"The Voice of the New Due Process Army" ————– Musings on Events in U.S. Immigration Court, Immigration Law, Sports, Music, Politics, and Other Random Topics by Retired United States Immigration Judge (Arlington, Virginia) and former Chairman of the Board of Immigration Appeals PAUL WICKHAM SCHMIDT and DR. ALICIA TRICHE, expert brief writer, practical scholar, emeritus Editor-in-Chief of The Green Card (FBA), and 2022 Federal Bar Association Immigration Section Lawyer of the Year. She is a/k/a “Delta Ondine,” a blues-based alt-rock singer-songwriter, who performs regularly in Memphis, where she hosts her own Blues Brunch series, and will soon be recording her first full, professional album. Stay tuned! 🎶 To see our complete professional bios, just click on the link below.
The Supreme Court on Tuesday said the Biden administration must comply with a lower court’s ruling to reinstate President Donald Trump’s policy that required many asylum seekers to wait outside the United States for their cases to be decided.
The administration had asked the court to put on hold a federal judge’s order that the “Remain in Mexico” policy known as Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) had to be immediately reimplemented. U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk ruled earlier this month that the Biden administration did not provide an adequate reason for getting rid of the policy and that its procedures regarding asylum seekers who enter the country were unlawful.
Over the objections of the three liberal justices, the court’s conservative majority agreed that the administration had not done enough to justify changing the policy.
The administration “failed to show a likelihood of success on the claim that the memorandum rescinding the Migrant Protection Protocols was not arbitrary and capricious,” the court said in a short, unsigned order. In such emergency matters, the court often does not elaborate on its reasoning.
It said Justices Stephen G. Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan would have granted the administration’s request. The three also gave no reason.
The action could be an ominous sign for the new administration. The court is considering a request that it dissolve the pandemic-related evictions moratorium implemented by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about which the court’s most conservative justices have already expressed skepticism.
The court often showed deference to the Trump administration in such emergency matters, including when the MPP was first implemented.
. . . .
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Read Robert’s full article at the link.
“Floaters — How The World’s Richest Country Responds To Asylum Seekers” — Supremes’ GOP majority makes it clear that it considers asylum seekers of color as something less than human, whose rights and lives simply don’t matter! They are expendable, according to elite ivory tower righty jurists who don’t even give asylees lives a thought and condemn them without rationale. Not their kids, not anyone they can relate to. EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT – The bodies of Salvadoran migrant Oscar Alberto Mart??nez Ram??rez and his nearly 2-year-old daughter Valeria lie on the bank of the Rio Grande in Matamoros, Mexico, Monday, June 24, 2019, after they drowned trying to cross the river to Brownsville, Texas. Martinez’ wife, Tania told Mexican authorities she watched her husband and child disappear in the strong current. (AP Photo/Julia Le Duc)
Not too surprising, given the Roberts Court’s fairly consistent disregard for human rights, the rule of law, the Due Process Clause of the Constitution, and ill-concealed contempt for racial justice and people of color! They had already gone “belly up” on MPP after it was properly blocked by lower Federal Courts during the Trump regime.
It’s going to be a long four years for American democracy, human rights, and individuals of color if the Dems can’t get it together, eliminate the filibuster, and enact some legislation while they are still in control of all three branches. But, it’s the Dems, so don’t count on much besides some hand-wringing and feckless rhetoric.
And to be fair, the Biden Administration’s continuedlawless use of Title 42 to suspend the rule of law for many at the border compliments both the Trump regime’s xenophobic policies and the Supremes’ dissing of people of color. Dred Scott is still alive and kicking in 21st Century America, even as our nation grows more diverse.
🇺🇸Due Process Forever!
PWS
08-24-21
ADDENDUM:
As recently posted by Dean Kevin Johnson on ImmigrationProf Blog:
“Thousands of people have suffered the horrible consequences of the Migrant Protection Protocols. The Supreme Court has now upheld the Texas court’s decision and, instead of keeping MPP a stain in the history books, it will continue to be a present-day disaster.
“Forcing vulnerable families and children to wait in provisional camps in Mexico puts their lives at risk, while also making it nearly impossible for them to access the asylum process. The Biden administration can and must work to terminate the policy again immediately. Rather than turning away people fleeing harm, we should ensure people have a fair day in court.”
WASHINGTON, Aug 20 (Reuters) – A U.S. Supreme Court justice on Friday temporarily blocked a lower court ruling that would require Democratic President Joe Biden to reinstate a contentious immigration policy implemented by his Republican predecessor, Donald Trump.
The brief order by conservative Justice Samuel Alito puts the litigation on hold while the high court considers how to handle the Biden administration’s request seeking to impose a longer-term block on the judge’s ruling that would require the government to revive the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) program.
. . . .
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Read the complete report at the link.
Doesn’t mean the Court will grant the Gov’s application for stay pending appeal. It’s just that Justice Alito sees enough of an issue that he wants his colleague to have a chance to weigh in.
“Floaters — How The World’s Richest Country Responds To Asylum Seekers” — Beneath the disingenuous legal blather of the 5th Circuit’s tone-deaf judges, this is the sentence that they are pronouncing on the world’s most vulnerable, without any due process or concern for human dignity. EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT – The bodies of Salvadoran migrant Oscar Alberto Mart??nez Ram??rez and his nearly 2-year-old daughter Valeria lie on the bank of the Rio Grande in Matamoros, Mexico, Monday, June 24, 2019, after they drowned trying to cross the river to Brownsville, Texas. Martinez’ wife, Tania told Mexican authorities she watched her husband and child disappear in the strong current. (AP Photo/Julia Le Duc)
Here’s the decision denying the Administration’s request for stay in Texas v. Biden:
Although this was only a stay application, the tone of the decision left little doubt about the court’s Trumpist ideology and intention to block rational humanitarian human rights initiatives by the Administration. Not surprisingly, the 3-judge panel was all GOP appointees — two Trump, one Bush II
I wouldn’t expect any help from the Supremes. So, we’ll see whether right wing Federal Judges and GOP AGs can conduct a war on human rights and communities of color by taking over the immigration enforcement apparatus and re-instating Trump’s racist policies.
The Administration is not entirely blameless here. The extreme problems with MPP, including how it caused needless deaths, torture, kidnapping, extortion, rape, and other grotesque mistreatment for those returned, were well-documented going into the 2020 election. Indeed, Biden and Harris campaigned on a promise to reverse them!
Yet, not having a viable plan for restoring the legal asylum system and dealing humanely with new border arrivals “ready for prime time” by inauguration, and still not really having one, is problematic. Although some have “touted” the just-released asylum NPR as the “solution,” that system is not, by any stretch of the imagination, “ready for prime time” either, given the disastrous operational, personnel, “cultural, and “quality control” issues at both the Asylum Offices and EOIR, which could and should have been addressed before now and which could actually become worse if the NPR goes into effect without major internal and leadership changes at these dysfunctional agencies.
