Category: Litigation

😎🗽⚖️ NDPA SUPERRSTAR 🌟 STACY TOLCHIN WINS EQUITABLE TOLLING CASE IN 5TH CIR! — BOCH-SABAN V. GARLAND (Published) — What if . . . . 

Stacy Tolchin
Stacy Tolchin ESQ
Law Office of Stacy Tolchin
Pasadena, CA
PHOTO: Website

https://www.ca5.uscourts.gov/opinions/pub/20/20-60540-CV0.pdf

Key Quote:

Whatever the merits of Liadov were at the time it was issued, the Supreme Court has since made quite clear that only statutes that are set forth to be construed as jurisdictional are, in fact, jurisdictional. See, e.g., Hamer v. Neighborhood Hous. Servs. of Chi., 138 S. Ct. 13, 21 (2017) (“‘[M]andatory and jurisdictional’ is erroneous and confounding terminology where, as here, the relevant time prescription is absent from the U.S. Code.”). Among others, the Second and Ninth Circuits have held, subsequent to Liadov, that the thirty-day BIA appeal filing rule is non-jurisdictional and subject to equitable tolling. See Attipoe v. Barr, 945 F.3d 76, 78–80 (2d Cir. 2019) (“Liadov is at odds with precedent in this Circuit and in others, as well with the Supreme Court’s repeated admonition not to treat claim-processing rules—such as the filing deadline in 8 C.F.R. § 1003.38—as jurisdictional.”); Irigoyen-Briones v. Holder, 644 F.3d 943, 946–48 (9th Cir. 2011). We agree with, and adopt, these courts’ reasoning. The BIA has the jurisdiction to hear the case if Boch-Saban establishes equitable tolling, an issue that the BIA should address in the first instance. For these reasons, we remand this case to the BIA to determine whether Boch-Saban proved entitlement to equitable tolling.

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Case started 17 years ago. R has been married to USC for 9 years. 5 years ago, the DHS agreed that the case should be terminated to allow the respondent to pursue an IV.

What if IJs routinely granted joint motions like this?

What if they were encouraged to do so?

What if the “best practice” in Immigration Court were to encourage maximum use of joint agreements by the parties?

What if the BIA actually encouraged and enforced “best practices?”

What if long residence and being eligible for legal immigration were consistently treated as  “compelling equities.”

Wouldn’t those be “painless methods” for reducing the 1.7 million case backlog without gimmicks or stomping on anyone’s rights?

What if “practical scholar-litigators” like Stacy (a “complex litigation specialist”), who understand and have experienced the “dynamics” of Immigration Courts, were selected to become Immigration Judges and Appellate Immigration Judges?

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

04-10-22

Related posts:

  1. ⚖️5TH CIRCUIT BELATEDLY “OUTS” IJ AGNELIS REESE (NOW RETIRED) FOR 99.5% ASYLUM DENIAL RECORD —  “We find it likely that a ‘reasonable man, were he to know all the circumstances, would harbor doubts about the judge’s impartiality.’” Inexplicably Garland & Co. Let Other “Asylum Deniers Club” Members Continue to Wreak Havoc On Asylum Seekers, Their Lawyers, & The Entire U.S. Justice System!🤮
  2. 🧑🏽‍⚖️⚖️🗽🇺🇸WHO’S JUDGE IS IT ANYWAY? — The Crisis Of Independence In Our Immigration Courts! — Coming April 7, 2021! — Sponsored By The HNBA! — Don’t Miss It!
  3. 🆘🤮IS 11TH CIR. GROWING WEARY OF GARLAND’S SCOFFLAW BIA? —Two Trips To The Circuit, & The BIA Still Violates Own Regulations, Ignores Precedent, Spouts Gibberish While OIL’s Defense Of This Nonsense & Malfeasance By EOIR Raises Serious Ethical Questions! — THAMOTAR v. U.S. ATT’Y GEN. — Garland’s Dysfunctional & Systematically Unjust Courts Undermine OUR Democracy☠️ — Demand An IMMEDIATE End To The Scofflaw Nonsense🤡 🧹 At OUR Justice Department! 🏴‍☠️
  4. 🏴‍☠️👎🏽🤮 AIMLESS DOCKET RESHUFFLING (“ADR”) ON STEROIDS! — EOIR Dysfunction Shows What Happens When “Captive Court System” Kowtows To Political Handlers Rather Than Serving The Public! — Jason Dzubow, The Asylumist, Reports!

🤯WILL DEMS BLOW CHANCE TO UNITE AGAINST RACISM & SHOW HOW RULE OF LAW WORKS FOR ASYLUM SEEKERS @ BORDER? —“[W]hy shouldn’t it be a win for the president, too, comporting to his pledge for a more humane immigration system?”🗽⚖️🇺🇸

https://www.dailykos.com/story/2022/4/5/2090184/-GOP-states-waste-no-time-suing-over-Biden-admin-s-termination-of-anti-asylum-Title-42-policy

Gabe Ortiz
Gabe Ortiz
Staff Writer
The Daily Kos
PHOTO: dailycos.com

Gabe Ortiz in the Daily Kos:

. . . .

Republicans will use Title 42’s rollback “to fearmonger in an election year, using nativist talking points based on falsehoods,” The Boston Globe columnist Marcela García writes. “An invasion is coming! Expect chaos at the border! Yet those sound bites ignore the fact that Title 42 utterly failed even as a border management mechanism: Data show that migrant encounters surged to a record high during the policy.”

Marcela Garcia
Marcela Garcia
Associate
Editor and Columnist
Boston Globe
PICTURE: bostonglobe.com

“For Biden and the Democrats, the end of this disastrous policy should not be framed as a political headache, butas an opportunity to demonstrate that it is possible and suitable to process asylum applications in an orderly, legal, and humane way at the US-Mexico border,” she continued, noting new policy intended to speed up asylum processing, and a plan “that includes directing more resources and personnel to the southern border.”

pastedGraphic.png

Aaron Reichlin-Melnick

@ReichlinMelnick

·

Apr 5, 2022

What a mess. Everyone is now openly admitting Title 42 has nothing to do with public health and speaking of it purely in terms of an immigration deterrent—which it isn’t. Title 42 drove up apprehension numbers! There have been 750,000 repeat crossings thanks to Title 42.

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Marianne LeVine

@marianne_levine

Tester:”Ending Title 42 is expected to cause a significant increase of migration to the United States and put more pressure on an already broken system. These problems do not only affect the southern border, but put more strain on those working to secure the northern border”

pastedGraphic.png

Aaron Reichlin-Melnick

@ReichlinMelnick

The amount of lies and misinformation about Title 42 is hitting a fever pitch. Title 42 has been an abject failure. It’s not about public health and it’s a terrible deterrent.

It’s shut down the asylum system at the ports of entry and forced desperate people into crossing.

4:25 PM · Apr 5, 2022

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García is right. For as long as we can successfully keep this policy from continued use, it should be framed as a huge step forward for U.S. asylum law and a victory for vulnerable people who have been blocked from their U.S. asylum rights for more than two years. Isn’t restoring asylum law, especially in light of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, undoubtedly a good thing? And why shouldn’t it be a win for the president, too, comporting to his pledge for a more humane immigration system?

Or we can just let Stephen Miller and racist border agents keep controlling the narrative, with his lies that restoring U.S. asylum rights “will mean armageddon,” and the agents’ union claiming supposed “mass chaos.”

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It’s past time for ALL Dem pols and EVERYONE in the Biden Administration to stop enabling racist false narratives about refugees and asylum seekers (and, for Garland to stop “defending the indefensible”)! And, that means that one way or another, the Biden Administration needs to get off their tails and put in place a system to “process asylum applications in an orderly, legal, and humane way at the US-Mexico border.” 

It’s very possible! And, it’s no less than what Biden and other Dems promised when they ran in 2020 and solicited the votes of the human/rights, racial justice communities!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

04-07-22

Related posts:

  1. WOW, HERE’S A SURPRISE: MANY KIDS FLEEING VIOLENCE IN THE NORTHERN TRIANGLE KNOW NOTHING ABOUT BIDEN BORDER POLICIES — They Are Just Trying To Save Their Lives!
  2. ⚖️🗽MORE TRUTH ABOUT THE SOUTHERN BORDER FROM ONE OF AMERICA’S 🇺🇸 LEADING HUMAN RIGHTS EXPERTS: “Real Needs, Not Fictitious Crises Account For The Situation at US-Mexico Border,” By Donald Kerwin Center For Migration Studies
  3. 👍🏼⚖️🗽MAJORITY OF ASYLUM SEEKERS WIN THEIR CASES, EVEN IN A BROKEN & BIASED  SYSTEM INTENTIONALLY STACKED AGAINST THEM — But, Only, If They Can Get To A “Merits Adjudication!” — Nativist Lies, Myths, Driving USG Policies Exposed! — Why USCIS & EOIR Self-Created Backlogs Primarily Shaft Those Deserving Legal Protection Of Some Type!
  4. 🇺🇸🏴‍☠️RACE IN AMERICA: CARRIE ROSENBAUM “GETS IT,” EVEN AS MAYORKAS, GARLAND, HARRIS & THE OTHER BIDEN HYPOCRITES PRETEND NOT TO:  “Immigration reform, and a more robust application of the Equal Protection doctrine to all those inside the country, and at our borders, is necessary to move towards meaningfully dismantling systemic racism.”

⚖️THE GIBSON REPORT — 04-04-22 — Compiled By Elizabeth Gibson, Esquire, Managing Attorney, NIJC — HEADLINERS: New “Doyle Memo” On PD 🙂 — GOP White Nationalist AGs Seek Extension Of Illegal, Immoral Title 42 Charade🤮🏴‍☠️!

Elizabeth Gibson
Elizabeth Gibson
Managing Attorney
National Immigrant Justice Center
Publisher of “The Gibson Report”

Weekly Briefing

 

This briefing is designed as a quick-reference aggregation of developments in immigration law, practice, and policy that you can scan for anything you missed over the last week. The contents of the news, links, and events do not necessarily reflect the position of the National Immigrant Justice Center. If you have items that you would like considered for inclusion, please email them to egibson@heartlandalliance.org.

 

CONTENTS (jump to section)

  • PRACTICE ALERTS
  • NEWS
  • LITIGATION & AGENCY UPDATES
  • RESOURCES
  • EVENTS

 

PRACTICE ALERTS

 

Guidance to OPLA Attorneys Regarding the Enforcement of Civil Immigration Laws and the Exercise of Prosecutorial Discretion

ICE: On April 4, 2022, Principal Legal Advisor Kerry E. Doyle issued a memorandum to the OPLA workforce titled Guidance to OPLA Attorneys Regarding the Enforcement of Civil Immigration Laws and the Exercise of Prosecutorial Discretion (Doyle Memorandum), which will take effect on April 25, 2022. The Doyle Memorandum is consistent with DHS Secretary Alejandro N. Mayorkas’ September 30, 2021 memorandum titled Guidelines for the Enforcement of Civil Immigration Law, which took effect on November 29, 2021. Upon its effective date, the Doyle Memorandum rescinds OPLA’s prior PD guidance.

 

USCIS Extends Flexibility for Responding to Agency Requests

 

EOIR Policy Manual Updated with New Records Request Procedures: The EOIR Policy Manual has been updated to address this at Section 12.2, here and BIA Policy Manual at 13.1, here.

 

USCIS Service Center Expands Credit Card Payment Pilot Program to All Forms

 

NEWS

 

Biden rescinds controversial Title 42 order limiting asylum

The Hill: While crafted by the Trump administration just days into the pandemic, Title 42 has been used roughly 1.7 million times by the Biden administration, a figure that includes repeat crossers. See also Republican states sue to stop Biden admin’s lifting of Title 42 border policy; Migrants hopeful, suspicious at US reopening to asylum; Migrants march from south Mexico as US lifts COVID ban; Democrats fractured on response to end of Title 42.

