naij-asks-eoir-to-suspend-non-detained-mchs

NAIJ Asks EOIR to Suspend Non-Detained MCHs

NAIJ, Mar. 12, 2020

“… we call on you to suspend all non-detained master calendar dockets for the duration of this public health crisis. Immigration Judges can use cancelled master calendar time to hear individual cases (including addressing the backlog of hundreds of thousands of long-pending cases scheduled for individual hearing) that do not involve unwarranted exposure to large numbers of people in our space-limited facilities. …”

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Thanks, Dan.

As the situation deteriorates, America’s mismanaged “Clown Courts” 🤡🤡 continue to endanger the public while denying due process and wasting taxpayer money by having no contingency plans in place and failing to issue clear guidance to either their own employees or the public.

But, let the record show that they have plenty of time to develop unneeded and counterproductive “Immigration Judge dashboards,” tie up the system with frivolous litigation to “decertify” the NAIJ, and set up “TV pilot programs” to railroad kids through the Atlanta Immigration Court. All enforcement-related “gimmicks;” no time for due process or the public interest.

But, the record should also document the dereliction of duty by Congress and the Article IIIs for allowing this “clown show” to continue to inflict damage on the American public and our legal system.

Due Process Forever! Clown Courts Never!🤡🤡

PWS

03-13-20

HERE’S A SEPARATE LETTER ON THE URGENT NEED FOR AN ARTICLE I U.S. IMMIGRATION COURT THAT I SENT TO MY SENATORS AND CONGRESSMAN TODAY!

Sent to Senator Mark Warner (D-VA), Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA), and Representative Don Beyer (D-VA) and a few others today:

Dear

RE: Independent Article I U.S. Immigration Court

As an American, human being, taxpayer, and retired career civil servant, I am outraged at the totally unconstitutional and maliciously incompetent destruction of due process and the rule of law, not to mention simple human decency, in our U.S. Immigration Courts by the Department of Justice and the Trump Administration. They have created unprecedented dysfunction and grotesque unfairness.

The current mess, with already record low and plummeting morale and an out of control, largely self-created backlog of more than 1.3 million cases, serves neither the human beings condemned to its daily injustices and intentional degradations of humanity nor the legitimate needs of DHS enforcement. The latter should not be confused with the many outright lies and intentionally false narratives about the need for massive, counterproductive, fiscally wasteful, and intentionally cruel immigration enforcement spread by this Administration. I call on you to join your colleagues in supporting bipartisan legislation to create an independent, Article I U.S. Immigration Court as one of our highest and most pressing national priorities.

I have been involved in the field of immigration, law enforcement, refugees, and human rights for 47 years. More than 35 of those years were spent at the U.S. Department of Justice, where I worked under both Republican and Democratic Administrations. Indeed, as a career Senior Executive under the Reagan Administration, I helped create the Executive Office for Immigration Review (“EOIR”) to house the Immigration Courts and the Board of Immigration Appeals (“BIA”).

Our aim then was to increase judicial independence, due process, fundamental fairness, and professionalism. The Department that I loyally served bears no resemblance whatsoever to the unbelievable ethical and legal morass that now exists under Bill Barr, one of the three most totally unmqualified individuals to hold that post during my lifetime (the others being convicted felon John Mitchell and notorious White Nationalist enforcement zealot Jeff Sessions, who was primarily responsible for the Administration’s cruel and unconstitutional “child separation” program).

Prior to my retirement on June 30, 2019, I spent 13 years as an Immigration Judge at the U.S. Immigration Court in Arlington, Virginia. Before that, I was a Board Member and Appellate Immigration Judge at the BIA, for eight years, the first six as BIA Chair. I also spent more than a decade at the “Legacy Immigration & Naturalization Service,” (“INS”) where as Deputy General Counsel, and Acting General Counsel during portions of the Carter and Reagan Administrations, I was responsible for the overall operation of the nationwide legal program, including all representation before the Immigration Courts and the BIA. I have also practiced immigration law as a partner at the D.C. Office of Jones Day and as managing partner of the D.C. Office of Fragomen.

I currently teach Immigration Law & Policy as an Adjunct Professor at Georgetown Law, as well as making numerous speeches and other public appearances, and publishing my own blog, immigrationcourtside.com. I am a proud member of the Round Table of Former Immigration Judges, a voluntary organization, with more than 40 former judges as members, committed to filing amicus briefs, public statements, and taking part in educational efforts intended to increase public and judicial understanding of the Immigration Courts and to promote an essential restoration of due process and fundamental fairness as its focus.

I know of few, if any, other participants in the current “immigration dialogue,” who have personally been involved in more cases either helping deserving individuals achieve legal status under our laws or, conversely, ordering the removal of individuals found not to qualify to remain here under our laws. In other words, I know what I’m talking about, much of it from face to face encounters with individuals on all sides of the issue in Immigration Court, as well as years of experience in shaping national immigration policy and legislation in both the public and private sectors.

I have had to personally deliver to individuals and their families the “bad news” that I was required by the law to return them to countries where I had little doubt that they would suffer torture, rape, dehumanization, or even death. It’s a sobering experience not shared by most of those clueless demagogues now bragging about how “success” should be measured by our ability to inflict more unnecessary cruelty and inhumanity on some of the most vulnerable individuals in the world and how “court efficiency” means nothing other than assembly line removals with neither due process nor fundamental fairness.

What’s happening now in our Immigration Courts is a travesty and a national catastrophe. It is wrong, from a Constitutional, legal, and moral standpoint. It eventually will join Jim Crow as one of the most heinous abuses of legal authority and human rights in modern American legal history. Surely, we all want to be on “the right side of history” on this fundamental issue.

Today, many NGOs involved in justice, immigration, and human rights launched a “twitter storm” to raise awareness of the tragic abuses of the legal system going on at the Administration’s instigation daily in our failed and unconscionably “weaponized” Immigration Courts. Innocent lives are literally being lost and families and futures ruined while we stand by and watch. America’s future as a great nation and “beacon of hope” for the rest of the world is literally being dissolved and washed down the drain.

Please take time to read the detailed letter that our Round Table of Former Immigration Judges signed, along with the American Immigration Lawyers Association and 53 other distinguished non-governmental organizations, demanding an end to the abusive Immigration Courts under DOJ control and the establishment of a constitutionally required independent Immigration Court that will insure due process and fundamental fairness as required by our Constitution.

That letter may be found at this link: https://www.aila.org/advo-media/aila-correspondence/2020/advocates-call-on-congress-establish-independent

Also, if you have not already done so, I urge you to read the letter signed by me and more than 2,500 other former DOJ officials deploring the corruption and unethical behavior that Bill Barr has “normalized” at the DOJ and demanding his resignation.

That letter may be found at this link: https://medium.com/@dojalumni/doj-alumni-statement-on-the-events-surrounding-the-sentencing-of-roger-stone-c2cb75ae4937

American justice is facing an existential crisis resulting from this Administration’s weaponization and maliciously incompetent management of what is perhaps our biggest, and certainly most important in terms of human lives and American’s future in the world, court systems: The Immigration Courts. When these courts finally implode under the Trump Administration’s continued abuses, they will take with them a large portion of our American justice system and that which makes America different from the rest of the world.

