Health Care – Page 16 – immigrationcourtside.com

N.J. STATE BAR SEEKS GOVERNOR’S INTERVENTION AFTER DOJ IGNORES PLEAS TO CLOSE UNSAFE N.J. IMMIGRATION COURTS!☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️

Hon. Susan G. Roy
Law Office of Susan G. Roy, LLC
Princeton Junction, NJ
Member, Round Table of Former Immigration Judges

NDPA stalwart and Round Table Member Hon. Sue Roy sends this:

March 26, 2020

VIA EMAIL ONLY Hon. Phil Murphy Governor

State of New Jersey Office of the Governor P.O. Box 001

Trenton, NJ 08625

Dear Governor Murphy,

Re: The Closure of the Newark and Elizabeth Immigration Courts

NEW JERSEY STATE BAR ASSOCIATION

EVELYN PADIN, PRESIDENT Law Office of Evelyn Padin 286 First Street

Jersey City, NJ 07302 201-963-8822 • FAX: 201-963-8874 evelyn@lawjcnj.com

The New Jersey State Bar Association (NJSBA) is requesting that the Newark and Elizabeth Immigration Courts be closed immediately, in the interest of the health and safety of the residents of NJ and the country. In support of this request, the NJSBA asks you to consider the following:

NEWARK IMMIGRATION COURT:

On March 6, 2020, the Newark Immigration Court, located on the 12th floor of the Rodino Building, 970 Broad Street, Newark, NJ, was temporarily closed for the afternoon because an attorney who had been exposed to COVID-19 and who was experiencing symptoms was present in court.

On March 9, 2020, the Newark Immigration Court reopened, and remained open until March 18, 2020. During that period of time, literally thousands of respondents and their family members were required to appear at master calendar and individual hearings, along with their attorneys, attorneys from the Office of Chief Counsel, Court staff, interpreters, security guards and Immigration Judges.

It was later learned that a second private attorney and an interpreter have tested positive for COVID-19 after being in court on March 11, 2020. The attorney is quite ill. Approximately 70 other cases were heard that morning before the same Immigration Judge, who is currently under self-quarantine. That is only a fraction of the people who were present at court that day. Because of the volume of individuals who must appear at the Newark Immigration Court on any given day, the majority of individuals must wait together, sometimes for hours, in an extremely small waiting room, in which all attorneys, courts staff, interpreters, security guards and judges must also pass.

New Jersey Law Center • One Constitution Square • New Brunswick, NJ 0 8901-1520

732-249-5000 • FAX: 732-249-2815 • EMAIL: president@njsba.com • www.njsba.com

It was also learned that an attorney from the DHS Office of Chief Counsel, who was present in Court on March 13, has not only tested positive for COVID-19 but is currently in a medically induced coma in ICU fighting for his life. The entire staff of the Office of Chief Counsel, which is primarily located on the 13th Floor of the Rodino Building, has been placed under required quarantine for a period of two weeks.

As a result of this, the US Department of Justice, Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) issued a directive on Twitter and Facebook stating that the Newark Immigration Court would be closed from March 18-April 10, 2020, and that all court filings would be considered timely filed on April 10, when the court reopened.

Last night, March 25, at 9:30 pm, EOIR announced via Twitter and Facebook that Newark Immigration Court would reopen starting TODAY, March 26. No further information was given to the public, or, notably, the Immigration Judges or the court staff. It has been clarified that the Newark Court has reopened for court filings only, because EOIR has now stated that any filings due during the previous days of closure would now be due on March 30, 2020.

Some members of the court staff are now required to be present to accept in-person filings at the court window, as well as to handle filings that have been mailed to the court. The Office of Chief Counsel remains closed under quarantine, and therefore cannot accept filings.

The reopening of the Newark Immigration Court, even for a limited purpose, is in clear violation of Executive Order 107. The functions of the Court at this time are non-essential, because the Court does not handle detained cases. Moreover, the reopening is putting Court staff in jeopardy of not only exposure to the virus themselves, but also of spreading it to others. The City of Newark is under a shelter-in-place restriction, and, this morning, the U.S District Court for the District of New Jersey just issued an order closing the Martin Luther King and Frank R. Lautenberg courthouses because several employees have confirmed positive COVID-19 tests. The courts are closed immediately and will remain closed through April 6, 2020.

It should be noted that the courthouses are located next door to the Rodino building, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office is in the Rodino Building. Staff, attorneys, and members of the public use the same parking facilities, elevators, and even cafeterias located in the buildings.

Therefore, for all of the above reasons, the Newark Immigration Court should be closed immediately and remain closed until its scheduled reopening date of April 10, at the earliest.

ELIZABETH IMMIGRATION COURT:

The Elizabeth Immigration Court is located at 625 Evans Street, Elizabeth, NJ, and is located in the same building as, and in close proximity to, ICE detainees. The Elizabeth Court handles detained cases and is currently open.

On March 13, 2020, a medical staff person who works in the detention center was presumed to have been exposed to COVID-19; this diagnosis was later confirmed. Moreover, because attorneys for the Office of Chief Counsel travel back and forth between the Elizabeth Immigration Court and the Detention Center, where there is an auxiliary OCC office, and the Rodino Building in Newark, the OCC in Elizabeth has been included in the mandatory, two-week quarantine. Numerous private and pro bono

attorneys also routinely appear in both courts, as do interpreters and ICE personnel.

One of the Elizabeth Immigration Judges has been out on leave; an Immigration Judge from Newark, whose husband had been quarantined but tested negative for the virus, is now handling the docket in Elizabeth.

Immigration attorneys are allowed to appear telephonically if they choose; court staff, judges, security guards, interpreters, and, of course, the detainees housed in Elizabeth are there in person. The Office of Chief Counsel is still under quarantine; their attorneys have been appearing telephonically.

On March 24, 2020, at 2:30 pm, EOIR announced, via Twitter and Facebook, that the Elizabeth Immigration Court was closing for the rest of the afternoon because they had received confirmation of “the presence of an individual with a test-confirmed Coronavirus diagnosis.”

The Elizabeth Immigration Court reopened the next day and remains open.

The Elizabeth Immigration Court hears cases for individuals who are housed at Elizabeth Detention Center, as well as at Essex and Hudson County Jails. The individuals housed at those jails are usually seen via tele video. However, a detainee and a senior staff person at Essex County Jail both have positive COVID-19 diagnoses and are experiencing serious symptoms. And ICE detainees at all three locations are engaging in hunger strikes because they are afraid of contracting the virus as well.

Moreover, on March 25, EOIR issued a requirement that all attorneys dealing with inmates in ICE detention centers and courts MUST bring their own personal protective equipment (PPE) in order to be allowed to enter the facilities. Therefore, either attorneys cannot adequately represent their clients, or they must obtain PPE at the expense of health care providers and first responders who desperately need this equipment.

The NJSBA recognizes that it is more difficult to close a court that handles detained cases, as that imposes a reduction of the individuals’ constitutional rights. However, the NJSBA believes that a short- term closure of two weeks, in order to ensure that anyone who has been exposed to COVID-19 does not spread the virus, even unwittingly, is extremely important to protect the health and safety of the individuals who are housed there, who work there, and who must report there, as well as the public at large.

The NJSBA would, at the same time, ask that the State confer with ICE regarding the release of any non-criminal or low-risk immigration detainees. This would further aid in slowing the spread of the virus, as well as protecting the individuals who work at the Elizabeth Immigration Court and Detention Center and would minimize significantly the numbers of detained cases on the court docket. Should ICE forbear from placing new detainees in custody within NJ facilities would also stem the spread of the virus to vulnerable inmate populations. Alternatives to detention, such as ankle-bracelets, or mandatory video or telephonic check-ins would help ensure that ICE’s mission is not curtailed.

It should be noted that the National Association of Immigration Judges (NAIJ), the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) and the American Federation of Government Employees #511 (AFGE/ICE Professionals Union) issued a joint statement on March 22, 2020, asking for the nationwide closure of all immigration courts across the country.

Immigration attorneys, immigration courts staff, and immigration prosecutors are literally having to

make life and death decisions every day because of EOIR’s callous disregard for the health and safety of its employees, immigrants, anyone who must come into contact with the courts, and the

public. Accordingly, NJSBA is asking you to close the NJ immigration courts immediately to preserve the health and safety of the residents of NJ.

Respectfully submitted,

Evelyn Padin, Esq. President

cc: Senator Robert Menendez Senator Cory Booker

Matthew Platkin, Esq., Counsel to the Governor

Susan Roy, Esq., Chair, NJSBA Immigration Law Section Angela C. Scheck, Executive Director

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Thanks, Sue, for all you do!

To be honest, I’m not sure that a State Governor has authority to close down a Federal Office, even in times of emergency. But, this absurd, yet deadly, situation shows the arrogant disrespect for human life, common sense, and basic decency of Barr and his EOIR toadies.

Normally, you would expect cooperation, coordination, and support from the Feds in time of a health emergency. In the age of Trump and his kakistocracy, not so much. After all, you’re dealing with a regime headed by a maliciously incompetent dude who couldn’t wait to start undermining the best advice of his own doctors and nearly all health care professionals in the U.S. Bad things happen to a country that empowers a kakistocracy!

PWS

03-27-20

KILLER “COURTS” ☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️👎🏻👎🏻👎🏻👎🏻👎🏻 — “Malicious Incompetence” Or “Criminal Negligence” @ EOIR? — Experts Chase & Dzubow Rip Into EOIR/DOJ Officials For Needlessly Endangering Lives! — Kakistocracy Turns Deadly!

https://www.jeffreyschase.com/blog/2020/3/26/like-firing-randomly-into-a-crowd

Hon. Jeffrey S. Chase in Jeffrey S. Chase Blog:

Like “Firing Randomly Into a Crowd”

On March 23, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit issued a sua sponte order in a case pending before it, ordering the Petitioner’s immediate release from detention “in light of the rapidly escalating health crisis, which public health authorities predict will especially impact immigration detention centers.” In taking such action, the court used its authority to protect those under its jurisdiction.This is what judges and courts are supposed to do.