Moreover, it appears that DOJ Attorneys did a substandard job of documenting the many problems, adverse effects, and operational issues with MPP and the injustices and abuses it inflicted upon legal asylum seekers.
As opposed to the rather contrived interests of the states in furthering oppression, endorsed by the Fifth Circuit, the human interests of those seeking asylum under what was supposed to be a fair and functional legal system have fallen off the radar screen. The law still says that any individual arriving at the border, regardless of status, has a right to apply for asylum. That right, as well as the humanity of refugees and the legal and moral obligations of our nation, has been entirely abrogated by the Fifth Circuit.
In a well-functioning democracy, Congress could reform the law, bring the righty judges back under control, and restore Constitutional protections and human and civil rights, But, that would probably take a party different from today’s Dems. And, of course, with the support of the Supremes, the GOP is working furiously to suppress minority votes and insure GOP minority rule stretches long into the future.
Anna Marie Gallagher, Esquire Executive Director CLINIC PHOTO: CLINIC website
Here’s a statement from CLINIC condemning this Judge’s decision to reinstate the misnamed “Migrant Protection Protocols,” better known as “Remain in Mexico,” or more accurately as “Let ‘Em Die In Mexico:”
A Statement From the ED: CLINIC Condemns Federal Ruling to Resume Migrant Protection Protocols
SILVER SPRING, Maryland — The following is a statement from CLINIC Executive Director Anna Gallagher:
“CLINIC staff and volunteers have accompanied and provided legal counsel to thousands of men, women and children who sought safety at our doors, only to be stranded in Mexico in inhumane conditions through MPP. They desperately waited for protection and admission to one of the richest countries in the world, in increasing danger, by design of the U.S. government.
MPP is a national shame.
Jesus said, ‘whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’ Judge Kacsmaryk’s decision is contrary to man’s law and God’s law and must be overturned. We now call on President Biden to act on his faith and once again, end this policy that is so contrary to our values and who we aspire to be.”
CLINIC advocates for humane and just immigration policy. Its network of nonprofit immigration programs — 400 organizations in 48 states and the District of Columbia — is the largest in the nation.
In case you miss the irony, think of this: At the very moment we are pleading with the international community to help extricate us from the humanitarian disaster in Afghanistan, we are illegally and arbitrarily turning away legal asylum applicants at our border, many of them women and children with claims just as compelling as those from Afghani women and girls, and returning them to dangerous areas with NO PROCESS AT ALL!
And, Judge K would like to support his GOP White Nationalist buddies in Texas and Missouri by unlawfully reimplementing “Remain in Mexico” — a much-studied, vigorously and rightfully criticized program deemed a practical, human rights, legal, and humanitarian disaster by every credible human rights organization.
CLINIC is right: “Shame!”
The above statement is, of course, not the only cogent criticism I have received at Courtside about this decision. It just happens to be the one that appeared first in my Courtside inbox, courtesy of my good friend and NDPA stalwart Anna Marie Gallagher, Executive Director of CLINIC!
As the human rights situations in Afghanistan, Haiti, and the Northern Triangle continue to unravel, the lack of a coherent, operational, legally sound, properly generous refugee and asylum program will continue to haunt the Administration;
In particular, the disgraceful failure to establish a strong, consistent, humane, and protection-oriented interpretation of gender-based asylum to protect women, who are disproportionately targeted for persecution, torture, and other violence, will cost lives of the most vulnerable and be a lasting stain on our nation. (I just listened to Peter Baker, NBC WH Correspondent, on Meet the Press, characterize Afghanistan under the Taliban as a “nation of spouse beaters!”)
The need to fix our our refugee and asylum systems immediately was obvious on January 20, 2021. Why, after 7 months it still is nowhere close to being accomplished is less obvious!
The turmoil in Afghanistan and Haiti and the ongoing human rights disasters in Latin America, all reasonably predictable, are going to increase the human and political problems flowing from a failure to take human rights seriously and to bring the practical human rights experts necessary to solve these issues constructively into the Government power structure! In the end, human rights are everyone’s rights! We ignore that at our peril!
Ironically, while protecting women from persecution and improving their lives was used as a justification by Administrations of both parties for our continuing military presence in Afghanistan, now, as the “end game” plays out in real time, it appears to have been largely reduced to a “talking point” (or a “news feature”) without any discernible plan for protecting or saving Afghan female refugees. Sadly politicos and officials from both parties seem more interested in using women’s lives as “cover” for two decades of ultimately futile presence there than with actually saving any lives now. Indeed, if we treat Afghan women refugees with the inhumane indifference we have continued to heap on female refugees seeking legal asylum at our Southern Border, their outlook is beyond grim.
“Floaters — How The World’s Richest Country Responds To Asylum Seekers” — Some Life-tenured Federal Judges abuse their privileged positions to insure that this is what “due process” will look like for asylum seekers of color! EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT – The bodies of Salvadoran migrant Oscar Alberto Mart??nez Ram??rez and his nearly 2-year-old daughter Valeria lie on the bank of the Rio Grande in Matamoros, Mexico, Monday, June 24, 2019, after they drowned trying to cross the river to Brownsville, Texas. Martinez’ wife, Tania told Mexican authorities she watched her husband and child disappear in the strong current. (AP Photo/Julia Le Duc)
Here’s the decision from U.S. District JudgeMATTHEW J. KACSMARYK in Texas v. Biden:
Judge Kacsmaryk was appointed to the bench by Trump & McConnell in 2019. He is a former Federal prosecutor, deputy general counsel of a right wing religious group, and member of the Federalist Society. His nomination was (obviously unsuccessfully) opposed by more than 200 prominent civil rights, religious tolerance, and human rights groups.
Here’s an excerpt from their letter in opposition addressed to the Senate:
On behalf of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, a coalition of more than 200 national organizations committed to promoting and protecting the civil and human rights of all persons in the United States, I write in strong opposition to the confirmation of Matthew Kacsmaryk to be a U.S. District Judge for the Northern District of Texas.
Nominees to the federal courts must be committed to respecting the law, Constitution, and core American values of justice, fairness, and inclusivity. Mr. Kacsmaryk does not meet this standard. He is an anti-LGBT activist and culture warrior who does not respect the equal dignity of all people. His record reveals a hostility to LGBT equality and to women’s health, and he would not be able to rule fairly and impartially in cases involving those issues.
Interestingly, the letter was signed by none other than Vanita S. Gupta, then President & CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and currently the Associate Attorney General of the U.S.
Gupta and her colleagues had Judge K “pegged” as an unqualified righty bigot then! But, with the lineup currently in place at the 5th and the Supremes, it remains to be seen whether there is any effective short-term remedy for his grotesque abuses of power and human rights.
Judicial appointments are important! Maybe it’s time for Gupta and others at DOJ to treat Immigration Judge and BIA appointments as such!