I should know – I dealt with the human wreckage caused by the failure of courts and justice systems in other countries nearly every working day for more than four decades. This Administration has turned our once-proud Immigration Courts into a “parody of justice” usually found in third-world dictatorships or authoritarian states where due process is but a mirage.

Therefore, I respectfully ask for your support in creating an independent Article I U.S. Immigration Court. Due Process Forever!

With my thanks and very best wishes,

Paul Wickham Schmidt

U.S. Immigration Judge (Retired)

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PWS

02-19-20

DEM SENS BLAST REGIME’S CONTINUING DUE PROCESS FARCE IN IMMIGRATION COURTS! – Round Table Member Hon. Charles Honeyman Takes to Airwaves to Call For Independent U.S Immigration Court!

https://www.wabe.org/senate-democrats-accuse-justice-department-of-politicizing-immigration-courts/

Joel Rose reports for NPR:

Senate Democrats Accuse Justice Department Of Politicizing Immigration Courts

JOEL ROSE • FEB 13, 2020

Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill.(left), and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., Democratic members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, wrote a letter accusing the Trump administration of politicizing the immigration courts.

CREDIT J. SCOTT APPLEWHITE / AP

Top Senate Democrats warn that the Trump administration is deliberately undermining the independence of immigration courts.

In a bluntly-worded letter to the Justice Department, which oversees the immigration courts, the senators accuse the administration of waging an “ongoing campaign to erode the independence of immigration courts,” including changing court rules to allow more political influence over decisions, and promoting partisan judges to the Board of Immigration Appeals.

“The administration’s gross mismanagement of these courts,” they write, threatens to do “lasting damage to public confidence in the immigration court system.”

The letter was sent Thursday to Attorney General William Barr. It was signed by nine Democratic members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, including Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, Richard Durbin of Illinois, Mazie Hirono of Hawaii and Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota. They are requesting extensive information about the department’s hiring practices for trial-level and appellate judges, among other documents.

The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the letter.

The senators’ concerns echo those voiced by former and current immigration judges, including the head of the union representing those judges. Ashley Tabaddor, the president of the National Association of Immigration Judges, testified at a House Judiciary Committee hearing last month that immigration courts should no longer be overseen by the Justice Department.

“The only real and lasting solution is the establishment of an independent Immigration Court,” Tabaddor wrote in her testimony. “It must be free from the constantly changing (often diametrically opposed) politicized policy directives of the Department of Justice.”

The judge’s union has pushed back against productivity quotas for immigration judges, which were announced in 2018. The union also opposed new Trump administration rules that gave more power to the director of the Executive Office for Immigration Review, a political appointee.

The Trump administration, for its part, has moved to decertify the judges’ union.

Immigration courts face a massive backlog of more than a million cases. And there’s wide agreement that the court system needs reform. But not everyone believes that removing immigration courts from the Justice Department is the right approach.

“The attorney general and his subordinates are actively working to remedy this problem, by providing the needed resources to the immigration courts,” wrote Andrew Arthur, a former immigration judge who is now a fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies, in his testimony before the House Judiciary Committee last month. “Restructuring the immigration courts … will almost certainly not address the core problems that are facing those courts,” Arthur added.

At a time when caseloads are surging, some immigration judges are quitting, citing frustration and exhaustion. Judge Charles Honeyman retired from the Philadelphia Immigration Court in January after 24 years on the job.

“I would want future administrations and the Congress to think of immigration judges as judges, literally, and give them the autonomy and the independence and the confidence to make decisions without political interference or overreach,” he said in an interview with NPR’s Noel King.

“The only way to do that is to create an independent court where the judge makes a decision and the judge isn’t afraid of how many cases he has to complete for the year or whether some political actor is going to be looking over his shoulder and say, I don’t agree with that decision; we’re going to find a way to put pressure on you,” Honeyman said.

Copyright 2020 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

WABE brings you the local stories and national news that you value and trust. Please make a gift today.

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Here’s the letter:

https://www.whitehouse.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/2020-02-13%20Ltr%20to%20AJ%20Barr%20re%20independence%20of%20immigration%20courts%20(004).pdf

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

Thanks, Charlie, my friend, for speaking out so forcefully for Due Process and justice in our Immigration Courts!

After seeing how Trump attacked an Article III life-tenured U.S. District Judge this week, does anyone seriously think that an Immigration Judge, a mere civil servant, who ruled against the Trump/Miller White Nationalist agenda in a case that came to Trump’s attention would retain their job under Billy Barr? After seeing how Trump treated some career civil servants and military officers after they “spoke truth to power” does anyone seriously think that Billy Barr of any other regime sycophant would defend fair and impartial decision making that Trump didn’t like?

No way! So how can ANY foreign national get a fair hearing before a “fake court system” where the prosecution authorities retain the right to change any result that goes against them and to remove subordinates who are supposed to be exercising independent judgement from their jobs if they don’t like the result.

The entire Immigraton Court system is and has been for some time now a cruel, unconstitutional hoax. Why haven’t the Article III Courts, whose judges are protected by life tenure, done their duty by stepping in and putting an end to this unconstitutional dysfunctional mess that is destroying innocent lives and ruining futures?

PWS

02-13-20

THE DOJ’S NEW TITLE UNDER BILLY BARR: “HOOKERS FOR TRUMP” – “Why Bill Barr’s DOJ replaced Catholic Charities with Hookers for Jesus” – Why “There has never been a better time to be a Hooker for Jesus.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/02/11/why-bill-barrs-doj-replaced-catholic-charities-with-hookers-jesus/

Dana Milbank writes in WashPost:

There has never been a better time to be a Hooker for Jesus.

Under Attorney General Bill Barr’s management, it appears no corner of the Justice Department can escape perversion — even the annual grants the Justice Department gives to nonprofits and local governments to help victims of human trafficking.

In a new grant award, senior Justice officials rejected the recommendations of career officials and decided to deny grants to highly rated Catholic Charities in Palm Beach, Fla., and Chicanos Por La Causa in Phoenix. Instead, Reuters reported, they gave more than $1 million combined to lower-rated groups called the Lincoln Tubman Foundation and Hookers for Jesus.

Why? Well, it turns out the head of the Catholic Charities affiliate had been active with Democrats and the Phoenix group had opposed President Trump’s immigration policies. By contrast, Hookers for Jesus is run by a Christian conservative and the Lincoln Tubman group was launched by a relative of a Trump delegate to the 2016 convention.

That Catholic Charities has been replaced by Hookers for Jesus says much about Barr’s Justice Department. Friends of Trump are rewarded. Opponents of Trump are punished. And the nation’s law enforcement apparatus becomes Trump’s personal plaything.

Federal prosecutors Monday recommended that Trump associate Roger Stone serve seven to nine years in prison for obstruction of justice, lying to Congress, witness tampering and other crimes.

Then Trump tweeted that the proposed sentence was “horrible and very unfair” and “the real crimes were on the other side.” And by midday Tuesday, Barr’s Justice Department announced that it would reduce Stone’s sentence recommendation. All four prosecutors, protesting the politicization, asked to withdraw from the case.

