Dreamers – Page 24 – immigrationcourtside.com

WHAT DO YOU CALL SOMEONE WHO ENJOYS INFLICTING GRATUITOUS PAIN AND SUFFERING ON VULNERABLE PEOPLE? — Jeff Sessions

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/category/the-daily-202/?utm_term=.c4e82aca4268&wpisrc=nl_daily202&wpmm=1

James Hohmann writes in then”Daily 202″ in the Washington Post:

“THE BIG IDEA: Photographers caught a giddy Jeff Sessions cracking a satisfied smile last week as he prepared to announce that 690,000 undocumented immigrants who had been brought into the United States as minors would no longer be shielded from deportation. The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program “is being rescinded,” the attorney general declared in the first line of his statement. “There is nothing compassionate about the failure to enforce immigration laws. … Failure to enforce the laws in the past has put our nation at risk of crime, violence and even terrorism. … The effect of this unilateral executive amnesty, among other things, contributed to a surge of unaccompanied minors on the southern border that yielded terrible humanitarian consequences. It also denied jobs to hundreds of thousands of Americans by allowing those same jobs to go to illegal aliens.” Fact checkers called these and other claims Sessions made about the immigrants known as “dreamers” dubious or outright false. Perhaps that’s why he didn’t take questions afterward. Regardless, the speech was widely covered as a triumph for the nation’s chief law enforcement officer and a sign that he was out of President Trump’s doghouse. Not only did Sessions get the outcome he wanted; he also got to deliver the news from the Justice Department briefing room. Trump’s DACA decision last week seemed to validate Sessions’s decision to slog on through the summer even after being frozen out of the inner circle. From interviews to tweets, Trump repeatedly attacked his attorney general throughout July as “weak” and “beleaguered.” The main reason Sessions chose to put up with indignities that might cause most people to quit was because he believed he could make a difference on immigration policy. That has always been his signature issue and animated his two decades in the Senate.

— But it took less than 10 days for Trump to once again undercut Sessions. The president on Thursday signaled his embrace of granting permanent legal status to these “dreamers” as part of a deal with Democrats that he said is close to being finalized. He also acknowledged that he’s not going to make a deal to save DACA contingent on getting funding for the wall he wants to build along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Discussing the exact same group of people that Sessions painted with such a sinister brush one week earlier, Trump tweeted yesterday: “Does anybody really want to throw out good, educated and accomplished young people who have jobs, some serving in the military? Really!” Trump tweeted yesterday. “They have been in our country for many years through no fault of their own — brought in by parents at young age.”

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Read the rest of Hohmann’s always-entertaining column at the above link.

Quite simply, Jeff “Gonzo Apocalypto” Sessions is a poor excuse for a human being and a disgrace to the U.S. Department of Justice. What kind of person is motivated by a desire to destroy our society by hurting fine American young people and smearing them with lies and innuendo?

But, let’s not forget who empowered his message of hate and fear by appointing him, and who “blew by” his long record of racial problems while silencing the opposition that told truth. And, a special “shout out” should go to those who voted to put this intentionally divisive Administration in office and to the unapologetically racially challenged white GOP voters of Alabama who elected this leftover of the Jim Crow era time and time again.

Jeff Sessions does not represent the values of the majority of Americans. We must get it together at the ballot box to insure that he (and those like him) never again happen to us and to our country!

PWS

09-15-17

Under Pressure From Federal Court, DHS Might Extend Key DACA Deadline!

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/09/14/feds-consider-delaying-daca-deadline-242742?cid=apn

Josh Gerstein reports in Politico:

“The Department of Homeland Security is “actively considering” delaying a looming deadline for so called-Dreamers to renew their status under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, a Justice Department attorney said at a court hearing Thursday, according to attendees and a government official.

Deputy Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate cited the hurricanes that recently hit Texas, Florida and nearby states as grounds for the potential delay to the Oct. 5 deadline, while noting that no final decision had been made, an official said.

Word of the possible delay came as a federal judge signaled that he might postpone the cut-off date unless the Trump administration acted first, attendees at a Thursday court hearing said.

During the session, in federal court in Brooklyn, U.S. District Court Judge Nicholas Garaufis repeatedly labeled the deadline “arbitrary” and said he saw little harm in pushing it back, according to advocates.

“He focused quite a bit on the October 5 deadline and called it arbitrary,” said David Chen, a Yale law student helping litigate the issue, “and said essentially that so many people who are DACA recipients would face quite a lot of harm and experience quite a lot of chaos if they were unable to renew by the deadline.”

The Trump administration announced last week that it was winding down the Obama-era program known DACA, a mechanism used to give quasi-legal status and work permits to about 800,000 undocumented foreigners who arrived in the U.S. as children.

Homeland security officials announced that people whose work permits are set to expire between Sept. 5, 2017, and March 5 of next year must submit a renewal application by Oct. 5 to receive another two-year permit. After March 5, no more DACA permits will be granted, leading to a two-year phase-out of the program, officials said.”

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Read the complete article at the link.

Judges hate it when they can’t talk the USG into “voluntarily” doing the right thing!

PWS

09-14-17

NY TIMES: Trump Actually Fired Jeff Sessions Over Mueller Appointment — Pence & Others Talked Unglued Prez Out Of Accepting Resignation! — Trump’s Intent To Obstruct Russia Investigation Clear If Report Accurate!

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/14/us/politics/jeff-sessions-trump.html?smid=tw-share

Michael S. Schmidt and Maggie Haberman report:

“WASHINGTON — Shortly after learning in May that a special counsel had been appointed to investigate links between his campaign associates and Russia, President Trump berated Attorney General Jeff Sessions in an Oval Office meeting and said he should resign, according to current and former administration officials and others briefed on the matter.

The president blamed the appointment of the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, on Mr. Sessions’s decision to recuse himself from the Justice Department’s Russia investigation — a move Mr. Trump believes was the moment his administration effectively lost control over the inquiry. Accusing Mr. Sessions of “disloyalty,” Mr. Trump unleashed a string of insults on his attorney general.

Ashen and emotional, Mr. Sessions told the president he would quit and sent a resignation letter to the White House, according to four people who were told details of the meeting. Mr. Sessions would later tell associates that the demeaning way the president addressed him was the most humiliating experience in decades of public life.

The Oval Office meeting, details of which have not previously been reported, shows the intensity of Mr. Trump’s emotions as the Russia investigation gained steam and how he appeared to immediately see Mr. Mueller’s appointment as a looming problem for his administration. It also illustrates the depth of antipathy Mr. Trump has had for Mr. Sessions — one of his earliest campaign supporters — and how the president interprets “disloyalty” within his circle of advisers.

Mr. Trump ended up rejecting Mr. Sessions’s May resignation letter after senior members of his administration argued that dismissing the attorney general would only create more problems for a president who had already fired an F.B.I. director and a national security adviser. Mr. Trump once again, in July, told aides he wanted to remove Mr. Sessions, but for a second time didn’t take action.

. . . .

The president relented, and eventually returned the resignation letter to Mr. Sessions — with a handwritten response on it.

For Mr. Sessions, the aggressiveness with which Mr. Trump has sought his removal was a blow. The son of a general store owner in a small town in Alabama, Mr. Sessions had long wanted to be the nation’s top federal law enforcement official or to serve in another top law enforcement or judicial post. He earned a reputation in the Senate as someone tough on immigration, and was the first senator to back Mr. Trump in the presidential campaign.