🇺🇸Due Process Forever! Better Federal Judges for a better America!
Judge Garland & Secretary Mayorkas continue to abuse asylum seekers at the Southern Border & in the U.S. Albrecht Dürer, Public Domain, via Wikimedia CommonsKevin Sieff Latin American Correspondent, Washington Post
MATAMOROS, Mexico — Carolina had memorized the date, but she triple-checked her documents just to make sure. For months, her life had revolved around the court hearing at which she could finally make her asylum claim.
Like tens of thousands of asylum seekers who reached the U.S. border during the Trump administration, the 36-year-old from Honduras had been sent to wait in Mexico for her immigration hearing. She was told to return to the border on her court date.
So on Feb. 26, 2020, she woke up early and put on her best blouse. She said a short prayer. But not long after her bus left for Laredo, Tex., gunmen stopped the vehicle. They kidnapped Carolina and her 15-year-old daughter, took them to a stash house packed with other kidnapped migrants and demanded thousands of dollars in ransom.
By the time they were released a few days later, Carolina had missed her day in court.
Her asylum case, it turned out, had been closed in absentia because she hadn’t shown up. Of the 68,000 asylum cases processed under the Trump-era Migrant Protection Protocols, the policy also know as “Remain in Mexico,” 28,000 were closed for the same reason: Because asylum seekers didn’t present themselves.
. . . .
“MPP deprived people of due process and fundamental fairness,” she said. “In order to restore access to asylum in a meaningful way, the Biden administration needs to reopen cases for people ordered removed under MPP and allow them to pursue their claims safely from within the United States.”
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Read Kevin’s full article at the link.
The last statement, from Haiyun Damon-Feng, the director of the Adelante Pro Bono Project and assistant director of the William H. Gates Public Service Law Program at the University of Washington School of Law, sums it up. It’s not rocket science! It’s basic “Con Law 101” with some common sense and human decency thrown in! It’s also an essential part of the Biden Administration fulfilling basic campaign promises! Folks like Damon-Feng are the ones who should be running this system, solving the problems, and reconstructing the legal asylum system!
In what kind of “court” system are kidnapped individuals, some of them minors and children, further penalized and the Government allowed to get away with not keeping accurate addresses of individuals in their process and of knowingly sending them into danger zones? The victims remain in limbo and suffering while the perpetrators of these illegal outages — both current and former government officials — have not been held accountable. This is a national disgrace compounded by the fact that neither Judge Garland nor Secretary Mayorkas have taken corrective actions. Nor have they cleaned out the deadwood from their own legally and morally bankrupt systems and put competent individuals in charge!
Qualified Immigration Judges and competent administrators at the DOJ and DHS could have started solving these problems beginning the day after the inauguration. That 100 days into the Biden Administration this system is still operating illegally and taking a human toll is both a betrayal of campaign promises and an abuse of humanity! It’s also horrible and clearly illegal policy!
How does an Administration that is actively engaged in “Dred Scottifying” people of color at the border and in their wholly owned Immigration “Courts” — actually modern day “Star Chambers” — have any “legitimate voice” on racial justice in America?
“Justice” Star Chamber Style
🇺🇸⚖️🗽Due Process Forever! Human lives matter! The Constitution matters! Asylum law matters!
With the U.S. “on pace to encounter more individuals on the southwest border than we have in the last 20 years,” as Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement March 16, immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border has emerged as one of the toughest challenges facing the Biden Administration. Last week, President Biden put Vice President Kamala Harris in charge of “stemming” the flow of migrants, Biden was questioned about the immigration situation at his first official press conference, immigrant detention centers began to fill up once again, and lawmakers from both sides of the aisle made trips to the border to publicize the issue and propose solutions.
Biden’s attempts to address immigration may be new, but the issue is one that has dogged his predecessors for decades. Since the 1970s, Republicans and Democrats alike have tried to address undocumented immigration by constructing ever more draconian policies of border control, deportation and detention—border theater that grabs headlines and sometimes leads to short-term change, but never actually solves the problem.
There’s a reason why the U.S. government has failed for so many years to “control” the border: none of these policies have addressed the real reasons for migration itself. In migration studies, these are known as “push” and “pull” factors, the causes that drive migrants from one country to another.
Today, the countries sending the most migrants to the U.S.-Mexico border–especially the Central American countries of Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador–are experiencing a combination of push factors that include poverty and inequality, political instability, and violence. And while the current situation may be unique, it is also deeply rooted in history.
Many countries in Central America have struggled with poverty since the time of independence from Spain in the early 19th century. While they are beautiful countries that are rich in culture and history, that colonial past has meant they have historically been home to large, landless, poor, rural populations, including many indigenous people of Mayan descent. In the years after Spanish control, they were typically ruled by small oligarchies that disproportionately held wealth, land and power, and their economies were primary export-dependent, which brought great riches to landowners but also exacerbated and perpetuated inequality and the poverty of the majority. Those dynamics have carried forward to today. More recently, climate change–in particular, drought and massivestorms–has forced the vulnerable rural poor out of the countryside.
. . . .
And while many Central Americans could indeed qualify for asylum based on their experiences of persecution, the previous administration made every effort to limit their ability to obtain it. Now the Biden Administration must decide whether to restore the asylum framework, which has become the only possible path to legal migration (as well as safety and security) for Central Americans and other migrants who—due to these combined push and pull factors—are desperate to come to the United States.
Given the complicated and deep-rooted reasons behind migration, lawmakers cannot control or “solve” the ongoing crisis at the border by simply pouring money and resources into ever more militaristic border theater. It’s no wonder that decades of such policies have done little to change the underlying dynamics.
Instead, if Americans are serious about changing the situation at the border, we need to address the push and pull factors behind Central American migration. We need to acknowledge the reality of the U.S. economy (in particular, that it demands immigrant labor to work low-wage jobs) and work to construct new legal frameworks that reflect that reality. We need to target financial and logistical support to encourage Central American countries to address the poverty and inequality that fuel migration, rather than cutting foreign aid, as the Trump Administration did. We need to do all we can to end the pervasive gang violence that pushes so many migrants out of their homelands. And of course, we must continue to evaluate our own historical and contemporary role in creating the longstanding problems that are pushing Central Americans to migrate.
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Read the rest of Julia’s article at the link. One key truth: many more Central American migrants would qualify for asylum and be legally admitted to our society under a fair application of our asylum laws directed and supervised by real expert judges who scrupulously enforce due process and best practices on a now biased, unfair, and dysfunctional system!
“Stemming the tide” might be neither realistic nor possible at this time. But, controlling it, managing it humanely and legally, and regularizing it, while lessening the “push” factors should be achievable.
It would, however, require bold actions:
Recognizing the primacy of humanitarian protection laws and insisting on due process in implementing them;
Putting experts in humanitarian situations, due process advocates, diplomats, labor economists, and demographers in leadership positions; and
Embracing much larger levels of legal immigration, particularly from Latin America.