But politicization is now the norm. Last week, Barr assigned himself the sole authority to decide which presidential candidates — Democrats and Republicans — should be investigated by the FBI.

Also last week, the Department of Homeland Security, working with the Justice Department, announced that New York state residents can no longer enroll in certain Trusted Traveler programs such as Global Entry — apparent punishment for the strongly Democratic state’s policies on illegal immigrants.

On Monday, Barr declared that the Justice Department had created an “intake process” to receive Rudy Giuliani’s dirt from Ukraine on Joe Biden and Hunter Biden — dirt dug in a boondoggle that left two Giuliani associates under indictment and Trump impeached.

The same day, Barr’s agency announced lawsuits against California, New Jersey and King County (Seattle), Washington — politically “blue” jurisdictions all — as part of what he called a “significant escalation” against sanctuary cities.

On Tuesday, to get a better sense of the man who has turned the Justice Department into Trump’s toy, I watched Barr speak to the Major County Sheriffs of America, a friendly audience, at the Willard Hotel in Washington.

Even by Trumpian standards, the jowly Barr, in his large round glasses, pinstripe suit and Trump-red tie, was strikingly sycophantic. “In his State of the Union, President Trump delivered a message of genuine optimism filled with an unapologetic faith in God and in American greatness and in the common virtues of the American people: altruism, industriousness, self-reliance and generosity,” he read, deadpan.

Trump, he went on, “loves this country,” and “he especially loves you.” The boot-licking performance continued, about Trump’s wise leadership, his unbroken promises and even the just-impeached president’s passionate belief in the “rule of law.”

Then Barr turned to the enemy. He attacked “rogue DA’s” and “so-called social-justice reformers,” who are responsible for “historic levels of homicide and other violent crime” in Philadelphia, San Francisco, Seattle, St. Louis, Chicago and Baltimore. Politicians in sanctuary jurisdictions, he said, prefer “to help criminal aliens evade the law.” Barr vowed to fight these foes with “all lawful means” — federal subpoenas to force them to turn over “information about criminal aliens,” dozens of lawsuits to invalidate statutes and attempts to deny them both competitive and automatic grants.

In response to a question, Barr railed against tech companies’ use of encryption: “They’re designing these devices so you can be impervious to any government scrutiny,” he protested.

Maybe people wouldn’t be so sensitive about government scrutiny if the top law enforcement official weren’t using his position to punish political opponents and reward political allies.

Instead, with Barr’s acquiescence, we live in a moment in which: Trump’s Treasury Department immediately releases sensitive financial information about Hunter Biden, while refusing to release similar information about Trump; Trump ousts officials who testified in the impeachment inquiry and even ousts the blameless twin brother of one of the witnesses; and Trump’s FBI decides to monitor violent “people on either side” of the abortion debate — although the FBI couldn’t point to a single instance of violence by abortion-rights supporters.

This week, the Pentagon released a new color scheme for Air Force One, replacing the 60-year-old design with one that looks suspiciously like the old Trump Shuttle.Surprised? Don’t be. Soon the entire administration will be able to apply for a Justice Department grant as a newly formed nonprofit: Hookers for Trump.

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Barr’s inspirational lesson for new lawyers: Once you achieve fame, fortune, and protection from corrupt politicos and complicit judges, it’s virtually impossible to get your law license revoked for unethical performance. As long as you thumb your nose at the law and ethical rules right in public, right in front of judges, you’re essentially immune. The “rules” only apply to those poor suckers at the bottom of the “legal totem pole.”

This is actually a fairly new development under the Trump regime. In the past, even high-profile lawyers who violated their ethical obligations got zapped: John Mitchell, Dick Kleindienst, Bill Clinton(technically, he might have “surrendered his law license” in lieu of disbarment), Webb Hubbell, etc.

But, during the Trump regime, Federal Judges seem content to just “roll their eyes” at lies, false narratives, thinly veiled racist or religiously bigoted rationales for policy, and simply astounding conflicts of interest (how about running a biased and unconstitutional Immigration “Court” right in plain view?) streaming out of an ethics-free zone at the “Department of Hookers for Trump.”

U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson was actually a “target” of Roger Stone’s contemptuous and openly threatening behavior. It will be interesting to see how she deals with the sudden reversal and baseless plea for mercy from Barr for this unrepentant and totally unapologetic criminal.

As if to resolve any doubts as to his contempt for America and democratic institutions, the cowardly “Bully-in-Chief” unleashed an unprovoked twitter tirade against Judge Jackson and the career prosecutors in the case. https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/02/12/trump-stone-judge/

Perhaps predictability, this was followed by an impotent call by Senate Democrats for the uber corrupt Billy Barr to resign and for the equally corrupt and spineless Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) to stop slithering around the Capitol and schedule an “investigative hearing” into improper political influence at the “Department of Hookers for Trump.” https://apple.news/Az2hAo6yqT8uKJSuAX26F1Q Don’t hold your breath, folks!

At the same time, former DOJ Inspector General Michael R. Bromwich was telling WashPost’s Greg Sargent that the conduct of Trump and Billy the Toady was an “existential threat to the institutions that most of us value, prize and have served.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/02/12/trump-openly-corrupts-doj-former-insider-sounds-alarm/. Right on with that!

This is not “normal.” This is not “right.” It’s time for those of us who still believe in American democracy to take a stand in November to remove Trump and the sociopathic element that he represents in our society from power. Otherwise, the “race to the bottom” will continue, unabated. And more innocent people will be hurt by or die because of this unprincipled, totally immoral lunatic.

PWS

02-12-20

LETTER FROM 21 DEMOCRATIC SENATORS HIGHLIGHTS FRAUD, “CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY” IN TRUMP REGIME’S BOGUS “SAFE THIRD COUNTRY AGREEMENTS” WITH SOME OF THE WORLD’S MOST DANGEROUS AND INHOSPTABLE COUNTRIES FOR ASYLUM SEEKERS!

Trump Refugee Policy

https://www.warren.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/2020.02.05%20Letter%20to%20State,%20DOJ,%20DHS%20about%20Northern%20Triangle%20Asylum%20Cooperative%20Agreements.pdf

The Honorable Michael R. Pompeo Secretary of State
U.S. Department of State
2201 C Street, NW

Washington, DC 20037

The Honorable William P. Barr Attorney General
U.S. Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20530-0001

The Honorable Chad F. Wolf
Acting Secretary of Homeland Security U.S. Department of Homeland Security 3801 Nebraska Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20528

tinitrd ~tatrs ~rnatr WASHINGTON. DC 20510

February 5, 2020

Dear Secretary Pompeo, Attorney General Barr, and Acting Secretary Wolf:

We write regarding the “asylum cooperative agreements”1 (ACAs) that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has signed in recent months with Guatemala? El Salvador,3 and Honduras,4 countries collectively referred to as the “Northern Triangle.” These agreements outline a framework that could enable the United States to expel asylum seekers to each ofthese countries, regardless of where the migrants are from or which countries they have transited en

1 Sometimes referred to as “safe third country agreements.” U.S. Executive Office for Immigration Review and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Federal Register Notice, “Implementing Bilateral and Multilateral Asylum Cooperative Agreements Under the Immigration and Nationality Act,” effective November 19, 2019, https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-20 19-11-19/pdf/20 19-25137.pdf.