 

Cash will now expedite your work permit, in new Biden immigration rule

Reuters: The Biden administration on Tuesday released a final rule expanding a program that allows applicants for various employment-related immigration benefits to pay up to $2,500 to speed up the process, in a bid to ease massive backlogs at the agency. See also USCIS Announces New Actions to Reduce Backlogs, Expand Premium Processing, and Provide Relief to Work Permit Holders (USCIS continues to make progress toward a temporary final rule currently named “Temporary Increase of the Automatic Extension Period of Employment Authorization and Documentation for Certain Renewal Applicants.”).

 

Immigration Orgs Urge Mayorkas To Support Sanctuary Cities

Law360: Immigrant rights, community and legal advocacy organizations (including NIJC) asked Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Tuesday to abandon attempts to undermine local policies limiting cooperation with DHS agencies and instead terminate enforcement agreements with cities and counties.

 

Migrants Fleeing Hurricanes And Drought Face New Climate Disasters In ICE Detention

Intercept: The privately run facility where Argueta Anariba was held was one of several new U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities in Louisiana. The implications of caging thousands of people in a state that’s notorious for extreme weather crystallized with the intensifying wind.

 

Facing Demand for Labor, U.S. to Provide 35,000 More Seasonal Worker Visas

NYT: The visa program being expanded, known as the H-2B visa program, allows American businesses to hire foreign workers for seasonal nonagricultural jobs like mowing lawns, cleaning hotel rooms, staffing amusement parks and waiting tables. Industries like landscaping, hospitality and tourism are particularly reliant on foreign nationals to meet high demand during the busy summer months.

 

LITIGATION & AGENCY UPDATES

 

Matter Of Wong, 28 I&N Dec. 518 (BIA 2022) on “Conviction”

BIA: A finding of guilt in a proceeding that affords defendants all of the constitutional rights of criminal procedure that are applicable without limitation and that are incorporated against the States under the Fourteenth Amendment is a “conviction” for immigration purposes under section 101(a)(48)(A) of the Immigration and Nationality Act.

 

2nd Circ. Says USCIS Must Revisit Inadmissibility Finding

Law360: The Second Circuit ruled Monday that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services failed to weigh the full facts when denying an Afghan national’s application for permanent residence because he fought opposition forces under duress after being abducted by the Taliban.

 

CA3 on Cancellation Remand in Cruz-Garcia V. Garland

Justia: The BIA also did not address Cruz-Garcia’s challenge to the IJ’s alleged failure to permit Lesley to testify, but that may have been because the BIA erroneously concluded that Cruz-Garcia had not challenged the IJ’s discretionary determination and therefore did not “reach . . . the arguments raised on appeal.”… Because the BIA failed to address an exhausted argument that ultimately challenges the IJ’s determination that he was not entitled to cancellation of removal, remand is warranted.

 

CA5 on Credibility & Firm Resettlement

CA5: In his credible-fear  interview,  Muminov  did  not  describe  his  alleged 2016 protest  of  the  confiscation of his passport or the beating that he incurred thereafter… Given these discrepancies, a reasonable factfinder could conclude, as the IJ and BIA did, that Muminov’s testimony about politically motivated attacks “was too inconsistent”… He cites his testimony about extortionate fees that  he  was  forced  to  pay  to  live  in  Moscow  and  the  harassment  and  discrimination that he faced there. This  testimony may  well  support a  restricted-residence  exception, but we cannot say that the IJ and BIA were compelled to conclude that…

 

6th Circ. Tells Mom To Return Kids To Venezuela

Law360: A Venezuelan mom must return her children to South America, the Sixth Circuit ordered in a published but split decision, ruling that an incident of domestic violence she said was committed by the father and witnessed by the children was too minor for the court to refuse a Hague Convention petition for their return.

 

8th Circ. Rejects Christian Somali’s Bid To Fight Deportation

Law360: An Eighth Circuit panel declined Wednesday to review a Somali man’s petition to avoid deportation, saying the immigration judge who looked at the case properly determined that even if the man’s testimony were found credible, he still wouldn’t likely face torture in Somalia due to his Christian beliefs.

 

CA10: Federal appeals court rules trans Honduran woman should have received asylum in U.S.

Washington Blade: “Any reasonable adjudicator would be compelled to find a pattern or practice of persecution against transgender women in Honduras,” reads the 10th Circuit ruling.

 

Court OKs Deal Tying Immigration Bonds To Ability To Pay

Law360: A California federal judge has approved a settlement between a class of unauthorized immigrants and the federal government that prohibits judges from setting unreasonable bond amounts for those detained without considering their ability to pay.

 

U.S. Must Face Suit Over Trump’s Separation of Migrant Kids

An Arizona federal judge on Friday dismissed the families putative Bivens class action regarding family separation against 15 high-ranking Trump Administration officials but rejected the federal government’s motion to dismiss as to the families’ FTCA claims against the United States.

 

DHS Enforcement Memo Still Partly Barred Amid Appeal

Law360: An Ohio federal judge refused to shelve his earlier ruling blocking the U.S. Department of Homeland Security from following a Biden administration mandate narrowing immigration enforcement priorities when making custody decisions while DHS appeals his order.

 

Honduran Migrant’s Rape Case Against ICE Agent Too Late

Law360: A Connecticut federal judge dismissed a Honduran immigrant’s claims that an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer raped and blackmailed her with the threat of deportation for seven years, finding that her claims are all time-barred.

 

CDC Provides Public Health Determination and Order on Termination of Title 42

AILA: CDC released an order to terminate its Title 42 public health order on May 23, 2022. The document assesses the current state of the COVID-19 pandemic, provides legal considerations, and describes plans for DHS to mitigate COVID-19, provide vaccinations to migrants, and resume use of Title 8.

 

USCIS Announces Actions to Reduce Backlogs, Expand Premium Processing, and Provide Relief to Work Permit Holders

AILA: USCIS announced actions to reduce caseloads and processing times. These include setting new internal cycle time goals, creating premium processing availability of Form I-539, Form I-765 and Form I-140 in FY2022, and working toward a temporary final rule for streamlining EAD processes.

 

Concerns about the Immigration Judge and Board Member hiring process

DOJ OIG: In May 2018, eight members of Congress asked the DOJ Office of the Inspector General (OIG) to investigate allegations that after January 2017, offers for Immigration Judge and Board Member positions were withdrawn or delayed for political or ideological reasons. While we were engaged in assessing these allegations, we received additional allegations that other candidates may have been favored in the hiring process because of their connections to the Trump administration, or perceived political affiliation or ideology. The DOJ OIG did not find sufficient evidence based on an assessment of the allegations to warrant opening a full investigation. However, during the course of our assessment, we identified concerns about the Immigration Judge and Board Member hiring process.

 

RESOURCES

 

NIJC RESOURCES

 

GENERAL RESOURCES

 

 

EVENTS

 

NIJC EVENTS

 

GENERAL EVENTS

 

To sign up for additional NIJC newsletters, visit:  https://immigrantjustice.org/subscribe.

 

You now can change your email settings or search the archives using the Google Group. If you are receiving this briefing from a third party, you can visit the Google Group and request to be added.

 

Elizabeth Gibson (Pronouns: she/her/ella)

Managing Attorney for Capacity Building and Mentorship

National Immigrant Justice Center

A HEARTLAND ALLIANCE Program

224 S. Michigan Ave., Suite 600, Chicago, IL 60604
T: (312) 660-1688| F: (312) 660-1688| E: egibson@heartlandalliance.org

www.immigrantjustice.org | Facebook | Twitter

 

 

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On its face, the “Doyle Memo” on PD looks good. But, as is always the case with ICE, it all depends on how it is interpreted, used, and applied on the “Field Office Level” and before the Immigration Courts.

On Title 42, interestingly, GOP states that were fine with the Trump regime’s racist attacks on the rule of law now are apoplectic about the Biden’s Administration’s long overdue effort to restore law, order, and human rights to the border.

It will also be telling to see how Federal Courts (particularly the 5th Circuit) that happily facilitated the Executive’s scofflaw, racist assaults on the Constitution and immigrants’ rights during the Trump era react to the Biden Administration’s efforts to restore at least some semblance of asylum laws and due process.

Experts like Blaine Bookey, Legal Director of the Center for Gender & Refugee Studies; Eleanor Acer, Director of Refugee Protection, Human Rights First; Lee Gelernt, Deputy Director, ACLU Immigrants’ Rights Project, and many others have pointed out that the “Trump/Miller Title 42 Blockade” was an illegal (not to mention immoral) pretext “from the git go.”

We can only hope that Garland does a better job of defending the termination of Title 42 than he did with the equally illegal and immoral “Remain in Mexico” program. However, having made the bad decision to rely upon and defend Title 42 for the last year, and fecklessly standing by while it was illegally invoked by the Biden Administration over a million times to deny migrants their legal rights, Garland might find some of his best legal arguments foreclosed by his own actions.

It’s also possible that given the unconscionable delay, lack of enthusiasm, and lack of effective planning within the Biden Administration for the termination of Title 42 and for vindicating the rights of immigrants of color in general, some of those in influential positions would not be unhappy if a “Trumpist Federal Court” forced them to keep illegally turning back refugees at our border forever!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

04-05-22

Related posts:

  1. ICRC: “Migration is not going to stop. If you try to prevent it or strictly regulate it, people start to pile up at the borders, which is happening in Mexico and other countries.”
  2. WOW, HERE’S A SURPRISE: MANY KIDS FLEEING VIOLENCE IN THE NORTHERN TRIANGLE KNOW NOTHING ABOUT BIDEN BORDER POLICIES — They Are Just Trying To Save Their Lives!
  3. 🗽⚖️🇺🇸LEE GELERNT @ ACLU SAYS BIDEN ADMINISTRATION “cannot farm out the asylum system.” Yet, That Appears To Be Largely What They Are Doing Under New, Previously Unpublicized Program!
  4. FINALLY, LEADING DEMS IN CONGRESS DEMAND END TO BIDEN’S TITLE 42 CHARADE! — NDPA  All-Star 🌟🦸🏻‍♀️ Blaine Bookey Speaks Out For Ukrainians & Other Legal Asylum Seekers Being Abused 🤮  By Biden Administration @ The Southern Border!

😴NQRFPT: After A Year Of “Blowing Off” Recs Of Progressive Experts, Garland’s Dysfunctional Courts Appear Shockingly Unprepared To Handle Influx Of Kids!🆘 — Mike LaSusa Reports for Law360 Quoting Me, Among Others!

NQRFPT = “Not Quite Ready For Prime Time” — Unfortunately, it’s a more than apt descriptor for the Biden Administration’s overall inept and tone-deaf approach to due process and immigrants’ rights in the beyond dysfunctional and unjust “Immigration Courts” under EOIR @ Garalnd’s DOJ.

Mike LaSusa
Mike LaSusa
Legal and Natioanl Security Reporter
Law369
PHOTO: Twitter

Influx Of Solo Kids Poses Challenge For Immigration Courts

By Mike LaSusa

Law360 (March 31, 2022, 2:44 PM EDT) — Unaccompanied minors arriving in increasing numbers at the southern U.S. border are likely to face a tough time finding legal representation and navigating an overwhelmed immigration court system that has no special procedures for handling their cases.

The number of unaccompanied children encountered by U.S. Customs and Border Protection has risen sharply over the past year, to an average of more than 10,000 per month, according to CBP data. Those kids’ cases often end up in immigration court, where they are subject to the exact same treatment as adults, no matter their age.

“Nobody really thought of this when the laws were enacted,” said retired Immigration Judge Paul Wickham Schmidt, now an adjunct professor at Georgetown Law. “Everything dealing with kids is kind of an add-on,” he said, referring to special dockets for minors and other initiatives that aren’t expressly laid out in the law but have been tried in various courts over the years.

About a third of the immigration court cases started since October involve people under 18, and of those people, 40% are 4 or under, according to recent statistics from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Executive Office for Immigration Review, which operates the courts.

It’s unclear how many of those cases involve unaccompanied children and how many involve kids with adult relatives, and it’s hard to make historical comparisons because of changes in how the EOIR has tracked data on kids’ cases over the years.

But kids’ cases are indeed making up an increasing share of immigration court dockets, according to Jennifer Podkul, vice president of policy and advocacy for Kids in Need of Defense, or KIND, one of the main providers of legal services for migrant kids in the U.S.