In contrast, the leadership of EOIR, the agency which oversees our nation’s immigration courts, sees its mission quite differently. With shocking indifference to those subject to its authority, including its own employees as well as members of the public, EOIR’s present leadership seeks only to please its Department of Justice masters, much like a dog rolling over or playing dead to earn a pat on the head from its owner.

As we all began to comprehend the seriousness of the coronavirus pandemic weeks ago, EOIR refused to close immigration courts out of fear of sending a message contrary to Trump’s statements that the health crisis was a “hoax.” Christopher Santoro, the coward holding the title of Acting Chief Immigration Judge, ordered court staff to remove CDC-issued advisories on ways to help stop the spread (i.e. by not shaking hands) on the grounds that the immigration judges lacked the authority to hang such notices in their own courtrooms. In defense of his stupidity, Santoro offered the age-old excuse of the weak: that he was only following orders.

As the virus spread, and people began dying, EOIR kept its courts open far longer than it should have. An ICE attorney who represented the government throughout a crowded Master Calendar hearing in Newark, NJ on March 13 is presently in a coma in intensive care with COVID-19 fighting for his life. I’ve heard that an immigration judge in one of NYC’s immigration courts is presently ill with COVID-19 and pneumonia.There have been additional reports of others at immigration detention centers testing positive.

As cities locked down and sheltered in place, EOIR finally agreed to postpone non-detained hearings, but only until April 10. Hearings in detained courts continue to go forward.And for some reason, non-detained courts that were closed and should have remained so were reopened for the filing of documents only, with such openings announced by nighttime tweets. On Wednesday night, EOIR tweeted that several courts would “open” the next morning, without explaining whether that meant hearings that had previously been announced as postponed would instead go forward the following morning.As this occurred after business hours, there was no one to call for clarification. In fact, the opening was only to file documents.EOIR’s leadership (for want of a better term) has decided that all court filings due during the court closings are now due on March 30.Many lawyers in NYC have no way to meet this deadline, as their office buildings have been locked in compliance with the state’s shutdown order.

In order to accept these filings, EOIR is forcing court clerical staff to leave the safety of their homes, disobey the state PAUSE directive and expose themselves and their family members to possible infection in order to report to work. In NYC, traveling to work for most employees requires riding trains and buses, further increasing the risk of exposure.As schools are closed, how those court staff with child care needs will manage in a time requiring social isolation is unknown.

Furthermore, not all judges hearing detained cases are granting continuances despite the crisis. EOIR has not informed judges that the present crisis exempts them from meeting their performance metrics, which requires all judges to complete 700 cases per year, and to finish 95 percent of cases on the day of their first-scheduled individual hearing. Newly hired judges, who are on probation for two years, are therefore being forced to choose between their own job security and the health and welfare of all those who appear in their courts.

In recent days, EOIR has been besieged with letters from health care professionals, law professors, and various legal and advocacy organizations containing strong arguments to do what the Ninth Circuit had done instinctively and without having to be asked. In one of these letters, attorney George Terezakis, writing on behalf of the New York-based Association of Deportation Defense Attorneys (on whose Board of Directors I sit), described how the mother of a detained respondent who traveled from her home in Long Island to the court in Lower Manhattan by commuter train and subway to file a document for her son’s hearing was later diagnosed with the coronavirus. Terezakis continued: “Just as someone firing randomly into a crowd of Immigration Judges, court staff, attorneys, interpreters and detainees’ family members will foreseeably and inevitably kill someone…keeping the courts open ensures continued, needless infection, serious illness and death…”The letter continued: “This is a real crisis requiring real leadership to take decisive action that will place the safety of those under its jurisdiction ahead of other concerns. There is no escaping the inevitable consequences of inaction.”

As for Santoro, “I was only following orders” has historically fared poorly as a defense. Someone whose name is preceded by the title “Chief Immigration Judge” is required to stand up and take appropriate action in a time of crisis, and accept the consequences of such action. And for those in EOIR’s leadership chain who refuse to do so, it is incumbent on all of us to do everything in our power to ensure that they will be held fully accountable for their inaction under the next administration.

Copyright 2020 by Jeffrey S. Chase. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

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

https://www.asylumist.com/2020/03/26/incompetence-and-reckless-at-eoir-endanger-lives/

Jason Dzubow writes in The Asylumist:

The coronavirus is causing unprecedented disruptions to nearly every area of life, and the Immigration Courts are no exception. The courts were already in a post-apocalyptic era, with over one million cases in the backlog, and now the situation has been thrown into near total chaos. The fundamental problem is that EOIR–the Executive Office for Immigration Review, the office that oversees Immigration Courts and the Board of Immigration Appeals–is determined to continue adjudicating cases, even if that means risking the lives of its own employees; not to mention the lives of respondents, witnesses, and lawyers (and anyone who comes into contact with them).

EOIR is closing and re-opening various courts seemingly at random, often times with an after-hours Tweet, such as one last night at 9:23 PM, declaring that the Newark and Seattle Immigration Courts will reopen today for purposes of accepting filings and litigating detained cases (non-detained cases through April 10, 2020 have been postponed). In reaction to this latest news, Susan G. Roy, an attorney and former Immigration Judge (and my friend from law school – Hi Sue!) wrote last night–

NJ has the second highest number of corona virus cases in the nation, second only to NY. The Newark Immigration Court was closed because someone tested positive for the virus. Now a DHS attorney is fighting for his life in ICU, another attorney is very ill, and an interpreter has tested positive. These are the ones we know about. The Court was set to reopen on April 12. That is a reasonable time to ensure that everyone is safe and that the risk of transmission is limited. How is it even remotely reasonable to decide to open TOMORROW? Even if it is only for filings, court staff and others will be forced to violate the Governor’s Executive Order [directing all residents to stay at home], put themselves at great risk, and risk contaminating others, while many people who work in the same building remain under mandatory quarantine. You are ruthlessly jeopardizing the lives of your own employees, not to mention the public, for no legitimate reason.

And it’s not just advocates who are upset about EOIR’s decision-making. The National Association of Immigration Judges (“NAIJ” – the judges’ union) and ICE attorneys are also reacting with anger. In response to EOIR’s tweet reopening the courts in Seattle and Newark, NAIJ responds, “Putting our lives at risk, one Tweet at a time.” And Fanny Behar-Ostrow, an ICE prosecutor and president of AFGE Local 511, says of EOIR: “It’s like insanity has taken over the agency,“

The gravity of keeping courts open is reflected in one incident, described in a recent letter from the Association of Deportation Defense Attorneys in New York–

One of our members recently had a detained master calendar hearing scheduled for this past Friday, March 20, at the Varick St. Court. In order to prepare the bond application and for the master, the attorney and his staff met with the client‘s mother. A request for a bond hearing, together with the required relief applications, and a request for a telephonic hearing, were hand delivered to the Court at noon on Wednesday March 18th, 2020. The attorney did not receive any response to the motion for a telephonic hearing, and repeated calls to the court that day and the next went unanswered. To ensure that the Court was aware of the request, the client‘s mother retrieved from the attorney‘s office, Thursday evening, a letter to the court confirming the request for a telephonic hearing. She traveled to the court in Manhattan, from Long Island, and delivered the letter to the Clerk, and thereafter waited in the waiting area with family members of other detainees and other attorneys who were compelled to appear.

Today we received confirmation the client‘s mother has been diagnosed with COVID–19 virus, through medical testing. Can you imagine the number of people she came into contact with as the result of the decision to keep this court open? In addition to exposing the attorney and office staff, she traveled from her home on Long Island, on the Long Island Railroad, to Penn Station, from there to the subway and ultimately to the Court. Undoubtedly she came into contact with, and exposed, countless numbers of people, who in turn exposed countless others.

Anyone with a basic grasp of the fundamental principles of epidemiology – easily garnered from watching CNN or the local evening news – understands how easily this virus spreads. Given this, the decision to continue to keep the courts open can only be construed as a conscious decision on the part of EOIR to subject our Immigration Judges, court staff, interpreters, DHS attorneys, institutional defenders, members of the private bar, our clients, their families, and all whom they come into contact with, to an unreasonable risk of infection, serious illness and death.

NAIJ echoes this sentiment: “With [New York] the epicenter of the virus, DOJ is failing to protect its employees and the public we serve.”

The appropriate path forward is painfully obvious. EOIR should immediately close all courts for all cases. Staff should work remotely when possible to re-set dates and adjudicate bond decisions (so non-criminal aliens who do not pose a danger to the community can be released from detention). That is the best way to protect everyone involved with the Immigration Court system and the public at large.

Finally, I think it is important to name names. The Director of EOIR is James McHenry. I have never been a fan. Mr. McHenry was profoundly unqualified for his job, having gone from supervising maybe half a dozen people in a prior position to overseeing thousands at EOIR. However, he was politically aligned with the goals of the Trump Administration and he got the job. I have previously described the functioning of the agency during Mr. McHenry’s tenure as maliciousness tempered by incompetence. But these days, it is more like maliciousness exacerbated by incompetence. And in the current crisis, incompetence can be deadly. It’s time for Mr. McHenry and EOIR to do the right thing: Close the courts now.