2 U.S. Department of Homeland Security, “Agreement between the Government of the United States and the Government of the Republic of Guatemala on Cooperation Regarding the Examination of Protection Claims,” signed July 26,2019, https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6232982-Signed-Agreement- English.html#document/p 1.

3 U.S. Department of Homeland Security, “Agreement between the Government of the United States and the Government ofthe Republic ofEl Salvador for Cooperation in the Examination ofProtection Claims,” signed September 20, 2019, https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6427712-US-El-Salvador-Cooperative- Agreement.html.

4 U.S. Department of Homeland Security, “Agreement between the Government ofthe United States and the Government ofthe Republic of Honduras for Cooperation in the Examination of Protection Claims,” signed September 25, 2019, https://ca-times.brightspotcdn.com/47/a5/85ea59444cb89bb2f3eca15880f3/us-honduras- asylum-cooperative-agreement.pdf.

1

route to the United States.5 The Trump Administration’s approach to asylum seekers is not only inhumane and potentially illegal; it could also overwhelm the asylum systems ofGuatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras and further destabilize those countries. As such, these agreements could have serious and detrimental implications for U.S. national security.

There is significant evidence that the Northern Triangle countries are unlikely to provide safety or adequate protection for asylum seekers, both because ofthe pervasive violent crime and targeted persecution there as well as their governments’ weak or practically non-existent asylum capacities. We are also concerned that expelling asylum seekers under this framework raises serious legal and procedural questions, including the degree to which the Administration complied with relevant law in producing and signing these agreements.

As you know, the Northern Triangle countries have some ofthe highest homicide rates in the world and are experiencing massive forced displacement both internally and across borders.6•7•8 The Department of State’s own human rights reports for these countries describe the dangers of rape, femicide, forced child labor, and threats against the LGBTQ community.9 Gang violence is pervasive and often transcends borders; some ofthese criminal organizations are so dangerous that even some police forces trained to combat gang violence are themselves fleeing to the United States.10 Despite these troubling facts, on November 21,2019, the Administration expelled a Honduran man to Guatemala in the first transfer under these agreements.11 ·

The Administration has since expelled more than 250 migrants from Honduras and El Salvador to Guatemala.12 At first, the Administration said it would transfer only single adults.13 However,

5 The agreements do not allow for returning an asylum seeker to the country oftheir own nationality. But they allow, for example, for a Honduran or a Cameroonian asylum seeker to be deported to Guatemala. U.S. Executive Office for Immigration Review and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Federal Register Notice, “Implementing Bilateral and Multilateral Asylum Cooperative Agreements Under the Immigration and Nationality Act,” effective November 19,2019, https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2019-11-19/pdf/2019-25137.pdf.

6 United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, “Global Study on Homicide 2019,” July 2019, https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/data-and-analysis/global-study-on-homicide.html.
7 United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, “Global Trends: Forced Displacement in 2018,” June 20, 2019, p. 48, https://www.unhcr.org/en-us/statistics/unhcrstats/5d08d7ee7/unhcr-global-trends-2018.html. (In 2018, over 282,000 people from the Northern Triangle countries had asylum applications pending adjudication worldwide)
8 Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, “Painting the Full Picture: Persistent data gaps on internal displacement associated with violence in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras,” November 2019, pp. 10-15, http://www.internal-displacement.org/publications/painting-the-full-picture-displacement-data-gaps-in-the-ntca.
9 U.S. Department of State, “Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2018: El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras,” 2018, https://www.state.gov/reportlcustoin/420abb692c/.
10 Washington Post, “It’s so dangerous to police MS-13 in El Salvador that officers are fleeing the country,” Kevin Sieff, March 3, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the americas/its-so-dangerous-to-police-ms-13-in-el- salvador-that-officers-are-fleeing-the-countrv/2019/03/03/e897dbaa-2287-11e9-b5b4-1d18dfb7b084 stmy.html

11 Reuters, “Shifting asylum ‘burden’: U.S. sends Guatemala first Honduran migrant,” Sofia Menchu, November 21, 2019, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration-guatemala/shifting-asylum-burden-us-sends-guatemala- frrst-honduran-migrant-idUSKBN1XV1 WM.
12 The Intercept, “One year into ‘Remain in Mexico,’ the U.S. is enlisting Central America in its crackdown on asylum,” Sandra Cuffe, January 29, 2020, https://theintercept.com/2020/01/29/remain-in-mexico-year-anniversary- central-america/.

13 LA Times, “In a first, U.S. starts pushing Central American families seeking asylum to Guatemala,” Molly O’Toole, December 10, 2019, https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2019-12-10/u-s-starts-pushing-asylum- seeking-families-back-to-guatemala-for-first-time.

2

the Administration has begun to transfer children and families, including a Honduran mother with two children who had been hospitalized.14 Reportedly, many ofthese migrants are not even aware in advance ofthe country to which they are being transferred. Upon arrival, they are told that they have 72 hours to either apply for asylum or leave, but are reportedly given practically no information about the process.15

Because ofthe lack ofprotection offered in Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras, these agreements raise serious legal questions. On November 18,2019, the Department ofJustice and DHS released an interim fmal rule (“Rule”) amending departmental regulations in order to implement the ACAs.16 The Rule, effective November 19, 2019, characterizes the ACAs as “safe third country” agreements as described in the Immigration and Nationality Act, which provides that asylum seekers may be removed under the following conditiop.s:

“[I]fthe Attorney General determines that the alien may be removed, pursuant to a bilateral or multilateral agreement, to a country (other than the country ofthe alien’s nationality or, in the case ofan alien having no nationality, the country of the alien’s last habitual residence) in which the alien’s life or freedom would not be threatened on account ofrace, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion, and where the alien would have access to a full and fair procedure for determining a claim to asylum or equivalent temporary protection, uilless the Attorney General fmds that it is in the public interest for the alien to receive asylum in the United States.”17

The Rule provides that the Attorney General and the Secretary of Homeland Security will make “categorical” determinations as to whether the Northern Triangle countries offer access to a “full and fair procedure” for determining asylum claims. Written information provided to our offices by the Administration indicates that “[t]he Attorney General and Secretary ofHomeland Security determined that Guatemala’s asylum system provides full and fair access to individuals seeking protection, as required by U.S. law, prior to the ACA entering into force on November 15.”18

The notion that Guatemala or the other two Northern Triangle countries offers such a procedure strains credulity-their systems for determining asylum claims are, at best, deeply flawed and under-resourced, and at worst, practically non-existent. According to the State Department’s human rights reports, in Guatemala, “identification and referral mechanisms for potential asylum seekers were inadequate… [and] migration and police authorities lacked adequate training

14 Associated Press, “Advocates: Honduran mother, children deported to Guatemala,” Nomaan Merchant, January 21, 2020, https://apnews.com/583a7dl0644f407e8035e5b6eddlc8f7.
15 Washington Post, “The U.S. is putting asylum seekers on planes to Guatemala- often without telling them where they’re going,” Kevin Sieff, January 14, 2020, https://www.washingtonpost.com/worldlthe americas/the-us- is-putting-asylum-seekers-on-planes-to-guatemala–often-without-telling-them-where-theyre- going/2020/01/13/0f89a93a-3576-llea-alff-c48cld59a4a1 story.html.