“The cases are taking a lot longer because the backlog has increased so much,” Podkul said. Amid the crush of cases, attorneys can be hard to find.

. . . .

The immigration courts should consider “getting some real juvenile judges who actually understand asylum law and have real special training, not just a few hours of canned training, to deal with kids,” said Schmidt, the former immigration judge.

. . . .

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Those with Law360 access can read Mike’s complete article at the link.

For what seems to be the millionth time with Garland, it’s not “rocket science.”🚀 He should have brought in Jen Podkul, her “boss,” Wendy Young of KIND, or a similar qualified leader from outside Government, to kick tail, roll some heads, clean out the deadwood, and set up a “Juvenile Division” of the Immigration Court staffed with well-qualified “real” judges, experts in asylum law, SIJ status, U & T visas, PD, and due process for vulnerable populations. 

Such judicial talent is out there. But, that’s the problem with Garland! The judicial and leadership talent remain largely “out there” while lesser qualified individuals continue to botch cases and screw up the justice system on a regular basis! Actions have consequences; so do inactions and failure to act decisively and courageously.

And, of course, Garland should have replaced the BIA with real judges — progressive practical scholars who wouldn’t tolerate some of the garbage inflicted on kids by the current out of control, undisciplined, “enforcement biased,” anti-immigrant EOIR system. 

Instead, Garland employs Miller “restrictionist enforcement guru” Tracy Short as his “Chief Immigration Judge” and another “Miller holdover” David Wetmore as BIA Chair. No immigration expert in America would deem either of these guys capable or qualified to insure due process for kids (or, for that matter anyone else) in Immgration Court. 

Yet, more than a year into the Biden Administration, there they are! It’s almost as if Stephen Miller just moved over to DOJ to join his buddy Gene Hamilton in abusing immigrants in Immigration Court. (Technically, Hamilton is gone, but it would be hard to tell from the way Garland and his equally tone-deaf lieutenants have messed up EOIR. Currently, he and Miller are officers of “America First Legal” a neo-fascist group engaged in “aiming to reinstate Trump-era policies that bar unaccompanied migrant children from entering the United States,” according to Wikipedia.)

Meanwhile, the folks with the expertise to solve problems and get the Immigration Courts back on track, like Jen & Wendy, are giving interviews and trying to fix Garland’s ungodly mess from the outside! What’s wrong with this picture? What’s wrong with this Administration?

We’re about to find out! Big time, as Garland’s broken, due-process denying “court” system continues it’s “death spiral,” ☠️ taking lots of kids and other human lives down with it!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

04-01-22

Related posts:

  1. ⚖️🗽🧑🏽‍⚖️CAMILLE J.  MACKLER @ JUST SECURITY “GETS IT!” — How Come Judge Garland & The Biden Administration Don’t? — “If we want to re-build a better, stronger immigration system, we need to start with immigration courts.” — Get Involved! Get Angry! Say No To Institutionalized Racism, Misogyny, & Dehumanization (“Dred Scottification”) @ EOIR! Force Judge Garland To Pay Attention! Demand Change, Now!
  2. 🏴‍☠️👎🏻🤮“HOUSTON, WE’VE STILL GOT A PROBLEM!” — A HUGE AND GROWING ONE — Garland’s Failure To Restore “Justice @ Justice” Reverberates Throughout Our Nation!🆘
  3. 🇺🇸🗽⚖️🧑🏽‍⚖️👍🏼BREAKING — THE NDPA STRIKES BACK WITH VIGOR: 70 Human Rights, Civil Rights, Due Process, Good Government, Immigration, Equal Justice, Racial Justice, Progressive, Gender Justice Organizations Rip Garland, Monaco In Letter Protesting Their Abject Failure To Address Due Process, Racial Justice, Rule Of Law Disaster At EOIR — New, Competent, Diverse, Progressive Leadership & Judges Needed To Counteract 4 Years Of White Nationalism, Biased Hiring, “Malicious Incompetence!” — No More “Miller Lite Unhappy Hour” @ DOJ!
  4. 🗽⚖️ “COURTSIDE” IN THE NEWS: BOTH NOLAN @ THE HILL & KEVIN @ IMMIGRATIONPROF BLOG HIGHLIGHT MY BLISTERING ANALYSIS OF BIDEN’S FIRST-YEAR IMMIGRATION POLICIES! — Garland’s Monumental EOIR Fail Writ Large Among “Underreported News” Of 2021 — Mishandling Of Immigration Courts Creates Key “Enthusiasm Gap” Among Progressives Heading Into 2022 Midterms!

🤪GARLAND’S ZANY COURTS! — AG Agrees That His Judges Will Comply With Constitution In Bond Cases, But Only In CD CAL!🤯

Yup, it’s a great settlement! But, only for those in the CDCA or who don’t understand how totally screwed up, unfair, directionless, visionless, and out of control Garland’s “Clown Courts” 🤡 are! 

Check out Hernandez v. Garland here:

https://www.aclusocal.org/en/press-releases/court-ice-cant-detain-immigrants-based-poverty

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So, Garland agrees that “his judges” will comply with the Constitution, but ONLY in the CDCA. In the other 95% of Immigration Courts nationwide, they evidently are free to choose to act in a “normal” arbitrary and capricious unconstitutional manner. Nice!

Of course, by initially setting no bond or more than $10K in any case, DHS can unilaterally invoke the “regulatory clamper” (8 CFR 1003.19(i)(2)) to defeat any release on bond pending appeal. Since the BIA routinely holds bond appeals until the detained merits cases are complete, then dismisses them as “moot,” the Administration retains lots of tools to act unconstitutionally.

Another nice touch!

Does anyone truly understand how completely screwed up and unconstitutional Garland’s “star chambers courts” are? 

This is what “justice” looks like in 21st Century America, in a Dem Administration no less? Gimmie a break?

A better BIA might have imposed Constitutional due process requiring consideration of ability to pay nationwide, thus preempting the need for more Article III Court litigation and inconsistent decisions affecting the fundamental human right of liberty!

A “better BIA” might have properly limited the DHS’s unconstitutional authority to use the “clamper” to block release on bond, rather than reducing Immigration Judges to a “clerical” role. See, e.g., Matter of Joseph (“Joseph I”), 22 I&N Dec. 660, 674 (BIA 1999) (Moscato, Board Member dissenting, joined by Schmidt, Chair, and Heilman, Villageliu, Guendelsberger, Rosenberg, Jones, Board Members).

A better AG might have eliminated the unconstitutional “clamper” that gives ICE counsel unfair leverage in bond cases.

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

04-01-22

Related posts:

  1. ⚖️🗽🇺🇸👨🏻‍⚖️👩‍⚖️NEVER TOO LATE: 22 YEARS AGO, FIVE OF US DISSENTED FROM THE BIA’S “ROLLOVER” TO IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT IN THE “JOSEPH II” BOND CASE — Four Of Us Were “Exiled” For Our Views — Now, The 3rd Circuit Says We Were Right! — Gayle v. Warden!
  2. ☹️HE BEAT THE GOVERNMENT TWICE IN COURT — But, After Three Years In Jail Without Being Charged With Any Crime, Omar Ameen Still Can’t Get A Bond From Garland’s Courts —  How Can A System Where The Prosecutor Makes The Rules & Picks The Judges, Mostly From The Ranks Of Former Prosecutors, Provide The “Fair & Impartial Judging” Required By Due Process?
  3. WHY EOIR 🤡 MUST GO ** CH. CI — Latest CLINIC Court Victory Over Regime Exposes Unholy (Not To Mention Unconstitutional & Unethical) Alliance Between EOIR & ICE Enforcement To Screw Kids! — The Bottom Is Unfathomably Deep @ The Deadly EOIR Clown Show🤡! —  “ICE is barred (both at the IJ and BIA levels) from seeking denials of continuances or other postponements to await adjudication of the I-589 filed with USCIS, seeking EOIR exercise of jurisdiction over an asylum claim where USCIS has initial jurisdiction under the terms of the 2013 Kim Memo, or otherwise taking the position that USCIS lacks initial jurisdiction over the class member’s asylum application.”
  4. 🧑🏽‍⚖️⚖️🗽🇺🇸WHO’S JUDGE IS IT ANYWAY? — The Crisis Of Independence In Our Immigration Courts! — Coming April 7, 2021! — Sponsored By The HNBA! — Don’t Miss It!

⚖️GARLAND PROMOTES INSTITUTIONALIZED SLOPPINESS @ EOIR🤮: BIA’s Cancellation Denial Untethered To Record, Ignored Appellate Arguments, Defended By OIL, Rejected By 3rd Cir!

Check out the remand in Cruz-Garcia v. AG, 03-31-22, 3rd Cir., unpublished, here:

Cruz-Garcia – 3rd

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

For all the world, it looks like the BIA just signed off on a “canned language, rote denial” that had little or nothing to do with the actual record and the arguments raised on appeal. Apparently, as long as the bottom line is to “dismiss” the respondent’s appeal, what goes above it is largely irrelevant to the “Deniers’ Club” that Garland employs as “appellate judges.”

In a system already struggling with a largely self-inflicted backlog of 1.7 million cases, unnecessary remands caused by poor BIA performance are NOT a “no harm, no foul” proposition. Moreover, how in good faith can Garland propose to “expedite” asylum cases at the border when many of his trial judges possess neither the expertise nor the temperament to fairly and efficiently decide asylum claims and the Trump holdover appellate body charged with providing guidance, enforcing best practices, and guaranteeing fairness is itself a major part of the problem? That’s what “designed for disaster” is all about!

Wouldn’t it be refreshing to have an AG who made due process, fundamental fairness, correct results, and careful, “practical scholarly” analysis the touchstone of “his courts” and who cared enough about our justice system to appoint a BIA of real, expert judges — “practical scholars, if you will, of which there are plenty outside of EOIR — capable of focusing on and achieving the foregoing values?

Apparently, in his comfy 5th floor office at DOJ where he thinks great thoughts and does little to achieve them, Garland can’t put himself in the unnecessarily frustrating position of actual human beings and their lawyers who are subjected to EOIR’s incompetent nonsense and “judicial malpractice” on a regular basis! He doesn’t even seem capable of relating to the Courts of Appeals Judges who are constantly called upon to correct fundamental mistakes and clear injustices that Garland ignores and his DOJ attorneys mindlessly defend! Perhaps this “blind spot” is because on the DC Circuit, Garland was absolved from the task of reviewing individual petitions for review emanating from the dysfunctional Immigration Courts that he inherited from his White Nationalist predecessors. 

Whatever the reason for his lackadaisical performance, America needs and deserves an AG who takes immigrant justice, racial justice, due process, and equal justice for all seriously!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

03-31-22

Related posts:

  1. 🆘🤮IS 11TH CIR. GROWING WEARY OF GARLAND’S SCOFFLAW BIA? —Two Trips To The Circuit, & The BIA Still Violates Own Regulations, Ignores Precedent, Spouts Gibberish While OIL’s Defense Of This Nonsense & Malfeasance By EOIR Raises Serious Ethical Questions! — THAMOTAR v. U.S. ATT’Y GEN. — Garland’s Dysfunctional & Systematically Unjust Courts Undermine OUR Democracy☠️ — Demand An IMMEDIATE End To The Scofflaw Nonsense🤡 🧹 At OUR Justice Department! 🏴‍☠️
  2. ⚖️🗽🧑🏽‍⚖️”MEDLEY OF INJUSTICE” — CIRCUITS CONTINUE TO LOWER HAMMER 🔨 ON BIA: Anti-Asylum Misogyny; Illegal & Incredibly Stupid “Policies;” “Perplexing” Lack Of Legal Knowledge Highlighted In Latest Batch Of Reversals! — “Attempted rape by a gang of men, in broad daylight on a public street, is especially terrorizing because it powerfully demonstrates the perpetrator’s domination, control over the victim and imperviousness to the law. Requiring evidence of additional harms both minimizes the gravity of the sexual assault and demeans the victim.”
  3. ☠️🤮 “TEFLON MERRICK” — GROTESQUE DUE PROCESS MELTDOWN @ GARLAND’S EOIR CONTINUES UNABATED, WHILE AG AVOIDS ACCOUNTABILITY — 3RD CIR. CASTIGATES GARLAND’S BIASED & INCOMPETENT “STAR CHAMBERS” — “It is more akin to the argument of an advocate than the impartial analysis of a quasi-judicial agency.”
  4. ⚖️🤯🤮GARLAND’S OHIO JUDICIAL MELTDOWN — “High-Asylum-Denying” Immigration Judges Appointed By Barr & Sessions Remain On Garland’s Bench In Cleveland Despite Referring To Migrants As “Illegals” & “Pretty Virgins!” — EOIR Disciplinary System Remains As Opaque As Ever Under Garland!🏴‍☠️ Yulin Cheng Reports @ Columbus Dispatch!