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

Thanks, Jeffrey, Jason, and Sue, my friends, for “telling it like it is!” Now is not the time for “go along to get along” bureaucratic responses.
Unfortunately, attorneys and court staff might now start paying with their lives for EOIR’s inexcusable two-decade failure to implement a functional e-filing system.
As one of my Round Table colleagues said, “Since when is a late night tweet ‘official notice?’” Don’t remember anything about “notice by tweet” in 8 CFR!
As I noted previously, J.R. and his tone-deaf, complicit Supremes effectively repealed the “Bivens doctrine,” holding Federal officials responsible for “Constitutional torts” committed outside the scope of their official duties. They thereby essentially gave rogue Federal officials a “license to kill,” at least where the victim was merely an unarmed Mexican teenager. It appears that Barr, McHenry, and others in the “chain of command” are trying out their new “licenses.” They had better hope that J.R. & Co’s “willful blindness” and unwillingness to stand up for lives and Constitutional rights extend even when American citizen lawyers and court clerks are among the casualties.
Not surprisingly, EOIR’s contempt for due process and the lives of asylum seekers, families, children, and other migrants has expanded to include the lives of their own employees and members of the public forced to deal with this godawful, unconstitutional mess.
When the reckoning comes, we should not forget the negligent complicity of Congress as well as the Article III Courts for allowing the life-threatening, dysfunctional, unconstitutional mess that EOIR has become continue to operate and to threaten the health, safety, and welfare of all Americans.

PWS

03-27-20

CLOSE ‘EM DOWN, ALREADY! — ROUND TABLE JOINS 70+ OTHER NGOs CALLING FOR IMMEDIATE CLOSURE OF ALL IMMIGRATION COURTS!

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

Knjightess — Knightess of the Round Table

Hon. A. Ashlley Tabaddor — Hon. A. Ashley Tabaddor
President, National
Association of Immigration Judges (“NAIJ”)

Fanny Behar-Ostrow-Ostrow — Fanny Behar-Ostrow ESQ
Assistant Chief Counsel, DHS
President AFGE Local 511

From Dan Kowalski over @ LexisNexis Immigration Community:

More than 70 Organizations Call on DOJ to Immediately Close All Immigration Courts During the COVID-19 Pandemic

AILA Doc. No. 20032630 | Dated March 26, 2020 | File Size: 596 K

DOWNLOAD THE DOCUMENT

On March 26, 2020, more than 70 organizations joined AILA, the National Association of Immigration Judges (NAIJ), and the ICE Professionals Union, to call on the Department of Justice to immediately close all immigration courts during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Cite as AILA Doc. No. 20032630.

Related Resources

·         Resource Center: 2019 Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19)

·         Immigration Judges, Prosecutors, and Attorneys Call for the Nationwide Closure of All Immigration Courts

·         Press Call: Immigration Judges and Attorneys Joined by Public Health Experts Call for Additional Protective Measures Amid COVID-19 Outbreak

March 26, 2020

The Honorable William P. Barr Attorney General

U.S. Department of Justice

James McHenry

Director

Executive Office for Immigration Review

Submitted via email

RE: THE DOJ MUST IMMEDIATELY CLOSE ALL IMMIGRATION COURTS DURING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC

Dear Attorney General Barr and Director McHenry,

Following previous calls by the National Association of Immigration Judges (NAIJ), the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) Local 511 (ICE Professionals Union), and the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) for the temporary closure of all immigration courts, we, the undersigned international, national, state, and local immigration, civil rights, faith- based, government accountability, and labor organizations urge the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) to immediately close all 68 Immigration Courts operated by the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) in adherence with current public health protocols regarding the COVID-19 virus.

On the evening of March 17, EOIR postponed all non-detained hearings and recently postponed all of the Migrant Protection Protocol hearings (MPP) scheduled through April 22, 2020. However, more aggressive action is needed. While these policies are a step in the right direction, they fall far short of the required action called for by this pandemic emergency. The detained courts must also be closed to in-person hearings in order to minimize the spread of the virus, slow the rate of new infections, and to avoid overwhelming local resources.

Given the particular vulnerability of respondents in detained settings, the use of telework, which has been advocated by the Administration, can and should be quickly put in place. Immigration Judges stand ready and able to work to ensure priority matters, including detained bond matters, are addressed using technological tools. DOJ should permit all detained respondents to immediately receive telephonic bond redetermination hearings with teleworking judges and allow supporting documents to be faxed and emailed to a designated point of contact. When possible, ICE OPLA should stipulate to bond in written motions so it is not necessary to hold hearings.

The urgency for immediate, decisive action in this matter cannot be overstated. Every link in the chain that brings individuals to the court – from the use of public transportation, to security lines, crowded elevators, cramped cubicle spaces of court staff, packed waiting room facilities in the courthouses, and inadequate sanitizing resources at the courts – place lives at risk.

AILA Doc. No. 20032630. (Posted 3/26/20)

Every state and the District of Columbia have declared a state of emergency giving government leaders the opportunity to implement bold and unprecedented measures to slow and eventually

eliminate the spread of the virus. Some officials are releasing prisoners, allowing them to shelter in place at home. Cities, county, and state governments have moved swiftly to implement stay at home orders to ensure the protection of community members from this highly communicable virus. These measures include the scaling back of mass transit conveyances to most urban centers where the immigration courts are located, creating significant logistical problems for anyone needing to access the courts. On March 21, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced that it

will now require all legal visitors to provide and wear personal protective equipment (PPE) (disposable vinyl gloves, N-95 or surgical masks, and eye protection) in order to enter any

detention facility, despite the nationwide shortage of PPE.

Yet EOIR continues to operate courts in a business-as-usual manner, placing court personnel,

litigants, and all community members in harm’s way. To make matters worse, DOJ and EOIR decision-making has been opaque, with inadequate information being released, causing confusion

and leading to litigants showing up at hearings that are cancelled without notice.

DOJ’s current response to the COVID-19 pandemic and its spread is frighteningly disconnected from the realities of our communities, and the advice of local leaders and scientific experts. DOJ must immediately implement the temporary closure all immigration courts. Failing to take this action now will exacerbate a once-in-a-century public health crisis and lead to a greater loss

of life.

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact Laura Lynch, Senior Policy Counsel, AILA (llynch@aila.org), Judge Ashley Tabaddor, President, NAIJ (ashleytabaddor@gmail.com), or Fanny Behar-Ostrow, President, AFGE Local 511 (fbehar1@gmail.com).

Sincerely,

Fanny Behar-Ostrow ESQ
Assistant Chief Counsel, DHS
President AFGE Local 511

Advocates for Basic Legal Equality, Inc.

America’s Voice

American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) Local 511 American Immigration Council

American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA)

Americans for Immigrant Justice, Inc.

Amnesty International USA

Arizona Coalition to End Sexual and Domestic Violence

Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance, AFL-CIO

Asian Pacific Institute on Gender-Based Violence

ASISTA

Association of Deportation Defense Attorneys, Inc.

Ayuda

Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights (CAIR) Coalition

Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc.

Center for Gender & Refugee Studies

   AILA Doc. No. 20032630. (Posted 3/26/20)

Center for Victims of Torture

Central American Resource Center

Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights (CHIRLA)

Congregation of Our Lady of Charity of the Good Shepherd, U.S. Provinces End Domestic Abuse Wisconsin

Evangelical Lutheran Church in America

Federal Bar Association Immigration Law Section

*Disclaimer, this is the position of the Immigration Law Section and not the Federal Bar Association as a

whole.

Freedom Network USA

Government Accountability Project

Her Justice

HIAS

Human Rights First

Human Rights Initiative of North Texas

Illinois Coalition Against Domestic Violence

Immigrant Families Together

Immigration Equality

International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers International Rescue Committee

InterReligious Task Force on Central America

Just Neighbors

Justice for Our Neighbors-Michigan

Las America’s Immigrant Advocacy Center

Latin America Working Group

Leadership Conference of Women Religious

League of United Latin American Citizens

Legal Aid Justice Center

Montana Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence National Advocacy Center of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd National Association of Immigration Judges

National Council of Jewish Women

National Justice for Our Neighbors

National Latina Institute for Reproductive Justice

Nebraska Coalition to End Sexual and Domestic Violence Neighbors Immigration Clinic

NETWORK Lobby for Catholic Social Justice

New York Immigration Coalition

New York Justice for Our Neighbors

Northern Illinois Justice for Our Neighbors

Ohio Immigrant Alliance

Pax Christi USA

Restoration Immigration Legal Aid

Rian Immigrant Center

Round Table of Former Immigration Judges

Santa Fe Dreamers Project

Sisters of Mercy of the Americas Justice Team

AILA Doc. No. 20032630. (Posted 3/26/20)

South Texas Human Rights Center

Tennessee Justice for Our Neighbors

The Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project

The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights

Ujima Inc: The National Center on Violence Against Women in the Black Community Vermont Network Against Domestic and Sexual Violence

Virginia Coalition for Immigrant Rights

Virginia Coalition of Latino Organizations

Virginia Interfaith Center for Public Policy

Washington Office on Latin America

Washington State Coalition Against Domestic Violence

Wellspring United Church of Christ

Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights

AILA Doc. No. 20032630. (Posted 3/26/20)

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

Pretty disturbingly graphic example of how little EOIR & the DOJ care about the health, safety, and welfare of their own employees, let alone the public they have long ceased serving!

Also appreciate the courageous leadership of AFGE Local 511 President and DHS Assistant Chief Counsel Fanny Behar-Ostrow in joining the effort to end the regime’s reckless insanity. An “Honorary Member” of the NDPA to be sure! Folks like Fanny, Ashley, Laura, Jeff, and Dan are among America’s unsung heroes! Thanks for all you do!

Due Process Forever! Political “Courts” Endangering Public Welfare & Safety, Never!

