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🇺🇸⚖️🗽 “REVISITED: U.S. Immigration & Asylum Policies In The Twilight Of The Biden Administration”

In September 2024, I was invited to address a group of prospective social workers on immigration policy in the Biden Administration. They had read my previous published article “An Overview and Critique of US Immigration and Asylum Policies In The Trump Era” (2018). They requested an “update” on that article to cover significant developments during the Biden Administration.

While, obviously, things have changed since the election, I believe this speech still has relevance. Therefore, I publish it in a revised and updated version.

REVISITED VERSION 3

REVISITED: U.S. Immigration & Asylum Policies In The Twilight Of The Biden Administration

Originally Delivered in September 2024

Edited and Revised, Nov. 4, 2024

By Paul Wickham Schmidt

I call on you to join our NDPA, use your skills, commitment, and power to resist the haters, oppose the wobbly enablers, expose political bullies who trade away lives and rights that aren’t theirs, and fight to finally deliver on our nation’s yet-unfulfilled promise of due process, fundamental fairness, and equal justice for all in America!

INTRODUCTION

Good evening, and thanks for inviting me. Please listen very carefully to the following important announcement.

In the next hour, you will hear no party line, no bureaucratic doublespeak, no sugar coating, no BS, or other such nonsense. Just the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, of course as I define truth and see it through the lens of my five decades of work with and in the American immigration system.

The views expressed herein are mine, and mine alone. They also do not represent the position of any group, organization, individual, or other entity with which I am presently associated, have associated with in the past, or might become associated with in the future.

But, that’s not all folks! Because today is Wednesday and you are such a wonderful audience, I give you my famous, “industry best,” absolute, unconditional, money back guarantee that the following presentation will be free of power points, split screens, and all other forms of distracting modern technology that might interfere with your comprehension and total listening enjoyment. For the next hour, I will be your “power point.”

Congratulations and my deep appreciation for your noble choice of social work as a career. Your skills and talents are desperately needed in our society. As you might imagine, as an Immigration Judge I heard and relied upon expert testimony from professional social workers, among others.

I am also well aware of the important behind the scenes efforts of social workers to get individuals and families beyond their often-traumatic situations here and abroad, to adjust to and be able to function in our society, and thereby to have the confidence and devote the necessary attention to working with their legal representatives to present the best cases possible in court. As a decision-maker, sound information cogently presented is the key to getting it right and doing justice.

You are fortunate to have some great, inspirational examples to guide you.

Three of my personal heroes come to mind. First, Aimee Miller who owns and operates a group practice called Interconnect: Counseling and Consulting, LLC, dedicated to conducting psychosocial and mental health evaluations and providing expert testimony and reports for immigration proceedings. She also teaches at the University of Michigan, School of Social Work.

My friend Joan Hodges Wu, a licensed social worker, is the founder and CEO of AsylumWorks in Washington, D.C. Her organization is devoted to helping newly arrived asylum seekers and their families navigate the legal, language, employment, educational, and other potential hurdles of adjusting to a new life while facing the uncertainties of the future.

Another friend, Hanna Cartwright, received dual degrees in social work and law from Catholic University in D.C. She was an intern at the “Legacy” Arlington Immigration Court and a “charter member” of what I call the “New Due Process Army,” or “NDPA.” This is a group of outstanding professionals, many of them former students of mine at Georgetown Law, interns, and judicial law clerks at the Arlington Court, who are committed to social justice and “fighting the good fight” to force our nation to deliver on its promise of due process for immigrants. Hannah has had a varied career and has risen to become the co-founder and Director of Mariposa Legal in Indianapolis, Indiana.

Additionally, I am proud to be on the Advisory Council of
AYUDA, a community group serving the needs of asylum seekers and other immigrants in the D.C. metro area. AYUDA attorneys appeared before me pro bono when I was on the bench. Social work is one of the major service divisions of AYUDA, in addition to legal and language services.

These are all great and inspiring examples of individuals and organizations that “put it all on the line,” every day, to make their communities, America, and the world better places. And certainly, as you will find, there are many more of these throughout America.

I recently read an article in the Washington Post about the struggles and divisions in a small community in Massachusetts with resettling, on a temporary basis, a limited number of pregnant women, children, and families. Most of those at issue are recent arrivals to the U.S., many camping in a concourse at Logan Airport for weeks or even months. ^[1]

We need better resettlement programs. For some inexplicable reason, the Biden Administration thought that it would be a good idea to essentially “outsource” resettlement to restrictionist GOP governors like Abbott and DeSantis. They, in turn, bussed, or in some cases even flew, recently-arrived asylum seekers to locations in so-called “blue states,” where they believed they would overload local resources and cause problems, thereby inflaming xenophobic resentment.

Instead of such inexcusable nonsense, we need asylum resettlement programs that are “dressed for success” – some type of “national clearing house” to match asylees in an orderly fashion with locations across the U.S. where their skills are needed and they would be welcomed. Then, these communities and the asylum seekers must have support services to insure a mutually beneficial transition and reduce misunderstandings and resentments on both parts.

These organized programs should concentrate on preparing, supporting, informing, educating, and communicating with communities and migrants, requirements that are often overlooked or inadequate today. Change is an inevitable part of life, but that doesn’t mean everybody will like or accept it. We need better ways of “getting over the hump together.”

Tragically, neither political party appears interested in investing in the successful resettlement efforts that will benefit our nation and those seeking refuge through asylum. Therefore, it is likely to fall to the private/NGO sector to “model success” and innovative thinking. Certainly, social work services are an important part of this multi-disciplinary approach.

Now, to the main part of my presentation. You have read my 2019 article “An Overview and Critique of US Immigration and Asylum Policies in the Trump Era.” You have asked me to update you on the current status of the four “membership categories” that I posited in that article: full members; associate members, friends, and outcasts. So, here goes.

FULL MEMBERS

With respect to full members, essentially U.S. citizens, I’m pleased to report that naturalizations are up under the Biden Administration. As of this summer, more than 3.3 million new citizens had been naturalized as opposed to a little under 3 million during the entire Trump Administration. ^[2]

I think this is the result of ending the misallocation of resources and intimidation tactics used by the bureaucracy under Trump to discourage naturalization. The end of COVID also played a role. Plus, the Trump Administration’s message of hate, lies, and overt xenophobia probably convinced many lawful permanent residents that they would be safer with the protections of U.S. citizenship and the ability to vote on their political leaders.

Of course, you have probably heard of Trump’s outrageous threat to mess with birthright citizenship under the 14^th Amendment. Since this is a constitutional right, it legally can’t be abridged by either executive action or legislation. The intent here appears to be to harass, dehumanize, and spread fear among our ethic communities and to basically cast doubt on the status of many loyal Americans, mostly of color, who obtained citizenship in this manner notwithstanding the immigration status of their parents.

ASSOCIATE MEMBERS

Turning to “associate members,” basically green card holders, refugees, and asylees, admissions and adjustments to lawful permanent residence are up. Again, this probably stems largely from the end of COVID and the elimination of some bureaucratic hurdles, as well as some efforts to address backlogs at USCIS.