⚖️👩🏽‍⚖️👨🏼‍⚖️⚔️🛡LATEST ROUND TABLE AMICUS BRIEF FOCUSES ON GENDER-BASED PSG! — Chavez-Chilel v. A.G., 3rd Cir., Petition For Rehearing

Hon. Susan G. Roy
Hon. Susan G. Roy
Law Office of Susan G. Roy, LLC
Princeton Junction, NJ
Member, Round Table of Former Immigration Judges
Jeffrey S. Chase
Hon. Jeffrey S. Chase
Jeffrey S. Chase Blog
Coordinator & Chief Spokesperson, Round Table of Former Immigration Judges

 

 

Hon. “Sir Jeffrey” Chase reports:

The attached is the final “as filed” version of our latest brief in Chavez-Chilel v. Garland, in support of the motion for rehearing/rehearing en banc.  This one is very “all in the family,” as Sue Roy is our counsel, Sue and I drafted the brief, and decisions from Miriam Hayward and Charles Honeyman are attached as exhibits.

There is also an amicus brief by law school professors, and joining NJ attorney Ted Murphy as petitioner’s counsel is Paul Hughes, who argued Kisor v. Willkie before the Supreme Court (as well a Nasrallah v. Barr, a Supreme Court victory in which we were amici).

Best, Jeff

Chavez-chilel RT amicus FINAL

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

Thanks to our wonderful colleague Judge Sue Roy for taking the lead on this!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

03-31-22

Related posts:

  1. ⚖️🧑🏽‍⚖️JUDICIAL REVIEW — C.A. 2 — Brace Of Bad BIA Bobbles On Basics Brings “Culture Of Denial” Into Focus — Justice Will Continue To Be Illusive @ EOIR 👎🏽 Until Garland Steps Up & Replaces His Fatally Flawed BIA With Real Judges Who Are Progressive Practical Scholars In Immigration, Due Process, Human Rights, With A Firm Commitment To Bringing Racial & Gender Equity To Now-Disgraced Immigration Courts!🤮
  2. 🔮PROPHETS: MORE THAN SEVEN MONTHS AGO, “SIR JEFFREY”🛡 & I SAID IT WOULD TAKE MORE THAN HOLLOW PROMISES IN AN E.O. TO BRING JUSTICE  FOR VICTIMS OF GENDER VIOLENCE! — Sadly, We Were “Right On” As This Timely Lament From CGRS Shows!
  3. 🇺🇸⚖️🗽HON. JEFFREY S. CHASE: UNETHICAL, 🏴‍☠️WHITE NATIONALIST,⚰️ MISOGYNIST 🤮“WAR CRIMINAL” ☠️JEFFREY ROSEN TAKES COWARDLY🐓 PARTING SHOT AT REFUGEE🦸🏻 WOMEN! — DOJ Clean-Out, 🧹🪠🧻Fumigation, & Restaffing With Ethical Attorneys Can’t Begin Soon Enough!
  4. NDPA STALWART JASON “THE ASYLUMIST” DZUBOW 🌟 QUOTED IN AP ARTICLE ABOUT REPEAL OF A-B- & L-E-A-!

⚖️10TH CIR. SAYS TRANSGENDER WOMEN FACE “PATTERN OR PRACTICE OF PERSECUTION” IN HONDURAS — Gonzalez Aguilar v. Garland — Latest Setback For Garland’s “Asylum Deniers’ Club” (A/K/A “BIA”)!👎🏽 “Refugee Roulette” ☠️⚰️  The “Order Of The Day” @ Garland’s Dysfunctional & Unjust DOJ!

Dan Kowalski reports for LexisNexis:

https://www.lexisnexis.com/legalnewsroom/immigration/b/insidenews/posts/ca10-2-1-on-honduras-transgender-women-gonzalez-aguilar-v-garland

Immigration Law

pastedGraphic.png

Daniel M. Kowalski

29 Mar 2022

CA10 (2-1) on Honduras, Transgender Women: Gonzalez Aguilar v. Garland

Gonzalez Aguilar v. Garland

“Kelly Gonzalez Aguilar is a transgender woman from Honduras. She came to the United States and applied for asylum, withholding of removal, and deferral of removal. In support, Kelly claimed • past persecution in Honduras from her uncle’s abuse, • fear of future persecution from pervasive discrimination and violence against transgender women in Honduras, and • likely torture upon return to Honduras. The immigration judge denied the applications and ordered removal to Honduras. In denying asylum, the immigration judge found no pattern or practice of persecution. Kelly appealed the denial of each application, and the Board of Immigration Appeals dismissed the appeal. The dismissal led Kelly to petition for judicial review. We grant the petition. On the asylum claim, any reasonable adjudicator would be compelled to find a pattern or practice of persecution against transgender women in Honduras.”

[Hats off to Nicole Henning, Tania Linares Garcia and Keren Hart Zwick!  And…nota bene…this PFR was filed in 2018!]

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

Imagine what it would be like if we had an AG with the guts and decency to appoint a BIA of real judges — asylum experts who would adhere to due process and fairly, properly, and consistently interpret asylum laws rather than spewing out specious, life-destroying, bogus denials? Backlogs might even start decreasing!

Remarkably, even the Trump-appointed dissenting Circuit Judge Joel M. Carson concedes that EOIR easily could have decided this case in favor for the respondent and perhaps should have. 

No doubt a person could view the record before us differently—the majority does so today—and I might on de novo review.

He then willingly gets lost in a forest of bogus reasons for abusing “standards of review” as an excuse for Article III Judges to avoid responsibility for life-threatening miscarriages of justice.

In stark terms, a reasonable judge could have saved this respondent and probably should have. But, this IJ and the BIA chose not to. So, who cares because it’s only a brown-skinned asylum seeker whose life is so insignificant that we should relegate it to the realm of chance and happenstance. Next case, please!

Asylum law, according to the Supremes in Cardoza-Fonseca is supposed to be interpreted generously in favor of protection. If legal protection from persecution or death is one possible outcome, it should be the the only acceptable outcome! Saying that some humans should potentially die while others be protected basically depending on a Federal Judge’s personal philosophy and mood on a particular day isn’t just legally wrong and a denial of due process and equal protection — it’s immoral!

The point is obvious. Better qualified judges at the BIA would put an end to this treatment of life or death decisions as a “crap shoot” — dependent on which IJ is drawn, the composition of the BIA “panel,” the Federal Circuit in which the case arises, the “luck of the draw” on the Circuit panel, and probably the “day of the week.” This is no way to run a justice system. And, Garland and his complicit lieutenants know that!

A better AG would long ago have installed a better BIA. It’s classic “Refugee Roulette” ☠️⚰️ being promoted by a Dem Administration! Instead of putting an end to this disgraceful “intellectual game of chance with human lives” being played by ivory tower bureaucrats and judges who have “immunized” themselves from the traumatic real life consequences of their bad decisions, Garland has chosen to “play along” 

I’m not the only one to express frustration with Garland’s failure to do his job, to prioritize accountability, and to take justice, human lives, and the rule of law seriously! See, e.g., https://www.huffpost.com/entry/merrick-garland-justice-department-contempt-charges-lag-capitol-riot-investigation_n_62427a3ae4b0e44de9b8451f

When he’s not carrying out Stephen Miller’s anti-asylum policies @ EOIR with Miller’s holdover acolytes  as “judges” and “senior executives,” Garland is busy helping Trump and his fellow GOP insurrectionists “run out the clock” on the House Jan. 6 Panel!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

03-30-22

Related posts:

  1. 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! 
  2. ⚖️🗽🧑🏽‍⚖️”MEDLEY OF INJUSTICE” — CIRCUITS CONTINUE TO LOWER HAMMER 🔨 ON BIA: Anti-Asylum Misogyny; Illegal & Incredibly Stupid “Policies;” “Perplexing” Lack Of Legal Knowledge Highlighted In Latest Batch Of Reversals! — “Attempted rape by a gang of men, in broad daylight on a public street, is especially terrorizing because it powerfully demonstrates the perpetrator’s domination, control over the victim and imperviousness to the law. Requiring evidence of additional harms both minimizes the gravity of the sexual assault and demeans the victim.”
  3. ⚖️🗽🧑🏽‍⚖️COURTS OF APPEALS CONTINUE TO THROW ROTTEN TOMATOES 🍅 @ BIA’S ANTI-ASYLUM BIAS — Basic Analytical, Legal Errors Continue From Weaponized, Non-Expert “Star Chamber” ☠️ Posing As ”Tribunal!” — Judge Garland Must Fix This Inexcusable, Unnecessary, Systemic Failure Now! — Justice For Persons Of Color & Migrants Can’t “Wait For Godot!”
  4. ⚖️🧑🏽‍⚖️JUDICIAL REVIEW — C.A. 2 — Brace Of Bad BIA Bobbles On Basics Brings “Culture Of Denial” Into Focus — Justice Will Continue To Be Illusive @ EOIR 👎🏽 Until Garland Steps Up & Replaces His Fatally Flawed BIA With Real Judges Who Are Progressive Practical Scholars In Immigration, Due Process, Human Rights, With A Firm Commitment To Bringing Racial & Gender Equity To Now-Disgraced Immigration Courts!🤮

⚖️ JUDGE TARA NASELOW-NAHAS “JUST SAYS NO” TO ICE’s ATTEMPTED IRAQI DEPORTATION! — Ruling Comes After U.S. Magistrate Judge Found DOJ’s Failed Extradition Attempt Based On Bogus Evidence!

Bob Egelko
Bob Egelko
Courts Reporter
SF Chronicle
PHOTO: SF Chron

Bob Egelko reports for the SF Chron:

https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Immigration-judge-blocks-deportation-of-17035086.php

An immigration judge has blocked the deportation of a Sacramento man to his native Iraq where he would face trial, and likely execution, for a terrorist murder — a murder that, according to a U.S. magistrate, took place while the man was in another country.

Omar Ameen was granted U.S. refugee status in 2014 by immigration officials who said he would face persecution in Iraq. But the U.S. government jailed him in August 2018 while Iraq sought to extradite him on a murder charge.

Last April, U.S. Magistrate Judge Edmund Brennan found that the crime Iraq accused Ameen of committing, the fatal shooting of a police officer in 2014 before his departure for the U.S., had taken place while Ameen was 600 miles away in Turkey, where he had fled from Iraq more than two years earlier.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement then sought to deport Ameen to Iraq, saying he had lied about his alleged terrorist connections and other subjects, and kept him in custody. But Immigration Judge Tara Naselow-Nahas of Van Nuys (Los Angeles County) ruled last week that Ameen could not be deported to Iraq because he was likely to be jailed and tortured there. She did not dismiss ICE’s claim that Ameen had made false statements, but said she found no evidence of terrorist connections.

. . . .

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

Read the rest of the article at the link.

Immigration Judges make critical life or death decisions every day. Yet the system suffers from gross inconsistencies, huge backlogs, lack of discipline, poor intellectual leadership, an appellate board mired in leftover Trumpism, and an Attorney General who generally has been slow to recognize the importance of Immigration Court reform and a focus on due process, fundamental fairness, expertise, and quality in his “wholly owned” system.

One of the lead attorneys for Mr. Ameen is Round Table stalwart and former Immigration Judge Ilyce Shugall!  Congrats to Ilyce and her team!