Vice President Kamala D. Harris Vice President of the United States (Official Senate Photo)
Unfortunately for Vice President Harris and the rest of us who want humane, realistic immigration policies, there are reasons for our half-century of overall failure on the border.
Bloated government bureaucracies, powerful corporate interests, nativist politicians, and even foreign leaders are heavily invested in expensive and guaranteed to fail “uber enforcement” gimmicks. Failure basically creates a never-ending demand for more: more enforcement agents, “civil prisons,” jailers, deporters, cars, trucks, guns, boats, ammo, walls, fences, technology, courts, judges, prosecutors, lobbyists, “baby jails,” processing centers, foreign aid that goes largely into the pockets of corrupt leaders and their cronies, and a never-ending supply of underground, low-wage, politically neutered workers.
Additionally, we now have an entire political party with an agenda of overt institutionalized racism, dehumanization of the other, and fear-mongering White Nationalist myths driving its bogus populist narrative.
None of these “architects and enablers of border failure and institutionalized racism” are going “quietly into the night.” They will fight tooth and nail to defend their sinecures, profitable empires, and politically useful White Nationalist myths.
The politician who finally breaks the deadly cycle of failure and human misery at our border, while harnessing and realizing the positive power of human migration, will become a hero for future historians and undoubtedly merit a chapter in a new edition of Profiles in Courage.
Sadly, such recognition and adulation is likely to come long after she is gone from the scene. Long term vision and moral courage are not necessarily rewarded with short-term political popularity. Just ask the few Republicans who voted in accordance with the overwhelming, basically uncontested, evidence of Trump’s “high crimes and misdemeanors!”
That’s why it’s a tough challenge even for someone of Vice President Harris’s undoubted intelligence and abilities. It’s up to those of us who believe in a better America to keep her from getting sidetracked and co-opted by the vested interests of failure and White Nationalist myth-makers and purveyors.
President Biden’s top advisers promise “long-needed systemic reforms” to address a backlog of more than 1 million asylum cases in the immigration court system, which often keeps people applying for asylum waiting years to resolve their cases. That could mean some big changes to how asylum cases are processed at the southern border.
The plan the Biden administration is considering to speed up the process would take some asylum cases from the southern border out of the hands of the overloaded immigration courts under the Department of Justice and instead handle them under the purview of the Department of Homeland Security, where asylum officers already process tens of thousands of cases a year, two people familiar with the discussions who were not authorized to speak about administration plans told NPR exclusively.
Those familiar with the discussions say one outcome could be discouraging unauthorized migration. That’s because those who can argue for a certain fear of persecution are able to gain temporary residence and often a work permit as they wait out their cases.
. . . .
Advocates say they welcome a more efficient system, provided changes are not used as a way to expedite removals as the Trump administration did.
Eleanor Acer of Human Rights First says there are a host of reasons to allow asylum officers to conduct the first set of interviews and reduce the numbers, but she says it’s important that applicants have a chance to appeal to the court before being removed.
“The massive backlog must be dealt with,” she said. “But the answer to that problem is not to deprive asylum seekers of due process and a fair hearing, or to weaponize the asylum process to try to deter other people from seeking U.S. protection.”
The Biden administration has already ended two of the Trump administration’s programs, the Prompt Asylum Case Review and the Humanitarian Asylum Review Program, that were designed to quickly return Mexican and Central American asylum seekers suspected of having invalid claims.
Department of Homeland Security officials declined to discuss plans to shift border cases to the asylum division.
But an administration official said last week they are now working on a number of policies and regulations to create “a better functioning asylum system.”
That includes establishing refugee processing in the region and strengthening other countries’ asylum systems.
Biden also resurrected the Central American Minors program that reunited children with parents who are in the United States legally.
The Biden administration is now seeking to “pick up the pieces” after the Trump administration, with a different set of policies that abide by U.S. law but also international obligations, Meissner said.
“We need to have access to asylum,” Meissner said, “but it needs to be done in a way that can be prompt and fair, not in a way that leads to waits of years and years and court backlogs.
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Read the complete article at the link.
Why it could work:
Granting relief at the lowest level of the system is cost effective;
It’s easier to hire, train, and assign Asylum Officers than Immigration Judges;
Immigration Court time should be reserved for those cases where there is a real issue as to whether relief can be granted.
Why it probably won’t work:
Leadership is critical. Right now, there are only a few experts in government with the knowledge, proven leadership ability, organizational skills, and courage to lead this program.
Two obvious names that come to mind are Judge A. Ashley Tabaddor, currently USCIS Chief Counsel, and Judge Dana Leigh Marks, one of the “founding mothers” of U.S. asylum law and pioneer of the well-founded fear standard. Both are past Presidents of the NAIJ. Neither has yet been tapped for this assignment.
By contrast, there are a number of experts in the private/NGO sector who could lead this effort. Obvious choices would be Judge Paul Grussendorf, former Immigration Judge, Asylum Officer, UN Representative, and professor; Professor Karen Musalo, Director, Center for Refugee & Gender Studies, UC Hastings Law; Eleanor Acer, Senior Director, Refugee Protection, Human Rights First (quoted in this article); Professor Michele Pistone, Creator and Founder of the VIISTA asylum training program at Villanova Law; Professor Phil Schrag, Co-Director of the CALS Asylum Clinic at Georgetown Law and author of Baby Jails and the upcoming release The End of Asylum; Michelle Mendez, Director, Defending Vulnerable Populations at CLINIC; or Judge Ilyce Shugall of our Round Table. But, nobody of that caliber has been tapped either.
Without creative, dynamic, expert leadership, and a different approach to personnel, the program will be yet another bureaucratic failure. In case nobody has noticed, after four years of never ending abuse, gross mismanagement, and intentional misdirection by the Trump kakistocracy, the USCIS Asylum & Refugee program is also in shambles — demoralized, disorganized, leaderless, incredibly backlogged. An obvious untapped source is retired Asylum Officers and Adjudicators who could be brought back on a limited-term basis, intensively trained by experts from a “Better EOIR,” and who often are in a position to travel frequently and on short notice.
It’s not about deterrence. Already, this article speaks of “possible deterrent effect.” WRONG!The purpose of an asylum adjudication system is to provide fair, timely, generous adjudications of asylum eligibility in accordance with the letter and spirit of the Refugee Act of 1980, the U.N. Convention and Protocol on which it is based, and the due process clause of our Constitution. We have never had such a system, which inevitably would be more orderly and efficient, but also result in many more grants.
The main reason why we don’t currently have a functioning asylum system, and never have had the system that asylum seekers need and deserve, is that the system is at the mercy of a bogus Executive-controlled “court” system that time and time again has been compromised by politicos seeking who use it as an enforcement tool rather than an independent court of justice.