But their relationship began to deteriorate little more than a month after Mr. Trump was sworn in as president, after Mr. Sessions’s announcement that he was recusing himself from the Russia inquiry caught Mr. Trump by surprise.

The president spent months stewing about the recusal. In a July 19 interview with The Times, Mr. Trump said he never would have appointed Mr. Sessions to be attorney general if he knew he was going to recuse himself from the Russia investigation. Mr. Trump called the decision “very unfair to the president.”

Days after the Times interview, Mr. Trump told aides he wanted to replace Mr. Sessions. Some of the president’s aides, not sure if Mr. Trump really wanted the attorney general gone or was just working through his anger, were able to delay the firing until the president’s anger passed.

But Mr. Trump continued his public attacks in the days that followed, including taking to Twitter to call him “weak” — a word that is among the harshest criticisms in Mr. Trump’s arsenal.

Administration officials and some of Mr. Trump’s outside advisers have puzzled at Mr. Sessions’s decision to stay on. But people close to Mr. Sessions said that he did not leave because he had a chance to have an impact on what he sees as a defining issue of his career: curtailing legal and illegal immigration.

In recent weeks, he has spearheaded the effort to undo what he believed to be the Obama administration’s dangerously lenient immigration policies, including the Deferred Action of Childhood Arrivals program.

Mr. Sessions had no illusions about converting Mr. Trump to his side of the argument — Mr. Trump remains deeply ambivalent — and he had no illusions about repairing a damaged relationship he had once regarded as a friendship. But he told people he felt he had successfully pushed the president toward ending the Obama immigration policy, and thought it had given him increased leverage in the West Wing.

The president agreed to terminate the program, and on Sept. 5 Mr. Sessions stood alone at a lectern — a moment that seemed to be a significant victory for the attorney general.

But his satisfaction was fleeting. Mr. Trump quickly undercut Mr. Sessions in a tweet by saying he would reconsider whether or not to end the program, leading the attorney general to tell allies that he was frustrated that the president had muddled months of work leading to the announcement of the new policy.

On Wednesday evening, Democrats announced they had reached a deal with the president to quickly extend protections for young undocumented immigrants.

On Thursday morning, taking a vastly different position from the one Mr. Sessions had announced, the president tweeted about the need for protections for people brought here “through no fault of their own.”

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I’m not in favor of publicly humiliating any human being, even Jeff Sessions. But, my sympathy is tempered by Sessions’s willingness to lie and humiliate migrants, Hispanics, African Americans, and members of the LGBTQ community, among others, in pursuit of his obscene White Nationalist agenda. In other words, to pick on the most vulnerable members of our society, rather than using the laws to protect them and advance the cause of justice, including social justice (a concept that Sessions has never grasped).

Trump’s reasons for firing Sessions were unethical and wrong. But, Sessions is already the worst and least qualified Attorney General in modern history. When he finally departs the Department of Justice, of his own volition or otherwise, it will be a relief to all Americans who believe in the Constitution and a diverse, humane, inclusive society. The only question is whether the damage that Sessions is doing at Justice and to the Department’s credibility can ever be repaired after the debacle of his tenure finally ends.

PWS

09-14-17

“DREAM DEAL” DESCENDS INTO TYPICAL TRUMP CHAOS WITHIN 24 HOURS! — Who REALLY Knows What’s On His Mind?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-border-wall-daca_us_59ba570ee4b0edff971983ee?ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009

Elise Foley and Willa Frej report for HuffPost:

“WASHINGTON ― President Donald Trump gave a series of conflicting statements on Thursday about how he hopes to deal with young undocumented immigrants who came to the U.S. as children, muddying the waters over whether he will support their bid to gain eventual citizenship and whether he will demand a border wall in exchange.

Trump’s comments, made both to reporters and on Twitter, came after leading Democrats in Congress said they had reached an informal deal with the president on legislation to help so-called Dreamers, or undocumented young people who entered the country as children.

Last week, Trump put the fates of hundreds of thousands of Dreamers up in the air by rescinding the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which granted two-year work permits and deportation relief.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said on Wednesday that they had reached an agreement with Trump to tie measures to grant Dreamers legal status to border security measures, but not to a wall. They said Trump had made clear he would continue to demand a wall, and that they had told him they would oppose it.

Trump denied that a deal had been made, although he initially did not dispute key details of what the Democrats had said. But later, he said Dreamers’ fates would be tied to the construction of a border wall, even if it’s not part of legislation that addresses Dreamers.

“We have to be sure the wall isn’t obstructed, because without the wall, I wouldn’t do anything. … It doesn’t have to be here but they can’t obstruct the wall if it’s in a budget or anything else,” Trump told reporters in Florida, according to a pool report.

He added that he would “only do it if we get extreme security, not only surveillance but everything that goes with surveillance,” Trump said. “If there’s not a wall, we’re doing nothing.”

The president also created more confusion by suggesting that he might not support allowing Dreamers to eventually gain citizenship. That would destroy any hope of a deal with Democrats, who want Trump to support the Dream Act, which would allow undocumented young people who came to the U.S. as children to eventually become citizens.

“We’re not looking at citizenship,” he said. “We’re not looking at amnesty. We’re looking at allowing people to stay here.”

That doesn’t necessarily preclude eventually supporting Dream Act-style measures, however. The bill would not grant citizenship immediately; it would allow Dreamers to gain legal status that would make them eligible for eventual citizenship ― so there’s potential that Trump could eventually back such measures and still claim they were not the “amnesty” he opposes.

Earlier on Thursday, Trump said in a series of tweets that any deal on Dreamers would be contingent on “massive border security,” although he didn’t specify that it had to include a wall. He added that the wall is “already under construction in the form of new renovation of old and existing fences and walls” and would proceed.”

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

And, the beat goes on! I knew that sanity couldn’t last long in the “Age of Trump.”

PWS

09-14-17

DEAL OR NO DEAL? — You Can’t Tell With “The Donald” — But He Didn’t Really Deny That Something Is “In Play” With The Dems!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-border-wall-daca_us_59ba570ee4b0edff971983ee

Willa Frej reports for HuffPost:

“President Donald Trump denied on Thursday that he had made a firm agreement with Democrats on immigration, but did not dispute key details from the deal ― namely, that protection for young undocumented immigrants wouldn’t be tied to his long-promised U.S.-Mexico border wall.

In a series of tweets on Thursday, Trump said that any deal on Dreamers ― undocumented immigrants who came to the U.S. as children ― would be contingent on “massive border security,” but did not specifically say it had to be the wall.

He later said that the wall is “already under construction in the form of new renovation of old and existing fences and walls” and would proceed.

Trump also told reporters outside the White House on Thursday that “the wall will come later.” Asked if he favors amnesty, the president replied that “the word is DACA.”

The president also seemed to throw cold water on concerns that he wanted to deport beneficiaries of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals or DACA program, which the administration decided earlier this month to end.

Trump’s Thursday comments followed a dinner he held the previous evening with House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) and Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.). Following the meeting, they announced that the president agreed to a border security plan that would offer protections to the 800,000 Dreamers, and that the wall was not part of the deal.

Pelosi and Schumer released a statement Thursday clarifying their announcement from the night before, confirming that no final deal had been put in place.

Yet they added, “While both sides agreed that the wall would not be any part of this agreement, the President made clear he intends to pursue it at a later time, and we made clear we would continue to oppose it.”