Hon. Ilyce Shugall
Hon. Ilyce Shugall
U.S. Immigraton Judge (Retired)
Member Rounds Table of Former Immigration Judges

Here’s more on the case from KCRA News:  https://www.kcra.com/article/omar-ameen-cannot-be-sent-to-iraq-what-happens-next/39566797

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

03-29-22

 

Related posts:

  1. ⚖️🗽🧑🏽‍⚖️”MEDLEY OF INJUSTICE” — CIRCUITS CONTINUE TO LOWER HAMMER 🔨 ON BIA: Anti-Asylum Misogyny; Illegal & Incredibly Stupid “Policies;” “Perplexing” Lack Of Legal Knowledge Highlighted In Latest Batch Of Reversals! — “Attempted rape by a gang of men, in broad daylight on a public street, is especially terrorizing because it powerfully demonstrates the perpetrator’s domination, control over the victim and imperviousness to the law. Requiring evidence of additional harms both minimizes the gravity of the sexual assault and demeans the victim.”
  2. ☹️HE BEAT THE GOVERNMENT TWICE IN COURT — But, After Three Years In Jail Without Being Charged With Any Crime, Omar Ameen Still Can’t Get A Bond From Garland’s Courts —  How Can A System Where The Prosecutor Makes The Rules & Picks The Judges, Mostly From The Ranks Of Former Prosecutors, Provide The “Fair & Impartial Judging” Required By Due Process?
  3. FACT: THE ROUND TABLE 🛡⚔️ HELPS LEAD THE FIGHT AGAINST EOIR CLOWN 🤡🦹🏿‍♂️ SHOW’S “DYING GASP” ASSAULTS 🤮 ON THE MOST VULNERABLE AMONG US! — “Injustice Anywhere Is A Threat To Justice Everywhere!” — Rev. MLK, Jr.
  4. ⚖️🗽🧑🏽‍⚖️👨🏻‍⚖️🇺🇸MUST-READ FOR TEAM GARLAND @ DOJ: ABA COMMISSION ON IMMIGRATION JOINS CALL FOR INDEPENDENT ARTICLE I IMMIGRATION COURT, MAJOR DUE PROCESS REFORMS, END OF WHITE NATIONALIST KAKISTOCRACY @ EOIR! 

😰TRAUMATIZED BY DEALING WITH GARLAND’S DYSFUNCTIONAL EOIR? — Thankfully, There’s Help For That! — Professor Steve Yale-Loehr & A Panel Of Mental Health Experts Will Discuss Methods For Dealing With Traumatic Situations Created By An Out-Of-Control, Leaderless, Values-Free System Designed & Staffed To Dehumanize & Deny!*

 

Navigating Trauma: Tips for Attorneys and Their Clients: Free webinar Mar. 30 1 pm ET

Interested in learning how to deal with trauma in your clients and vicarious trauma you might suffer in sensitive cases like asylum, domestic violence, and violent crimes? Sign up for a free webinar entitled “Navigating Trauma: Tips for Attorneys and Their Clients” this Wednesday March 30, from 1-2 pm Eastern time.

Dr. JoAnn Difede, Director of the Program for Anxiety and Traumatic Stress Studies and a Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medicine, and Dr. Michelle Pelcovitz, Assistant Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medicine, will teach you how to recognize and deal with trauma. They will also provide self-care tips. Stephen Yale-Loehr, Professor of Immigration Law Practice at Cornell Law School and co-chair of the New York State Bar Association (NYSBA) Committee on Immigration Representation, will moderate.

The webinar is sponsored by NYSBA, Cornell Law School, Proskauer, Immigrant Justice Corps, the Association of Pro Bono Counsel, and other organizations. NYSBA will provide 1.0 MCLE credit of professional practice for attendees.

Anyone can register for the free webinar; you don’t have to be a NYSBA member. NYSBA members can register at https://nysba.org/events/navigating-trauma-tips-for-attorneys-and-their-clients/. If you aren’t a NYSBA member, set up a free account at https://nysba.org. Then input your name and email address so NYSBA can send you the Zoom link. The price is set up for free, so it will automatically be $0.00 when you add the program to your cart and check out. You can also call the NYSBA membership center at 800-582-2452 to register via phone. The program will be recorded, and attendees will receive handouts.

Stephen Yale-Loehr

Professor of Immigration Law Practice, Cornell Law School

Faculty Director, Immigration Law and Policy Program

Faculty Fellow, Migrations Initiative

Co-director, Asylum Appeals Clinic

Co-Author, Immigration Law & Procedure Treatise

Of Counsel, Miller Mayer

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

Feeling stressed? Burned out? “Aimless Docket Reshuffling,” poor quality IJ decisions, and a “Trump holdover BIA” stacked with “appellate judges” who almost never see an asylum case they aren’t eager to deny got you down? Tired of having the exact same facts and arguments win in one case and lose in the next! Angry about Garland’s latest due process killing gimmick — more “expedited asylum procedures?”

Welcome to “business as usual” in the “Not so Wonderful” World of Merrick Garland’s EOIR!☠️ 

To practice before the dysfunctional Immigration Courts and USCIS in the “Biden Era,” members of the NDPA are going to need “coping skills” in addition to legal expertise to “fight the good fight” against systemic injustice, indifference to common sense and best practices, and endemic incompetence! 

Check this out!  It’s free!

Remember: It’s only human lives and the future of humanity that are at stake here! Why should Garland and his ivory tower lieutenants take it seriously, just because YOU do? 

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

03-25-22

*⚠️IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: “Courtside” is solely responsible for the content of this promotion. It has not been approved for public consumption by the webinar sponsors, the FDA, or anyone else of any importance whatsoever!

Related posts:

  1. 👍🏼⚖️🗽MAJORITY OF ASYLUM SEEKERS WIN THEIR CASES, EVEN IN A BROKEN & BIASED  SYSTEM INTENTIONALLY STACKED AGAINST THEM — But, Only, If They Can Get To A “Merits Adjudication!” — Nativist Lies, Myths, Driving USG Policies Exposed! — Why USCIS & EOIR Self-Created Backlogs Primarily Shaft Those Deserving Legal Protection Of Some Type!
  2. FROM THE HEIGHTS OF KASINGA TO THE DEPTHS OF AMERICA’S DEADLY STAR CHAMBERS: Will The Biden Administration Tap The New Due Process Army To Fix EOIR & Save Our Nation? 
  3. 🏴‍☠️☠️🤮👎🏻IN NYT OP-ED, FORMER TRUMP DOJ ATTORNEY ERICA NEWLAND ADMITS COMPLICITY! — Having Undermined Democratic Institutions, Sold False Narratives To (Too Often Willing) Federal Judges, & Participated In Racist-Inspired “Dred Scottification” (“Dehumanization”) Of the Other Is Actually a BIG Deal! — So Is The Destruction Of Due Process & Fundamental Fairness In The Immigration Courts (Now, “Clown Courts”🤡, or “America’s Star Chambers”☠️) 
  4. ⚖️🗽🧑🏽‍⚖️CAMILLE J.  MACKLER @ JUST SECURITY “GETS IT!” — How Come Judge Garland & The Biden Administration Don’t? — “If we want to re-build a better, stronger immigration system, we need to start with immigration courts.” — Get Involved! Get Angry! Say No To Institutionalized Racism, Misogyny, & Dehumanization (“Dred Scottification”) @ EOIR! Force Judge Garland To Pay Attention! Demand Change, Now!

ICRC: “Migration is not going to stop. If you try to prevent it or strictly regulate it, people start to pile up at the borders, which is happening in Mexico and other countries.”

Reuters reports:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/24/migration-violence-mexico-central-america?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

Waves of migration through Mexico and Central America, and people who go missing, will increase in 2022 due to high levels of violence in the region, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said.

Battle-scarred ghost town bears mute witness to Mexico’s drug wars

“In many countries, violence is wreaking more and more havoc, and that’s why there are more and more migrants,” ICRC representative Jordi Raich told Reuters in an interview Wednesday. “And it’s not a situation that is going to improve or slow down, not even in the years to come.“

Immigration authorities in Mexico detained 307,679 migrants in 2021, a 68% increase compared with 182,940 detentions in 2019, according to government data.

Shelters in Mexico were completely overwhelmed last year, filled with frustrated migrants unable to continue their journey to the United States, Raich said.

Many migrants get “stuck” along Mexico’s southern or northern borders, Raich said, where they face “enormous economic constraints” and are able to find only basic services.

The administration of Joe Biden has faced record numbers of migrants arriving at the southern border and has implored Mexico and Central American countries to do more to stem the wave.

Disappearances in the region have not slowed either, the Red Cross said in a report released Thursday. Mexico recently surpassed 100,000 people reported missing in the country.

In El Salvador, 488 missing person cases remain unsolved, and in Guatemala, the number of missing women rose to six a day, the Red Cross report said.

Raich said it will be difficult to respond to the root causes of migration immediately. A joint effort among countries like El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras is necessary, he added.

“Migration is not going to stop,” Raich said. “If you try to prevent it or strictly regulate it, people start to pile up at the borders, which is happening in Mexico and other countries.”

Meanwhile, the Biden administration on Thursday rolled out a sweeping new regulation that aims to speed up asylum processing and deportations at the US-Mexico border, amid a record number of migrants seeking to enter the US.

The announcement of the new rule came as US officials are debating whether to end a separate Covid-era policy that has blocked most asylum claims at the border. The asylum overhaul could provide a faster way to process border crossers if the Covid order is ended.

. . . .

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

Read the full article at the link.

Cruelty, walls, detention, family separation, border militarization, expedited hearings — they aren’t going to stop human migration. We will be able to increase border deaths, expand the scope of “black market migration,” increase our “underground population,” and enrich human smugglers.  Good policy? 

Meanwhile, it’s obvious that the “disingenuous internal debate” on Title 42 has nothing whatsoever to do with public health and everything to do with whether continued illegal and immoral suspension of asylum protections at the border will prove politically advantageous to the Biden Administration. It won’t! It might, however, cost Dems support among progressives.

How dishonest and unethical is the Biden Administration’s discussion of violating the law? (Do we actually have an Attorney General?) According to the WashPost, scofflaw Biden Administration officials actually are considering lifting Title 42 for families, but not for single males! https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/03/24/border-biden-migrants-influx-pandemic/

There is, of course, no known medical evidence that “single males” present a greater COVID threat than families! Indeed, there is no known medical evidence to suggest that any potential asylum applicant is a threat to the health and safety of the US.

The whole thing is a deadly farce! Why aren’t Hill Dems calling for oversight of Garland’s sitting by and watching while the law and ethics are pulverized around him? Or worse yet, what about his Department’s defense of abrogation of our laws? Believe it or not, we actually have asylum and protection laws on the books, duly enacted by Congress, although you’d never know it from Garland’s feckless performance!

Meanwhile, WashPost and other so-called “mainstream media” continue to hype stories about increased border pressure. So, continuing to violate asylum law is a viable alternative “strategy?” Give me a break! How is violating the law going to stop folks from fleeing deadly conditions in their home countries? It won’t, as the ICRC points out above!

What it will do, as also pointed out above, is kill more asylum seekers, subject them to rape, torture and other harm, enrich smugglers, and increase the extralegal population in the U.S.!

Blaine Bookey
Blaine Bookey
Legal Director
Center for Gender & Refugee Studies @ Hastings Law
Photo: CGRS website

It also will increase those waiting in vain at the Southern Border for the reopening of a legal asylum system that has abandoned them! In the words of one expert:

“The conditions are squalid,” said Blaine Bookey, the legal director of the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies at University of California, Hastings College of the Law, who led a team interviewing dozens of families waiting in Tijuana for the federal government to lift Title 42. “There is real lack of access to sanitation, medical care, adequate food, all of the real basic fundamental necessities.”

. . . .

“There have been some exceptions made for Ukrainians, which we’re happy to see, but the policy should be ended for everyone,” Bookey said. “There was never a public health justification, and there certainly isn’t now.” (WashPost, supra).

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) babbles nativist nonsense:

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) said at a committee hearing last week that the influx has “completely derailed” efforts to discuss improving legal immigration to the United States, which he said states such as Texas need to staff hospitals and fill jobs. Border states such as Texas and Arizona are bracing for higher numbers of unauthorized immigrants in coming weeks, he said.