PWS

03-26-20

NDPA HEROES CONTINUE TO FIGHT FOR LIVES OF MOST VULNERABLE DURING TIME OF CRISIS! — New Filing Seeks Release Of “Sitting Ducks” From The DHS Gulag !

Elizabeth Jordan ESQUIRE — Elizabeth Jordan Esquire
Director, Immigration Detention Accountability Project (IDAP)

Laura Lichter ESQUIRE — Laura Lichter
Lichter Immigration
Denver, CO
Past President, AILA

Hi all –

We filed an emergency motion about COVID-19 last night. It is system-wide, although filed in CD California, and includes evidence from Aurora thanks to Laura Lichter’s brave client.

The pleading is here: https://www.splcenter.org/sites/default/files/fraihat_v._ice_pls_memo_iso_emergency_pi.pdf

And I attach three medical expert declarations. Please use them however you’d like.

Thanks

Liz.

Elizabeth Jordan*

(she/her/ella)

Director, Immigration Detention Accountability Project (IDAP)

Civil Rights Education and Enforcement Center (CREEC)

*Not admitted in Colorado; practice limited to federal and immigration courts.

Declaration of Dr. Homer Venters

Franco-Paredes declaration

Meyer declaration

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

Every life saved is important. Thanks to Liz, Laura, and all the other “NDPA Heroes” involved in this effort.

DUE PROCESS FOREVER! THE NEW AMERICAN GULAG (NAG) NEVER! HATS OFF THE ELIZABETH, HER AMAZING TEAM, LAURA, & THE MANY OTHER HEROES OF THE NDPA!

PWS

03-26-20

SENATE COMES TOGETHER, PASSES $2 TRILLION RELIEF BILL — FED CHAIR JEROME POWELL SEES STRONG ECONOMIC REBOUND ONCE CORONAVIRUS UNDER CONTROL — Basically, First Things First, Says Powell — Get The Virus Under Control & We’ve “Got Your Economic Back” When The Economy Restarts!

https://apple.news/ADKmnNtYdTSqV4_DcsV3xbg

Lucy Bayly reports for NBC News:

“There can be a good rebound on the other side of this,” said Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell.

The coronavirus pandemic is putting unprecedented strain on the U.S. economy, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said Thursday in an exclusive interview with Savannah Guthrie on the “TODAY” show, noting, “There can be a good rebound on the other side of this.”

“We may well be in a recession,” Powell said, in a rare live interview. “But I would point to the difference between this and a normal recession. There is not anything fundamentally wrong with our economy. Quite the contrary. We are starting from a very strong position.”

“This is a unique situation,” Powell said, when asked if the economy could withstand a monthlong shutdown. “I think people need to understand this is not a typical downturn. People are being asked to close their business, to stay home from work, and to not engage in certain economic activity, and so they are pulling back. At a certain point, we will get the virus under control and confidence will return.”

The Federal Reserve has launched a series of emergency moves since the viral outbreak started to erode the U.S. economy. The central bank slashed interest rates twice this month, down to nearly zero, and has pumped trillions of dollars into the financial system to shore up the economy, backstop credit, and stabilize the dollar.

The Fed said such extreme action was warranted because “the coronavirus outbreak has harmed communities and disrupted economic activity in many countries, including the United States.”

By making borrowing as cheap as possible, the central bank hopes to give companies and individuals ready access to nearly interest-free cash to invest and spend.

Download the NBC News app for full coverage and alerts about the coronavirus outbreak

“We’re trying to make a bridge from a very strong economy to another place of economic strength,” Powell said Thursday, by stepping in and replacing lending to small- and medium-sized businesses and other “places where credit is not being offered.”

Powell’s comments come the morning after the Senate overwhelmingly passed a massive $2 trillion rescue package, the government’s own response to the harsh economic blow from the coronavirus pandemic.

The Senate approved the 880-page bill in a unanimous 96-0 vote. The measure would provide billions of dollars in credit for struggling industries, a significant boost to unemployment insurance and direct cash payments to Americans.

With regard to President Donald Trump’s hope to reopen the economy by Easter, Powell said, “We are not experts in pandemics over here. We don’t get to make that decision. We would tend to listen to the experts. Dr. [Anthony] Fauci said something like, ‘The virus is going to set the timetable,’ and that sounds right to me.”

“The sooner we get the virus under control, people will very willingly open back up their businesses and get back to work,” Powell said.

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

If we can just “tune out” Trump and his negative leadership, follow the lead of our health professionals, Governors, and Mayors, and all pull together, putting human lives first, we can get through to better days. Until then, unfortunately, things are likely to get worse as America runs short of basic medical supplies, personnel, and hospital space.

Economies can and will be rebuilt. The dead can’t be brought back to life. Every life we re able to save now is valuable and will pay a dividend, whether economic, emotional, or spiritual, on the other side of the crisis. Already, we’re seeing both young and old come together to help, as medical students and retired health professionals volunteer to step into the breach.

I found Jerome Powell’s interview with Savannah Guthrie of NBC’s Today Show one of the best and most reassuring, from an economic standpoint, interview with a Federal official recently. You can watch it in its entirety at the above link.

Stay well, and Due Process Forever!

PWS

O3-26-20

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

“Vote ‘Em Out”

By Willie Nelson

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

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

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

Listen to Willie here:

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

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

Tracy Jan reports for the WashPost:

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

By Tracy Jan

March 25 at 10:00 AM ET

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

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

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

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

[Facing eviction as millions shelter in place]

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Read Tracy’s full article at the link.

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

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

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

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

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

PWS

03-25-20

WITH A BLITHERING IDIOT CALLING THE SHOTS AND THE RIGHT-WING’S VILEST OF THE DUMB EGGING HIM ON, AMERICA CAREENS TOWARD A HEALTH CATASTROPHE WITH NO COHERENT PLAN! — Tuning Trump Out & Could Be Our Only Hope!

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/trump-claims-more-death-with-economy-shutdown-than-coronavirus_n_5e7950cfc5b63c3b6495df4c

Sanjana Karanth reports for HuffPost:

President Donald Trump’s insistence on downplaying the coronavirus risks reached dangerous levels Monday as he scoffed at medical advice and threatened to open up the economy despite skyrocketing case numbers.

At the White House’s daily coronavirus briefing, the president focused on wanting to reopen businesses very soon despite global guidance to essentially shut down societies and encourage people to stay home.

“It’s bad, and obviously the numbers are going to increase with time, and they’re going to start to decrease, and we’re going to be opening our country up for business because our country was meant to be open,” Trump said, despite the rising COVID-19 death toll.

The U.S. saw confirmed cases rise to more than 41,000 on Monday, with nearly 600 deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins medical school’s coronavirus resource center. World Health Organization Director Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Monday that the pandemic is actually accelerating ― stressing that it took 67 days from the first reported case to reach the first 100,000 cases, 11 days for the second 100,000 cases and just four days for the third 100,000 cases.

. . . .

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

Yeah, that corrupt GOP vote to acquit could turn out to seal the fate of millions of Americans. With no plan, no brains, and no coherent strategy, you just have to hope you and those you love won’t be among Trump’s victims.

The markets should love chaos and death. But the problem is in Italy other places, they can’t even have funerals. So even “death stocks” might not be a good investment.

Wow! Talk about “malicious incompetence.” Trump is certainly leading the charge!

PWS

03-23-20

KAKISTOCRACY WARNING: Trump Bored With Following Dr.’s Orders, Looking For Ways To Countermand Them — Sure, Thousands Of Americans Might Needlessly Die, But It Would Be Great For The Economy — No Amount Of Incompetent Bungling, Self-Promotion, Or Sociopathic Behavior Will Shake His GOP Support!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/03/23/trump-cares-more-about-stock-market-than-humans/

Jennifer Rubin in WashPost:

Until Monday morning, President Trump’s most horrifying utterance with regard to the coronavirus was his sarcastic reaction to news that Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), whose wife has multiple sclerosis and therefore is in the high-risk category for infection, was self-isolating due to potential exposure to the coronavirus. “Gee, that’s too bad,” Trump snarked about his political rival. As bad as that was — mocking the possible life-threatening illness of others — he managed to top that with a truly horrifying tweet:

The cure — social distancing — has been imposed to save thousands of lives. But in Trump’s mind, the resulting economic slowdown and bear market from those measures are worse than a potentially catastrophic death toll. That’s the only reasonable interpretation of his outburst, which coincides with reporting from the New York Times that, “at the White House, in recent days, there has been a growing sentiment that medical experts were allowed to set policy that has hurt the economy, and there has been a push to find ways to let people start returning to work.”

For Trump and many in his party, what matters most is money. (“Some Republican lawmakers have also pleaded with the White House to find ways to restart the economy, as financial markets continue to slide and job losses for April could be in the millions.”) To them, letting medical experts set policy to combat a pandemic is a serious error. “Worse” than the deaths of thousands of Americans, in the minds of the narcissistic president, is the chance that his reelection could be impaired by bad economic numbers. Does it dawn on him that thousands of dead Americans might reflect poorly on him as well?

[More coverage of the coronavirus pandemic]

Trump’s latest spasm of indifference to other humans comes at a time when one of those experts, Surgeon General Jerome M. Adams, warns that the situation is about to get much worse. In a CBS interview, Adams said: “I didn’t expect to be starting off my week with such a dire message for America, but the numbers are going to get worse this week.” He reiterated, “Things are going to get worse before they get better. And we really need everyone to understand this is serious, to lean into what they can do to flatten the curve.”

Here we see the gap between Trump’s pecuniary and political interests (which he thinks depend entirely on the stock market) and the experts trying to get us to do things that would prevent greater loss of life. Trump’s behavior — denying the crisis, painting it as a threat from foreigners (when community spread is already well underway), constantly lying about progress being made, attacking political rivals and congratulating himself on his response (and forcing recitals of praise from advisers) — tells us that even a pandemic, in his mind, is all about him.