Many of Trump’s staunchest supporters, including Fox News Host Sean Hannity and conservative commentator Ann Coulter, quickly lashed out at reports that president seemed to be softening his stance on immigration.

White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders later tweeted that “excluding the wall was certainly not agreed to,” but a spokesman for Schumer shot back that, while the wall wasn’t dead yet, it wasn’t part of this deal specifically.

This story has been updated to include Trump’s additional comments to reporters and a statement from Pelosi and Schumer.”

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You know you’re on the right track, Mr. President, when you are being criticized by racist, national embarrassments Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity, and Rep. Steve King (R-IA) (how come the GOP hasn’t banished this guy for his unapologetically racist and xenophobic views? — Yeah, he has a Constitutional right to spout his poisonous lies on and off the floor of Congress, and the folks in his Congressional District have a right to elect him to publicly represent their racism, lack of decency, and lack of judgment. — But, that doesn’t entitle him to membership in one of our two major political parties.)

And ignoring the rancid input of AG Jeff Sessions and his White Nationalist clone Stephen Miller on anything touching on immigration or national security would also be wise. Just see where this “Demonic Duo” is going and head the other way as fast as you can.

Along with Bannon, Sessions and Miller are at home on the wrong side of history, particularly racial and migration history. The President already got bad legal advice, based on bogus ideological reasoning, from Sessions in terminating DACA. Now he is having to put distance between himself and the markedly xenophobic anti-DACA narrative that Gonzo set forth when gleefully announcing an end to DACA and cheerfully throwing 800,000 American lives into turmoil. What a guy!

PWS

09-14-71

BREAKING: CAN WE BELIEVE THIS? — NBC Reports That Trump & Dems Cut Deal To Save Dreamers Over Dinner!!!

http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/politics/Ryan-Deporting-Young-Immigrants-Not-in-Nations-Interest-444252723.html

Jill Colvin reports:

“President Donald Trump told lawmakers Wednesday that he’s open to signing legislation protecting thousands of young immigrants from deportation even if the bill does not include funding for his promised border wall. But Trump remains committed to building a barrier along the U.S.-Mexican border, even if Democrats say it’s a non-starter.
Trump had dinner with Sen. Chuck Schumer and top Democrat Nancy Pelosi Wednesday night, and they reached a deal on DACA, according to a joint statement by the democrats.
“We agreed to enshrine the protections of DACA into law quickly, and to work out a package of border security, excluding the wall, that’s acceptable to both sides,” the statement read.
Trump, who was deeply disappointed by Republicans’ failure to pass a health care overhaul, infuriated many in his party when he reached a three-month deal with Sen. Schumer and House Democratic Leader Pelosi to raise the debt ceiling, keep the government running and speed relief to states affected by recent hurricanes.

Trump ended the program earlier this month and has given Congress six months to come up with a legislative fix before the so-called “Dreamers'” statuses begin to expire.
“We don’t want to forget DACA,” Trump told the members at the meeting. “We want to see if we can do something in a bipartisan fashion so that we can solve the DACA problem and other immigration problems.”
As part of that effort, Trump said he would not insist on tying extending DACA protections to wall funding, as long as a final bill included “some sort of border security,” said Democratic Rep. Henry Cuellar of Texas, who attended the meeting.

“He said, ‘We don’t have to have the wall on this bill,'” recalled Cuellar. “He said: ‘We can put that somewhere else, like appropriations or somewhere.’ But that was very significant because a lot of us don’t want to tie DACA and the wall. We’re not going to split the baby on that one. So he himself said, ‘We’re not going to put the wall tied into this.'”
Trump has made a sudden pivot to bipartisanship after months of railing against Democrats as “obstructionist.” He has urged them to join him in overhauling the nation’s tax code, among other priorities.
“More and more we’re trying to work things out together,” Trump explained Wednesday, calling the development a “positive thing” for both parties.

“If you look at some of the greatest legislation ever passed, it was done on a bipartisan manner. And so that’s what we’re going to give a shot,” he said.
The “Kumbaya” moment appeared to extend to the thorny issue of immigration, which has been vexing lawmakers for years. Funding for Trump’s promised wall had been thought to be a major point of contention between Republicans and Democrats as they attempted to forge a deal.
Democrats have been adamant in their opposition to the wall, but both Pelosi and a top White House staffer indicated Tuesday that they were open to a compromise on border security to expedite DACA legislation.

White House legislative director Marc Short said during a breakfast that, while the president remained committed to the wall, funding for it did not necessarily need to be linked directly to the “Dreamers” issue. “I don’t want us to bind ourselves into a construct that makes reaching a conclusion on DACA impossible,” he said.”

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I have to admit that I’m stunned by this swing of the pendulum. But, I’m pleased and relieved for the great Dreamers if it works. The Devil is often in the details, particularly with immigration.

On this occasion, I’ll have to agree with the President that bipartisan legislation putting the best interests of the country first is a good thing, and a smart way for the President to get credit for some legislative achievements.

We’ll have to see what happens, But, it’s nice to end the day on a more optimistic note.

PWS

09-13-17

UPDATE:

The Devil is indeed in the details! According to this more recent article from Sophie Tatum at CNN (forwarded by my friend and fellow insomniac Nolan Rappaport) the “deal” is far from done and the White House version of the meeting is not the same as the Schumer-Pelosi statement:

“White House press secretary Sarah Sanders immediately pushed back on the idea the wall would be dropped.
“While DACA and border security were both discussed, excluding the wall was certainly not agreed to,” Sanders said.
White House Legislative Affairs Director Marc Short confirmed that the President and Democrats agreed to work to find a legislative fix for DACA, but he called Democrats’ claim of a deal that would exclude wall funding “intentionally misleading.”

http://www.cnn.com/2017/09/13/politics/chuck-schumer-nancy-pelosi-donald-trump/index.html

Stay tuned!

PWS

09-14-17

ATTN: “NEW DUE PROCESS ARMY” & ALL INTERESTED ATTORNEYS: Pro Bono Immigration Lawyers Needed In NOVA — Training Will Be Provided By Catholic Charities Legal Services!

Our minister, Pastor Deborah Porras of Beverley Hills Community Methodist Church in Alexandria, VA sent me the following:

———- Forwarded message ———
From: NOVASanctuaryCongregationsNetwork <novasanctuarycongregationsnetwork@googlegroups.com>
Date: Wed, Sep 13, 2017 at 1:16 PM
Subject: Seeking attorneys for pro bono immigration cases
To: NOVASanctuaryCongregationsNetwork <novasanctuarycongregationsnetwork@googlegroups.com>

Please pass the following on to attorneys who may want to help with pro bono immigration cases:

Are you a lawyer? Would you like to use your legal skills to help keep our immigrant neighbors safe? One of the most pressing needs we hear from immigrant organizations in the DC area is “more lawyers” – and with DACA recipients now needing to look at what other options they may have to remain in the country, the need for legal services is especially great right now.

The All Souls (Unitarian) Church Sanctuary Movement Support Committee is sponsoring a training for lawyers who are interested in volunteering on a pro bono immigration case. Catholic Charities Immigration Legal Services will provide the training, coordinate case assignments, and support volunteers who are handling cases.