There has been a significant improvement and revival of U.S. overseas refugee programs. They are now on target to exceed 100,000 refugee admissions, although probably falling a bit short of the 125,000 announced target number. Compare that with the paltry fewer than 12,000 admissions in the final fiscal year of the Trump Administration.^[3]

Still, refugee programs are underutilized and not targeting all our real needs. For example, while the Administration has significantly improved refugee admissions from Latin America and the Caribbean, they are still well below the number necessary to meet actual demand. Of the top five refugee admission countries, DRC, Syria, Afghanistan, Burma, and Guatemala, only the latter is in the Western Hemisphere.

Worse yet, has been the cowardly bipartisan attack on our legal asylum system at the Southern Border. This culminated in some of the most draconian anti-asylum executive actions ever in relatively recent regulations issued over the strenuous, well-founded objections of experts, advocates, and NGOs with actual experience in the plight of asylum seekers.

Disgracefully, the Biden Administration is considering extending these legally questionable provisions, now under attack in litigation. At the same time, V.P. Harris has pledged that if elected she would attempt to resurrect a horrible, anti-asylum “Bipartisan Border Bill” aimed at accomplishing much of the same damage. For his part, Trump has long demeaned and dehumanized legal asylum seekers and would happily seek to eliminate or further restrict their admission.

Neither party seems interested in “doing the right, and obvious, thing” – building an asylum screening and adjudication system that actually works in a fair, generous, and timely manner. The Executive Office for Immigration Review (“EOIR”), an agency of the USDOJ that contains the Immigration Courts, where I once worked, is a particularly dysfunctional mess, with out-of-control backlogs burgeoning to nearly 4 million cases. It also produces wildly inconsistent results with asylum grant rates ranging from approximately 0% to 100% among nearly 700 Immigration Judges.

Essentially, both parties seek to improperly punish and demean legal asylum seekers for their bipartisan failure to fix the asylum adjudication system across more than two decades. That’s what “bipartisanship” has come to mean in immigration: Basically, a race to the bottom to find the lowest common denominator!

FRIENDS

With respect to so called-friends, those with limited permission to be here, but no clear path to permanent residence or citizenship, nonimmigrant visas have rebounded with the lifting of COVID restrictions.

However, so-called “Dreamers” remain in limbo. There is no foreseeable prospect for legislative relief and a “red-state” challenge to the legality of their DACA status is in the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, likely headed for the Supremes.

The Biden Administration used executive actions to create some new “legal pathways” programs allowing up to 30,000 per month pre-screened individuals with U.S. sponsors to be “paroled” into the U.S. for an initial two-year period. This program has proved somewhat successful in reducing pressure at the Southern Border.

However, it is limited to nationals of Cuba, Haiti, Venezuela, and Nicaragua. That plus the numerical limitations diminish its ameliorative effect. In addition, the program had to be temporarily paused to look into allegations of sponsorship fraud.

Moreover, unlike those admitted in refugee or asylum status, those paroled have no statutory path to green cards and eventual U.S. citizenship. They would need special legislation to gain lawful permanent status.

But, given strong GOP opposition to these humanitarian programs, these individuals are likely to remain in “limbo,” and become “political footballs” subject to the whims of the next Administration. Many have been, or will be, forced into the already backlogged asylum adjudication system, thereby defeating part of the original purpose of these parole programs.^[4]

Remarkably, the Administration also chose to use parole, rather than the refugee system, to allow large numbers of our Afghan allies to come to the United States following the Taliban takeover. These also remain in limbo, in the absence of a legislative path to permanent status.

Unlike Trump, who tried to restrict and eliminate so-called
Temporary Protected Status, or “TPS” wherever possible, the Biden Administration has made relatively robust use of TPS. The Administration has also made some improvements in the timely issuance and renewal of important “Employment Authorization Documents” (“EADs”) for those awaiting adjudication of applications filed with USCIS and EOIR.

OUTCASTS

With respect to those “outcasts” who don’t fit within any of the three foregoing categories, sometimes called “undocumented,” their numbers are probably around 10 to 12 million. ^[5]It is certainly not the bogus 20 million figure that GOP politicos and the right-wing media like to throw around. It’s also unclear to me whether this figure subsumes the many asylum applicants who actually are neither “undocumented” nor “illegal,” but here with Government permission to pursue their legal asylum applications before the USCIS Asylum Office and/or EOIR.

The Biden Administration tried to help noncitizen spouses and stepchildren of USCs regularize their status with a widely-hailed practical, humanitarian program called “Parole in Place” (“PIP”). However, perhaps predictably, a Trump-appointed Federal Judge blocked the PIP Program, at least temporarily. He acted at the request of “red states” with anti-immigrant agendas. So, while PIP registrations are still taking place, the fate of the program is unclear at this juncture.

Perhaps, worst of all, as I mentioned earlier, the Immigration Courts remain a dismal mess, with nearly 4 million case backlog that has grown exponentially under A.G. Garland. Instead of fixing EOIR and standing up for the legal and human rights of asylum seekers, Garland has instituted “built to fail” gimmicks like “expedited dockets” and approved regulations barring most asylum claims at southern border in violation of the statutory right, not to mention human right, to seek asylum “regardless of status.”

NGOs, practical experts, and advocates who, unlike Garland and his lieutenants, actually work with asylum seekers at the border and elsewhere, have documented how these tone-deaf policies increase deaths and abuses of asylum seekers in Mexico and beyond. However, truth has been to no avail in this appalling situation. I’d argue that most of the Administration’s misguided “maximum enforcement/no due process” at the border has been in response to their abject failure to bring long-overdue reforms to EOIR and the AO. They now seek to “cover-up” this massive failure by scheming to avoid the system entirely, rather than fixing it.

Trump outrageously threatens mass deportations. These would not only violate laws guaranteeing due process, but also sow fear and terror in many ethnic communities, which is, of course, the real point of such threats: essentially “dehumanization” or “de-personification” of wide swarths of our society going far beyond immigrants. At the same time, he would waste money, misdirect law enforcement resources, and likely tank our economy, which depends heavily on the labor of immigrants, both legal and undocumented. Not a pretty picture.

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, the Biden Administration has been a “mixed bag” on immigration, human rights, civil rights, and the rule of law. Basically, it has been “one step forward, and two steps back.”

A number of the Administration’s ameliorative programs for immigrants, like retention of DACA, humanitarian parole, increased refugee admissions, and “Parole in Place” have been too timid, limited, or blocked by restrictionist litigation.

On the other hand, bad border policies and largely ignoring the due process crisis in the Immigration Courts have undermined the rule of law, promoted the “bipartisan demonization and dehumanization of asylum seekers and other migrants at the border,” squandered scarce resources in the private/NGO sector, and wrecked death, despair, and untold misery on some of our most vulnerable fellow humans.

In extremely unfortunate ways, we are now replicating the very pre-1980 programs and disorganized, ad hoc, often-biased approaches that the Refugee Act of 1980 and the creation of EOIR were intended to solve.

Refugee provisions are avoided when dealing with so-called “emergencies,” leading to the mass parole of Afghans, limbo status, and the need for Congressional action for permanent status. Asylum determinations are basically reverting to ad hoc, often arbitrary and capricious, decisions that favor some nationalities and ethnicities over others based on US internal politics and foreign policy concerns. Humanitarian parole programs, while potentially a step in the right direction, deny individuals the stability and clear route to green cards and citizenship as well as some of the protections that come with refugee, asylum, and other types of legal admissions. It also makes them “political footballs” for the restrictionist right.