Trump may think he can sugarcoat coronavirus, but media critic Erik Wemple says it is time for the government to speak with one clear voice about public health. (Erik Wemple/The Washington Post)

With thousands of families facing a health crisis and millions suffering economic tragedy, Trump whines that he has not received sufficient credit for his actions (which mayors, governors and scientists say were grossly negligent and insufficient). All the while, he remains poised to thrust his hand into the cookie jar of government bailout money.

The experts must be heeded. The governors and mayors must be supported. Trump must be ignored or must delegate all significant decision-making to someone competent and conscientious of the human suffering unfolding before us. Otherwise, we are in grave trouble.

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

With Trump, the goalposts are continually moving; what we might once have thought of as the “rock bottom” in the “race to the bottom” suddenly becomes just another milepost.

We are already in “grave trouble,” Jennifer! With a dim-witted narcissist sociopath in charge, a party of elitist grifters running the Senate, an irresponsible minority of the electorate mindlessly committed to Trump’s insanity, and a system that facilitates minority rule, the majority of us who are interested in saving lives (including those of the foregoing group) and preserving our democratic republic are, indeed, in dire straits.

The “quote of the day” has to go to Trump’s “economic advisor” Steven Moore: “But you can’t have a policy that says we’re going to save every human life at any cost, no matter how many trillions of dollars you’re talking about.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-signals-growing-weariness-with-social-distancing-and-other-steps-advocated-by-health-officials/2020/03/23/0920ea0a-6cfc-11ea-a3ec-70d7479d83f0_story.html

Let’s flip Steven’s warped thinking around: Instead of giving a $500 billion bailout to America’s fat cat corporations, why not give a mere $1 billion directly to each of America’s 335 million people. They could decide how best to spend it to “pump up” the economy: their own health care, investing in corporations, buying bonds, endowing universities, building houses, starting small businesses, going to the racetrack, taking cruises, philanthropy, or just spending it all wildly on rampant consumerism. Much cheaper than the bailout. Hell, Trump supporters could even choose to spend a night at every Trump property in the world!

And, better yet, neither Moore, “Munchkin,” Kudlow, Kushner, nor any of the other grifter/kakistocrats surrounding Trump could tell “average Americans” how to spend their money. After all, forgotten to Trump and his GOP, it actually is the people’s money with which they are lining their pockets and the those of their fat cat corporate buddies while tuning out our health care concerns. Heck, what’s a human life compared with a dollar?

PWS

03-23-20

LAW CLINIC PROFESSORS WRITE TO ACTING CHIEF IMMIGRATION JUDGE URGING STRONG ACTIONS TO PREVENT SPREAD OF CORONAVIRUS!

EYORE — “Eyore In Distress”
Once A Symbol of Fairness, Due Process, & Best Practices, Now Gone “Belly Up”

March 20, 2020

The Hon. Christopher A. Santoro Chief Immigration Judge

Office of the Chief Immigration Judge 5107 Leesburg Pike, Suite 2500

Falls Church, VA 22041

Via Email

Dear Chief Immigration Judge Santoro:

We are law school professors who teach immigration clinics that provide pro bono representation in immigration courts around the country. We write to urge you to immediately develop and implement proactive plans for the prevention and management of COVID-19 at all United States immigration courts. In this letter, we offer several recommendations for such protective measures.

. . . .

Read the full letter here:

Letter to CIJ Re Protective Plans for COVID-19

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

I’m repeating myself. I’ve always found Acting Chief Judge Santoro to be an advocate for “good government” and “doing the right thing” for the people he works with and for the public. For a number of years, he was “our” Assistant Chief Judge in Arlington. I enjoyed working with him and found him consistently concerned with the well-being of our employees and the efficient operation of our court. He also went to great lengths to insure that we were always informed about what was happening, particularly in the (normal) absence of much meaningful communication from “on high.” Even then, though, some areas and directives were “outside his portfolio.”

I’m relatively sure that his “hands are tied” in this situation and that the “strings at EOIR are being pulled” by others above him in the “food chain.” The latter are driven by political and ideological agendas often quite different from the overall public interest and usually have little, if any, demonstrated concern for he the safety and welfare of EOIR’s “captive clientele.” Indeed, the DOJ politicos don’t seem to have much concern for their own employees either, leaving them largely to “twist in the wind” in a time of national crisis.

PWS

03-22-20

CLEAR AS MUD: Politicized Immigration “Courts” Continue To Bobble The Message In The Time Of Plague, Endangering Their Own Employees, Attorneys, & The Public! — America’s Clown Courts 🤡☠️ Enter A Deadly New Phase As Feckless Article III Courts Watch The Show Go On! —“I don’t know who’s making the calls, but they’re wrong.” — DUH!

https://apple.news/Af7cWvYFbT5CO7qZKyldm3w

Dara Lind reports for Pro Publica:

Interviews with 10 workers at immigration courts around the country reveal fear, contradictory messages and continuing perils for the employees.

ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up to receive our biggest stories as soon as they’re published.

On Tuesday night — over a day after several Bay Area counties issued shelter-in-place orders barring most people from leaving their homes — the San Francisco immigration court sent an email to staff: Hearings were being postponed nationwide for most immigrants, so the court would be closed starting Wednesday. (The text of the email was provided to ProPublica.)

On Wednesday, however, employees were directed to get onto a conference call, according to two participants. There they were told the Tuesday night email was wrong. The court wasn’t closed. They would have to come into the office — or use their vacation time to stay home. When staff asked about the shelter-in-place orders, the response was that the Department of Justice, which runs immigration courts, took the position that those were local laws and didn’t apply to federal employees.

The Trump administration has reduced immigration court operations in the past week, by postponing hearings for non-detained immigrants and closing a handful of courts to the public. Those actions came after the unions representing immigration prosecutors and judges issued a rare public call for courts to close.

The reduced court operations came after weeks of employees raising concerns privately and, they say, receiving few and unhelpful answers. And because the closures are determined solely by whether a court is hearing cases of detained immigrants, rather than by the level of health peril, employees still feel they’re putting their health at risk every time they come into the office as instructed.

That’s the picture that emerges from interviews with 10 federal employees who work at immigration courts across the country. Most spoke on the condition of anonymity. Many said they had raised concerns internally about their exposure to COVID-19 to their managers or hadn’t been informed of potential exposures.

“When I signed up for this job, I thought it might be morally compromising at times,” one immigration court employee told ProPublica, “but I never thought it would be compromising of my health and safety.”

The Executive Office for Immigration Review, the DOJ agency that oversees immigration courts, told ProPublica that agency headquarters was responsible for deciding when courts closed, but it did not confirm or deny specifics of the employees’ allegations, saying, “We do not comment on internal communications or internal personnel operations.”

In Denver, one prosecutor interviewed by ProPublica was alarmed by a judge’s frequent coughs during a hearing last Friday. “Don’t mind my coughing,” the judge said, according to the prosecutor. “I don’t think it’s coronavirus.” The following Tuesday, the prosecutor noticed that the judge was out for the rest of the week and emailed a court staffer in concern: Was it the coronavirus? Should she be taking precautions? The staffer’s reply: For privacy reasons, the prosecutor’s questions couldn’t be answered.

Only after news broke to the public on Tuesday night that a judge at the Denver immigration court had been diagnosed with COVID-19 (the disease caused by the new coronavirus) did court officials follow up with the prosecutor and confirm her suspicions. Other attorneys the judge had been in close contact with were notified the next day. The court remained open through Thursday, when the entire building it was housed in was shut down for deep cleaning by the General Services Administration. (It’s currently set to reopen Monday.)

In New York, legal aid groups sent a letter to immigration court officials saying that two of their attorneys had symptoms of COVID-19 and a third had been exposed to someone who’d tested positive. All three attorneys had appeared in court the past week, and all had hearings scheduled the following day. The courts didn’t say anything to their employees about the letter, according to multiple sources.

Since taking office, the Trump administration has pressured the immigration courts to process as many immigrants as quickly as possible — pressuring judges to hear more cases and complete them within a year, and making it harder for immigrants or attorneys to postpone hearings. Now, they face a public health crisis that requires everyone to reduce person-to-person contact.

Immigration court workers have two concerns. The first is that the courts are often crowded and require close contact with members of the public. The second is that, like most employees of any type, especially those who take public transit, they are exposed every time they leave their homes to work.

Employees remain concerned about their exposure over the past few weeks, while courts were running as usual. Employees in New York and California — the states hardest hit by the pandemic to date — told ProPublica that their requests for “deep cleaning” were rejected by managers, and that they were bringing their own Clorox wipes and disinfectant spray to the office.

Most immigration court business happens in person. Even trying to postpone an immigration hearing (for example, due to illness) requires an attorney to file a paper form with a clerk. And if an immigrant doesn’t show up for a hearing, they’re at risk of getting ordered deported in absentia. In at least one New York court, according to two people who work there, the chief judge told employees Monday to issue absentia deportation orders if immigrants weren’t showing up, even if the coronavirus was the suspected cause.

Policies the Trump administration introduced before the COVID-19 pandemic put considerable pressure on judges and prosecutors not to allow immigrants to postpone their hearings. Judges face a “performance standard” of completing 80% of their cases within a year — a standard over 90% of judges don’t meet, according to the National Association of Immigration Judges. But the more than 150 judges who have been hired in the past two years are still in their probationary period, where they could be fired for failing to meet performance standards.

While many judges have been lenient in granting coronavirus-related postponements, others have not. Last week, according to one California immigration court employee, a judge took a break from a hearing to tell colleagues that the immigrant’s attorney claimed to be sick, but because he wasn’t coughing, the hearing would move forward.