Immigration Legal Services Training
Wednesday, September 27, 2017
6:30-8:45 p.m.
All Souls Church Unitarian
1500 Harvard Street, NW
Washington, DC 20009
The training will include a general overview of immigration law as well as specific information on U visas for immigrants who have been the victim of a crime. Volunteers will be initially assigned to cases involving U visas.
Volunteers must be lawyers who are currently licensed to practice and may not be federal employees. If you’re interested in volunteering, click here to register for the required training, or contact Maya Hermann at hermann.maya@icloud.com.
—
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To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to novasanctuarycongregationsnetwork+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
To post to this group, send email to novasanctuarycongregationsnetwork@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/novasanctuarycongregationsnetwork/66f7c2fb-6ef2-427b-b6e8-3f7efb9cc3cf%40googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
—
Sent from Pastor Deborah with blessings!

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

There is no greater due process need in America today than the need for pro bono lawyers to represent migrants appearing before the USCIS and in the U.S. Immigration Courts. Unlike criminal cases, Government appointed counsel is not available to those facing removal from the US, even if they have been here for decades or have green cards.

Lawyers make a difference! In Immigration Court represented migrants are 5 to 17 times more likely to “win” their cases than are those who are forced to appear without counsel. I’m sure the same is true before USCIS in the area of “U” visas for victims of crime. The “U” visa process is complicated and requires meticulous documentation and effective presentation. I personally can’t imagine how anyone could successfully navagate this process without a highly competent lawyer!

Note: In my “cut and paste” I wasn’t able to reproduce the “live” links in the original e-mail. So those interested should contact Maya Hermann at her e-mail address in bold above!

PWS

09-13-17

CAL. SUES TRUMP TO PRESERVE DACA!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/california-daca-lawsuit_us_59b6c50de4b0349d072b91fc

Mollie Reilly reports in HuffPost:

“SAN FRANCISCO ― California Attorney General Xavier Becerra (D) announced Monday he is suing President Donald Trump’s administration to block it from ending protections against deportation for hundreds of thousands of young undocumented immigrants.

Attorneys general in Maine, Maryland and Minnesota are joining the suit.

Becerra’s announcement came one week after the Trump administration rescinded the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program and left the issue for Congress to resolve legislatively in the next six months, when work permits and deportation protections will begin to lapse for many of its recipients. Implemented by President Barack Obama in 2012, DACA protects from deportation roughly 800,000 “Dreamers” who came to the U.S. as children and allows them to work legally. More than 200,000 Dreamers live in California.

In the lawsuit, Becerra argues that rescinding DACA violates the Fifth Amendment’s due process clause due to concern that the administration will use the personal information Dreamers provided to apply for the program to find and deport them or their family members.

He also argues that using that information would violate the legal principle of equitable estoppel, which essentially protects against a “bait and switch,” in this case giving Dreamers reason to believe their personal information wouldn’t be used against them and then doing so anyway.

The lawsuit also contends the administration violated two federal laws ― the Administrative Procedure Act and the Regulatory Flexibility Act ― by rescinding the program without giving the public proper notice nor soliciting public comment on changes to it. Becerra also argues that the Justice Department’s action violates those statutes because the department failed to adequately assess the effect rescinding DACA will have on businesses and municipalities.

“The reckless choice to rescind DACA violated the Constitution as well as federal laws that help ensure our government treats everyone fairly and transparently,” Becerra said at a press conference Monday morning.”

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Read the complete article at the link.

All it takes is for one of these cases to succeed. And, California, in the 9th Circuit, seems a promising venue for the State.

PWS

09-11-17

TAL KOPAN AT CNN: WE’LL SOON LEARN IF THERE IS ANY LIMIT TO THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION’S BAD IMMIGRATION POLICIES: Hundreds Of Thousands Of U.S. Workers & Families In “TPS” Status Anxiously Await Word Of Their Fate!

http://www.cnn.com/2017/09/11/politics/next-daca-tps-temporary-protected-status/index.html

Tal reports

“To qualify for protections from El Salvador, recipients must have lived in the United States since 2001, and for Honduras, it’s 1998, meaning any revocation of the program would upend lives built in the United States for nearly 20 years.

Lawmakers have been pressing the Trump administration to preserve temporary protected status for the countries whose deadlines for redesignation are coming up soon, citing the communities that would be harmed. At a meeting in July with members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, then-Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly indicated he could end Haiti’s status but hadn’t made a decision on Central America.

In addition to the humanitarian concerns, supporters of the program point to analyses that show an economic impact from revoking it.

“If El Salvador terminates, literally 260,000 eligible workers will fall out of the workforce at the stroke of midnight on whatever day that happens,” Rodriguez said.

An analysis by the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, which advocates for pro-immigration policies, found that deporting all the immigrants from El Salvador, Honduras and Haiti who have temporary protected status would cost $3.1 billion and take away $6.9 billion in contributions to Social Security and Medicare and $45.2 billion to the gross domestic product over a decade. Turnover costs for their employers would total nearly $1 billion.

“There’s different elements to the concern,” said Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a Democrat from California. “First, in the case of people who’ve been here a considerable period of time, people become members of their community, and so … a couple decades later, you own businesses, you have families, you have grandchildren, you’re kind of part of our situation here.”

Lofgren said the designated countries often remain in dire straits, and sending people back to them would be “unwise.”

The program is one of the issues that Congress needs to tackle as part of immigration reform because insisting on keeping recipients’ status temporary becomes untenable, she said.

“There should be some rational way to transition people who have been here for a long time, and in the case of these people, they’ve been here in legal status, who because of the length of their stay have basically become valued members of our community,” Lofgren said. “That’s a matter of a change of immigration law.”

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Read Tal’s complete article at the link.

Terminating TPS would further de-stabbilize the U.S. Immigration Court system because many, probably the majority of TPS recipients have court cases that were “administratively closed” and therefore taken off that Court’s docket (currently totalling more than 610,000 cases with some hearings already scheduled four or more years in the future). Merely the preliminary act of “moving to re-calendar” the TPS cases all at once could crash the court system, given its current non-automated, largely manual, paper intensive procedures and lack of any e-filing.

If hundreds of thousands of individuals were returned to El Salvador it would likely de-stabllize the country and lead to collapse and internal chaos. Additionally, loss of “remittances” sent to El Salvador by legally working TPS individuals in the U.S. would almost certainly send the El Salvadoran economy into a tailspin. For that reason, a prior plan during the Clinton Administration for a phase-out of Salvadoran TPS led to panicked entreaties from the Salvadoran Government to the Administration to leave the TPS program in place.

From my perspective as an Immigration Judge, TPS was one of the “smartest” programs ever. It allowed many deserving individuals with difficult asylum cases that would have taken many hours of hearing time to be removed from the court docket with minimal work for the Immigration Court and our overburdened staff. Even “de novo review” of a TPS denial could ordinarily be accomplished in a 30 minute “short block” of hearing time rather than a 3-hour “full block” hearing.

TPS combined efficient adjudication by USCIS with needed work authorization for American families, while “demurring” on the more difficult questions of green card status or a path to citizenship. It also had an effective enforcement mechanism. Those relatively few TPS individuals who committed a felony or two or more misdemeanors were arrested, placed in detention, stripped of status, and in most cases removed from the U.S. promptly under the policies placed in effect by the Obama Administration.