Making EOIR an independent entity within DOJ, back in 1983, a process I was involved in, was supposed to advance quasi-judicial independence and professionalism. Instead, after decades of bipartisan misdirection and mismanagement, the Immigration Courts have essentially resumed some of their pre-EOIR characteristics of being perceived, and often acting, as politicized arms of DHS enforcement, too often lacking professionalism, expertise, consistency, practical problem-solving abilities, and compassion.

I recently posted on Linkedin an article by Eduardo Porter that summarized the current gloomy and disturbing state of our national non-debate on immigration:

Consider immigration, the epicenter of zero-sum thinking in voters’ minds. It’s an issue that is critical to the United States’ future and a topic that is easily demagogued as a struggle between endangered Americans and some predatory “other.” Harris, like Biden, has worked to distance herself from Trump’s most implausible ideas (such as expelling 11 million people). Still, she leads a Democratic Party that believes one of its paramount challenges is stopping immigrants from coming to the United States.
^[6]

That’s a rather sad, yet fundamentally true, commentary on how our nation of immigrants now thinks and acts. The GOP demonizes, dehumanizes, and lies about immigrants; the Dems roll over and want to change the subject. As you witnessed in the Presidential “debate,” actually more of an exercise in “performative entertainment” than a serious discussion of issues, we don’t know November’s winners, but we already know the losers: Immigrants, due process, and social justice advocates.

Few, if any, politicos on the national level have the moral courage and clear vision to mount a well-justified, evidence-based defense of asylum seekers and other migrants. Likewise, few of them advocate for investing in achievable improvements in the system. Instead, they seek partisan political advantage, on the backs of the desperate and disenfranchised, by eagerly and cynically pouring money and manpower into cruel, ultimately ineffective, enforcement and “deterrence” gimmicks.

The latter, not incidentally, have spawned a highly profitable and politically potent industry that benefits from every deadly, failed border deterrence “enhancement.” No wonder positive change and creative problem solving are so elusive, and so many of our politicos lack the guts effectively to protect immigrants’ lives, human dignity, and rights at the border and beyond!

More than 50 years of experience working in our immigration systems, at different levels, and from many angles, tell me the following inalienable truths:

Human migration is real;
Forced migration is exactly that;
It won’t be stopped by walls, prisons, deterrents, or other cruelty;
Asylum is a human and legal right;
Immigrants are good for America; and
Due process for all persons in the U.S. is essential.

My time on the stage is winding down. But, yours, my friends, is just beginning. I call on you to join our NDPA, use your skills, commitment, and power to resist the haters, oppose the wobbly enablers, expose political bullies who trade away lives and rights that aren’t theirs, and fight to finally deliver on our nation’s yet-unfulfilled promise of due process, fundamental fairness, and equal justice for all in America!

Thank you for listening, and due process forever!

(11-04-24)

^[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/interactive/2024/migrant-shelter-norfolk-massachusetts-immigration-debate/.

^[2] https://truthout.org/articles/trump-backlogged-citizenship-process-biden-has-halved-the-time-it-takes/

^[3] https://www.wrapsnet.org/admissions-and-arrivals/

^[4] Indeed, after this speech was delivered, but before the election, the Biden Administration announced plans to abandon more than 530,000 individuals paroled into the U.S. under these “lawful pathways” programs. Upon expiration of their current parole, they will be forced to either leave the U.S. or apply for some type of relief, the primary one being the asylum adjudication system which is already absurdly backlogged. https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://www.nyic.org/2024/10/advocates-outraged-by-president-bidens-refusal-to-extend-humanitarian-parole-for-immigrants-in-the-u-s/&ved=2ahUKEwjdx-jssoyKAxU-F1kFHd_XGCYQFnoECB4QAQ&usg=AOvVaw1D3gxxQl0uOawGZ7HkwLBT

^[5] https://ssri.psu.edu/news/mpi-issues-latest-estimates-size-and-origins-us-unauthorized-immigrant-population

^[6] https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/09/03/politics-trump-biden-trade-immigration/

🇺🇸⚖️🗽🎖️🙏🏽 THANK YOU PROFESSOR STEPHEN YALE-LOEHR: MY LETTER TO A FRIEND & AMAZING “PRACTICAL SCHOLAR” ON THE OCCASION OF HIS RETIREMENT FROM TEACHING!

Dear Steve:

Congratulations again and my utmost appreciation for your absolutely stellar, four-decade, high-impact career in applied scholarship on immigration, human rights, and justice in America. Your influence, which I trust will continue unabated into retirement, has been a huge positive for our nation and our world.

As I previously mentioned, I am sorry that I will be unable because of previous commitments to celebrate in person or online with you and your many admirers at Cornell Law on November 8. But, I know it will be a “love-fest” whether in the form of “roast” or “conferring of regalia!”

You are the epitome of what I have termed the “practical scholar” — someone who uses creativity, extraordinary learning, and masterful command of a complex subject to solve problems, achieve actual results in the real world, inspire others, and produce positive trends. I have truly treasured our friendship and association going back over four decades to your time at Interpreter Releases, Immigration Briefings, and Federal Publications. We, of course, shared the mentorship of the late, great former BIA Chair and Editor of Interpreter Releases Maury Roberts, the friendship and professional association with the late Juan Osuna who played a major role in our respective careers, as well as our mutual association with Sue Siler who worked with me during my “Jones Day era.”

I assume that you recollect helping and encouraging me to set a “footnote record” with my article on employer sanctions for Immigration Briefings as well as our work together on some updates for your treatise Immigration Law & Procedure, and the now long in the past Federal Publications “holiday bashes” for authors and editors!

Our friendship and association continued beyond my “private practice phase” into my tenure as BIA Chair and then into my “next chapter” at the “Legacy Arlington Immigration Court.” Following my retirement, I was delighted to accept your kind invitation to be part of the Berger International Programs Lecture Series at Cornell Law in March 2017. We also had a chance to strategize and talk about”applied law” with your wonderful Clinic students who were engaged in some really challenging and important cases!

Professors Jaclyn Kelley-Widmer & Steve Yale Loehr show off their “no ties look” at Cornell Law, March 2017.

I also appreciated having a chance to see your spectacular campus and to chat with you informally over meals. Your book “Green Card Stories,” which you “gifted” to me at the time, eventually because one of the sources and inspirations for an adult enrichment class on a cultural anthropological and legal approach to American immigration history that I co-taught with my friend and colleague Dr. Jennifer Esperanza at Lawrence University’s Bjorklunden Seminars.

No, it’s not the Tower of London, but the “Tower of Law” @ Cornell (not to be confused with the “Falls Church Tower”).
March 2017

Of course in addition to your many scholarly publications and Clinic successes, you have been a tireless presenter and public voice for truth, accuracy, scholarship, and humane solutions to thorny immigration and human rights issues at a time when myths, disinformation, and fear about these topics scandalously have become “normalized” in our political and media discourse. Indeed, I have “featured” your activities, including your heartfelt tribute to Juan Osuna, on my blog immigrationcourtside.com no less than 45 times (and I probably missed a couple)! I also greatly admire and appreciate you and others having the guts and integrity to “speak truth to power and set the record straight” even when powerful currents are pushing in the opposite direction.

Recently, I was happy to be able to share an evening with you and Amy during the DC Tribute Dinner for our mutual friend and inspiration Doris Meissner. I will also take full credit for shaming you into wearing a coat and tie to the function. After all, somebody has to maintain standards among the ranks of the New Due Process Army (“NDPA”).