“Rather than deter would-be migrants with weak asylum claims from taking the dangerous journey to the southwest border, the administration has rolled out the welcome mat and created new incentives to illegally immigrate to the United States,” he said at the March 15 hearing before the Senate Judiciary subcommittee on immigration, citizenship and border safety.

To my knowledge, neither Cornyn nor any of his other GOP nativist buddies have ever adjudicated an asylum application. Nor have they represented asylum seekers before the Asylum Office or in our broken Immigration Courts. So, how would that have any idea whether certain asylum claims are “weak” or not? They wouldn‘t!

Moreover, we haven’t had a functioning asylum system at our Southern Border for years. So, how would anyone know how many of the claims are  “weak?” They wouldn’t?

Remarkably, apparently unknown to Cornyn and his scofflaw buddies, we actually have laws to deal with his concerns. When the legal system is “open for business” — which it isn’t now — those claiming asylum at the border are subject to “summary exclusion” by DHS officers. Their claims are then expeditiously reviewed by Asylum Officers for a “credible fear” of asylum. Those who don’t establish credible fear, subject only to cursory review by an Immigration Judge, can be immediately removed by DHS.

Historically, when the system was at least nominally functional, those “passing” credible fear have been turned over to the now dysfunctional Immigration Courts. Under Trump, these “parodies of courts”  were “weaponized” into “asylum killing grounds.”

Sessions and Barr packed their non-independent “captive courts” with “judges” perceived to be “enforcement oriented” and “anti-asylum” — willing to skew the law and facts as necessary to deny and deport. This mess is “led” by an appellate body, the BIA, which contains some of the most notorious members of the “Asylum Deniers’ Club”  — folks who got their appellate jobs under Barr specifically because as Immigraton Judges they denied almost every asylum case that came before them! In other words, even when there was some semblance of a legal asylum system, it was redesigned under Trump to be systemically unfair to asylum seekers, particularly women and applicants of color. For sure, racism and misogyny played into this unseemly scenario.

Remarkably, Garland has chosen to maintain this dysfunctional, biased, and broken system largely in the form it existed and with almost all of the same unqualified or questionably qualified “judges” he inherited from Session and Barr!

While the Administration has announced “new interim regulations” that would allow Asylum Officers to grant meritorious cases without going before Immigration Courts, the system still depends on “guidance,” supervision, and de novo review by the broken, biased, and dysfunctional Immigration Courts running amok under Garland. https://immigrationcourtside.com/2022/03/24/🏴☠%EF%B8%8Fno-surprise-boston-asylum-office-screws-🔩-maine-refugees-☠%EF%B8%8F-part-of-a-serious-national-anti-asylum-bias-largely/

Our broken asylum system can’t and won’t be fixed without dealing head-on with the overarching problem — systemic anti-asylum bias, poor quality decision-making, grotesque inconsistencies, and beyond incompetent administration of our Immigraton Courts by the DOJ!

Remarkably, Garland’s proposed solution is yet another “designed to fail” gimmick — expedite cases in his broken and biased, anti-asylum system! So the solution to a defective court system, infected with anti-asylum bias and poorly qualified judges turning out defective decisions is to make it “go faster!” The new regulations also fail to deal with the huge due process issue of lack of competent representation in the asylum system, particularly the Immigration Courts. Come on man!

We don’t need over 500 pages of new regulations and sophomoric, alternate universe “time limits” for an agency that can’t even find its files! What we need is for Garland to do the job he was hired to do more than a year ago! That’s  “clean house” at the Immigration Courts, bring in competent, fair judges who have experience in Immigration Court and are legitimate, well-recognized asylum experts — starting with a new BIA (save for their one qualified Appellate Immigration Judge Andrea Saenz, a Garland appointee).

Get expert judges, intellectual leaders, and competent judicial administrators into the broken Immigration Court system to provide coherent, practical asylum legal guidance and work with advocates, the Asylum Office, and DHS to get a functional and fair legal asylum system in place and operating smoothly and efficiently at the border. It should already be in place by now. That it isn’t, is entirely “on Garland!”

Then, with experts who actually are committed to fairly and impartially applying asylum law in place, we’ll see, for the first time, how many of the asylum claims are valid and how many aren’t! And, while we’re at it, we might find that many of the “legal” immigrants Texas and the rest of America needs are right there at our borders — just waiting for our legal system to do justice and admit them. Asylum seekers are seeking legal immigration! It the USG that’s acting “illegally” here!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

03-26-22

Related posts:

  1. GROSS NATIONAL DISGRACE: “A Fucking Disaster That Is Designed to Fail”: How Trump Wrecked America’s Immigration Courts — Fernanda Echavarri Reports For Mother Jones On How Our Failed Justice System Daily Abuses The Most Vulnerable While Feckless Legislators &   Smugly Complicit Article III Judges Look On & Ignore The Human Carnage They Are Enabling — “ Two days after US immigration officials sent her to Tijuana, she was raped.”
  2. EOIR TARGETS UNACCOMPANIED KIDS FOR DEPORATION RAILROAD!
  3. 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! 
  4. COMPLICITY HAS COSTS:  Article III Judges’ Association Apparently Worries That Trump, Barr, GOP Toadies Starting To “Treat Them Like Immigration Judges” — Do They Fear Descent To Status Of Mere Refugees, Immigrants, “Dreamers,” Unaccompanied Children, Or Others Treated As “Less Than Persons” By Trump, 5th Cir., 11th Cir., 9th Cir., & The Supremes’ “J.R. Five?” 

⚖️THE GIBSON REPORT — 03-21-22 — Compiled By Elizabeth Gibson, Esquire, Managing Attorney, NIJC — BIA Suffers Beat-Downs In 11th (Burglary)  & 1st (Credibility, CAT) Cirs, While Shernette G. Noyes Gets Rare Win For Immigrant In BIA Theft Precedent, Matter of C. MORGAN, 28 I&N Dec. 508 (BIA 2022)!

Elizabeth Gibson
Elizabeth Gibson
Managing Attorney
National Immigrant Justice Center
Publisher of “The Gibson Report”

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Weekly Briefing

 

This briefing is designed as a quick-reference aggregation of developments in immigration law, practice, and policy that you can scan for anything you missed over the last week. The content of the news, links, and events do not necessarily reflect the position of the National Immigrant Justice Center. If you have items that you would like considered for inclusion, please email them to egibson@heartlandalliance.org.

 

CONTENTS (jump to section)

  • PRACTICE ALERTS
  • NEWS
  • LITIGATION & AGENCY UPDATES
  • RESOURCES
  • EVENTS

 

PRACTICE ALERTS

 

USCIS Preparing to Resume Public Services on June 4

 

Secretary Mayorkas Designates Afghanistan for Temporary Protected Status

 

CBP General Notice Regarding Electronic Form I-94s Instead of Paper at Land Ports of Entry

 

DHS To End COVID-19 Temporary Policy for Allowing Expired Identity Documents for Employment Verification

 

 

NEWS

 

One-Third of New Immigration Court Cases Are Children; One in Eight Are 0-4 Years of Age

TRAC: The largest segment where age was recorded, some 32,691, were children from zero to four years of age. This represents 12 percent of cases received this fiscal year, or a little less than one out of every eight.

 

DHS withdraws Trump-era rule that expanded quick deportations

Reuters: DHS in a notice published in the Federal Register said the “expedited removal” process is best focused on people who recently entered the U.S. and remain in close proximity to the border, rather than those targeted by Trump’s sweeping 2019 expansion, who have been in the country longer and developed ties to their communities.

 

‘Travesty’: Immigration advocates accuse Biden administration of TPS double standard on immigrants of color

MSN: The administration’s announcement that it would provide “temporary protected status,” or TPS, for Afghans came weeks after the Department of Homeland Security granted the same protections for Ukrainians living in the United States. See also More than 44,000 Afghans tried for a fast track to the U.S. About 200 have gotten it; Russians are blocked at US border, Ukrainians are admitted.

 

Watchdog recommends relocation of detainees from ICE facility, citing unsanitary conditions and staff shortages 
CBS: The Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General (OIG) issued a damning report on Friday documenting unsanitary conditions, staff shortages and security lapses at ICE’s Torrance County Detention Center in New Mexico. The OIG found the conditions so unsafe that it took the highly unusual step of urging ICE to immediately remove all persons detained at the facility. ICE is refusing to comply with this recommendation and has contested the integrity of the OIG’s investigation. 

 

US seeks regional approach to migration and asylum seekers

AP: Faced with the likelihood of eventually reopening its southern border to asylum seekers, the United States government is urging allies in Latin America to shore up immigration controls and expand their own asylum programs.

 

Notable opinions by high court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson

AP: In 2019, Jackson temporarily blocked the Trump administration’s plan to expand fast-track deportations of people in the country illegally, no matter where they are arrested.

 

Profile of Sen. Dick Durbin

Politico: When it comes to immigration, Durbin said, “I don’t want to hear the word reconciliation,” referring to the budgetary rules that can allow for the Senate to sidestep a filibuster. “That holds up false hope. … The question is: is there anything we can do on the subject of immigration that can win 60 votes in the Senate? We’re going to test that.”

 

Immigrants with asylum put lives on hold over green card waits

RollCall: For green card applications filed by people with asylum, the wait ranges from 25 to 52 months, or more than four years, according to the USCIS website. See also Visa limbo for immigrants in U.S.; U.S. Work-Permit Backlog Is Costing Immigrants Their Jobs.

 

Powered by artificial intelligence, ‘autonomous’ border towers test Democrats’ support for surveillance technology

WaPo: The towers use thermal imaging, cameras and radar to feed an artificial intelligence system that can determine whether a moving object is an animal, vehicle or person, and beam its location coordinates to U.S. Border Patrol agents.

 

LITIGATION & AGENCY UPDATES

 

BIA AMICUS INVITATION (VACATUR OF A CRIMINAL CONVICTION), Due Date: April 6, 2022

BIA: What factors should the Board weigh when considering an untimely motion to reopen that is premised on a vacatur of a criminal conviction?

 

Matter of C. MORGAN, 28 I&N Dec. 508 (BIA 2022).

BIA:  Larceny in the third degree under section 53a-124(a) of the Connecticut General Statutes is not a theft offense aggravated felony under section 101(a)(43)(G) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(43)(G) (2018), because it incorporates by reference a definition of “larceny” under section 53a-119 of the Connecticut General Statutes that is overbroad and indivisible with respect to the generic definition of a theft offense.  Almeida v. Holder, 588 F.3d 778 (2d Cir. 2009), and Abimbola v. Ashcroft, 378 F.3d 173 (2d Cir. 2004), not followed.

 

April argument calendar features cases on Trump-era asylum policy and praying football coach

SCOTUSblog: Biden v. Texas (April 26): Whether the Department of Homeland Security must continue to enforce the Migrant Protection Protocols, a policy begun by President Donald Trump that requires asylum seekers at the southern border to stay in Mexico while awaiting a hearing in U.S. immigration court.

 

Judge Revives Suits Over Denied Travel Ban Waivers

Law360: Foreigners locked out of the U.S. due to former President Donald Trump’s now-defunct travel bans will get a new chance to fight their case, after a California federal judge reopened two lawsuits over the policy on Tuesday.

 

CA5: HIV Status Not Enough To Halt Deportation

Law360: A recent HIV diagnosis alone does not put a Mexican national at greater risk of state-sanctioned violence if he’s returned home, the Fifth Circuit ruled Monday in a unanimous published opinion denying the man’s asylum bid.

 

Unpub. CA5 Credibility, CAT Remand: Thraiyappah V. Garland

LexisNexis: Because the BIA erred in concluding its affirmance of the IJ’s adverse credibility determination effectively disposed of Thraiyappah’s pattern-or-practice claim for CAT protection based on his Tamil ethnicity, we Grant the petition, Vacate in part and Remand to the BIA.

 

CA11: BIA Must Rethink Removal For Burglary Of Empty Dwelling

Law360: A man facing deportation from the U.S. for burglarizing an empty Florida property got another chance to challenge his removal after the Eleventh Circuit questioned a finding by immigration judges that his crime constituted “moral turpitude.”