In 2014, the last year that I taught Refugee Law & Policy at Georgetown Law I “graded” the U.S. Asylum system at “B-.” Not as good as it should be, but not as bad as it could be.
Now I’d give it an “F.” Completely dysfunctional, highly arbitrary, and a tool of institutionalized racism and White Nationalism.
The system is ineffective as a deterrent. There is no known basis to believe that quick and often arbitrary and wrongful “rejections” are an effective deterrent. That’s particularly true because rejections are seldom explained in a reasonable, understandable manner. So, to the extent that there is a “message” it’s that you got the wrong officer or the wrong judge on the wrong day or that the U.S. legal system is inherently unfair and should be avoided by hiring a smuggler to get you to the interior of the U.S. where, as a practical matter, you have a better chance of obtaining “de facto refuge.”
The only “efficiency and leverage” that comes from the Asylum Officer system is in quickly identifying and consistently granting a substantial number of applications. That, and only that, does actually relieve the Immigration Court system of unnecessary cases. Otherwise, “non-grants” still have to go to the Immigration Courts for de novo review. I probably granted the majority of asylum cases “referred” from the Asylum Office. That leaves plenty of room to believe that a better trained and operated system with some positive guidance and effective supervision by better Immigration Judges and a truly expert BIA would achieve substantially higher grant rates and higher efficiency at the Asylum Office, thereby keeping many cases out of court and speeding the process for asylees to obtain permanent residence and eventually U.S. citizenship!
Some assumptions appear invalid. This article also repeats the unproven assumption that a fair, just, and efficient asylum system would result in rejection of the majority of cases. I doubt that.
Prior to the Trump disaster, approximately 75-80% of asylum applicants at the Southern Border passed “credible fear.” That the majority of them never achieved asylum was due less to the lack of merit in their claims than to factors such as: 1) lack of a system to match asylum seekers with qualified counsel; 2) wrong-headed anti-asylum precedents from the BIA that were specifically directed against asylum seekers from Latin America — basically institutionalized racism in the guise of “enforcement;” 3) poor selection, training, and motivation of Immigration Judges some of whom simply did not treat asylum seekers fairly, nor were they given any incentive to do so.
I granted asylum or other protection to many refugees from the Northern Triangle. I probably could have granted twice that number had the BIA precedents actually fairly and reasonably interpreted asylum law to specifically cover gender-based claims and claims arising from persecution by gangs basically operating “in lieu of government authorities” in most of the Northern Triangle.
Additionally, an honest interpretation of the CAT by the BIA would have allowed life-saving protection to be extended to many others who lacked nexus but had a high probability of torture with Government acquiescence upon return. I believe that a return to the original Acosta-Kasinga line of asylum analysis and adoption of proper CAT interpretationsalong the lines set forth by the (exiled) dissenting judges in Matter of J-E- would result in grants of some type of protection (asylum, withholding, or CAT) in the majority of Southern Border cases coming from the Northern Triangle that passed credible fear or reasonable fear.
Asylum, along with refugee status, is a key form of legal immigration to the U.S. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. It’s NOT a “loophole.” It’s the law! Studies by groups of experts such as CMS have shown the huge benefits that refugees confer on the U.S. I have no reason to believe that asylum seekers as a group are any different.
As long as we keep treating the reality of human migration and the strengths and humanity of asylum seekers as a negative rather than a positive, we will continue to fail, as we have for decades, to fully comply with either our own laws or international conventions.
A broken, dysfunctional, unfair EOIR will continue to drag American justice down. There must be de novo review of denials by EOIR and far, far more competent review and direction in the review of credible fear denials by EOIR. A better BIA could actually set binding precedents on “credible fear” and “reasonable fear.”
Currently, EOIR is incapable of producing either consistently fair results (particularly for asylum seekers) or the inspired legal scholarship and leadership for the asylum system to be functional and held accountable. It’s going to require all new leadership, an all new BIA, elimination of all of the Trump-eraprecedents that impede fairness for asylum seekers, new merit-based selection criteria for Immigration Judges, professional administration from judicial experts, and an immediate slashing of the largely self-created “backlog” of 1.3 million cases by closing and removing from the docket every case more than a year old that doesn’t relate to a priority (most are folks who would be covered by Biden’s legalization program anyway; many are eligible for relief that USCIS could grant) to get EOIR in a position to provide the necessary legal guidance and system accountability for the Asylum Office. The absurdist notion that we could or would want to remove every one of the 10-11 million undocumented residents (many performing essential services that propped us up through the pandemic) is one of the “big lies” that has prevented rational reforms of our immigration system.
In plain terms, EOIR needs an immediate “rebuild” with a new progressive, humanitarian judiciary of experts. There is no early indication that Judge Garland either understands that “mission-critical” need or has a plan for achieving it.
As we say in the business the “devil is in the details.” Right now, I can see neither the details nor theleadership in place or “in the pipeline” to solve the debilitating problems in our asylum system that actually are undermining the entire U.S. justice system.
Biden could fix it. But, I wouldn’t count on it. That means that the only real fix in the offing will be for the NDPA to force the Administration to “get it right” through aggressive, never-ending litigation as well as continuing to seek better legislators. Highly inefficient. Yet, sometimes it’s the only way to get the attention of those in power.
If nothing else, we’ll continue to make an important historic record of the cruelty and stupidity with which the current asylum system is being administered. It doesn’t have to be this way. We can always choose to follow our “better angels.” It just takes the courage and the good judgement to get the right folks in the right jobs to make it happen.
The Republican senator Ted Cruz has drawn criticism for taking a trip to America’s southern border as the conservative Texan politician once again became the butt of internet jokes and memes.
In the style of a wildlife documentary, Cruz captured his experience with the help of professional photographers and shared his recent journey to the US-Mexico border Thursday night on social media, where he aimed to shed light on what Republicans have dubbed a crisis.
Sporting a dark green fishing shirt and matching baseball cap with the Texas flag, Cruz spoke at a press conference where he sought to paint a dramatic picture of his experience: “On the other side of the river we have been listening to and seeing cartel members – human traffickers – right on the other side of the river waving flashlights, yelling and taunting Americans, taunting the border patrol.”
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Despite his claims that the border situation is a direct result of the Biden administration’s immigration policies, residents in the Rio Grande Valley have said no such crisis exists. In fact, the number of border crossings under the Biden administration largely mirror those under the former Trump administration. Cruz was accompanied by 18 other Republican senators including John Cornyn, Susan Collins and Lindsey Graham.
After claiming he ran into heckling cartel members and saw a dead body floating in the Rio Grande, Cruz was derided by many, including the former congressman Beto O’Rourke who said:“You’re in a border patrol boat armed with machine guns. The only threat you face is unarmed children and families who are seeking asylum (as well as the occasional heckler).”
. . . .