16 U.S. Executive Office for Immigration Review and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Federal Register Notice, “Implementing Bilateral and Multilateral Asylum Cooperative Agreements Under the Immigration and Nationality Act,” effective November 19, 2019. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2019-11-19/pdf/2019- 25137.pdf.

17 8 USC§ 1158(a)(2)(A). Emphasis added.
18 U.S. Department of State, Answer to Question for the Record to Deputy Secretary of State Nominee Stephen Biegun by Senator Bob Menendez (#235), Submitted November 20, 2019.

3

concerning the rules for establishing refu,gee status.”19 Guatemala does not have a dedicated office for resolving asylum cases; instead, a commission offour officials from several ministries and the immigration department.meet a few times a year to decide cases.20 Reportedly, these officials did not resolve a single case in the first seven months of2019.21 Honduras and El Salvador do not have a single full-time asylum officer. By contrast, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has about 500 asylum officers who are currently tasked with adjudicating over 300,000 pending asylum cases.22 Thus, the Northern Triangle countries are not remotely equipped to fully and fairly handle even a small fraction ofthese cases.

The lack of asylum capacity poses a grave risk that these Northern Triangle governments w ill- whether inadvertently or willfully-return asylum seekers to their country ofpersecution, constituting the serious human rights violation of refoulement that is prohibited under Section 208(a)(2)(A) ofthe U.S Immigration and Nationality Act.

This provision ofU.S.law codifies U.S. obligations prohibiting the return ofrefugees to a territory where his or her life or freedom would be threatened as a state party to the 1967 Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees. The ACAs may also violate U.S. obligations as a party to the 1984 Convention against Torture.23 Indeed, in response to the publication ofthe Rule, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees released a statement, saying it “has serious concerns about the new U.S. policy on asylum,” calling it “an approach at variance with international law that could result in the transfer ofhighly vulnerable individuals to countries where they may face life-threatening dangers.”24 A recently filed lawsuit details additional legal violations posed by the implementation ofthe ACAs.25

The ACAs recently signed by DHS appear to have been drafted in haste, with multiple typographical errors introduced into the agreements.26 There is little sign that they were

19 U.S. Department of State, “Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2018: El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras,” 2018, https://www.state.gov/reportlcustom/420abb692c/.
20 Wall Street Journal, “Asylum Seekers at U.S. Southern Border Can Now Be Sent to Guatemala Instead,” Michelle Hackman and Juan Montes, November 19, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/asy1um-seekers-at-u-s-southern- border-can-now-be-sent-to-guatemala-instead-11574187109.
21 Univision News, “Guatemala’s ’embryonic’ asylum system lacks capacity to serve as safe U.S. partner, experts say,” David C. Adams, August 2, 2019, https://www.univision.com/univision-news/immigration/guatemalas- embcyonic-asylum-system-lacks-capacity-to-serve-as-safe-u-s-partner-experts-say.
22 Government Executive, “Homeland Security Says It Will Dramatically Increase Asylum Workforce by Year’s End,” Eric Katz, October 23, 2019, https://www.govexec.com/workforce/2019/10/homeland-security-says-it-will- dramatically-increase-asylum-workforce-years-end/160828/.
23 Protocol Relating to the Status ofRefugees, January 31, 1967; Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, December 12, 1984; “Benchbook on International Law,” Diane Marie Amann (ed.), pp. ill.E-51, 2014, https://www.asil.org/sites/defau1t/files/benchbook/humanrights4.pdf.
24 UNHCR, “Statement on new U.S. asylum policy,” press release, November 19, 2019, https://www.unhcr.org/en- us/news/press/2019/11/5dd426824/statement-on-new-us-asylum-policy.html.
25 U.T. v. Barr, “Complaint for Declaratory and Injunctive Relief,” United States District Court for the District of Columbia, https://www.ac1u.org/sites/default/files/field document/complaint – u.t. v. barr 1 15 2020.pdf.
26 For example, the agreement with El Salvador refers to “El Salvadornian [sic] migration law, although this language is incorrect. A Google search for “El Salvadornian” produces zero results.:_the most common English- language demonym is “Salvadoran,” though “Salvadorian” and “Salvadorean” are also used. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvadorans. U.S. Department of Homeland Security, “Agreement between the Government ofthe United States and the Government ofthe Republic ofEl Salvador for Cooperation in the

4

negotiated in a meaningful way individually with each country. Furthermore, the President’s actions leading up to the agreements’ signing-including social media statements threatening to withhold, and subsequent withholding of, Congressionally-appropriated aid to the region- indicate that Central American officials may have accepted the terms under duress.27

~ Additionally, one news report indicated that, in a private meeting with President Trump, Secretary Pompeo criticized the agreement with Guatemala, “ca:lled the agreement flawed and a mistake,” and told the President that ”the Guatemalan government did not have the ability to carry out its terms.”28 This raises questions about the degree to which the State Department was involved in policy deliberations and decisions underlying these agreements.

Accordingly, please provide answers to the following questions by February 18, 2020:

Did any officials within the State Department raise concerns abol)t the feasibility of implementing these ACAs due to the lack of capacity of the Northern Triangle countries’ asylum systems, or for any other reason? Please provide any such memoranda or communications in which any such concerns were articulated.

What specific concerns about the agreement with Guatemala were raised by Secretary Pompeo in the reported Oval Office meeting with the President? Have these concerns been addressed?

Were any assessments of the Northern Triangle countries’ asylum adjudication procedures made prior to the negotiation or conclusion ofthe ACAs? Please provide any documents related to any such assessments.

The ACAs indicate that the parties shall develop standard operating procedures and plans regarding the implementation ofthese agreements. What is the status ofthese plans in each Northern Triangle coll.ntry?

4.. The ACAs indicate that they shall enter into force upon “exchange ofnotes” indicating that both countries have compl~ted the n~cessary domestic legal procedures for bringing the agreement into force. Which ofthe ACAs are in force? Please include copies ofany and all records related to this required exchange of notes.

Reportedly, Honduran officials wanted to delay transfers until both countries “provided notification that they have complied with the legal and institutional conditions necessary for proper implementation of this agreement” but DHS officials wrote that this request read to them as an “escape-hatch not to implement the ACA.”29 Should this be taken as an indication that DHS considers the ACAs to be in force even in the absence of such “notification” by both countries?