 

ACLU Seeks ICE Docs To Check On Biden Reform Promise

Law360: The Massachusetts chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union sued U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Wednesday seeking records it says will show whether the Biden administration followed through on a promise to reform immigration enforcement policies.

 

USCIS Releases Updated Information on Rosario Class Action

AILA: USCIS stated that following the February 7, 2022, court decision in Asylumworks v. Mayorkas, USCIS must process all initial EAD applications from asylum applicants within 30 days. Given certain conditions regarding Form I-765, some applicants may be considered Rosario class members.

 

DHS Notice Rescinding 2019 Expedited Removal Notice

AILA: Advance copy of DHS notice rescinding the July 23, 2019, notice Designating Aliens for Expedited Removal, which expanded the application of expedited removal procedures. The notice will be published in the Federal Register on 3/21/22 and will be effective on that date.

 

DHS Designates Afghanistan for TPS for 18 Months

AILA: Secretary of Homeland Security Mayorkas announced the designation of Afghanistan for Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for 18 months. The designation will take effect upon publication of a forthcoming Federal Register notice, which will also include instructions for applying for TPS and an EAD.

 

AG Issues Memorandum on FOIA Guidelines

AILA: The Attorney General issued a memo to heads of executive departments and agencies with guidelines for the fair and effective administration of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The memo includes guidelines for removing barriers to access and reducing FOIA request backlogs, among other things.

 

DOS Provides Guidance on Local Filing of Form I-130 Petitions

AILA: DOS states that U.S. citizens physically present overseas with their Afghan, Ethiopian, and Ukrainian immediate family members can request to locally file a Form I-130 petition at the nearest U.S. embassy or consulate that processes immigrant visas. DOS specifies who citizens can file for.

 

DHS Extends Validity of Certain EADs Issued Under TPS for Somalia

AILA: DHS has automatically extended the validity of certain EADs with a Category Code of A12 or C19 issued under TPS for Somalia through September 12, 2022. Information on updating expiration dates and reverification is available.

 

ICE Issues Guidance on Protections for Noncitizen Victims of Crime

AILA: ICE issued directive 10036.2, which states that ICE personnel are generally prohibited from using or disclosing information protected by Section 1367 to anyone other than DHS or DOJ employees. This includes information on applicants for T & U visas, continued presence, or VAWA based benefits.

 

Third Extension of Effective Date of USCIS Temporary Final Rule on Interpreters at Asylum Interviews

AILA: USCIS temporary final rule extending the expiration date of the temporary final rule on interpreters at asylum interviews published at 85 FR 59655, which was set to expire on 3/16/22, through 3/16/23. (87 FR 14757, 3/16/22)

 

RESOURCES

 

 

EVENTS

 

NIJC EVENTS

   

GENERAL EVENTS

 

To sign up for additional NIJC newsletters, visit:  https://immigrantjustice.org/subscribe.

 

You now can change your email settings or search the archives using the Google Group. If you are receiving this briefing from a third party, you can visit the group page and request to be added.

 

Elizabeth Gibson (Pronouns: she/her/ella)

Managing Attorney for Capacity Building and Mentorship

National Immigrant Justice Center

A HEARTLAND ALLIANCE Program

224 S. Michigan Ave., Suite 600, Chicago, IL 60604
T: (312) 660-1688| F: (312) 660-1688| E: egibson@heartlandalliance.org

www.immigrantjustice.org | Facebook | Twitter

 

 

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

Many congrats to Attorney Shernette G. Noyes of Stratford, CT for doing the near impossible: Notching a well-deserved win for an immigrant in a “crimmigration” case before one of the toughest BIA panels this side of Dodge City!

Shernette G. Noyes ESQ
Shernette G. Noyes ESQ
Noyes & Associates LLP
Stratford, CT
PHOTO: Noyes & Associates LLP

 

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

03-23-22

Related posts:

  1. 🎊🎉🍾THE GIBSON REPORT IS BACK!😎😎😎 — 03-07-22 — Congrats To NDPA Stalwart 🗽 Liz Gibson On Her New Job As Managing Attorney @ National Immigrant Justice Center!  
  2. 🧑🏽‍⚖️⚖️🗽🇺🇸WHO’S JUDGE IS IT ANYWAY? — The Crisis Of Independence In Our Immigration Courts! — Coming April 7, 2021! — Sponsored By The HNBA! — Don’t Miss It!
  3. 🌬🤯MORE BLOWBACK FOR GARLAND’S “COURTS” — Problems Emerge On Credibility (1st Cir., 10th Cir.), Agfel (9th Cir.)
  4. ⚖️THE GIBSON REPORT — 02-07-22 — Compiled By Elizabeth Gibson Esquire, NY Legal Assistance Group — BONUS: “Ethics On Vacation @ DHS & DOJ”

FINALLY, LEADING DEMS IN CONGRESS DEMAND END TO BIDEN’S TITLE 42 CHARADE! — NDPA  All-Star 🌟🦸🏻‍♀️ Blaine Bookey Speaks Out For Ukrainians & Other Legal Asylum Seekers Being Abused 🤮  By Biden Administration @ The Southern Border!

 

Maria Sacchetti
Maria Sacchetti
Immigration Reporter, Washington Post

MarIa Sacchetti reports for WashPost:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/03/10/title42-border-asylum-democrats-trump/

Leading Senate Democrats demanded that the Biden administration immediately end a Trump-era policy that blocks asylum-seeking migrants from crossing land borders into the United States, after lawyers said U.S. Customs and Border Protection expelled a single mother of three who had traveled from Ukraine to Mexico seeking refuge.

Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) cited the “desperate” Ukrainian family at a news conference Thursday and said he was deeply disappointed that the Biden administration has dragged out the Trump-era policy, which a federal appeals court in D.C. last week called “questionable.” The Trump administration issued the order two years ago under Title 42, which is the public health code. Since then, officials have expelled more than 1.6 million migrants to countries such as Haiti and Mexico.

“The United States is supposed to welcome refugees with open arms, not put them in additional danger by denying them a chance to plead their case and leaving them at the mercy of criminals and smugglers,” Schumer said, joined by advocates for immigrants. “Now’s the time to stop the madness.”

Courts issue new directives to Biden on border expulsions

Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, added that the policy “has created life-threatening conditions” for migrants. He called on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which issued the order under President Donald Trump and has extended it under President Biden, to rescind it.

. . . .

Sofiia, 34, who asked to be identified only by her first name because she has family sheltering in their basements in Ukraine, said in a telephone interview that her family had enjoyed a good life there. She worked as a Hebrew teacher and lived in her father’s house. They left as bombs grew closer.

“I was seriously afraid for my life and the life of my kids,” she said in English, one of four languages that she speaks.

She said she and her children — ages 6, 12 and 14 — flung suitcases stuffed with clothes and medicines into her old Citroen and drove straight to Moldova, the closest border, and then into Romania, where they traveled to Germany and caught a flight to Mexico. She said that they tried to enter legally twice, once by car and again by foot, and that officials rejected them both times, citing the Title 42 order.

“I was surprised that they don’t even want to listen,” she said. “I was trying to tell them that I have tests and I am vaccinated but they told me, ‘No, no, no, no, no.’”

She said she does not speak Spanish and was crying on the bridge in Mexico when lawyer Blaine Bookey spotted her. Bookey, the legal director of the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies at the University of California’s Hastings law school, was there with her students to aid Haitian migrants facing similar troubles.

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Bookey said Customs and Border Protection told her that they would consider admitting the Ukrainian family. They were planning to try again Thursday, she said, adding that shelters in Mexico are filled with other would-be refugees who are not eligible to enter.

“There’s families like this that are showing up at the border from all sorts of countries from similar levels of violence. They deserve process to apply for asylum,” Bookey said. “This case really brings it home for people how just problematic this policy is.”

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

Read Maria’s full article at the link.

  • Rhetoric over action!
  • “Do as I say, not as I do!”

 

  • More cowardly performances from AG Garland and SG Prelogar who continue to “defend the indefensible,” putting politics over their constitutional duty to speak up for due process, human rights, racial justice, adherence to international conventions, and the rule of law.

 

  • The “COVID emergency” appears to be “over” everywhere in the U.S., even in areas with significant infection rates, EXCEPT for asylum seekers at the Southern Border who never were a major threat anyway.

 

  • “Saying no” to desperate Ukrainian mothers and children seeking refuge in the U.S. That’s ”law enforcement?” That’s how your tax dollars are being spent? Do these count as “border apprehensions?”

The Dem leaders are right to speak out. But, they waited far too long to do so. This travesty has been going on since Day 1 of the Biden Administration.

The only “hero” 🌟 here is Blaine Bookey and others like her who have the guts and courage to stand up for equal justice for all when politicos, judges, and public officials “tank!”

Blaine Bookey
Blaine Bookey
Legal Director
Center for Gender & Refugee Studies @ Hastings Law
Photo: CGRS website

Meanwhile, although the opposition to Biden’s scofflaw policy hasn’t restored the rule of law for most asylum seekers, it might have generated at least a modest reaction. CBS News reports that the CDC has revoked the (bogus) Title 42 authority to bar the entry of unaccompanied children seeking asylum.  News: https://apple.news/Anfp9S-UAQFqT5PWRc-8u2A

This appears to be a response to the attack on this group of vulnerable children by Trump-appointed righty anti-immigrant zealot U.S. District Judge Mark Pittman and his motley gang of  GOP state AGs. See, e.g., https://immigrationcourtside.com/2022/03/05/%f0%9f%a4%aftitle-42-madness-even-as-dc-circuit-bars-returns-to-persecution-or-torture-trump-federal-judge-in-texas-abuses-children%f0%9f%a4%ae%e2%98%a0%ef%b8%8f-circuit-findings-of-ill/

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

03-12-22

Related posts:

  1. 🏴‍☠️CLOSING THE BORDER TO LEGAL ASYLUM SEEKERS IS A VIOLATION OF BOTH DOMESTIC & INTERNATIONAL LAW — It’s Neither Something To Tout (Biden Administration) Nor A Solution (GOP) (Except, Perhaps, In The “Hitlerian” Sense) — Our Inability To Solve A Humanitarian Situation By Acting Lawfully, Sensibly, & Humanely Is A Sign Of Gross National Weakness Spurred By Unwillingness To See The Human Tragedies We Are Promoting! — And The Lousy, Misleading, & Tone-Deaf Reporting By The Some Of The “Mainstream Media” Is Making It Worse! — Leon Krauze & Suzanne Gamboa With Simple Truths About Human Migration That Neither Pols Nor Nativists Want You To Hear! — PLUS BONUS COVERAGE: Friday Mini-Essay: “Degrading Ourselves As A Nation Won’t Stop Human Migration”
  2. COURTSIDE HAS BEEN AT THE FOREFRONT OF EXPOSING THE “CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY” COMMITTED BY THE REGIME AND THE MORAL CULPABILITY OF THOSE WHO WILLFULLY CARRY OUT & ENABLE THESE ATROCITIES — The “Mainstream Media” Is Now Channeling Courtside! — “In the meantime, no government has the right to treat people with such abject inhumanity. History will remember Trump for this, but it will also remember the people who enable such atrocious acts.”
  3. CORRUPT, CHILD ABUSING, RACIST IMMIGRATION BUREAUCRACY 🏴‍☠️☠️🤮⚰️👎🏻 MUST BE REPLACED WITH PROFESSIONAL WORKFORCE COMMITTED TO DUE PROCESS, RULE OF LAW, HUMAN DIGNITY! — “CRUELTY TO migrant children, a trademark of the Trump administration’s immigration policy, did not cease when officials reversed course in the face of public outrage two years ago and stopped wrenching toddlers, tweens and teens from their parents — with no plan or process to reunite them. It has continued apace under cover of the pandemic . . . .”
  4. CRIME BLOTTER: CHILD ABUSE🤮☠️⚰️🦹🏿‍♀️: DOJ IG REPORT CONFIRMS WHAT COURTSIDE & OTHERS KNEW FROM THE START: Trump, Sessions, Miller, Rosenstein, Hamilton Are Cowards🐓, Lying 🤥 Criminals, Child Abusers🦹🏿‍♀️, Who Belong Behind Bars For Intentionally Abusing Asylum Seeking Families & Kids & Then Having Their Sleazy DOJ Lawyers Lie To Federal Judges! — What Happened To “Due Diligence” As An Ethical Requirement For Government Lawyers?