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Read more at the link about the GOP’s complete farce — while much more courageous individuals, asylum seekers, are forced to risk their lives because the U.S. is incapable of administering our own asylum laws in a fair, responsible, and competent manner. Cruz & co apparently view this as a “photo op.” Actually, it’s a human tragedy for which history will hold Cruz and his racist party largely responsible, even if the voters fail to do so.
The best solution is to hire experts from the private/NGO/academic sectors; build a functioning asylum and refugee system that will process applicants fairly, generously, predictably, and efficiently; reopen legal ports of entry; establish a robust “on site” refugee program for the Northern Triangle; and work with the international community to alleviate the causes of forced migration. Figure out how new arrivals who qualify for legal status can help rebuild our economy moving forward. Develop a humane program for returning those who don’t qualify without endangering their lives, health, and safety.
An absolutely essential part of the solution is a new, “reimagined” EOIR, staffed with real judges who are experts in asylum, human rights, and due process. An EOIR that will “through teamwork and innovation, be the world’s best courts, guaranteeing fairness and due process for all.” Judge Garland, where are you in American justice’s hour of dire need?
“Eyore In Distress” Once A Symbol of Fairness, Due Process, & Best Practices, Now Gone “Belly Up”
Imperfect as our current laws may be, they cover all of the foregoing. What we really need to do is follow our own laws with common sense, humanity, and a sense of urgency!
What we don’t need is more inane walls, more border enforcement directed against asylum seekers, and more cruel and illegal schemes to return refugees to back to danger without any due process. And, we certainly don’t need any more photo ops from Cruz and his GOP cronies.
Anna Marie Gallagher, Esquire Executive Director CLINIC PHOTO: CLINIC website
I wake every morning to follow news of our sisters and brothers, thinking especially of the children, who have set out from places like El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua and Haiti–even as far as Cameroon and the Democratic Republic of the Congo–to seek protection at our doorstep. My heart aches for them and I pray for their safety.
Today’s readings remind us of our obligation, as followers of Christ, to speak the truth and follow the light. The truth is that people are suffering, both young and old, and desperately seeking safety and welcome in our country. Yet U.S. authorities and policies are often hostile to receiving them. Their arrival at our doors is deemed a “crisis.” As followers of Christ, we must and we will stand up, act bravely and generously, to speak the truth and welcome them.
The real crisis is not at the border, but within the families forced to make the difficult decision to leave, and in the hearts of those who refuse to follow Jesus’ light. We, as Christians, must walk in the path of light as Jesus instructs, and do the right thing. We must make room at our table and remember that we all belong to each other. We must take Jesus’ words to heart and remember to love the mother, the father and the child at the border as if they were our own.
This is not a crisis for us, although it certainly is for the men, women, and children who are fleeing. For us it is an opportunity to act out our faith precisely as Jesus taught.
As these sojourners leave their homes in search of safety, they may repeat a prayer similar to this: “Even though I walk in the dark valley I fear no evil; for you are at my side.” The rhythm of the words and their meaning must comfort them, knowing that God is their companion. What happens when they arrive here is up to us. We could look to God and ask what He would do, but we already know the answer.
Anna Gallagher is Executive Director of the Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc. (CLINIC).
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Unfortunately, too many folks promote a bogus picture of what’s at stake at our border. The “alternatives” they trumpet are basically increasing family separation and suffering in Mexico or somewhere else as pointed out in this Politico article by Jack Herrera:
The result is a new form of family separation — but instead of happening at the hands of federal agents in American government facilities, it’s taking place, family by family, in camps like the one Janiana lives in. The fact that minors won’t be expelled like everyone else has rapidly spread by word of mouth across the length of the border. And while many families choose to stick together, the pressure to separate weighs heaviest on the most vulnerable — families who fear death, whether from persecutors who have followed them to the border, or from extreme hunger.
For Janiana, the possibility of being sent back to Honduras reads as a death sentence. She shows me the scars from her torture at the hands of a powerful gang back home that her family got on the wrong side of. Fearing further reprisals, Janiana fled with her sister’s children, a teenage nephew and teenage niece as well as the niece’s several-month-old son. The children haven’t been reconnected with their mother yet, who successfully entered the U.S. to begin the process of claiming asylum in 2019, before the pandemic. Staying in Mexico, Janiana says, was never an adequate long-term solution and increasingly feels intolerable. She says the family already tried to make a new life in the southern state of Oaxaca, but danger pursued them there, where her nephew was murdered.
Today, Janiana says her only hope is that the U.S. will begin to accept asylum seekers again, especially as the country gets a better hold over the pandemic. At the moment, she says with resignation, “all we can do is wait.” Though there is one painful exception on her mind: If she were somehow able send the baby across alone, he might be allowed to stay.
“It breaks my heart to even think about it,” she says.
Why not get the trained Refugee Officers, Asylum Officers, Immigration Judges, ORR child services officers, and pro bono lawyers in place to comply with our legal obligations in a robust, timely, fair, and efficient manner?
Why not put experts, like Wendy Young of Kids in Needs of Defense, who understand how our system should work in charge of the welfare of the children? Why not put someone who understands the practical and legal needs at the border, like former Immigration Judge Ilyce Shugall, in charge of the Immigration Court response? Why not put someone like retired Judge Paul Grussendorf, who has also been an Asylum Officer and a UNHCR representative, in charge of the Asylum Office response? Why not put retired Assistant Chief Immigration Judge Robert Weisel, who worked with the UNHCR after retirement, in charge of coordinating the response with NGOs and the private sector?
Yes, the Trump regime definitely left a dismantled and dysfunctional immigration bureaucracy and structure behind. But, just repeating that time after time sounds more like an excuse than a plan or a solution.
Sure, it won’t happen overnight. But, it won’t happen at all without different folks in charge at the “retail level.” I see little evidence of any progress on a real long-term plan and the short-term response is also an unnecessary mess, given that the Biden Team has had more than four months since the election to get a new structure and new personnel in place.
While there are a few “bright spots,” like Michelle Brané and Katie Tobin, I sincerely doubt that the group in charge right now is capable of solving the practical problems in rebuilding and improving our asylum and immigration systems. Nowhere is that more obvious than at EOIR, where the dysfunctional “clown show” 🤡 stumbles on, for no apparent reason.
Many of us keep trying, to no avail, to warn Judge Garland that he literally is sitting on a powder keg with the fuse lit and burning.💣 I guarantee that the next “manufactured crisis” will be when the current group of asylum cases coming from the border hit the broken, dysfunctional, ridiculously and unnecessarily backlogged, grotesquely mismanaged, ill-prepared, and anti-asylum-biased “Immigration Courts.” Waiting for the inevitable disaster, rather than bringing in a new “A Team” from the NDPA to start solving the problems now, is a monumental mistake by Judge G.
Why not fix the system to run the way it should, rather than spreading myths, throwing spitballs, and ignoring the unfolding human tragedy that can’t be solved with draconian enforcement and lame “don’t come” messages directed at forced migrants fleeing for their lives?