Examination ofProtection Claims,” signed September 20, 2019, p. 2, https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6427712-US-El-Salvador-Cooperative-Agreement.html.
27 Politico, “Trump warns ofretaliation against Guatemala after immigration deal falls through,” Rishika Dugyala and Sabrina Rodrigues, July 23, 2019, https://www.politico.com/story/2019/07/23/trump-guatemala-retaliation- immigration-deal-1426722; NPR, “Trump Froze Aid To Guatemala. Now Programs Are Shutting Down,” Tim McDonnell, September 17, 2019, https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2019/09/17/761266169/trump-froze- aid-to-guatemala-now-programs-are-shutting-down.
28 New York Times, “Trump Officials Argued Over Asylum Deal With Guatemala. Now Both Countries Must Make It Work,” Michael D. Shear and.Zolan Kanno-Youngs, August 2, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/02/us/politics/safe-third-guatemala.html.
29 BuzzFeed News, “Trump Wants To Start Deporting Asylum-Seekers To Honduras By January,” Hamed Aleaziz, November 25, 2019, https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/hamedaleaziz/asylum-seekers-deportation-honduras- trump.

5

The Rule indicates that the Attorney General and the Secretary ofHomeland Security will make a categorical determination that each ofthe Northern Triangle countries offers a “full and fair procedure” for adjudicating asylum claims.

Which, if any countries have the Attorney General and Secretary of Homeland

Security determined do have a “full and fair procedure”? Which, if any countries have the Attorney General and Secretary of Homeland Security determined do not have a “full and fair procedure”? For each country, when were any such determinations reached?

How are the Attorney General and the Secretary ofHomeland Security reaching these determinations? Please provide copies of any determinations made by DOJ and DHS and any related documentation ofdiscussions ofthis issue.

The Rule characterizes the ACAs as “safe third country” agreements as described in the Immigration and Nationality Act. Besides the ACAs, the only “safe third country” agreements signed in the 50 years since the enactment ofthe Immigration and Nationality Act was the agreement with Canada. Over two years elapsed between December 5, 2002, when that agreement was signed, and December 29, 2004, when it came into force.30 In contrast, less than four months elapsed between July 26, 2019, when the ACA with Guatemala was signed, and November 15,2019, when it came into force.

In the ACA signing ceremony in the Oval Office, Guatemala’s Minister of Interior and Home Affairs said that “Guatemala is definitely clear on the responsibility that it has. We are clear that we have to make changes.”31 What changes, if any, did Guatemala make to strengthen their asylum procedures in these four months? Please provide any communications between the government of Guatemala.and the Administration related to improvements made to Guatemala’s asylum system since the agreement was signed in July.

In order to ensure that the United States fulfills its obligations to refrain from sending a person to a place where such person will face harm, what procedures will the Administration follow if asylum seekers face torture, ill treatment, or persecution after being transferred to the Northern Triangle? ·

Is DHS transferring asylum seekers under the ACAs to Northern Triangle countries on the same flights as deportees? How is DHS ensuring that asylum seekers are not transferred in the company of individuals who may threaten their life or freedom after their arrival in country?

What, ifanything, was promised or offered by U.S. officials to the governments of Guatemala, El Salvador, or Honduras in exchange for their signing onto these agreements?

30 “AgreementbetweentheGovernmentofCanadaandtheGovernmentoftheUnitedStatesofAmericaFor cooperation in the examination ofrefugee status claims from nationals ofthird countries,” signed December 5, 2002, https://www.canada.ca/enlimmigration-refugees-citizenship/corporate/mandate/policies-operational-instructions- agreements/agreements/safe-third-country-agreementlfmal-text.html.
31 White House, “Remarks by President Trump at Signing ofSafe Third Country Agreement with Guatemala,” July 26, 2019, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-signing-safe-third-country- agreement-guatemala/.