In closing, thank thank you again, Steve, for your more than four decades of friendship, support, encouragement, scholarship, and unswerving commitment to using law as a tool for humane practices, due process, inspiring the younger generations, and overall making our nation and our world a better place! I wish you, Amy, and your family all the best in retirement and look forward to many years of continuing association in the cause of justice.

Congratulations again, due process forever, and best wishes, always,

Paul

🇺🇸⚖️⚔️🛡 OUR ROUND TABLE MAKES A DIFFERENCE WELL BEYOND LITIGATION: Practical, experienced, committed, generous former jurists continue to inspire the next generation of great NDPA lawyers and human rights advocates!😎👍

Powerful Force of Nature" — With lots of help from our friends, the Round Table has become a “Powerful Force of Nature,” carving out a spot for due process even along the most wild and rugged coasts!
PHOTO: PWS Maine Collection

“Our Fearless Leader,” Hon. Jeffrey S. Chase
Jeffrey S. Chase Blog
Coordinator & Chief Spokesperson, Round Table of Former Immigration Judges

“Sir Jeffrey” Chase forwarded this note of appreciation from one of the all-star advocates who represented The Round Table in drafting an amicus brief:

You, Paul and the Roundtable played a central role in this decision. Beyond the persuasive amicus brief, your group—along with . . . . —gave me the confidence to pursue the due process claim . . . . Your advocacy is admirable and much needed; it also has an impact beyond just the individual cases you support as an amicus. . . . . [T]his case has been one of the most impressive collaborative efforts I’ve had the opportunity to be involved with [in my decade of professional experience.] Thank you again for your interest and support of this important case, as well as your work in this space more broadly.

This is also a great space to once again thank all of the top flight legal talent, law firms, NGOs, and legal clinics that have donated their time and talents pro bono to the cause of due process, equal justice for all, and advancing best practices. Indeed, you have “given us a voice” — one that has proved to have an outsized impact on our American justice system.

Working with our wonderful “partners in due process and professional excellence” has been a total joy and fulfilling career opportunity for each of us! We never, ever forget what we owe to your skill and generous donation of time, resources, and effort. Just as we are committed to insuring that all individuals appearing in Immigration Court — the essential “retail level” of our justice system — have a right to be heard, YOU have insured that WE will be heard — loudly and clearly for a long time to come! Thank you again from the bottom. of our “collective hearts!”💕

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!⚖️🗽

PWS😎

10/30./24

🍁🍂🌅 STEP INTO FALL WITH PHOTOS FROM “SIR JEFFREY” CHASE & ME!

“Sir Jeffrey” from NYC:

PWS from Boothbay Harbor, ME (Linekin Bay Side):

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

DPF!

PWS

10-25-24

📰 SPECIAL EDITION: D.C. PREMIERE OF “THE COURTROOM” HEADLINES AYUDA/GEORGETOWN FUND RAISER AT NEW McCOURT SCHOOL OF PUBLIC POLICY!

Here’s a report on the night’s activities from AYUDAS’s amazing Executive Director Paula Fitzgerald:

Dear Friends,

I hope you enjoyed our screening of The Courtroom as much as I did. The panel discussion connected us back to Ayuda’s mission and the greatest challenges our clients face as they navigate the legal system in an unfamiliar language.

I want to give a big thanks some special supporters who make this evening possible:

A special thank you to Georgetown University’s Community Engagement Manager and Ayuda’s Advisory Board Member, Erick Castro, for coordinating this reception and film screening, as well as Georgetown University for hosting this event in their new Capitol Campus building.

We’re honored to have had Waterwell Productions with us, specifically Co-Founder & Board Chair Arian Moayed and Managing Director Sarah Scafidi. Thank you for sharing this powerful story with Ayuda’s community.

Thank you to the Honorable Paul Schmidt for helping us bring The Courtroom to DC and sharing your connection to the film.

A moment of appreciation for our stellar panelists, Edgar and Marilyn, and wonderful moderator, Sandra. Thank you all for closing out the evening with an engaging conversation.

A warm round of applause to each of you for joining us. It was truly a delightful evening and I’m so glad to have had the opportunity to connect with many of you.

Are you interested in learning more about Ayuda’s advocacy program? Email us at advocacy@ayuda.com. Are you interested in volunteering? Check out our volunteer portal for current opportunities. Are you interested in making a gift to support Ayuda’s mission? Visit our website or email us atdevelopment@ayuda.com.

AYUDA/GEORGETOWN “THE COURTROOM”

Warm regards,

Paula Fitzgerald

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

Here’s the text of my opening remarks:

**Ayuda’s Film Screening of The Courtroom – Opening Remarks by Paul Wickham Schmidt**

Georgetown University, McCourt School of Public Policy

September 18, 2024

Good evening and welcome everyone! Thanks for coming out to support Georgetown’s partnership with Ayuda.

My name is Paul Wickham Schmidt, and I’ve been given the privilege to introduce this powerful film, The Courtroom. Before I introduce a special guest, who is no stranger to the film and silver screen, I would like to share why this story is so important to me. My experience has landed me in an interesting corner of many of tonight’s themes and key players in making this event possible.

I was appointed as a federal immigration judge and served for 21 years, at both the trial and appellate levels. During my time as an adjunct professor at Georgetown Law, I’ve written extensively about immigration law. And, I’m currently a proud Advisory Board member for Ayuda, an organization that I truly care about and has deep roots in this community.

In fact, Ayuda helped all of us during my tenure in the “Legacy” Arlington Immigration Court with their superior pro bono representation. You will witness this evening the critical, life-saving and future-determining, role played by great legal representation in Immigration Court.

And, if you don’t already know, you will be astounded to learn that in Immigration Court individuals, including infants and toddlers, face trial for their lives without the right to appointed counsel! I want you to imagine how this case might have come out if this individual had been required to represent herself throughout her various legal proceedings. Yet, that is the predicament in which far, far too many individuals now find themselves.

I just read a TRAC Syracuse report that fewer than 15% of those ordered deported in Immigration Court in August 2024 were represented. I find that appalling! It’s actually a regressive trend since I left the bench. That’s why the role played by organizations like Ayuda and the teaching function of the CALS Asylum Clinic here at Georgetown Law are so completely essential to American Justice at what I call the “retail level.”

Now, I’m not here to read my resume. Instead, I will share why The Courtroom holds so much significance for us. The late film critic Roger Ebert once said, “the movies are like a machine that generates empathy.” The classic legal dramas like “12 Angry Men,” or “To Kill A Mockingbird,” for example, give us great insight into the devastating experience of being tried for a crime one did not commit.

But never had I seen a filmmaker put the empathy machine to work in Immigration Court. That is, until I learned about The Courtroom from my friend and colleague retired Immigration Judge Jeffrey S. Chase of New York. He actually served as an informal advisor on the production and played an important “cameo role” in the earlier award-winning stage versions of The Courtroom, as did other of our retired judicial colleagues.

Many of us will be fortunate enough never to have to endure a removal proceeding as a subject ourselves. We will never understand what it’s like to face the fear of being separated from our children, our families, our jobs, and our communities: In the words of the Supreme Court “all that makes life worth living!” (Ng Fung Ho v. White | 259 U.S. 276 (1922)).

The film you’re about to watch tells one woman’s story confronting these terrors, with the utmost compassion. The “script” is a verbatim transcript of an actual immigration case, brought to life by the great actors, directors, and producers at Waterwell.