PWS

09-11-17

THE GIBSON REPORT — 09-11-17

The Gibson Report, 09-11-17

TOP UPDATES

DACA
· Memorandum on Rescission Of Deferred Action For Childhood Arrivals (DACA)
· Overview of proposed legislation to replace DACA
· Litigation: AGs, Make the Road, University of California
· ILRC DACA Info Sheets
· DACA renewal loan fund
· Wellness: NYC WELL is a free and confidential resource that is available regardless of immigration status, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and in 200 languages – regardless of your immigration status. Dial 1-888-NYC-WELL, text WELL to 65173 or chat with a counselor online at nyc.gov/NYCWELL.
· Removal: DHS is already moving to recalendar DACA cases. Argue that this is premature and a waste of judicial resources.
· See Resources below for more.

DA Election for Kings County
Primaries tomorrow (Tuesday) include selecting a new DA. Medium has a breakdown of the candidates’ stances on immigration and broken windows policies.

Operation Mega
After word leaked that ICE was planning to target 6,000 to 10,000 immigrants in raids Sept. 17-22, ICE announced it was rescheduling the raids due to hurricanes. However, this does not mean there won’t necessarily be any raids. ICE Statement Regarding Questions on Enforcement Planning.

Bill bars transfer of PRM from State to DHS
FP: “In a stark repudiation of the Trump administration, lawmakers on Thursday passed a spending bill that overturned the president’s steep proposed cuts to foreign aid and diplomacy. Folded into the bill are management amendments that straitjacket some of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s efforts to redesign the State Department.”

US Justice Department Set to Appeal Ninth Circuit Travel Ban Ruling to Supreme Court
VOA: “According to a Justice Department official, the agency plans to ask the high court to weigh in on an appeals court ruling that says grandparents and cousins are close enough relatives to constitute an exemption from the Trump administration’s travel order. The court also said that refugees accepted by a resettlement agency should be allowed to travel to the United States.”

OIL filed a petition for panel rehearing in Harbin v. Sessions
IDP: I’m sad to report that OIL filed a petition for panel rehearing in Harbin v. Sessions. IDP and Legal Aid are working with Mr. Harbin’s lawyers on plans moving forward. Hopefully the panel will stick to its guns and deny the government’s request. And quickly.

CALLS TO ACTION

Call Congress to Pass the Dream Act (S. 1615/H.R. 3440)
Call your Congress members and urge them to pass the Dream Act, a bipartisan bill that would provide Dreamers a chance to adjust their immigration status, if they meet certain requirements. If Congress fails to act, 800,000 Dreamers who were protected by DACA will be at risk of being deported.
AILA Doc. No. 17090533

DACA Fee Donations Outside NYC
New York has several resources for assisting DACA recipients with renewal fees. Consider donating to organizations outside New York where the need may be greater. RAICES DACA fund.

Detention of UACs
NYLCU: Reaching out to the listserv to see if anyone has heard of any UACs that have been re-detained & placed in either secure facilities or at the non-secure Dobb’s Ferry facility in Westchester. NYCLU has heard reports that kids are being held with no good reason and we are doing some work around this issue. We’re hoping to speak to some kids or their parents, preferably at Dobb’s Ferry! Feel free to forward if you know folks who do a lot of UAC work or to other listservs! Please send any sensitive info to my work email, pgarciasalazar@nyclu.org.

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I see the DOJ just won’t quit on some of its positions that have been rejected by the Article IIIs on review. Hopefully, the Sessions’ DOJ will wear out its welcome and further tank its credibility with the Article IIIs.

PWS

09-11-17

THE ECONOMY: What America REALLY Needs: More Legal Workers, No More “Gonzo” Immigration Enforcement — More Immigrant Workers Needed To Save Our Economy — And They Don’t Have To Be Rocket Scientists & PhDs: Construction & Service Industries That Support US Economy Need “Entry Level” Workers!

http://host.madison.com/wsj/business/wisconsin-businesses-grapple-with-a-growing-worker-shortage/article_3ef1000e-c18b-5f72-bbcd-720ee2456111.html#utm_source=host.madison.com&utm_campaign=%2Femail%2F&utm_medium=email&utm_content=26CD42536544E247751EC74095D9CEDC67E77EDB

The Wisconsin State Journal (Madison) reports:

A Madison restaurant has raised pay for entry-level chefs in recent years more than 50 percent to $14 an hour, but still closes on Sunday evenings — not because of a lack of customers, but because workers are scarce.

Those and countless other stories across Wisconsin are symptoms of a growing worker shortage that is expected to worsen over the next decade, according to Wisconsin State Journal interviews with dozens of employers, economists, advocacy group experts and state political and economic development officials.

“We are right at the brink of the crisis,” said Ann Franz, director of the Northeast Wisconsin Manufacturing Alliance in Green Bay. “There just aren’t enough human beings in Wisconsin with baby boomers retiring. Just driving down the road there are constantly signs hiring. I’ve seen them on billboards: ‘Come to our car dealership and buy our car. Come so we can give you a job.'”

Employers from a broad range of industries are reporting difficulty finding workers — and not only for skilled professionals such as nurses, welders and computer programmers, who require a strong education and training system, but also for workers with a high school diploma and some additional training at restaurants, farms, construction sites, factories, senior care facilities, retailers and other businesses.

“I would call it Wisconsin’s mega-issue,” said Kurt Bauer, president of Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce, the state’s largest business group, which recently found 77 percent of members surveyed had difficulty finding workers, up from 53 percent two years ago. “All other issues, they may be important, but they are subordinate to workforce.”

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Read the rest of the article at the link.

In this context, terminating DACA, thereby depriving existing productive American workers of work authorization, is not only cruel, but also crazy. And supporting the RAISE Act — specifically designed by White Nationalist restrictionists to lower legal immigration while limiting the remaining opportunities largely to White, English speaking individuals with college degrees — is simply insane.

Legal immigration is good for America in many ways (beyond the economy) and we need more, not less, of it. Indeed, had we developed a more rational and realistic legal immigration system, most of the Dreamers and their families would have been admitted in an orderly fashion under the legal system years ago.

Guys like Jeff “Gonzo Apocalypto” Sessions who worked as an effective legislative minority to block sensible immigration reform through parliamentary maneuvers, are now falsely claiming that deportations, “gonzo” arbitrary enforcement, and a reign of terror are the only solutions to a fake crisis that they largely created.

But, in fact, there is no crisis. Most of the 11 million migrants here without documentation are working hard, in jobs we need, part of American families, English speaking or learning English, and fitting well into American communities. Indeed, they are far less disruptive to society than are ICE’s arbitrary and fear spresding enforcement policies. That’s certainly the case here in Alexandria and Northern Virginia. And even more of them would pay taxes if we simply made it easy for them by granting legal status.

The relatively small minority of undocumented migrants who are engaging in anti-social behavior can be identified and removed with some reasonable readjustment of existing resources. For example, more money allocated to the U.S. Immigration Courts, training, technology, community-based policing, and focused “smart”enforcement instead of wasteful and inhumane detention, unfocused arbitrary enforcement, unneeded walls, and filling prisons with minor immigration violators. ICE prosecutors should be authorized and encouraged to use their discretion to prioritize their Immigration Court dockets with a focus on due process and bettering society while recognizing that judicial time will always be both precious and limited.

The current scare tactics and dire, but false, scenarios being pushed by the Trump Administration will neither aid our economy nor serve America’s real needs. They would make us both less safe and less great as a nation.

PWS

09-10-17

NYT: THE “ANTI-DREAMERS'” (KNOWINGLY) FALSE NARRATIVE!