“Floaters — How The World’s Richest Country Responds To Asylum Seekers” EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT – The bodies of Salvadoran migrant Oscar Alberto Mart??nez Ram??rez and his nearly 2-year-old daughter Valeria lie on the bank of the Rio Grande in Matamoros, Mexico, Monday, June 24, 2019, after they drowned trying to cross the river to Brownsville, Texas. Martinez’ wife, Tania told Mexican authorities she watched her husband and child disappear in the strong current. (AP Photo/Julia Le Duc)Gabe Gutierrez NBC News Correspondent Atlanta, GA
Reminds me of the essay I recently posted from my friend, Don Kerwin at CMS:
The number of unaccompanied children and asylum-seekers crossing the US-Mexico border in search of protection has increased in recent weeks. The former president, his acolytes, and both extremist and mainstream media have characterized this situation as a “border crisis,” a self-inflicted wound by the Biden administration, and even a failure of US asylum policy. It is none of these things. Rather, it is a response to compounding pressures, most prominently the previous administration’s evisceration of US asylum and anti-trafficking policies and procedures, and the failure to address the conditions that are displacing residents of the Northern Triangle states of Central America (El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras), as well as Venezuela, Cuba, Haiti, and other countries…
The real immigration crisis is not at the border, but in the failure to respond effectively to the conditions driving forced migration, to establish orderly and viable legal immigration policies, to legalize the increasingly long-tenured undocumented population, and to reform and invest sufficiently in the US asylum and immigration court systems.
Donald M. Kerwin Executive Director Center for Migration Studies
It also echoes the words of veteran journalist Marc Cooper, posted by my friend Dan Kowalski over on LexisNexis Immigration Community:
When I was in Mexico reporting on the exodus, I would talk with dozens of migrants who were just a an hour or two away from starting their trek and, to a person, not one of them said they paid any attention to new US laws and regs as they were determined to cross no matter what. And no matter the sacrifices.
Dan Kowalski Online Editor of the LexisNexis Immigration Law Community (ILC)
Even the WashPost editorial page writers “get” the reality of human migration in a way the nativist fear-mongers never will:
Yet despite fearmongering by Republicans, the current influx is neither a public health emergency nor a national security threat. The vast majority of those allowed to enter the country will join relatives here while their asylum claims plod along. That wait is too long — it can stretch to three years or more — and the administration insists it will shrink the backlog. It has also earmarked $4 billion in aid from the pandemic relief bill for Central America — with strings attached to prevent its misuse — to attack the conditions that make life miserable there and drive migrants to seek refuge in this country.
Dumping Asylum Seekers in Honduras Artist: Monte Wolverton Reproduced under license
Still, sadly, facts and reality seem largely irrelevant here.
Despite denials from Secretary Mayorkas, the Biden Administration appears to be believing Kevin McCarthy’s BS on some level.
Thursday, the Administration basically negotiated a “lite version” of Trump’s “Let ‘Em Die in Mexico” — essentially trading AstroZenica vaccine (which wasn’t approved for use in the U.S. anyway) for Mexico’s agreement to step up harsh enforcement measures against migrants crossing their Southern Border and to warehouse families arbitrarily rejected without due process by the U.S. under our bogus CDC directive. We already have seen how well that works out!
A girl peers out from an encampment at the U.S.-Mexico border where she and several hundred people waited to present themselves to U.S. immigration to seek asylum. / Photo by David Maung
Any way you cut it, the realities of human migration, the lives of the desperate individuals involved, the views of human rights experts and advocates, and our supposed commitment to international conventions, the rule of law, and Constitutional Due Process take a back seat when the “bogus border debate” shifts into high gear.
There is actually a very simple truth here: “Forced migration” is not “optional!” In fact, a number of forced migrants prefer “death in the attempt” to “death in place.”
Therefore, all the “deterrents,” “border militarization,” “Baby Jails,” and “stay home statements” won’t ultimately stop the inexorable flow (although they might temporarily divert, modulate, or vary it— usually just enough for the “powers that be” to declare “victory at sea” as a result of their failed policies while ignoring the human carnage and lost opportunities they leave behind).
Professor Philip G. Schrag Georgetown Law Co-Director, CALS Asylum Clinic, Author of “Baby Jails”
Sure, there is a timing factor. Weather, the “business plans” and propaganda of smugglers (Trump’s “enforcement only” policies have been a boon for them in more ways than one, not only boosting their fees, but diverting enforcement resources away from the “real” law enforcement problems at the border involving drugs and human exploitation), and Biden’s pledge to restore humanity and the rule of law to America all factor into the equation in some way.
But, they are not the the primary causes of forced migration, except to the extent that climatechange (ignored and worsened by Trump and the GOP) has aggravated the poverty and economic disorder in the Northern Triangle by destroying the livelihoods of many farmers and making their land essentially worthless.
Tone-deaf GOP politicos like McCarthy and Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH) apparently think the solution is to continue to mock the rule of law, violate the Constitution, and simply declare the Southern Border closed forever, al a Stephen Miller. Let families and children “die in place” in their home countries, die on the journey at the hands of other governments, or rot forever in Mexico — “Out of sight, out of mind.” As long as it isn’t happening in our country and being covered by our news outlets, who cares about human lives? That was certainly the Trump approach!
That’s hardly a “solution,” except in neo-Nazi or Soviet-era terms. The harshest and most inhuman approaches will, as they have in the past and continue to do, fail to stop desperate humans who want to survive from doing what’s necessary to save their lives and preserve their families’ futures, even when that interferes with the GOP’s “whitewashed” version of “American greatness.”
The solution involves following Constitutional due process, re-establishing the rule of law (including a radical “reform and replace” of our dysfunctional Immigration Courts), and adhering to our international obligations, both in letter and spirit. It also requires an expanded, much more robust, legal immigration system that reflects the demands of our economy, the needs of migrants, and the realities of human migration, particularly from Latin America. Like it or not, there will be more immigration.
As I have said before: “There are many ways in which we can diminish our own humanity, but none of them will stop human migration.”
Will G. Reaper Become The Lasting Image of America’s 21st Century Human Rights & Racial Justice Failures In The Eyes Of The Rest Of Humanity & Future Generations? Image: Hernan Fednan, Creative Commons License
Contrary to the GOP blather, immigration, voluntary, forced, coerced, legal, extra-legal, white, non-white, Christian, non-Christian, is what the real America is all about, for better or worse. Overall, immigration is a positive force for America.
Here’s a great essay on the positive nature of immigration by Pedro Gerson on Slate. Pedro isthe director of the Immigration Law Clinic at the Louisiana State University Law Center, and a former immigration staff attorney at the Bronx Defenders. The latter organization has been home to a number of notable members of the NDPA.