When the credits roll, I hope you’ll remember that The Courtroom is much more than a story. It’s real-life drama, “living theater” as I used to describe it to my Georgetown Law students – and right now, more than 3 million immigrants undergoing deportation proceedings are living it, along with their families, friends, co-workers, and other community members whom they interact with on a daily basis.

It’s with great honor that I get the opportunity to introduce our next speaker. He’s an actor, director, and the screenplay writer of our feature presentation. He has received two Tony Award nominations and two Primetime Emmy Award nominations, and you might recognize him from Marvel Cinematic Universe. Please give a warm round of applause for Waterwell Co-Founder, Arian Moayed!

Arian, I really, really appreciate your taking time out of your hectic schedule to be with us tonight for this important D.C. Area premiere!

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

Due Process Forever!😎

PWS

09-19-24

😎 COURTSIDE ON SABBATICAL — After 7 1/2 Years, It’s Time! 🏜️

Sabbitical — Gone on sabbatical
IMAGE: Public Realm

Well, friends, since “inception” on December 22, 2016:

Neatly 7 1/2 years elapsed;
Three different Administrations;
5,526 posts (including this one);
1,152 comments;
43 “Pages;”
403 subscribers;
Over 1,000,000 “views” (estimated);
More than 140,400 “blocks” by my hard-working “spam catcher!”

It’s time for me to take a break from Courtside to “rest, refresh, and refocus” as they say in the “sabbatical business.” After all, I’ve been “retired” since June 30, 2016, going on eight years!

To mark the occasion, here’s a “reprint” of one of my favorites from that first month, December 2016:

Family Detention, Raids, Expediting Cases Fail To Deter Scared Central Americans!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/central-americans-continue-to-surge-across-us-border-new-dhs-figures-show/2016/12/30/ed28c0aa-cec7-11e6-b8a2-8c2a61b0436f_story.html?utm_term=.077ef694fd73

“Immigration advocates have repeatedly criticized the Obama administration for its increased reliance on detention facilities, particularly for Central American families, who they argue should be treated as refugees fleeing violent home countries rather than as priorities for deportation.

They also say that the growing number of apprehended migrants on the border, as reflected in the new Homeland Security figures, indicate that home raids and detentions of families from Central America isn’t working as a deterrent.”

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The “enforcement only” approach to forced migration from Central America has been an extraordinarily expensive total failure. But, the misguided attempt to “prioritize” cases of families seeking refuge from violence has been a major contributing factor in creating docket disfunction (“Aimless Docket Reshuffling”) in the United States Immigration Courts.

And, as a result, cases ready for trial that should have been heard as scheduled in Immigration Court have been “orbited” to the end of the docket where it is doubtful they ever will be reached. When political officials, who don’t understand the Immigration Court and are not committed to its due process mission, order the rearrangement of existing dockets without input from the trial judges, lawyers, court administrators, and members of the public who are most affected, only bad things can happen. And, they have!

PWS

12/31/16

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

True today as it was then!

🇺🇸 Thanks for reading and engaging, best wishes and, of course, “Due Process Forever!”

😎PWS🏜️🌄🌅🖼️

05-31-24

🇺🇸🗽IMMIGRATION HISTORY: CATHERINE E. SOICHET @ CNN: Looking Back At The Bracero Program: “Legalized Slavery!”

CATHERINE E. SHOICHET — Catherine E. Shoichet
Senior Writer
CNN
PHOTO: CNN

Catherine writes:

https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/21/travel/braceros-landmark-texas-rio-vista-cec?cid=ios_app

(CNN) — Some of Sebastian Corral’s memories have faded. But the 91-year-old remembers his 1953 arrival in the US as if it were yesterday.

How workers like him were forced to strip naked and sprayed with insecticide.

How their hands were inspected to make sure they were qualified for the hard labor that awaited them.

How unwelcome he and so many others felt even though they’d been invited across the border by the US government.

“You felt humiliated. You felt like you were nothing, even though you’d come to work and lift yourself up,” Corral told CNN in a recent interview via Zoom from his home in Vado, New Mexico.

Memories of those first moments in America came rushing back for Corral this month during a dramatically different visit to the place where he took his first steps in the country more than 70 years ago.

This time, officials were unveiling plaques designating the former Rio Vista Bracero Reception Center in Socorro, Texas, as a National Historic Landmark. And Corral was a guest of honor.

. . . .

Today, he describes the long journey that began at Rio Vista with pride:

“I came as a bracero. After being a bracero, then I was illegal for some years. After being illegal, then I was a permanent resident. Now I am a citizen.”

In some ways, Rio Vista wasn’t like Corral remembered when he returned this month. The buildings were more worn-down — some “pure ruins,” Corral says. But what Corral noticed most wasn’t the buildings; it was how differently he felt being there.

“I was not the same person as before,” he says.

So much had changed since those first days when he was a young man waiting for a rancher to arrive at Rio Vista with work.

He’d harvested cotton, and driven tractors, and picked beets and cucumbers as a bracero. He’d lived in New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming and Texas during his years in the program. Once, an El Paso restaurant had refused to serve him because he was Mexican. He’d been an undocumented immigrant for decades. He’d washed dishes and prepped food in a Los Angeles restaurant. He’d worked at dairy farms in California. He’d become a legal resident after President Reagan signed a law granting him and millions of others amnesty. He’d finally brought his wife and children to the US after years of separation. He’d saved enough money to buy land for all of them to build homes nearby. He’d had 14 grandchildren and 17 great-grandchildren.

And just two years ago, he’d finally become a US citizen after decades of knowing he was American, nearly 70 years after his first arrival in the United States.

All of this went through Corral’s mind as he revisited Rio Vista on May 11. And in the mix of emotions that hit him, he felt anger at some points, but also, contentment.

Some of the buildings around him were in ruins as they awaited renovation. But Corral was standing in the Rio Vista courtyard with generations of his family beside him.

And he saw something else: the life that he built.

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

Read the complete story at the link.

The thing that stands out time after time: The strength, character, and triumph of individual immigrants over laws and actions often intended to exploit, dehumanize, and/or discourage them!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

05-29-24

😎 👍 OPTIMISTIC LIFE, POSITIVE LEGACY: R.I.P. BILL WALTON (1952-2024) — Hoops Superstar,🏀 Memorable Announcer, 🎤Grateful Dead Fan, ☠️ All-Around Good Guy 🤣Succumbs To Cancer at 71, As Well-Earned Tributes Pour In!

From NBA.com:

https://www.nba.com/news/nba-family-pays-tribute-to-bill-walton

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Magic Johnson and more pay tribute to Bill Walton

NBA legends, current players and members of the basketball community react to the Hall of Famer’s death on Monday.

Updated on May 28, 2024 7:45 AM

Bill Walton (1952-2024)

Members of the NBA 75th Anniversary Team took to social media to honor the legendary Bill Walton (left) on Monday.

Hall of Fame center Bill Walton, a two-time champion at UCLA and in the NBA, a former No.1 overall pick, and one of the biggest personalities of the game, died on May 27 after a prolonged battle with cancer. He was 71 years old. Walton played 10 seasons in the NBA with the Portland Trail Blazers, LA Clippers and the Boston Celtics, averaging 13.3 points, 10.5 rebounds and 3.4 assists. He earned Finals MVP after leading the Blazers to the 1977 championship and won another title with the Celtics in 1986. A two-time All-Star, Walton won the league’s Most Valuable Player award in 1978.