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/08/us/politics/why-common-critiques-of-daca-are-misleading.html?smprod=nytcore-ipad&smid=nytcore-ipad-share

Linda Qiu writes:

“Defenders of President Trump’s decision to rescind an Obama-era immigration policy that shielded young immigrants from deportation have offered misleading critiques of the program.

They say the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy, known as DACA, led to a humanitarian crisis on the border, put native-born Americans out of work and conferred legal status to recipients. Here’s an assessment.

DACA does not specifically grant legal permanent residency or citizenship, but there are pathways for recipients.
Conservative news personalities have suggested that DACA leads to citizenship or that recipients are eligible. These claims require more context.

DACA grants recipients work permission and protects them from deportation, but it alone does not confer citizenship or legal permanent resident status. They are not granted legal status, according to the Department of Homeland Security, though their removals are deferred.

But, according to immigration data, just under 40,000 DACA recipients have obtained “green cards,” or legal permanent residency, and over 1,000 have become American citizens. This is possible because DACA recipients can change their immigration status through a legal basis other than DACA (like marrying an American citizen).

While immigration law bars people who overstayed their visa from returning to the United States for three or 10 years, depending on how long they have resided here unlawfully, DACA halts recipients’ accrual of “unlawful presence.” So someone who obtained DACA status before the re-entry penalty was triggered would remain protected from it.

DACA recipients who entered the country illegally cannot apply for residency the same way as people who entered legally and overstayed their visas. They can, however, apply for “advance parole,” which gives recipients permission to travel outside the United States under special circumstances and is not specific to DACA. When they return to the United States, they enter legally, opening up other avenues for legal status.

It’s misleading to suggest that DACA triggered a wave of migration from Central America.
In a statement, Mr. Trump blamed DACA for spurring “the massive surge of unaccompanied minors from Central America,” a claim echoed by his attorney general, Jeff Sessions, and other Republican lawmakers. But the link between DACA and the humanitarian crisis in 2014 is largely anecdotal and overstated.

Nearly 70,000 children, overwhelmingly from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador, tried to cross the United States border alone in the 2014 fiscal year. They would not have qualified for DACA, a program for undocumented immigrants brought in before age 16 who had been living in the United States since 2007.

There were certainly reports of children who listed American immigration policy as having prompted their solo journeys. The Obama administration’s clarification that the minors were not eligible for DACA also suggests a need to swat away the notion. And researchers have noted the possibility that DACA might have given migrants hope that the United States could provide future reprieve from deportation.

Still, it’s a stretch to say DACA was the single or even the main motivating factor behind the surge in migrant children reaching the border. For one, Salvadoran, Guatemalan and Honduran applications for asylum to other Central American countries increased by 1,185 percent from 2008 to 2014, showing that the children were seeking relief not only in the United States.

More significant drivers of the migration were violence, poverty, gang presence, economic opportunity and the desire to be reunified with family, and “it remains unclear if, and how, specific immigration policies have motivated children to migrate to the United States,” according to a 2014 Congressional Research Service report.

Department of Homeland Security data also shows that the surge in unaccompanied minors preceded President Barack Obama’s June 2012 DACA executive order. The number of apprehensions began to rise in January 2012 and plateaued from June 2012 to January 2013, before increasing and then peaking in May and June of 2014.

The evidence that DACA recipients have displaced native-born workers is lacking.
According to Mr. Trump’s press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, more than four million unemployed Americans in the same age group as DACA recipients “could possibly have those jobs” held by DACA recipients. And Mr. Sessions was more emphatic: The executive order “denied jobs to hundreds of thousands of Americans by allowing those same jobs to go to illegal aliens.”

While it’s certainly possible that there are individual cases of an employer hiring a DACA recipient instead of an American citizen, the claim of a widespread trend is unproved.

Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that trends in foreign-born and native-born unemployment rates have not changed with DACA. For example, the unemployment rate for natives who had attended college was lower than their foreign-born peers both before and after 2012, while the unemployment rate for natives without a high school diploma has consistently been higher than the foreign-born population.

Similarly, DACA appears to have had no discernible effect on the number of total job openings or those specifically in white collar industries — where DACA recipients are more commonly employed — which have been steadily rising since mid-2009. Economists dispute the overarching argument that less immigration leads to more jobs for Americans.

The defense that Mr. Trump’s order does not open up DACA recipients to deportation is false.
Rescinding DACA will not lead to the “mass deportation of people,” the conservative radio host and author Laura Ingraham said in an interview on Fox News. Representative Jim Jordan, Republican of Ohio, argued on CNN that the “only folks that are subject to deportation right now are those that have engaged in criminal activity.”

Mr. Jordan’s claim is false. The Department of Homeland Security has been clear that officials will potentially arrest and deport any undocumented immigrant without protected status, regardless of a criminal record. Though undocumented immigrants with criminal records still make up the majority of immigration arrests, noncriminal arrests more than doubled in Mr. Trump’s first 100 days as president, compared to the same time period in 2016.

Immigration lawyers say it’s too early to tell whether DACA recipients, who had to provide personal information to officials to apply for the status, will especially be at risk after Mr. Trump’s order. Previously, their information was “protected from disclosure” to Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection for the purpose of enforcement. The order, however, notes that information “will not be proactively provided to ICE and CBP,” and the president has said that former recipients would not be a priority for deportation.

“It’s very unclear to me whether U.S.C.I.S. will share that information if ICE affirmatively asks,” said Kate Voigt of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, referring to United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. It is clear, though, that Mr. Trump’s order rescinding DACA opens recipients up to deportation.”

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Truth is that DACA is good for the U.S. But, truth seldom, if ever, enters into the restrictionist White Nationalist narrative.

PWS

09-10-17

OPTIMISTS’ CORNER: Five Reasons Why DACA Legislation Could Pass!

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/09/5-reasons-why-a-dreamer-bill-could-really-happen.html?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Daily%20Intelligencer%20-%20September%208%2C%202017&utm_term=Subscription%20List%20-%20Daily%20Intelligencer%20%281%20Year%29

Jonathan Chait writes in The Intellingencer as reprinted in New York Maggie:

“Not just a dream? Photo: Spencer Platt/Getty Images
“If they pass a straight-up Dream amnesty,” says Mark Krikorian, an anti-immigration activist, “they will go into the elections having failed to repeal Obamacare but having passed amnesty.” When you put it like that, it sounds crazy, doesn’t it? And indeed it would seem bizarre for Donald Trump’s sole legislative achievement to be the negation of his central campaign theme. But in recent days, the implausible has become suddenly plausible.

1. Trump doesn’t really care about restrictionism. The president has many prejudices but almost no actual policy commitments. He rode anti-immigrant sentiment to the presidency, but his use of the theme was largely instrumental. Trump has alternated his nativist lurches with professions of sympathy for the Dreamers. “I have a love for these people and hopefully now Congress will be able to help them and do it properly,” Trump said recently. “And I can tell you, speaking to members of Congress, they want to be able to do something and do it right. And really, we have no choice.”

2. He’s in a bipartisanship groove. The president cares more about positive feedback and good press than anything else. His bipartisan deal to lift the debt ceiling for three months might have been substantively contentless, but he liked the response from the media. As a creature of impulse, he will probably want to tap the bar for another pleasure hit.