One email sent by the chief prosecutor at the Miami court Tuesday, read to ProPublica, told prosecutors that if an immigrant or her attorney claimed to be sick, any postponement should be counted against the immigrant (preventing them from requesting another postponement). If the immigrant didn’t want to postpone, and the judge wasn’t willing to hold the hearing by phone, the prosecutor was instructed to contact her manager — who would assess the claim of illness himself before deciding what to do. (A call to the chief prosecutor in Miami was not immediately returned.)

Most communication, though, has been oral. In at least two courts, chief judges were asked to put policies in writing and declined.

Employees have been in the dark about who, exactly, is making the decisions about which courts are open and when employees are allowed to work from home or take leave to stay home. “The word is that it’s out of their hands. Everything is out of everybody’s hands,” Fanny Behar-Ostrow, president of the union representing immigration prosecutors, told ProPublica Wednesday. “I don’t know who’s making the calls, but they’re wrong.”

An email obtained by the Miami Herald, written by the assistant chief immigration judge in charge of the Miami immigration court on Wednesday, said that closure decisions were ultimately being made by “the White House” — something that employees at other courts also said their managers had suggested. But chief judges gave conflicting explanations about which decisions were subject to White House approval; one chief judge told employees that the White House had to be involved in decisions about remote work, while other chief judges made those decisions themselves.

It’s not clear who at the White House is involved or how. Immigration officials told the Herald that the ultimate decision was made by the Office of Management and Budget. However, according to the employees ProPublica spoke to, some immigration court officials used “White House” to refer to policies set by the Office of Personnel Management. The assistant chief immigration judge (the judge in charge of a given immigration court location) for one California court told employees on March 12 that they’d had a phone call with staff for Vice President Mike Pence, who’s running the official coronavirus task force.

But to many employees, the specter of “White House” involvement raised concerns that the administration’s immigration policy priorities were getting in the way of its public health obligations.

. . . .

Read Dara’s full article at the link.

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

The confusion engendered by politicized immigration enforcement in support of a White Nationalist agenda doesn’t end with the Immigration Courts. Despite, or perhaps because of, a number of public statements by DHS political hacks, there’s still plenty of uncertainty and angst about DHS’s enforcement and detention policies. Chloe Hadavas over at Slate sets out what happens when politicos take over law enforcement and justice.

Chloe Havadas — Chloe Hadavas
Intern Reporter
Slate

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/03/ice-halts-immigration-enforcement-coronavirus.html

Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced on Wednesday that it will halt most arrests and deportations, focusing only on individuals who are “public safety risks” and who are “subject to mandatory detention based on criminal grounds,” as the coronavirus sweeps across the U.S. and public health officials scramble to limit the virus’ spread.

Undocumented immigrants are often afraid to seek medical care for fear of deportation. And even as state and local officials encouraged anyone who needed medical treatment to seek help, ICE officers continued to make arrests, including in areas hit hard by the virus. But in the temporary change in enforcement, ICE also said that it won’t carry out operations near health care facilities, including hospitals, doctors’ offices, and urgent care facilities, “except in the most extraordinary of circumstances,” the agency said in a statement. “Individuals should not avoid seeking medical care because they fear civil immigration enforcement.”

Immigration experts said ICE’s decision was somewhat unexpected, though they remain cautious about how to interpret it. “I’m always surprised to hear that they’re going to scale back on their efforts,” said Jennifer M. Chacón, a UCLA law professor who focuses on immigration. ICE’s statement marks a distinct shift from the agency’s operations under the Trump administration. Both Chacón and Karla McKanders, a law professor who directs the Immigration Practice Clinic at Vanderbilt University, said that it reminded them of the “felons, not families” immigration policy of the Obama administration. “You read it and it basically looks like the Obama-era enforcement priority statement, and you just wonder why it takes a pandemic to get ICE to think about prioritizing resources and focusing efforts on public safety,” said Chacón.

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

You can read the rest of Chloe’s article at the link.

“I don’t know who’s making the calls, but they’re wrong.” Kind of “says it all” about how the regime treats its own employees and the public good.

Meanwhile, Article III Courts, which have had more than ample opportunity to put an end to the constitutional farce taking place in Immigration Court and also to direct the DHS to take overdue steps to release non-dangerous (that is, most) immigration detainees before the epidemic sweeps chronically health-endangering immigration prisons in their New American Gulag (“NAG”), have once again “swallowed the whistle.” The Gulag, where kids are caged and put in “iceboxes,” families separated, and folks sometimes left to die, all for no reason other than “we can do it and nobody’s going to stop us” will haunt not only those corrupt public servants who established and operated it, but also those like legislators, judges, and public health officials who failed in their duties to end the human rights abuses.

Perhaps the Article IIIs are “running scared” because without the ongoing clown show in the U.S. Immigration Courts, the Article IIIs would be in line for the title of “Americas’s Most Dysfunctional Courts.”

Also, I think it’s time for Slate to take “Intern” off Chloe Hadavas’s title and ink this “up and coming talent” to a full time contract covering immigration and justice issues.

Due Process Forever. Dysfunctional Courts That Endanger The Public, Never!

🤡☠️

PWS

03-21-20

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

UPDATE: Gullible, complicit U.S. Judges in their ivory tower bubbles with plenty of hand sanitizers might be willing to believe DHS’s claims that everything is “hunky dory” in the New American Gulag, but the truth is stark, ugly, and predictable for anyone familiar with the regime’s immigration antics, lies, and cover-ups:

“The cells stink. The toilets don’t flush. There’s never enough soap. They give out soap once a week. One bar of soap a week. How does that make any sense?”

Read the latest from Vice News, as hunger strikes break out in three New Jersey detention facilities:

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/pkew79/immigrants-are-now-on-hunger-strike-in-3-ice-detention-centers–fears

Meanwhile, Courtside has been receiving reports from multiple sources in New Jersey about rapidly deteriorating conditions in Immigration Courts and the Gulag, failure to follow Federal health guidelines, possible positive coronavirus tests among ICE employees, and efforts by the the regime to keep the truth about about the growing health risks for detainees, judges, lawyers, and other personnel forced to deal with this dangerous, broken, and totally dysfunctional system “under wraps.”

I have also received disturbing, yet credible, reports of continuances for “at risk” attorneys being denied by some Immigration Judges, while other judges have received “no assurances” from their management “handlers” that the regime’s due-process-mocking “production quotas” will be waived during the health emergency! ☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️

PWS

03-21-20

SOUTHERN BORDER CLOSING UPDATE FROM LA TIMES

Molly Hennessy-Fiske
Houston Bureau Chief
LA Times

Kate Linthicum, — Kate Linthicum
Foreign Correspondent
LA Times

https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2020-03-20/trump-coronavirus-mexico-border

Press)

By ELI STOKOLS, KATE LINTHICUM, MOLLY HENNESSY-FISKE

MARCH 20, 20209:48 AM

WASHINGTON — The U.S. and Mexico have agreed to restrict all nonessential travel across their shared border in an effort to slow the spread of the coronavirus, President Trump said Friday, adding that he was invoking the Defense Production Act to increase output of badly needed medical supplies.

The tax filing deadline has been extended from April 15 to July 15, Trump added at the news conference, noting that people who have refunds due can still file early.

“Both our countries know the importance of working together to limit the spread of the virus and to ensure the commerce that supports both our economies keeps flowing,” Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo said after announcing the agreement with Mexico. The new restrictions will take effect on Saturday, he said.

The U.S. and Mexico were in discussions to ensure that workers, including legal agricultural workers, could continue to cross the border for their jobs, Pompeo said, noting that the aim was not to interfere with commerce.

Under the new rules, the Border Patrol will begin returning all undocumented immigrants directly to Mexico or Canada when they are caught at the border, rather than detaining them in the U.S., said Chad Wolf, acting secretary of Homeland Security.

. . . .

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

Read the complete article at the link.

Seems to me that the regime has been dumping and orbiting folks back across the border without any due process for some time now. So, can anybody explain what’s different about what they are doing now — except to promote the false implication that asylum seekers are responsible for the spread of the pandemic and that summarily removing them somehow ”solves a problem” or makes us “safer?”

Actually, what’s endangering our health is 1) gross lack of testing capacity; and 2) lack of a strong, clearly articulated, consistent, coordinated national response by the Feds. Neither has anything to do with asylum seekers. Indeed, had the regime not wasted so much time, attention, manpower, and money on focusing DHS almost exclusively on turning back bona fide asylum seekers, we likely would have been able to put together a better response to the real national emergency we now face.

PWS

03-20-20

DANGER ZONE: Yeah, We Should “All Pull Together” To Mitigate Our Public Health Crisis — But, It’s Just As Important Not To Let Trump & The GOP Off The Hook For “Malicious Incompetence” & Unethical Conduct That Ignored The Common Good & Aggravated The Risk! — “The public needs to know that the Republican Party is culpable for the present crisis, just as it was culpable for the Great Recession, even if it did not originate either.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/20/opinion/trump-republicans-coronavirus.html

Jamelle Bouie in The NY Times:

Donald Trump and the Republican Party are trying to distract you from their catastrophic failure.

Two months ago, as the world knows, Trump was praising China’s government for its handling of the coronavirus outbreak, while downplaying the severity of the threat to the United States. “We have it totally under control,” he said in an interview to CNBC on Jan. 22. “It’s one person coming in from China and we have it under control. It’s going to be just fine.” For good measure, he said it again on Twitter: “China has been working very hard to contain the Coronavirus. The United States greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency. It will all work out well. In particular, on behalf of the American People, I want to thank President Xi!”