6

Sincerely,

un· ed States Senator

k4-/a…~ Richard Blumenthal
United States Senator

~~~~

Kirsten E. Gillibrand Benjamin L. Cardin

United States Senator

United States Senator

‘0…=.>–·-topher S. Murphy United States Senator

United States Senator

~%Markey ·~ United States Senator

Edward J.

Bernard Sanders United States Senator

Thomas R. Carper United States Senator

~~

United States Senator

—

7

Tim Kaine
United States Senator

Christopher A. Coons United States Senator

8

Cory A. Booker United States Senator

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

All good points. But, I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for a reply from the regime.

Obviously, in the process of selling out America, the GOP just authorized the regime to “give a big middle finger” to any type of Congressional oversight.

Once you get beyond the fraud, lawlessness, and intentional cruelty of the regime’s agreements, here’s the reality of what’s awaits those illegally “orbited” to dangerous failed states in the Northern triangle: death, torture, rape, extortion, etc.:

HOW “AMERICA’S KILLER COURTS” PROMOTE “CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY” — HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH: TRUMP & HIS WHITE NATIONALIST SYCOPHANTS & TOADIES TOUT LAWLESS POLICIES THAT VIOLATE LEGAL OBLIGATIONS & HELP KILL, RAPE, TORTURE THOSE RETURNED TO EL SALVADOR — Supremes & Article III Judiciary Complicit In Gross Human Rights Violations!

This isn’t “normal.” It’s politically and judicially enabled neo-fascism unfolding right in front of us.

PWS

02-10-20

PROFESSOR KAREN MUSALO @ LA TIMES: We Can Restore Legality & Humanity To U.S. Asylum Law — That’s Why The Refugee Protection Act Deserves Everyone’s Support — “The bill lays out a plan to allow women and girls fleeing gender-based violence the opportunity to obtain asylum, and bring our country back in line with its humanitarian commitments. It’s a vision that all members of Congress should be able to get behind, even at a time of bitter partisanship.”

https://edition.pagesuite.com/popovers/dynamic_article_popover.aspx?guid=55eeae6e-b617-4ffd-b041-a54c15a3ada7&v=sdk

Professor Musalo writes in the LA Times:

Every day, courageous women and girls arrive at our southern border seeking refuge from unimaginable violence. Under our laws, they have the right to apply for asylum and have their cases heard. But rather than offering protection, the Trump administration is determined to send them back to the countries they have fought so hard to escape.

On Thursday, Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) and Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) introduced the Refugee Protection Act. The bill lays out a plan to allow women and girls fleeing gender-based violence the opportunity to obtain asylum, and bring our country back in line with its humanitarian commitments. It’s a vision that all members of Congress should be able to get behind, even at a time of bitter partisanship.

It’s no secret that this administration is systematically dismantling our asylum law. Women and children have borne the brunt of the suffering — from the egregious policies of family separation and “Remain in Mexico,” to the quiet publication of decisions by the attorney general that have closed door after door to those seeking safety.

The Refugee Protection Act would rectify many of these inhumane actions, and includes language to reverse recent decisions that have made it nearly impossible for women fleeing domestic violence or gang brutality to qualify as refugees.

One of those decisions — known as Matter of A-B- — was handed down by then-Atty. Gen. Jeff Sessions in 2018. That decision has been used to limit the legal definition of “refugee” in an attempt to eliminate the possibility of asylum in the U.S. for victims of domestic violence, sex trafficking and other gender-based human rights violations. Since then, we have seen asylum approval rates plummet for women, children and families arriving at our southern border.

The Matter of A-B- case involves a domestic violence survivor from El Salvador who fears she will be killed if she is sent back to her country. My organization, the Center for Gender & Refugee Studies, has represented A.B. in her asylum case for nearly two years.

In El Salvador, A.B., a courageous and resilient woman, endured over 15 years of beatings, rapes, death threats and psychological abuse at the hands of her husband. She secured a divorce and even moved to another part of El Salvador, desperate to escape her abuser. But no matter where she went, he tracked her down. When she requested a restraining order, the police provided her one — and told her to hand-deliver it to him. Fearing that he would make good on his threat to kill her, she fled to the United States.

In 2016, A.B. was granted asylum by the highest administrative tribunal in the immigration system, the Justice Department’s Board of Immigration Appeals. But in a highly unusual procedural move, Sessions seized upon A.B.’s case, overturned the grant of asylum, and used it to declare that the United States should no longer extend protection to domestic violence survivors.

A.B. has appealed Sessions’ action, but until a final decision is reached, she remains terrified that she will be deported. Countless other women who have made the arduous journey to the United States also face a hostile immigration system and, post-Matter of A-B-, an even harder legal battle.

Congress has an opportunity to correct this. The new bill would clarify legal requirements for asylum and provide clear guidance for cases involving gender-based violence. It would ensure that asylum seekers like A.B. get a fair opportunity to argue her claim before a judge.

The United States has a long history of giving refuge to people who’ve come to our shores. This measure would be a step toward restoring that tradition.

Karen Musalo is a law professor and the founding director of the Center for Gender & Refugee Studies at UC Hastings College of the Law. She is also lead coauthor of “Refugee Law and Policy: An International and Comparative Approach (5th edition).”

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

Here’s a link to an ImmigrationProf Blog summary and the text of the Refugee Protection Act, a recently introduced bill:

https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/immigration/2019/11/karen-musalo-restore-asylum-for-women-fleeing-abuse-and-death-.html

PWS

11-24-19

SENATE REPORTS “OUTS” WHITE NATIONALIST REGIME’S VILE ATTACK ON ASYLUM SYSTEM, WHILE HOUSE FINALLY SCHEDULES LONG-OVERDUE OVERSIGHT OF “LET ‘EM DIE IN MEXICO” PROGRAM!

https://www-m.cnn.com/2019/11/14/politics/merkley-asylum-report/

Priscilla Alvarez Reports for CNN:

(CNN)The Trump administration’s immigration policies have taken a toll on some of the officers tasked with carrying them out, according to a scathing report by Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley.

The 81-page report released Thursday compiles whistleblower accounts and media reports to provide an overview of the administration’s crackdown on migrants seeking asylum in the United States and attempts to curb migration to the southern border.

In one email, dated August 12, 2019, and obtained by Merkley’s office, an asylum officer denounced one of the administration’s policies as “clearly designed to further this administration’s racist agenda of keeping Hispanic and Latino populations from entering the United States.” The email was first reported by The Washington Post.

<img alt=”Trump administration proposes rule that would deny work permits to some asylum seekers” class=”media__image” src=”//cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/190813111158-ken-cuccinelli-presser-uscis-081219-large-169.jpg”>

Trump administration proposes rule that would deny work permits to some asylum seekers

The officer was referring to the so-called Migrant Protection Protocols program, which requires some migrants to stay in Mexico for the duration of their immigration proceedings. The program is being challenged in court, but has been allowed to proceed for the time being.

It’s not the first time asylum officers have expressed frustration over the program, which advocates argue puts migrants, many of whom are from Central America, in harm’s way.

In June, the union representing US asylum officers asked a federal court to end the policy, saying the directives are “fundamentally contrary to the moral fabric of our Nation and our international and domestic legal obligations.”

Merkley’s report, titled “Shattered Refuge,” emphasizes the frustrations held by some officials in the administration who are responsible for carrying out its policies and raises alarm over departmental actions that it alleges exacerbated the crisis at the southern border.

The report included details about:

Six pregnant women in Customs and Border Protection custody were sent back to Mexico in May to await their immigration proceedings despite being several months pregnant, according to whistleblowers. The report cites a letter the American Civil Liberties Union directed to the Department of Homeland Security inspector general in September elevating concerns about the placement of pregnant women in the Migrant Protection Protocols program.

The former head of the US Citizenship and Immigration Services asylum division, John L. Lafferty, was pushed out by then-acting Director Ken Cuccinelli. Whistleblowers perceived this to be “the result of acting as a committed, civil servant who played it by the book,” according to the report.

In April, US Citizenship and Immigration Services moved to raise the standard for credible-fear screenings, the first step in the asylum process. A lawsuit was filed in June challenging the change.

The Trump administration assigned CBP agents to conduct credible fear interviews in what appeared to be an attempt to curb the number of asylum applicants, the report states. (More than 50 Border Patrol agents are conducting credible fear screenings, according to USCIS. As of October 2019, Border Patrol agents have completed around 2,000 credible fear determinations.)

The report states that limiting entry at CBP ports of entry, a practice known as “metering,” has led to long wait lines and put migrants at heightened risk.

“America should be a land of hope and refuge — the place President Reagan called a shining city on a hill. We’ve seen the betrayal of that vision by the Trump administration’s intentional infliction of trauma on children and families as a warning to others to stay away,” Merkley said in a statement. “Their draconian actions were so contrary to American values and law that at least one whistleblower felt they could not morally or legally carry out their orders.”

The Trump administration has argued that the nation’s immigration system has incentivized people to journey to the southern border. President Donald Trump directed the Justice Department and DHS in April to propose regulations to staunch the flow of migrants, many of whom claim to be seeking asylum in the United States.