3. The cult of personality protects him. Previous efforts to protect the Dreamers have all fallen prey to conservative revolts. But the Trump imprimatur has unique power to give Republicans political cover. A glimpse of the strange dynamic came into view when Trump cut his debt-ceiling agreement with Democrats over the objections of the GOP leadership, and enraged conservatives took out their anger on … Paul Ryan.

Trump catered to his base by tapping into primal ethno-nationalist resentment. Having proven his tribal loyalty, he is perfectly positioned, should he choose, to bring along his base. A large segment of the party-messaging apparatus seems prepared to follow along. “Nobody wants to kick a bunch of kids out of the country, right?” Rush Limbaugh said Tuesday. “I don’t care if they’re budding little Al Capones. People just don’t want to do it … There needs to be a price, and it would be a great thing, couple this, say, with building the wall. I mean, you do all-in on border enforcement.”

4. The bill will materialize. There is almost certainly a majority in both chambers for a Dreamer bill. The trick is getting the bill to the floor. When Ryan ran for the Speakership, in 2015, he promised he would not bring immigration legislation to the floor unless it commanded a majority of his own party.

What might do the trick, however, is attaching DACA — Deferred Action of Child Arrivals — to an unrelated bill. There will be at least two measures to increase the debt ceiling. Those bills, crucially, will rely heavily on Democratic votes, since a large portion of the Republican base refuses to vote to increase the debt ceiling. This essentially circumvents the informal requirement that the GOP only brings up bills that most Republicans support, opening the door for passing something mostly with Democratic votes.

“There’s no way,” Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn of Texas says of a DACA vote. “We will take that up. I’m confident. But there’s no way that it will stand alone.” But it’s not standing alone any more.

5. Ambiguity is their friend. The ability of both sides to claim a deal does different things is the classic lubricant of any political negotiation. In this case, the grounds for ambiguity are obvious. Trump has made the symbolism of the wall a political fetish, and Democrats oppose it on similar grounds. The way around this standoff is to tie DACA to border-security measures that Trump can call a “wall” and Democrats can call “not a wall.”

After all, Democrats have previously supported border-security measures like increased drone surveillance and added fencing. What is the conceptual distinction between a fence and a wall? Not much.

The safest bet, of course, is that nothing happens, because that is almost always the safest bet in modern Washington. But the window of possibility has opened quickly. All of a sudden, helping the Dreamers is not just a dream.”

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Let’s keep our fingers crossed. It would be nice.

One potential problem is that Trump doesn’t appear to have any immigration expertise in his Administration that’s not part of the restrictionist White Nationlist cabal. He’d probably have to get down to the career level at USCIS to find someone to work on the legal details of a Dreamer bill.

Clearly, White Nationalist restrictionists like Sessions and Miller would have to be screened out of any bipartisan process. And, Chief of Staff Kelly showed little or no appreciation for promoting constructive legal immigration programs during his short DHS tenure. Indeed, he appearss to have overridden sound internal advice and counsel and suppressed evidence in supporting the Sessions-Bannon-Trump disingenuous “Travel Bans.” That’s the trouble with a politically biased Administration that neither appreciates nor has the ability to work with experts in the career civil service.

PWS

09-09-17

SURPRISE! – GONZO LIES: “2017 is on pace for the second-lowest crime rate since 1990 — and near-record low murders” — Sessions Fabricates “Crime Wave” To Support White Nationalist Anti-Hispanic, Anti-Black Political Narrative! –“It’s irresponsible to incite public panic based on falsehoods, and it makes our police officers’ jobs harder.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2017/09/06/2017-is-on-pace-to-have-the-second-lowest-crime-rate-since-1990-and-near-record-low-murders/?utm_term=.d5c197d6052e

Philip Bump reports in the Washington Post:

“At his swearing-in as the nation’s top law enforcement official in February, Attorney General Jeff Sessions picked up a thread that had run throughout Donald Trump’s campaign for president: America is experiencing an alarming crime wave.

“We have a crime problem,” Sessions said. “I wish the rise that we are seeing in crime in America today were some sort of aberration or a blip. My best judgment, having been involved in criminal law enforcement for many years, is that this is a dangerous, permanent trend that places the health and safety of the American people at risk.”

Preliminary analysis of crime data from the nation’s 30 largest cities released by the Brennan Center for Justice on Wednesday suggests that it isn’t. According to the center’s overview of crime and murder data, 2017 is on pace to have the second-lowest violent crime rate of any year since 1990.

From the report:

The overall crime rate is projected to drop by 1.8 percent to the second-lowest point since 1990.
The violent crime rate is projected to fall by 0.6 percent, also to the second-lowest point in over 25 years. (The lowest rate was in 2014.) “This result,” the report’s authors write, “is driven primarily by stabilization in Chicago and declines in Washington, D.C., two large cities that experienced increases in violence in recent years.”
The murder rate is projected to be down 2.5 percent, on-par with the rate in 2009.

Explore the center’s data for each of the country’s largest cities.

While there was indeed a national uptick in violent crime and murder during 2015 and 2016, one of the underrecognized drivers of those shifts was the sharp increase in killings in two cities, Chicago and Baltimore, which combined made up more than half of the increase in murders in large cities from 2014 to 2017. This year, the number of murders in Chicago alone is expected to drop 2.4 percent. But it’s declines in New York, Houston and Detroit that are driving the overall decrease.

Inimai Chettiar, director of the justice program at the center, told The Post that the analysis suggested two things.

“First, the long-term trend toward safer cities isn’t going anywhere,” Chettiar said over email. “The evidence conclusively shows there is currently no national crime wave. Second, short-term fluctuations in crime are often driven by local factors.”

There are several cities that reinforce that point. The murder rate in Charlotte, doubled over the first half of 2017, for example, even as it fell sharply in other places.

Chettiar addressed Sessions’s concerns directly.

“Our data leads us to believe that the upticks in 2015 and 2016 were likely short-term fluctuations,” she wrote, noting that “not enough research has been done to identify the exact catalyst.”

The center, which is a part of the New York University School of Law, shared its report with Ronal Serpas, a former New Orleans police superintendent who now co-chairs an organization focused on reducing incarceration rates.

“In contrast to what we have been hearing from the president and attorney general, this new data from police departments shows that all measures of crime and murder are in decline this year,” Serpas said in a statement provided to The Post. “It’s irresponsible to incite public panic based on falsehoods, and it makes our police officers’ jobs harder.” Both Serpas and Chettiar noted that in places where violent crime had increased the Trump administration’s focus was best placed on that crime — as opposed to immigration violations, for example.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions stands waiting during a meeting with the Fraternal Order of Police in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in March. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)

As the Trump campaign and then the Trump presidency cited localized increases as examples of the crime threat that Trump pledged to solve, independent observers frequently noted that, despite the uptick in crime in recent years, overall levels were still near recent lows following the sharp drop of the last 20 years. The Brennan Center’s analysis suggests that this trend will continue, leading the administration to a no-doubt vexing problem:

Is it too soon to claim credit?

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I’ve noted many times before that Session’s disingenuous, xenophobic, White Nationalist focus on immigration enforcement actually makes the country less safe from crime. This report confirms that.