Walton retired from the NBA after the 1987-88 season. He turned to broadcasting where he became one of the most entertaining and eccentric color commentators for NCAA and NBA telecasts.

A beloved member of the NBA family, legends, current players and other members of the basketball community took to social media to pay tribute to Walton’s career and his many off-the-court contributions.

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

Walton was a zany presence, but his guts and talent were undeniable. He was one of the dominant college players of my younger days as a fan when UCLA under the legendary coach John Wooden was the undisputed “King of the Court” in NCAA basketball.

You can read the heartfelt tributes from his contemporaries at the above link.

Even in death, Walton leaves a “positive spin” that we’re much in need of these days.

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

05-28-24

🇺🇸🗽🤯 HISTORY: 100 YEARS AGO, AMERICA TRIED, BUT ULTIMATELY FAILED, TO STAY “WHITE & PROTESTANT” WITH THE 1924 IMMIGRATION ACT — Many Were Hurt Or Died From This Bias In The Interim — Now Trump & The Nativist Right Want To Revive One Of The Worst Eras In U.S. History — Will Indifference & Ignorance From Dems & So-Called “Centrists” Let Them Get Away With Turning Back The Clock? ⏰☠️🤮 — Two Renowned Authors Offer A View Of A Biased, Deadly, & Ultimately Highly Counterproductive Past That Still Poisons Our Politics & Threatens Our Future As A Beacon Of Hope! — PLUS: Kowalski & Chase Take On The “False Scholars” 🤮 Who Disingenuously Attempt To “Glorify” Xenophobia & Racism!🤯

1924 Act — The 1924 Immigration Act vilified, dehumanized, and barred many of those immigrants who have made America great, like Italian Americans being demeaned in this cartoon. Yet, some descendants of those unfairly targeted appear oblivious to the mistakes of the past and willing to inflict the same immoral lies, harm, and suffering on today’s migrants.
IMAGE: Public Realm

Eduardo Porter writes in WashPost:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/interactive/2024/immigration-history-race-quota-progress/

“I think that we have sufficient stock in America now for us to shut the door.”

That sounds like Donald Trump, right? Maybe on one of his campaign stops? It certainly fits the mood of the country. This year, immigration became voters’ “most important problem” in Gallup polling for the first time since Central Americans flocked to the border in 2019. More than half of Americans perceive immigrants crossing the border illegally as a “critical threat.”

Yet the sentiment expressed above is almost exactly 100 years old. It was uttered by Sen. Ellison DuRant Smith, a South Carolina Democrat, on April 9, 1924. And it helped set the stage for a historic change in U.S. immigration law, which imposed strict national quotas for newcomers that would shape the United States’ ethnic makeup for decades to come.

. . . .

The renewed backlash against immigration has little to offer the American project, though. Closing the door to new Americans would be hardly desirable, a blow to one of the nation’s greatest sources of dynamism. Raw data confirms how immigrants are adding to the nation’s economic growth, even while helping keep a lid on inflation.

Anyway, that horse left the stable. The United States is full of immigrants from, in Trump’s memorable words, “s—hole countries.” The project to set this in reverse is a fool’s errand. The 1924 Johnson-Reed immigration law might have succeeded in curtailing immigration. But the restrictions did not hold. From Presidents Johnson to Trump, efforts to circle the wagons around some ancestral White American identity failed.

We are extremely lucky it did. Contra Sen. Ellison DuRant Smith’s 100-year old prescriptions, the nation owes what greatness it has to the many different women and men it has drawn from around the world to build their futures. This requires a different conversation — one that doesn’t feature mass expulsions and concentration camps but focuses on constructing a new shared American identity that fits everyone, including the many more immigrants who will arrive from the Global South for years to come.

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

Gordon F. Sander, journalist and historian, also writes in WashPost, perhaps somewhat less optimistically, but with the same historical truth in the face of current political lies and gross misrepresentations:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2024/05/24/johnson-reed-act-immigration-quotas-trump/

. . . .

Johnson and Reed were in a triumphant mood on the eve of their bill’s enactment. “America of the melting pot will no longer be necessary,” Reed wrote in the Times. He remarked on the new law’s impact: “It will mean a more homogenous nation, more self-reliant, more independent and more closely knit by common properties and common faith.”

The law immediately had its intended effect. In 1921, more than 200,000 Italians arrived at Ellis Island. In 1925, following the bill’s enactment, barely 6,000 Italians were permitted entry.

But there were less intended consequences, too, including on U.S. foreign relations. Although Reed insisted there was nothing personal about the act’s exclusion of Japanese people, the Japanese government took strong exception, leading to an increase in tensions between the two countries. There were riots in Tokyo. The road to Pearl Harbor was laid.

During the 1930s, after the eugenics-driven Nazis seized control of Germany, the quotas established by the act helped close the door to European Jews and others fleeing fascism.

At the same time, the law also inspired a small but determined group of opponents led by Rep. Emanuel Celler (D-N.Y.), who were committed to overturning it. Celler’s half-century-long campaign finally paid off in 1965 at the Statue of Liberty when, as Celler looked on, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Immigration and Nationality Act, which ended national origin quotas.

But with anti-immigration sentiment on the rise and quotas once again on the table, it’s clear that a century after its enactment, the ghost of Johnson-Reed isn’t completely gone.

Gordon F. Sander is a journalist and historian based in Riga, Latvia. He is the author of “The Frank Family That Survived: A 20th Century Odyssey” and other books

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

Many thanks to my friend and immigration maven Deb Sanders for alerting me to the Sander article. I strongly urge everyone to read both pieces at the links above.

Perhaps the most poignant comment I’ve received about these articles is from American educator, expert, author, and “practical scholar” Susan Gzesh:

And because of the 1924 Act, my grandparents lost dozens of their siblings, parents, aunts, uncles, nieces, and nephews to the Holocaust in the 1940s because Eastern European Jewish immigration to the US had been cut off. They would have been capable of sponsoring more family to come to the US in the late 1920s and 30s, but there was no quota for them.

I have no words to describe my feelings about so-called experts who would praise the 1924 Act. I know that Asian Americans must feel similarly to my sentiments.

Well said, Susan!

Susan Gzesh
American scholar, educator, expert, author
PHOTO: U. Of Chicago

I’ll leave it at that, for you to ponder the next time you hear Trump, DeSantis, Abbott, and the like fear-monger about the bogus “invasion,” spout “replacement theory,” and extoll the virtues of extralegal cruelties and dehumanization inflicted upon “the other” — typically the most vulnerable who are seeking our legal protection and appealing to our senses of justice and human dignity! And, also you can consider this when the so called “mainstream media” pander to these lies by uncritically presenting them as “the other side,” thereby echoing “alternative facts!”

It’s also worth remembering this when you hear Biden, Harris, Schumer, Murphy, and other weak-kneed Dem politicos who should know better adopt Trumpist White Nationalist proposals and falsely present them as “realistic compromises” — as opposed to what they really are — tragic acts of political and moral cowardice!

Eventually, as both of the above articles point out, America largely persevered and prospered over its demons of racism, anti-Catholicism, and anti-immigrant nationalism. But, it would be wrong to view this “long arc” analysis as “zeroing out” the sins and horrors of our past.

Susan Gzesh’s relatives died, some horribly and painfully, before their time. That can’t be changed by future progress. Nor can the children they might have had or the achievements they never got to make to our nation and the world be resurrected.