Pedro Gerson Director, Immigration Law Clinic LSU Law Center SOURCE: Twitter
As Pedro says, human migration to America will continue notwithstanding GOP xenophobes. The only question is whether we will have the wisdom and courage to work with and take advantage of its power in constructive, creative, forward looking ways, rather than trying to “recreate Jim Crow!”
Or, will we continue, as GOP restrictionists urge, to squander resources, goodwill, and human potential on futile efforts to eradicate what is perhaps the oldest and most fundamental phenomenon of human existence?
🇺🇸🗽⚖️Due Process Forever! Restore the rule of law! Fix The Disgraceful, Dysfunctional Immigration Courts, Judge Garland! End White Nationalist racism!
Donald M. Kerwin Executive Director Center for Migration Studies
In a new essay for the Center for Migration Studies of New York (CMS), CMS’s Executive Director Donald Kerwin writes:
The number of unaccompanied children and asylum-seekers crossing the US-Mexico border in search of protection has increased in recent weeks. The former president, his acolytes, and both extremist and mainstream media have characterized this situation as a “border crisis,” a self-inflicted wound by the Biden administration, and even a failure of US asylum policy. It is none of these things. Rather, it is a response to compounding pressures, most prominently the previous administration’s evisceration of US asylum and anti-trafficking policies and procedures, and the failure to address the conditions that are displacing residents of the Northern Triangle states of Central America (El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras), as well as Venezuela, Cuba, Haiti, and other countries…
The real immigration crisis is not at the border, but in the failure to respond effectively to the conditions driving forced migration, to establish orderly and viable legal immigration policies, to legalize the increasingly long-tenured undocumented population, and to reform and invest sufficiently in the US asylum and immigration court systems.
Thanks Don for speaking out against the scandalous GOP complete “border BS,” all too often parroted by the so-called “mainstream press.” Read the rest of Don’s essay at the link.
Don has spent his entire career solving migration and human rights problems. The Biden Administration and everyone who believes in American democracy should listen to “practical experts” like Don, rather than ignorant, racially-motivated GOP politicos and White Nationalist nativists spouting the “same old, same old” myths, fear-mongering, and unhelpful “non-solutions.”
If xenophobic rhetoric, cruelty, officially-sanctioned child abuse, evading our own legal and humanitarian responsibilities, and “enforcement only” were the “solutions,” the “problem at the Southern Border” — which has existed in one form or another for over a half century, would long ago have been solved. We can’t solve humanitarian situations that create forced migration with unilateral law enforcement gimmicks and cruelty toward the humans fighting for their lives. Human migration long pre-existed the formation of nation states and establishment of national boundaries.
Administration after administration, of both parties, have squandered time and taxpayer money on unsuccessful efforts to “enforce their way” out of forced migration situations. Contrary to GOP blather, Democratic Administrations have been almost as fixated as the GOP with unsuccessfully “detaining, deterring, and enforcing” their way out of human problems that demand more thoughtful human solutions.
All Administrations at some point prematurely claim that their efforts have “succeeded.” None actually have succeeded in addressing the causes of the migration. Therefore, none of these “false solutions” proves “durable.”
Significantly, Don is one of the few commentators to fully grasp the integral connection between the Trump regime’s complete destruction of the integrity of the Immigration Courts and its lawless, yet highly ineffective, border policies.
Real solutions don’t kill, harm, and maim refugees and forced migrants, encourage criminal cartels and corrupt foreign officials to prey on them, and stack up desperate humans in dangerous conditions just across the border because US Government officials were too biased and incompetent to operate under any semblance of the rule of law.
We can abide by our own laws, international norms, our Constitution, human decency, and common sense. It isn’t rocket science.
But, it does require a combination of expertise, courage, humanity, and practical problem solving that has been conspicuously absent from our governing structure since 2017, and severely undervalued before that.
Also, it’s certainly not that the Biden Administration has suddenly re-established due process and the rule of law at the border. Far from it!
The vast majority of those arriving at the border, even those who are applying at legal ports of entry, are unceremoniously and summarily removed without any process at all, let alone due process of law. This is all based on a largely bogus Trump-initiated exercise of authority by the CDC to use COVID-19 as a pretext to suspend the rule of law and constitutional due process at the border.
Moreover, we shouldn’t forget that even with the Biden Administration’s gradual efforts to re-establish a legal process for asylum seekers, unaccompanied children are still being held in Government detention for far longer than the 72-hours permitted under law. This problem won’t be solved, as some GOP nativists incredibly suggest, by dumping kids back across the Mexican Border, returning them to danger in their home countries without regard to their individual situations, or forcing them to turn to smugglers to make their way to relative safety in the interior of the U.S.
Nor will it be solved by long-term detention in disgraceful and inhumane “Baby Jails!” Ask my Georgetown Law colleague and author Professor Phil Schrag of the CALS Asylum Clinic about that!
Interestingly, some of the biggest complainers spreading the “open borders myth” are Greg Abbott and other Texas GOP politicos who have prematurely “reopened their state” in the middle of a pandemic in blatant contravention of best medical and public health advice. So, you can summarily dismiss their “crocodile tears” and bogus “hand wringing” about public health and safety.
That’s particularly true since the GOP is just coming off a massive example of how their incompetent mis-governance of Texascaused unnecessary misery and loss of life among Texas residents as a result of a highly predictable and long-foreseen “weather emergency.” Why does the mainstream media often continue to treat these “political hacks,” who couldn’t “govern” their way out of a paper bag, as credible spokespersons on anything, let alone human rights situations of which they have no expertise whatsoever?
🇺🇸🗽⚖️Due Process Forever! Re-Establish The Rule Of Law, Including Full, Robust Humanitarian Protections At The Border& In Our Disgracefully Dysfunctional Immigration “Courts.”
Thanks for speaking out Andrea!Andrea is a former Arlington Immigration Court intern and one of the “charter members” of the NDPA. As captured on this video, she was assaulted by ICE while trying to assist her child client in reuniting with his mother! A civil suit against the agent involved is pending.
CNN Digital Expansion 2019, Priscilla Alvarez Politics Reporter, CNN
Immigration
Lawyers are slowly making progress in locating and reuniting children and families separated at the southern US border as part of the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” immigration policy. A month ago, the parents of 611 children had yet to be located. Now, that number is down to 506. President Biden this month signed an executive order establishing a new task force designed to identify and reunify these separated families. Meanwhile, the Biden administration has lifted an order that temporarily banned certain immigrant visas during the pandemic and will begin admitting some of the hundreds of migrants held in deplorable conditions in tent camps as part of a policy requiring them to stay in Mexico until their US court dates. Both these decisions are reversals of controversial Trump-era policies.
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Progress on restoring the rule of law at the border and in our legal immigration system, although many advocates yearn for much faster remedial action. Links to more detailed analysis, much of it by CNN All-Star 🌟 Immigration Reporter Priscilla Alvarez, are embedded in the above CNN summary.