Moreover, with his “morbid fixation” on spreading a false narrative on immigration, Sessions has abandoned the real law enforcement functions of the DOJ, particularly in the areas of civil rights, voting rights, police brutality, prison reform, protection of the LGBTQ community, right-wing hate groups, domestic violence, and effectively combatting gangs, drug cartels, and human traffickers. As I’ve noted before, the latter three groups have been energized and empowered by Sessions’s focus on janitors, maids, gardeners, Dreamers and other “collaterals” — even dissing legal immigrants ands implicitly U.S. citizens of ethnic and immigrant heritage — rather than working on nuanced solutions to real law enforcement problems. By sowing unnecessary fear, mistrust, and terror among law-abiding productive members of migrant communities, he has basically “green-lighted” them as targets for crime, domestic violence, sexual exploitation, and gang recruitment. Ironically, this is a scenario I heard many times from individuals seeking refuge from third world countries: “I can’t go to the police because they won’t help and might even abuse or arrest me with impunity.”

Sessions is destroying the hard work of of community policing in ethnic communities in many cities throughout the U.S. One reason that many jurisdictions abandoned the “Safe Communities” program pushed by the Obama Administration is because they found it was a misnomer: busting undocumented workers and minor offenders actually did not make communities “safer.” Rather than learning from history, Sessions is doubling down on past failures. “Irresponsible” might be too kind a word to describe the Trump-Sessions White Nationalist legal agenda.

PWS

09-09-17

“JRUBE” IN WASHPOST: DEPT OF IN–JUSTICE: Under “Gonzo Apocalypto” White Nationalist, Xenophobic, Homophobic Political Agenda Replaces “Rule Of Law” — Latest DOJ Litigation Positions Fail “Straight Face” Test: “making up rules willy-nilly so as to show its rabid xenophobic base it is adhering to its promise of racial and ethnic exclusion!” — Read My “Mini-Essay” On How Advocates and U.S. Courts Could Restore Justice & Due Process To Our Broken U.S. Immigration Courts!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-turn/wp/2017/09/08/trump-is-getting-rotten-legal-advice-and-once-again-it-shows/?utm_term=.e34528c36b2c

Jennifer Rubin writes in “Right Turn” in the Washington Post:

“The 9th Circuit gave the back of the hand to the argument that the Trump administration could borrow a definition from another section of the immigration statute to exclude grandmothers. The Supreme Court had used mothers-in-law as an example of a close familial relationship it wanted to protect. The 9th Circuit judges wrote: “Plaintiffs correctly point out that the familial relationships the Government seeks to bar from entry are within the same ‘degree of kinship’ as a mother-in-law.” It’s hard to make a case that grandmothers would not qualify. It does not appear that the government even made a good-faith effort to apply the Supreme Court’s direction.

On one level, it’s shocking that a Republican administration that is supposed to be a defender of “family values” would take such a miserly position. But, of course, family values are of little consequence to an administration that is more than willing to repeal the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, auguring for the breakup of intimate family relations (e.g., one sibling gets deported but American-born siblings remain).

The 9th Circuit also looked at the administration’s argument that a refugee with a formal assurance of settlement lacks a bona fide relationship with some entity or individual in the United States. The court set out the laborious screening process refugees undertake (making a mockery of the notion these people are a security threat) and noted that after all those steps are completed the refugee gets a sponsorship assurance “from one of nine private non-profit organizations, known as resettlement agencies.” The 9th Circuit held: “The Government contends that a formal assurance does not create a bona fide relationship between a resettlement agency and a refugee, and stresses that ‘[t]he assurance is not an agreement between the resettlement agency and the refugee; rather, it is an agreement between the agency and the federal government.’ But the Supreme Court’s stay decision specifies that a qualifying relationship is one that is ‘formal, documented, and formed in the ordinary course, rather than for the purpose of evading [the Executive Order].”’”

Again, one cannot help but come away with the impression that the government is throwing up every half-baked idea it can find to limit the number of people entering the country, regardless of the national security risk or the hardship its action inflicts. The Trump administration is plainly reasoning backward — deny as many people as possible admittance and then think up a reason to justify its position.

In its fixation with keeping as many immigrants out of the United States as possible, the Trump administration cannot claim to merely be following the dictates of the law. (Gosh it’s out of our hands — “Dreamers” and grandmas have to go!) It is making up rules willy-nilly so as to show its rabid xenophobic base it is adhering to its promise of racial and ethnic exclusion. It’s hard to believe seasoned career Justice Department lawyers agree with these arguments. In its oversight hearings Congress should start grilling Attorney General Jeff Sessions as to how he comes up with his cockamamie legal arguments and whether political appointees are running roughshod over career DOJ lawyers.

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Read Rubin’s full article at the link.

Mini-Essay:

TIME FOR ACTION ON THE BROKEN U.S. IMMIGRATION COURTS — IF CONGRESS WON’T ACT, THE FEDERAL COURTS MUST

Paul Wickham Schmidt

United States Immigration Judge (Retired)

If nothing else, the Trump Administration has given me a new appreciation for the Post’s “JRube.” She certainly has “dialed up” Gonzo’s number and exposed what’s behind his pompous, disingenuous misuse of the term “rule of law.”

No chance that a GOP Senate with Chuck Grassley as Judiciary Chair is going to hold Gonzo accountable for his daily perversions of “justice.” But, at some point, Federal Courts could begin sanctioning DOJ lawyers for willful misrepresentations (the Hawaii arguments before the 9th contained several) and frivolous positions in litigation. It’s possible that some DOJ lawyers all the way up to Gonzo himself could be referred by Federal Judges to state bar authorities for a look at whether their multiple violations of ethical standards should result suspension of their law licenses.

Another thought kicking around inside my head is that Gonzo’s actions and his public statements are starting to make a plausible case for a due process challenge to the continued operation of the U.S. Immigration Courts.

As with school desegregation, prison reform, and voting rights, a Federal Court could find systematic bias and failure to protect due process. That could result in something like 1) a requirement that the DOJ submit a “due process restoration” plan to the court for approval, or 2) the court appointment of an independent “judicial monitor” to run the courts in a fair and unbiased manner consistent with due process, or 3) the Federal Courts could take over supervision of the US Immigration Courts pending the creation of an Article I (or Article III) replacement.

High on the list of constitutionally-required reforms would be ending the location of courts within DHS detention facilities. All courts should be located in areas where adequate pro bono counsel is reasonably available and accessible. Immigration Courts should be located outside of DHS facilities in buildings accessible to the public with reasonable security requirements. Immigration Judges must be required to continue cases until pro bono counsel can be retained. Alternatively, the Government could provide for appointed counsel.

Another obvious due process reform would be to strip the Attorney General of his (conflict of interest) authority to establish or review precedents and operating procedures for the U.S. Immigration Courts. Along with that, the DHS should be given an equal right to appeal adverse BIA appellate decisions to the Courts of Appeals (rather than seeking relief from the AG — clearly an interested party in relation to immigration enforcement).

There also should be an immediate end to the appointment and supervision of U.S. Immigration Judges by the politically-biased AG. U.S. Immigration Judges and BIA Appellate Immigration Judges should be appointed on a strict merit basis by either an independent judicial monitor or by the U.S. Courts of Appeals until Congress enacts statutory reforms.

The current U.S. Immigration Court system mocks justice in the same way that Jeff “Gonzo Apocalypto” Sessions mocks it almost every day. There might be no practical way to legally remove Gonzo at present, but the Federal Courts could step in to force the U.S. Immigration Courts to undertake due process reforms. The current situation is unacceptable from a constitutional due process standpoint. Something has to change for the better!

PWS

09-09-17\

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