As Susan mentions, the 1924 Act also reinforced long-standing racism and xenophobia against Asian Americans that led to the irreversible harm inflicted by the internment of Japanese American citizens, continuing Chinese Exclusion, and a host of state laws targeting the Asian population and making their lives miserable. Belated recognition of the wrongfulness and immorality of these reprehensible laws and actions does nothing for their past victims.

Many Irish, Italian, and other Catholics and their cherished institutions died, lost property, or were permanently displaced by widespread anti-Catholic riots brought on and fanned by the very type of biased and ignorant thinking that undergirded Johnson-Reed. They can’t be brought back to life and their property restored just by a “magic wave of the historical wand.”

U.S. citizens of Mexican-American heritage were deported and dispossessed, some from property their ancestors had owned long before there was even a United States. Apologizing to their descendants and acknowledging our mistakes as a nation won’t eliminate the injustices done them — ones that they took to their graves!

Despite the “lessons of the Holocaust,” America continues to struggle with anti-Semitism and anti-Islamic phobias and indifference to human suffering beyond our borders.

And, of course, the poisonous adverse impacts of slavery on our nation and our African-American compatriots continue to haunt and influence us despite disingenuous claims to the contrary.

My friends immigration experts Dan Kowalski and Hon. Jeffrey Chase also had some “choice words” for the “false scholars” who extol the fabricated “benefits” of White Nationalism and racism embodied in “laws” that contravened the very meaning of “with liberty and justice for all” — something to reflect upon this Memorial Day. See https://dankowalski.substack.com/p/true-colors.

That prompted this response from Susan:

Susan Gzesh

11 hrs ago

Thank you, Dan! In memory of my Gzesh, Wolfson, Kronenberg, and Kissilove relatives who were victims of the Holocaust – after their U.S.-based relatives failed to get visas for them.

I also recently weighed in on the horrors of the 1924 Act in a recent article by Felipe De La Hoz, published in The New Republic: https://immigrationcourtside.com/2024/05/02/🏴☠%EF%B8%8F🤯🤮-a-century-of-progress-arrested-the-1924-immigration-act-rears-its-ugly-nativist-head-again-felipe-de-la-hoz-in-the-new-repub/.

Heed the lessons of history, enshrine tolerance, honor diversity, and “improve on past performance!” We have a choice as to whether or not to repeat the mistakes of the past — to regress to a darker age or move forward to a brighter future for all! Make the right one!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

05-27-24

🇺🇸⚖️🗽 IMMIGRATION GURUS DAN KOWALSKI & PROFESSOR KAREN MUSALO SLAM NYT’S DAVID LEONHARDT’S DANGEROUS☠️, “TONE DEAF,” IRRESPONSIBLE REPACKAGING OF NATIVIST IMMIGRATION LIES & MYTHS!🤯🤮 — Like The Pandering Nativist Politicos He Echoes, Leonhardt Makes Himself Part Of The Problem, While Ignoring The Truth-Based Solutions Offered By Experts!

Dan writes on Substack:

https://dankowalski.substack.com/p/when-journalists-stray

When Journalists Stray Or: Next Time, David Leonhardt, Check With Experts Before Writing About Immigration

DAN KOWALSKI

MAY 23, 2024

Immigration law and policy are very complex, and truly boring for everyone except those who have to deal with them. But we live in an instant gratification, fast food culture. Immigration is a Hot Topic, folks want a Solution Now, so journalists naturally write about it…some better than others.

David Leonhardt, a senior writer at the New York Times, is a smart fellow who has won awards. But his “wheelhouse,” as the kids say, is mostly business and economics. I wish he (and/or his editors…where were they?) had consulted a panel of experts before hitting “send” on this piece.

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Now, I’m not an expert, but I did practice immigration law for almost 40 years, and today my social media feeds and email listservs are burning up with negative reactions to Leonhardt’s piece from true immigration experts.

Responding to every one of the problems in the piece would make this post too long, and would put you to sleep rather quickly, so I’ll touch on just a few highlights that really chapped my professional hide.

First, Leonhardt said, “Biden … changed the definition of asylum to include fear of gang violence.” That is simply false. The definition of who qualifies for asylum is based on the “refugee” definition, is fixed by statute, and only Congress can change that. Congress did NOT make any such change, and neither Biden nor any president could. Fear of gang violence as a basis for an asylum claim is a continuing subject of litigation at the Board of Immigration Appeals and in the federal courts, but the statute remains unchanged.

Second, Leonhardt states that Biden could have issued executive orders to mitigate the situation at the border. Oh, but “Yes, federal judges might block some of these policies… .” Maybe because they are illegal orders? No matter, “sending a message” is more important than legality.

Third, on the matter of admission into the U.S. via “parole,” Leonhardt implies that Biden expanded the use of parole beyond its “case-by-case” legal limits. Maybe Leonhardt did not know that “parole was … used to resettle over 360,000 Indochinese refugees between 1975 and mid-1980” and that “[b]etween 1962 and the end of May 1979, over 690,000 Cuban nationals were paroled into the country, “the largest number of refugees from a single nationality ever accepted into the United States.” ” – Amicus brief submitted to the Supreme Court in Clark v. Martinez.

Finally, the overall thrust of Leonhardt’s piece seems to be that the border is a “problem” that can and should be “solved” by some combination of legal and physical deterrents. This is a misperception common to educated elites as well as regular folks, and it is based on an ignorance of the full panoply of historical, economic, geographic and political forces that combine to make true border “control” a fantasy. Go to the border, look at the miles of desert, mountain and river and you will conclude that border walls are nothing more than a contractor’s financial wet dream. Talk to a woman from Central America who has risked everything to come here and you will conclude that no laws, no walls, no “message” would have deterred her.

I usually ignore much of what the MSM publishes about immigration, but the Times and Leonhardt carry a certain weight, so here I am, typing away. You’re welcome.

[The Comments are open, so fire away!]

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

Here’s the letter that Professor Karen Musalo, Director of the Center for Gender & Refugee Studies at Hastings Law wrote to the NYT:

Re: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/23/briefing/addressing-immigration.html

by David Leonhardt, May 23, 2024

Before David Leonhardt writes another piece on immigration, he should make sure he has his facts straight. He erroneously claims Biden “changed the definition of asylum to include fear of gang violence.” Biden did no such thing. What his Justice Department did was overturn a Trump-era ruling attempting to foreclose asylum claims by victims of domestic and gang violence, regardless of their legal merits. That decision was widely criticized, including on your pages in an op-ed I co-authored with Jane Fonda. Attorney General Garland rightfully vacated it, leaving the issue to be resolved by regulations [which to date have not been issued].

Leonhardt is incorrect in his assertion that more “aggressive” moves will mitigate challenges at the border, or score points with voters who overwhelmingly oppose cruel and exclusionary policies. The Senate bill touted as a step in the right direction would have codified failed policies that only create more chaos.

Executive actions reportedly under consideration would similarly exacerbate operational challenges and inevitably get tied up in litigation.

And yes, Republicans’ sabotage of the bill was “transparently cynical.” Just as cynical, however, was the president’s choice to back anti-immigrant legislation he knew was doomed. In their attempts to out-Trump Trump, the president and his allies have betrayed their values and the voters who put them in office.