Now, of course, Trump simultaneously denies that anyone could have known about the pandemic (“I would view it as something that just surprised the whole world”) and claims to have predicted the extent of the disaster (“This is a pandemic. I felt it was a pandemic long before it was called a pandemic”). Similarly, he’s moved from praising President Xi Jinping’s government to attacking it. He’s also changed the language he uses to describe the pathogen that causes Covid-19. After weeks of saying “coronavirus,” he now calls it the “Chinese virus.”

The administration says it’s simply holding Beijing responsible for spreading the disease. And it is true that the Chinese government suppressed information and punished whistle-blowers, hiding the potential danger until it was too late. But given the president’s previous praise for China’s response, that explanation doesn’t hold up.

The likely truth is that Trump is flailing. His change in language came shortly after the stock market collapsed and the president faced harsh criticism for his sluggish response to the outbreak. Rather than face his failures — the United States is far behind its peers in testing, and its hospitals are largely unprepared for a surge of the severely ill — Trump turned to racial demagoguery. He would bounce back not by fixing his mistakes but by fanning fear of foreign threat.

JAMELLE BOUIE’S NEWSLETTERDiscover overlooked writing from around the internet, and get exclusive thoughts, photos and reading recommendations from Jamelle. Sign up here.

Following the president’s lead, Republican lawmakers, activists and officials have adopted the president’s language about the virus while avoiding any discussion of his response to the outbreak. Senator John Cornyn of Texas told reporters that “China is to blame because” of “the culture where people eat bats and snakes and dogs and things like that.” Kevin McCarthy, the minority leader of the House, called the disease “Chinese coronavirus.” And on Twitter, Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa wondered what all the commotion was about: “I don’t understand why China gets upset bc we refer to the virus that originated there the ‘Chinese virus’ Spain never got upset when we referred to the Spanish flu in 1918&1919,” he wrote, in his typically hurried style.

None of this is the least bit clever. Trump failed to act when it was most important, and now his allies are flooding the zone with rhetoric meant to move attention away from the president’s poor performance and toward an argument over language.

One might think that Republicans have an interest in pushing the administration into a stronger response, but the truth is that Trump wasn’t the only member of his party to downplay the threat who knew better.

In January, just over two weeks after she was sworn in, Senator Kelly Loeffler of Georgia was part of a private briefing on the coronavirus provided by administration officials, including Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. That same day, according to The Daily Beast, she and her husband began to sell millions in stock, a process that continued over the next few weeks. They also made a purchase: between $100,000 and $250,000 worth of shares in a company that specializes in technology that helps people work remotely.

. . . .

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

You can read Jamelle’s complete article at the link. In addition to Loeffler, whose sole contribution in her short time in Congress appears to be misleading the public while lining her own pockets, Senator Richard Burr (R-NC) has also been implicated for using the “insider information” from the Intelligence Committee to “play” the market while America slipped into a crisis for which the Trump regime was woefully unprepared.

Both Senators deny any wrongdoing. But, it’s very clear that at a time of national crisis, their minds and actions were far from acting in the public interest.

So, we should “pull together” to get through this. But, we should never forget the existential importance of securing “regime change” and voting the GOP out of office at every level of Government come November. The future of our country and of humanity will depend on it!

PWS

03-20-20

CLOSE THE PRISONS FOR THOSE WHO AREN’T CRIMINALS IN THE FIRST PLACE! — 3,000 Experts Press For Migrants’ Release From Trump’s Gulag!

Professor César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández
Denver Sturm Law

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/19/opinion/coronavirus-immigration-prisons.html

By César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández and Carlos Moctezuma García in The NY Times:

Inside an immigration court in southern Texas this week, a judge asked one of us to stand at the far end of the courtroom and not submit any documents on behalf of a client, perhaps as a health precaution. Inside a nearby federal court, dozens of migrants were being processed for violating federal immigration law. The coronavirus has paused most of our lives. But for migrants, life under a pandemic looks a lot like life before it: suffering because President Trump has an insatiable appetite for imprisoning migrants.

It’s time to shut down immigration prisons.

Across the country, the federal government locks up tens of thousands of people every day who are suspected of violating immigration law. The Border Patrol crams people into holding cells that resemble large kennels. Immigration and Customs Enforcement runs a network of hundreds of prisons — from a county jail north of Boston to an 1,100-bed facility tucked in a southern Texas wildlife refuge. While it’s good that ICE will stop some immigration enforcement, it should release the detainees in its custody. Another government agency, the Marshals Service, holds thousands more who are being prosecuted for violating criminal immigration law.

No matter which agency is in charge, there are only two reasons recognized under U.S. law to confine these people: flight risk or dangerousness. But in this moment, the risks to life and public health that come with imprisoning migrants far outweigh either reason.

Image

A protest against migrant detention centers in Los Angeles last year.

Credit…

Ronen Tivony/SOPA Images — LightRocket, via Getty Images

Decades of research teaches us that crime goes down as the migrant population goes up. On top of that, pilot projects going back decades show that with the right support, migrants almost always do as they are asked. Inside immigration prisons, there are children too young even to tie their shoelaces. Families of asylum seekers hold on to the hope that in the United States, they might find refuge. There are longtime permanent residents with families, careers and homes here. Few have any history of violence. Most have powerful incentives to build lives just as ordinary as the rest of ours.

. . . .

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

https://apple.news/Aqvg6fBneSUWVSl192qWCsA

J. Edward Moreno reports in The Hill:

More than 3,000 medical professionals are calling on Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to release detainees amid the coronavirus pandemic.

In an open letter, the clinicians said the conditions inside detention facilities make it easy for the virus to spread and difficult for those in custody to seek medical attention.

“We strongly recommend that ICE implement community-based alternatives to detention to alleviate the mass overcrowding in detention facilities,” they said. “Individuals and families, particularly the most vulnerable—the elderly, pregnant women, people with serious mental illness, and those at higher risk of complications— should be released while their legal cases are being processed to avoid preventable deaths and mitigate the harm from a COVID-19 outbreak.”

The letter points to the spread of disease public health officials have seen in places like nursing homes, such as Life Care Center in Kirkland, Wash., where more than half of residents have tested positive for the virus and more than 20 percent have died in the past month.

“Considering the extreme risk presented by these conditions in light of the global COVID-19 epidemic, it is impossible to ensure that detainees will be in a ‘safe, secure and humane environment,’ as ICE’s own National Detention Standards state,” the letter added.

Since the start of the outbreak, some have raised concerns about immigration policies.

In February, Rep. Norma Torres (D-Calif.) wrote a letter to the administration’s coronavirus task force and later led a group of Democrats asking them to stop the implementation of the “public charge” rule amid the spread of COVID-19.

On Monday the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed a lawsuit against ICE, calling them to release migrants in civil detention at the Tacoma Northwest Detention Center who are at high risk for serious illness or death if a COVID-19 outbreak spreads to the facility.

. . . .

*******************
Read both of the foregoing articles in their entirety at the respective links.

OK, here’s my prediction: DHS will hold migrants until coronavirus breaks out “big time” in the Gulag and folks start getting sick and dying. At that point, DHS will dump them on the streets to fend for themselves. DHS will disclaim any responsibility, blaming the deaths and public health risks on the victims, their attorneys, judges, asylum laws, “sanctuary cities,” Democrats, and countries that decline to accept deportees.

What a great time for the fools at the BIA to make it virtually impossible for asylum seekers to get released from detention! https://immigrationcourtside.com/2020/03/18/latest-outrage-from-falls-church-bia-ignores-facts-abuses-discretion-to-deny-bond-to-asylum-seeker-matter-of-r-a-v-p-27-in-dec-803-bia-2020/

Politically biased, anti-asylum decision making by “judges” who work for the regime actually kills!

And, we should never forget that the Gulag, the BIA, and many other aspects of this politically biased, irrational, unconstitutional system that threatens human lives and debases humanity only continue to operate because of the fecklessness of Congress and the complicity of Article III Courts.

Due Process Forever! The New American Gulag Never!

PWS

03-19-20

UPDATE: FROM IMMPROF: U.S. Court in Seattle stuffs ACLU’s bid to spring vulnerable migrants from Gulag!

https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/immigration/2020/03/federal-court-denies-aclu-request-for-release-of-vulnerable-immigrant-detainees-in-seattle.html

Let’s see. We know conditions are bad in DHS facilities, and 3,000 health professionals say that the Gulag is a “coronavirus trap” waiting to happen. Many localities are releasing nonviolent criminals as a prudent measure to prevent the spread of disease.

But, the judge thinks it’s a great idea to wait and see if the disaster happens and the bodies stack up. By then, of course, it will be too late to stop the spread. But, I guess the judge is very confident that ICE practices “social distancing” and carefully wipes everything down in their Gulags. What could possibly go wrong?

As an incidental point, how would you like to be on the staff of one these high-risk prisons?

Gotta hope the judge is right for everyone’s sake. But, I greatly fear he’s wrong. Dead wrong!

PWS

03-20-20

UPDATE:

From: Matt Adams, Northwest Immigrant Rights Project [mailto:matt@nwirp.org]
Sent: Thursday, March 19, 2020 5:10 PM
To: Dan Kowalski
Subject: NWIRP and ACLU Statement on Court Refusal to Release People at High-Risk of COVID-19

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NWIRP and ACLU Statement on Court Refusal to Release People at High-Risk of COVID-19

March 19th, 2020

Media contacts

Matt Adams, Legal Director, NWIRP

(206) 957-8611, matt@nwirp.org

Hannah Johnson, ACLU

(650) 464-1698, hjohnson@aclu.org

SEATTLE, WA — A federal district court ruled today that it will not immediately release immigrants detained at the Tacoma Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma, Washington, as requested in a lawsuit filed Monday against U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The suit — filed by Northwest Immigrant Rights Project (NWIRP), the American Civil Liberties Union, and the ACLU of Washington — sought the release of people in civil detention who are at high risk for serious illness or death in the event of COVID-19 infection due to their age and / or underlying medical conditions. The court indicated that it would continue to consider the case, particularly as the situation related to COVID-19 rapidly evolves.