Within the last week, USCIS, an immigration agency within DHS, has rolled out proposed changes that would deny work permits to asylum seekers who cross the border illegally and apply a charge to asylum applications, among other things. Immigrant advocates and lawyers have pushed back on the proposed regulations, arguing that the rules penalize a swath of migrants who are seeking refuge in the United States.

Merkley’s report acknowledges the proposed changes to the asylum system and also resurfaces documents that found the controversial policy that led to the separation of thousands of families at the US-Mexico border was intended to deter migrants from coming to the border. It also reflects on the overcrowding at CBP facilities over the summer.

Here’s the information on the House Oversight hearings of “Let ‘Em Die In Mexico,” dishonestly referred to by DHS as the “Migrant Protection Protocols” (“MPP”):

EXAMINING THE HUMAN RIGHTS AND LEGAL IMPLICATIONS OF DHS’ ‘REMAIN IN MEXICO’ POLICY

DATE: Tuesday, November 19, 2019

Add to my Calendar

TIME: 10:00 AM

LOCATION: 310 Cannon House Office Building

SUBCOMMITTEE: Border Security, Facilitation, & Operations (116th Congress)

ISSUE: Border Security & Immigration

Video

Check back for live video of this hearing.

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

Make no mistake about it, the bogus MPP never had anything whatsoever to do,with “protecting” migrants! No, it was designed specifically to harm (kill on some occasions), punish, and “deter” asylum applicants from exercising their rights under U.S. and international law.

PWS

11-14-19

“LET ‘EM DIE IN MEXICO” — U.S. ASYLUM OFFICER EXPOSES TRUMP ADMINISTRATION’S INTENTIONAL RACIST VIOLATIONS OF HUMAN RIGHTS, ENABLED BY A COMPLICIT 9th CIRCUIT! — “The MPP both discriminates and penalizes. Implementation of the MPP is clearly designed to further this administration’s racist agenda of keeping Hispanic and Latino populations from entering the United States. This is evident in the arbitrary nature of the order, in that it only applies to the southern border. It is also clear from the half-hazard implementation that appears to target populations from specific Central American countries even though a much broader range of international migrants cross the southern border.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/11/12/scathing-manifesto-an-asylum-officer-blasts-trumps-cruelty-migrants/

Greg Sargent writes in the WashPost:

November 12, 2019 at 3:47 p.m. EST

President Trump’s requirement that asylum seekers remain in Mexico while they await hearings in the United States is creating a new humanitarian crisis. Yet it isn’t generating nearly the outrage and media scrutiny that his horrific family separations did.

But now a deeply dismayed asylum officer has authored a remarkable manifesto that was obtained by Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), as part of an investigation Merkley is conducting of Trump’s asylum policies.

The manifesto indicts the “Remain in Mexico” program from the inside in sweeping and scalding terms, describing it as illegal under U.S. law, a violation of the United States’ international human rights obligations and arbitrarily implemented to deliberately punish people for seeking asylum here.

The policy is “clearly designed to further this administration’s racist agenda of keeping Hispanic and Latino populations from entering the United States,” the asylum officer writes in the manifesto.

The asylum officer recently left their job, and in the missive, the officer says he or she could not continue to implement it “after careful consideration and moral contemplation.”

The officer’s condemnations of the policy are among the key revelations in a forthcoming assessment of Trump’s asylum policies by Merkley’s office.

Those policies include everything from ongoing efforts to send asylum seekers back to Honduras, which is “one of the most violent and unstable nations in the world,” to a new proposal to charge asylum applicants a $50 fee.

Merkley’s report, portions of which I’ve seen, will conclude that the administration has undertaken “systemic efforts” to “effectively rewrite U.S. asylum laws, rules and procedures,” with the overarching goal of “gutting the asylum system” but “without congressional approval or involvement.”

Merkley’s report will also conclude that Trump’s policies have “intentionally inflicted trauma” on asylum seeking families.

The Remain in Mexico policy — which is also known as the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) — requires migrants seeking asylum to wait in Mexico pending hearings in the United States, with the ostensible goal of preventing them from disappearing into the interior during that waiting period. About 50,000 migrants have been relocated there.

Numerous critics have said it’s deeply cruel to knowingly force migrants to wait in places where they’ll be subjected to serious risk, and journalistic exposés and studies alike have documented that the MPPs do does just that.

The officer, who has repeatedly been in touch with Merkley’s office as part of its investigation, will remain anonymous.

But the officer’s lawyer — Dana Gold, senior counsel at the Government Accountability Project — confirmed to me the authenticity of the manifesto and confirmed that it accurately depicts the person’s circumstances.

“In addition to this whistleblower, we are representing several other Department of Homeland Security whistleblowers who have raised serious concerns about immigration-related abuses,” Gold said. “That Congress is taking these issues seriously is essential to promoting accountability and protecting ethical civil servants committed to upholding their oaths of office.”

Tensions have been rising between asylum officers and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the agency that oversees the asylum system. And the union for asylum officers has already issued a legal brief condemning MPP amid litigation over the program.

But this asylum officer’s personal indictment of the policy goes much further.

For one thing, he or she accuses the administration of implementing the policy in an “arbitrary” manner:

The MPP both discriminates and penalizes. Implementation of the MPP is clearly designed to further this administration’s racist agenda of keeping Hispanic and Latino populations from entering the United States. This is evident in the arbitrary nature of the order, in that it only applies to the southern border. It is also clear from the half-hazard implementation that appears to target populations from specific Central American countries even though a much broader range of international migrants cross the southern border.

For another, he or she alleges that internal processes are breaking down. Under MPP, if asylum seekers in U.S. territory declare in their initial interview a fear of being returned to Mexico, they’re supposed to get a second screening, conducted by a trained asylum officer who is supposed to determine whether that fear is credible.

But the asylum officer charges that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services — which didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking comment — is mismanaging the system in a way that’s deliberately designed to be punitive and to make it harder for applicants to succeed:

The implementation is calculated to prevent individuals from receiving any type of protection or immigration benefits in the future. As such, it is a punitive measure intended to punish individuals who attempt to request protection in the United States. There is no clearly established policy and system for notifying applicants of changes to hearing dates and times, or for the applicants to provide change of addresses to the courts and Border Patrol. Without a highly functional notice system, the administration has ensured that a high number of applicants will miss their court dates.

And the asylum officer blasts the program as “ad hoc” and rigged against applicants:

The current process places on the applicants the highest burden of proof in civil proceedings in the lowest quality hearing available. This is a legal standard not previously implemented by the Asylum Office and reserved for an Immigration Judge in a full hearing. However, we are conducting the interviews telephonically, often with poor telephone connections, while at the same time denying applicants any time to rest, gather evidence, present witnesses, and, most egregious of all, denying them access to legal representation.

In a statement sent my way, Merkley vowed more revelations to come.

“This whistleblower reveals that in multiple ways, the Trump administration has asked them and other American asylum officers to take actions they believe break their oath of office and violate the law,” Merkley told me. “In the coming days, I will be releasing a report that details the full scope of this administration’s efforts to gut our legal asylum system.”

What this will confirm again is that for Trump, the goal is to make it as hard as possible for people to apply for asylum who actually would likely qualify for it — further eroding our commitment to the principle that desperate people have the right to appeal for refuge here and get a fair hearing without fear of being returned to face catastrophe.

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

So, why are those supposedly sworn to uphold the law, given the privilege of life-tenure, participating in overtly transparent human rights, legal, and constitutional violations?

Why do “ordinary civil servants” have more legal understanding and courage than the “robed ones in the ivory tower?”

Why are Federal Judges permitting a corrupt, biased, and racist Administration to cut off access to courts and punish individuals for exercising their legal rights under our laws?

Why is it OK to use the legal system as a “deterrent” to those seeking legal refuge under our laws?

Assuming that our republic survives, the question for the future is what can we do to insure appointment of Federal Judges, at all levels, with integrity who possess the courage to stand up for the most vulnerable among us in the face of unconstitutional racism and White Nationalism.

PWS

11-13-19

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Vote ’em out (vote ’em out) Vote ’em out (vote ’em out) And when they’re gone we’ll sing and dance and shout Bring some new ones in And we’ll start that show again And if you don’t like who’s in there, vote ’em out

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If you don’t like who’s in there, vote ’em out
That’s what Election Day is all about
The biggest gun we’ve got
Is called “the ballot box”
So if you don’t like who’s in there, vote ’em out

Vote ’em out (vote ’em out)
Vote ’em out (vote ’em out)
And when they’re gone we’ll sing and dance and shout
Bring some new ones in
And we’ll start that show again
And if you don’t like who’s in there, vote ’em out

If it’s a bunch of clowns you voted in
Election Day is comin’ ’round again
If you don’t like it now
If it’s more than you’ll allow
If you don’t like who’s in there, vote ’em out