🤮 INDEFENSIBLE: 7th Cir. Schools BIA On Briefing Schedules, Own Regs, Fabricated “Facts” — Oluwajana v. Garland

 

Dan Kowalski reports from LexisNexis:

https://www.lexisnexis.com/LegalNewsRoom/immigration/b/insidenews/posts/ca7-on-bia-abuse-of-discretion-oluwajana-v-garland

CA7 on BIA Abuse of Discretion: Oluwajana v. Garland

Oluwajana v. Garland

“After an immigration judge ordered him removed from the United States, Olawole Oluwajana appealed to the Board of Immigration Appeals and retained counsel to represent him. But the government was slow in providing a copy of Oluwajana’s immigration file, without which his attorney could not prepare a brief. The Board granted one extension but denied a second, suggesting that Oluwajana instead submit his brief with a motion seeking leave to file it late. When he did so, less than two weeks after the submission deadline, the Board denied the motion in a cursory—and factually erroneous—footnote. And having rejected the brief, the Board upheld the removal order without considering Oluwajana’s allegations of error by the immigration judge. Based on the undisputed circumstances of this case, we conclude that the Board abused its discretion by unreasonably rejecting Oluwajana’s brief. We therefore grant the petition for review, vacate the Board’s order, and remand for further proceedings.”

[Hats off to Chicago Superlawyer Scott Pollock and Christina J. Murdoch!]

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Here, the BIA took 7 months to set a briefing schedule, didn’t get the file to counsel in a timely manner, then “dinged” the R’s counsel for being 12 days late in filing a brief on a complex issue where input from legal counsel would likely be “outcome determinative!”

But, along the way, “Garland’s Clown Show” 🤡 fabricated a 33 day “late period.” And, to add insult to injury, they ignored their own regulations and instructions to counsel.

Even OIL couldn’t defend this one! But, Garland nevertheless retains the “Miller Lite” Clowns from his predecessors’ “whatever it takes to deny and deport assembly line!”  No quality, no fairness, no accountability! Just “anything goes” when it’s “only immigrants of color!”

Briefing schedules aren’t “rocket science.” But Garland’s “Miller Lite” holdover gang can’t even get the simple stuff right!

How is this “expert judging” entitled to “deference?” 

How is having the Circuit spend time cleaning up Garland’s messes an acceptable use of Article III resources? 

What happens to the many human victims of Garland’s unjust and unprofessional system who don’t have Scott Pollock & Co. to take Garland to the Court of Appeals? 

What happens to Garland’s victims when the CA is on “autopilot,” which often happens?

Is it any wonder that “judges” who would rather fight with attorneys than read their briefs are running an astounding 1.6 million case backlog and an appellate backlog of 82,000, up approximately 7 times from just four years ago?

Wonder why an AG running a “second (or perhaps third or fourth) class justice system” for people of color isn’t a very effective leader or force for racial justice in America?

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

03-11-22

Related posts:

  1. ⚖️🗽🧑🏽‍⚖️COURTS OF APPEALS CONTINUE TO THROW ROTTEN TOMATOES 🍅 @ BIA’S ANTI-ASYLUM BIAS — Basic Analytical, Legal Errors Continue From Weaponized, Non-Expert “Star Chamber” ☠️ Posing As ”Tribunal!” — Judge Garland Must Fix This Inexcusable, Unnecessary, Systemic Failure Now! — Justice For Persons Of Color & Migrants Can’t “Wait For Godot!”
  2. 🏴‍☠️☠️🤮👎🏻ERROR SUPPLY: EOIR’s Anti-Asylum Bias, Failure To Apply Precedents, Earns Yet Another Rebuke From 3d Cir.  — Blanco v. AG
  3. ⚖️🗽🧑🏽‍⚖️”MEDLEY OF INJUSTICE” — CIRCUITS CONTINUE TO LOWER HAMMER 🔨 ON BIA: Anti-Asylum Misogyny; Illegal & Incredibly Stupid “Policies;” “Perplexing” Lack Of Legal Knowledge Highlighted In Latest Batch Of Reversals! — “Attempted rape by a gang of men, in broad daylight on a public street, is especially terrorizing because it powerfully demonstrates the perpetrator’s domination, control over the victim and imperviousness to the law. Requiring evidence of additional harms both minimizes the gravity of the sexual assault and demeans the victim.”
  4. 🏴‍☠️👎🏽🤮 AIMLESS DOCKET RESHUFFLING (“ADR”) ON STEROIDS! — EOIR Dysfunction Shows What Happens When “Captive Court System” Kowtows To Political Handlers Rather Than Serving The Public! — Jason Dzubow, The Asylumist, Reports!

😎⚖️🗽 NDPA SUPERSTAR 🌟 ELSY M. RAMOS VELASQUEZ WINS ANOTHER ROUND FOR THE SIAHAAN FAMILY! — “Temporary” BIA Appellate Immigration Judge Elise Manuel Issues Helpful Correct Guidance On Equitable Tolling, Ineffective Assistance In 4th Cir. MTR Context! — Why Is This The Exception, Rather Than The Rule @ Garland’s Dysfunctional EOIR?

 

Elsy M. Ramos Velasquez
Elsy M. Ramos Velasquez
Associate
Clark Hill PLC
D.C.

Elsy says “It is truly an honor to represent this family.” Here is a copy of Judge Manuel’s excellent decision:

Siahaan, Binsar_BIA Order Granting Motion to Reopen

 

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

For more on Elsy’s previous efforts on behalf of this family, see https://immigrationcourtside.com/category/pro-bono-representation/clark-hill-plc/elsy-m-valasquez-esquire/

Clear, concise, helpful, and correct. This is the type of guidance that should be in BIA precedents! It has the potential to “move” large number as of cases through Garland’s backlogged system. 

It would also deter ill-advised “bogus oppositions” to meritorious motions such as the one woodenly advanced by DHS in this case. They do it because sometimes they are rewarded by lousy EOIR judging. At worst, it’s a crap shoot as EOIR currently functions (or, in too many cases, malfunctions). 

Start consistently granting meritorious motions like this and the dilatory tactics from DHS will stop! In any system, particularly one as backlogged as this one, getting the Government to stop wasting judicial time and promoting bad results in a big step forward! 

The prior Administration made an all-out effort to institutionalize bias and bad judgment. Garland has been far, far too slow in exposing and rooting out this bad behavior!

Just look around for some helpful, positive “precedential” guidance from the BIA on equitable tolling in the Fourth Circuit. Let me know if you find any!

So what aren’t cases like this precedents? Why does Garland’s BIA instead keep publishing a steady stream of obtuse, poorly reasoned, anti-immigrant precedents written by Trump holdovers. These push IJs in the wrong direction, lead to prolonged wasteful litigation, reinforce the toxic “culture of denial,” create a “false narrative” that denies the merits of many respondents’ claims, and, worst of all, abrogate the BIA’s duty to insure fundamental fairness and due process for all! 

Where’s the positive guidance on how to grant gender-based and family-based asylum cases, building on the restoration of A-R-C-G- to clear out meritorious old cases?

Where’s the positive guidance on how to “leverage” PD and administrative closing to reduce backlogs? 

Where’s the positive precedent on expeditiously granting reopening in the many non-LPR cancellation cases mishandled by EOIR in light of Pereira and Niz-Chavez? 

Where’s the common sense workable rule on nexus that reflects “mixed motive” and incorporates ordinary concepts of causation while  jettisoning the prior Administration’s bogus “look for any motivation that doesn’t qualify, no matter how attenuated or contrived” approach?

Where’s the reasonable bond guidance that would promote consistency and end the routine practice of setting absurdly high bonds in some Immigration Courts?

Garland’s “Miller Lite Holdover” BIA continues to fail, flail, and betray the Administration’s promise to appoint better, more broadly experienced, representative Federal Judges at all levels, including the “retail level.” However, a number of his “Temporary” Appellate Immigration Judges continue to outshine and outperform their holdover colleagues. See, e.g., https://immigrationcourtside.com/2022/02/26/%f0%9f%91%a9%f0%9f%8f%bb%e2%9a%96%ef%b8%8f-temporary-appellate-judge-beth-liebmann-gets-it-right%f0%9f%98%8e-but-garlands-bia-majority-steamrolls/

With the available talent to reshape the BIA into a body that would actually fulfill the vision of “through teamwork and innovation be the world’s best tribunal guaranteeing fairness and due process for all” why does Garland continue to screw immigrants and build more backlog by treating “Miller Lite Holdovers” as if they were life-tenured judges? They aren’t! 

Although Garland appears to be in denial, “immigration judging” is some of the most consequential and important decision-making in the entire Federal Judicial System! Many, probably the majority, of those languishing in Garland’s out of control, largely self-created 1.6 million case EOIR backlog have strong claims to remain in a fair and efficient system. Yet, you would never know it by the indolent way Garland has handled the BIA mess (82,000 pending appeals) and his failure to speak out and lead by example on due process, fundamental fairness, racial justice, and human rights. 

A new, functioning, expert, star-studded BIA, dedicated to due process, fundamental fairness, equal justice, human rights, and best practices, would be a great starting place! A year into an Administration that should know better, it’s long, long overdue!

Meanwhile, Elsy and other talented, motivated, committed members of the NDPA will continue to pound and expose Garland’s dysfunctional “courts” at all levels of the judicial system until we get the change that we need and that was (falsely) promised!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

03-10-22

 

  

Related posts:

  1. 🆘🤮IS 11TH CIR. GROWING WEARY OF GARLAND’S SCOFFLAW BIA? —Two Trips To The Circuit, & The BIA Still Violates Own Regulations, Ignores Precedent, Spouts Gibberish While OIL’s Defense Of This Nonsense & Malfeasance By EOIR Raises Serious Ethical Questions! — THAMOTAR v. U.S. ATT’Y GEN. — Garland’s Dysfunctional & Systematically Unjust Courts Undermine OUR Democracy☠️ — Demand An IMMEDIATE End To The Scofflaw Nonsense🤡 🧹 At OUR Justice Department! 🏴‍☠️
  2. ⚖️🧑🏽‍⚖️JUDICIAL REVIEW — C.A. 2 — Brace Of Bad BIA Bobbles On Basics Brings “Culture Of Denial” Into Focus — Justice Will Continue To Be Illusive @ EOIR 👎🏽 Until Garland Steps Up & Replaces His Fatally Flawed BIA With Real Judges Who Are Progressive Practical Scholars In Immigration, Due Process, Human Rights, With A Firm Commitment To Bringing Racial & Gender Equity To Now-Disgraced Immigration Courts!🤮
  3. 🏴‍☠️☠️⚰️🆘NO JUSTICE @ JUSTICE! — OUTRAGE OF PROGRESSIVE EXPERTS CONTINUES TO GROW AS GARLAND FAILS TO VACATE SESSIONS/BARR RACIST, MISOGYNIST, ANTI-IMMIGRANT, UNETHICAL, BIASED PRECEDENTS — “Garland’s Star Chambers” Careen Further Out Of Control As AG Dithers While Lives Of Vulnerable Refugee Women Hang in Balance & Pro Bono Advocates Are Forced To Exhaust Resources Fighting Trump DOJ’s Misdeeds That Biden Has Failed To Fix, Despite Promises — “Unforced Errors,” Lack Of Competent Progressive Leadership Continue To Plague Flawed Immigration Agenda @ Justice, Offend Dem Supporters! — Expert Professors Karen Musalo & Stephen Legomsky Call For Immediate Vacating Of Repulsive Matter of A-B- Abomination Before More Lives Of Women Of Color Are Lost!
  4. 🏴‍☠️👎🏽🤮 AIMLESS DOCKET RESHUFFLING (“ADR”) ON STEROIDS! — EOIR Dysfunction Shows What Happens When “Captive Court System” Kowtows To Political Handlers Rather Than Serving The Public! — Jason Dzubow, The Asylumist, Reports!