Public health experts have repeatedly warned that release of vulnerable people from custody is critical in light of the lack of a vaccine, treatment, or cure for COVID-19 — both for the health and safety of people in detention, as well as for the staff who work at these facilities and the communities they return home to every day. As the healthcare system in the Seattle-area is increasingly overwhelmed with COVID-19 cases, this step is urgent to reducing the toll on its infrastructure.

Matt Adams, legal director for NWIRP, issued the following statement:

“We strongly disagree with ICE’s assertion that the harm is not imminent simply because ICE has not yet publicly confirmed any cases of COVID 19 at the NWDC,” said Matt Adams. “We will continue pushing forward to challenge the detention of our vulnerable clients during this pandemic. I just hope our clients do not succumb to severe illness or death before we can procure their release.”

Eunice Cho, senior staff attorney at the ACLU’s National Prison Project, issued the following statement:

“We will continue to fight for our clients, who face tremendous danger to their health while in detention. Public health officials are in agreement — it is not a matter of if there is a COVID-19 outbreak in immigrant detention centers, but when. ICE should heed their warning. By refusing to immediately release our clients, ICE is jeopardizing their lives and the lives of its staff and their families.”

You can read the today’s order here

About Northwest Immigrant Rights Project

Northwest Immigrant Rights Project (NWIRP) is a nationally-recognized legal services organization founded in 1984. Each year, NWIRP provides direct legal assistance in immigration matters to over 10,000 low-income people from over 130 countries, speaking over 60 languages and dialects. NWIRP also strives to achieve systemic change to policies and practices affecting immigrants through impact litigation, public policy work, and community education. Visit their website at www.nwirp.org and follow them on Twitter @nwirp.

FOLLOW NWIRP

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Northwest Immigrant Rights Project | 615 2nd Avenue , Suite 400 , Seattle, WA 98104

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STUPIDITY ISN’T JUST FOR THE YOUNG: IT’S ENDEMIC IN THE GOP: Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) 🤡🤡🤡🤡 Is Just The Latest To Demonstrate Why Throwing The GOP Out Of Office At All Levels Must Be Our Highest National Priority!

https://apple.news/AVg2viCFHQWG9XWU6P3SXfg

Caroline Kelly reports for CNN:

Republican Sen. Ron Johnson cast doubt on the severity of federally issued guidance aimed at staunching the spread of the novel coronavirus, urging people to consider the economic drawbacks of the recommendations as health officials plead with the American public to heed them.

“I’m not denying what a nasty disease COVID-19 can be, and how it’s obviously devastating to somewhere between 1 and 3.4 percent of the population,” Johnson, a Wisconsin Republican, told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on Tuesday. “But that means 97 to 99 percent will get through this and develop immunities and will be able to move beyond this.”

“But we don’t shut down our economy because tens of thousands of people die on the highways. It’s a risk we accept so we can move about,” Johnson continued, in apparent reference to recent guidance issued at the federal and state levels for people to avoid large groups and stay away from bars, restaurants and other businesses to help blunt the spread of coronavirus. “We don’t shut down our economies because tens of thousands of people die from the common flu.”

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has urged Americans to practice social distancing, and the White House on Monday issued guidelines that all Americans avoid gathering in groups of more than 10, avoid non-essential travel and that urged older people to stay at home.

The recommendations — which come as the coronavirus continues to take hold in the US with at least 8,525 cases and 145 deaths as of Wednesday night — has caused some states and cities to implement drastic regulations on businesses. But the death toll from the virus, the nation’s top infectious disease expert has warned, depends on how seriously Americans commit to the actions necessary to curb the outbreak.

Johnson said that he was not discrediting those restrictions, but said they were disproportionate to the virus’ actual threat.

“I really don’t want to say that” efforts to contain the virus have gone too far, Johnson said. “It may be exactly what we need to do. But again, what I do want to do is put this all in perspective as we move forward here.”

. . . .

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

Read the rest of Caroline’s article at the above link.

Hey Ron, 1% of the U.S. population would only be 3.3 million. 3.4% would be around 11.2 million. But, who cares about little stats like that?

And, Ronnie, my man, here’s what experts say could happen in the U.S. if others do as you suggest and put short-term economic considerations over public health:

Between 160 million and 214 million people in the United States could be infected over the course of the epidemic, according to a projection that encompasses the range of the four scenarios. That could last months or even over a year, with infections concentrated in shorter periods, staggered across time in different communities, experts said. As many as 200,000 to 1.7 million people could die.

And, the calculations based on the C.D.C.’s scenarios suggested, 2.4 million to 21 million people in the United States could require hospitalization, potentially crushing the nation’s medical system, which has only about 925,000 staffed hospital beds. Fewer than a tenth of those are for people who are critically ill.

The assumptions fueling those scenarios are mitigated by the fact that cities, states, businesses and individuals are beginning to take steps to slow transmission, even if some are acting less aggressively than others. The C.D.C.-led effort is developing more sophisticated models showing how interventions might decrease the worst-case numbers, though their projections have not been made public.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/13/us/coronavirus-deaths-estimate.html?referringSource=articleShare

200,000 to 2.1 million dead! While those might be “little numbers“ to you, Ronnie, I’m guessing they will seem rather serious to the families of those who needlessly die! Could cause quite a stench if all of those bodies were piled up at your door! Perhaps taking an “economic hit” that is more or less inevitable in the time of worldwide pandemic anyway is better than running the risk of killing hundreds of thousands to millions, something that appears to have gone over Ronnie’s head.

Scary as the image might be, Johnson actually would be more at home with the young idiots partying down on Clearwater Beach. The thought of him as a legislator is positively terrifying.

Unfortunately, Wisconsin voters won’t be able to oust this fool they have inflicted on America until 2022. But, the rest of us could be saving our country and our lives if we get rid of Mitch and the GOP wrecking crew in November! That would consign Ron and others like him to the “back benches” where they could do less damage to our nation until the time comes when they can be voted out of office.

“Four Clowns” for you, Ronnie!🤡🤡🤡🤡

Vote ‘Em Out!

PWS

03-19-20

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

UPDATE FROM THE GUARDIAN: FAUCI RIPS JOHNSON FOR DANGEROUS STUPIDITY:

Dr Anthony Fauci criticized senator Ron Johnson for downplaying the threat of coronavirus and questioning the drastic government response to it.

“I’m not denying what a nasty disease COVID-19 can be, and how it’s obviously devastating to somewhere between 1 and 3.4 percent of the population,” Johnson saidearlier this week.

“But that means 97 to 99 percent will get through this and develop immunities and will be able to move beyond this. But we don’t shut down our economy because tens of thousands of people die on the highways.

Fauci said it was a “false equivalency to compare traffic accidents” to coronavirus and emphasized a drastic response was necessary when a new and dangerously contagious virus was uncovered.

Last Updated: 13:05 Friday, 20 March 2020

29m ago

HERE’S WHAT’S NEW IN IMMIGRATION: PRISCILLA ALVAREZ @ CNN GIVES US A NICE CONCISE LIST OF 12 MAJOR CHANGES BROUGHT ABOUT BY CORONAVIRUS!

https://apple.news/ACTEYnrSLRfWcWwTWOOBfyQ

Priscilla writes:

As the United States responds to the coronavirus pandemic, the Trump administration has made sweeping changes to the country’s immigration apparatus, altering daily operations and disrupting the lives of thousands.

In a little over a week, there have been a dozen changes, ranging from postponing immigration hearings to pausing deportation flights to certain countries and suspending refugee admissions. The tweaks to the system are being made incrementally, though rapidly, as the pandemic spreads across the country.

Against the backdrop of the coronavirus outbreak, the Trump administration is also trying to move forward with some of its most restrictionist policies that have struggled to be put into practice, including blocking entry to asylum seekers.

President Donald Trump confirmed he’s planning to bar entry to migrants during a White House briefing Wednesday. “The answer’s yes,” Trump said when asked if he was planning to take that step, which he said would come “very soon,” adding, “Probably today.”

Below is a list of the changes to the immigration system over recent days:

. . . .

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

Read the complete article with Priscilla’s list at the link.

What if our “immigration bureaucracy” provided information in such a clear and timely manner as Priscilla? Thanks, Priscilla for your constant excellent reporting and for all you do for our society. Truly, one of many “heroes” out there!

PWS

03-19-20

Related posts:

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Due Process Forever! Political “Courts” Endangering Public Welfare & Safety, Never!

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DUE PROCESS FOREVER! THE NEW AMERICAN GULAG (NAG) NEVER! HATS OFF THE ELIZABETH, HER AMAZING TEAM, LAURA, & THE MANY OTHER HEROES OF THE NDPA!

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Stay well, and Due Process Forever!

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“Vote ‘Em Out”

By Willie Nelson

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

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

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

Related posts:

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Due Process Forever. Dysfunctional Courts That Endanger The Public, Never!

🤡☠️

“The cells stink. The toilets don’t flush. There’s never enough soap. They give out soap once a week. One bar of soap a week. How does that make any sense?”

Related posts:

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Due Process Forever! The New American Gulag Never!

UPDATE: FROM IMMPROF: U.S. Court in Seattle stuffs ACLU’s bid to spring vulnerable migrants from Gulag!

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“Four Clowns” for you, Ronnie!🤡🤡🤡🤡

Vote ‘Em Out!

UPDATE FROM THE GUARDIAN: FAUCI RIPS JOHNSON FOR DANGEROUS STUPIDITY:

Related posts:

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

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

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