Karen Musalo

San Francisco, CA

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

Thanks, Dan and Karen! Turning Leonhardt loose on a subject he’s obviously unqualified to write about — “stunning ignorance” in the words of one world-renowned expert — is nothing short of journalistic malpractice on the part of the NYT!

Immigration is a serious topic with life or death implications for migrants and the future of our nation. It deserves serious, informed, professional journalism by experts who are familiar with the plight of forced migrants and the actual legal requirements for asylum and due process as well as the realities of the border and the anti-immigrant absurdities of our dysfunctional Immigration Courts and non-legally-compliant asylum adjudication system.

There are lots of well-qualified folks around who could inform the public. Needless to say Leonhardt is not one of them. Unhappily, few “mainstream media” journalists have the necessary creds. That’s one reason the toxic national debate is so dominated by right wing White Nationalist media spreading lies and myths with little critical pushback from the “MSM.”

Rachel SiegelEconomics Reporter Washington Post PHOTO: WashPost — Rachel Siegel
Economics Reporter
Washington Post
PHOTO: WashPost

Ironically, the same day’s Washington Post had an article by Rachel Siegel about how robust immigration of all types has saved the U.S. economy and how many economists believe Trump’s mindless, restrictionist, and likely illegal nativist policies could slow growth, devastate the U.S. workforce, and exacerbate inflation! https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/05/20/trump-immigration-undocumented-economy/. At the same time, he would create chaos and waste billions in public funds.

Recently, I published a number of articles by experts debunking many of the very anti-immigrant myths that Leonhardt disingenuously repeats or enables:

🤯☠️🤮👎 POLITICOS’ “BIPARTISAN” LIES & FEAR MONGERING ABOUT IMMIGRATION MAKES THINGS WORSE! — “Rebuilding the U.S. immigration system to be both functional and humane requires dismissing harmful myths and inflammatory rhetoric in favor of truth and facts. Here’s the truth!” — The Vera Institute Of Justice ⚖️ Reports! 🗽

🇺🇸⚖️🗽 EXPLODING THE NEGATIVE “BIPARTISAN MYTHS” ABOUT ASYLUM SEEKERS: TRAC’S 10-YR. STUDY SHOWS THAT HUGE MAJORITY (2/3) OF ASYLUM SEEKERS GET FAVORABLE RESULTS IF (A BIG “IF”) THEY CAN GET A DECISION FROM EOIR — Representation Is Critical To Success — Hundreds Of Thousands Who Deserve To Stay Languish In Garland’s Endless Backlogs, While He Continues To Enable “Aimless Docket Reshuffling” (“ADR”), The Bane Of Due Process, Fairness, & Efficiency!

⚖️🗽 REV. CRAIG MOUSIN @ LAWFUL ASSEMBLY PODCAST URGES US TO TELL THE ADMINISTRATION & CONGRESS TO WITHDRAW ANTI-ASYLUM PROPOSED REGS: “Let’s give courage to those who recognize the benefits of a working asylum system. There are many positive ways to cut down on inefficiencies at the border!”

🇺🇸🗽👍 NICOLE NAREA @ VOX CORRECTS TOXIC “BORDER MYTHS” THAT DRIVE OUR LARGELY ONE-SIDED POLITICAL “DIALOGUE” ON IMMIGRATION!

🤯 MORE BAD ASYLUM POLICIES COMING? — Jeez, Joe, Stop The “Miller Lite” Nativist Nonsense & Fix Your Broken Asylum Adjudication System With Due Process Already! 🤯

🗽⚖️ EXPERT URGES U.S. TO COMPLY WITH INTERNATIONAL NORMS ON GENDER-BASED PROTECTION — Current “Any Reason To Deny” Restrictive Interpretations & Actions Are A Threat To Women Everywhere & Unnecessarily Bog Down Already Burdened System With Unnecessary Legal Minutia, Says Professor Karen Musalo In New Article!

https://immigrationcourtside.com/2024/05/03/%f0%9f%87%ba%f0%9f%87%b8%e2%9a%96%ef%b8%8f%f0%9f%97%bd%f0%9f%91%8d-uw-law-professor-erin-barbato-speaks-to-the-milwaukee-journal-sentinel-gutsy-practical-scholar-goes-where-politico/.

In one of many bad moments, Leonhardt uncritically “parrots” the oft-debunked fiction that changes in U.S. immigration policies and “deterrents” like walls, detention, and racially-driven cruelty are primary long-term “drivers” of forced human migration. Undoubtedly, in the complex interrelated world of migration, such policies do have some fairly marginal, largely short-term effects, causing changes in migration paths, adjustments in smuggling methods, changes in smuggling fees, more deaths and unreported irregular entries (when enforcement “gimmicks” are irresponsibly expanded), and enough “statistical variance” to allow proponents of these futile policies to falsely claim “victory” before the system reverts to a new “equilibrium.”

But the truth is inescapable, even if inconvenient for Leonhardt and other dilettantes: Human migration is a complex worldwide phenomenon driven by forces beyond the ability of any single nation, even one as powerful and influential as the U.S., to control by harsh deterrence and restriction, no matter how cruel, deadly, and wasteful. See, e.g., https://immigrationcourtside.com/wp-admin/about.php (“Migrants will continue to flee bombs, look for better-paying jobs and accept extraordinary risks as the price of providing a better life for their children. . . . No wall, sheriff or headscarf law would have prevented [forced migrants] from leaving their homes.”).

As cogently stated by Robert McKee Irwin, an immigration scholar at U.C. Davis:

Research shows that the United States’ immigration policies have never deterred migrants from coming to the country; they have only made the immigration process longer and more difficult.

https://www.ucdavis.edu/blog/curiosity/conversation-immigration-policies-do-not-deter-migrants-coming-us

Indeed, Leonhardt quite disingenuously ignores the fact that misguided “uber enforcement” policies are not only futile, but also increase trauma, suffering, and death for those seeking only to exercise their legal right to seek asylum. See, e.g., Human Rights First, “Trapped, Preyed Upon, and Punished: One Year of The Biden Administration Asylum Ban,” https://link.quorum.us/f/a/guoNlRSTVRVbYZ3FDvlfbA~~/AACYXwA~/RgRoMPIbP0RCaHR0cHM6Ly9odW1hbnJpZ2h0c2ZpcnN0Lm9yZy9ldmVudHMvcmVwb3J0YnJpZWZpbmctMXllYXJhc3lsdW1iYW4vVwNzcGNCCmZGIm1OZko_DEZSEmplbm5pbmdzMTJAYW9sLmNvbVgEAAAAAA~~.

Leonhardt also suggests, quite incorrectly, that Biden’s (limited) attempts to increase pathways for legal immigration and return to the rule of law at the border somehow benefitted and encouraged smugglers and cartels. NOTHING could be more wrong-headed!

It is Trump and his restrictionist allies and enablers who have been a huge boon for human smugglers! As legal pathways are eliminated or unreasonably restricted, the entire “protection” system falls into the hands of smugglers and other trans-border criminal organizations who become “the only game in town” for those seeking protection! Smuggling prices go up and the risks to migrants increase, even as profit margins for the smugglers skyrocket! Equally bad, law enforcement is diverted from real criminals to playing a bogus “numbers game” at the expense of those who seek only to have their life-determining claims heard fairly, timely, and humanely in accordance with the rule of law!

If our country builds a fair, timely, and humane system for considering asylum claims, something that succeeding Administrations have shamefully eschewed, the majority of asylum applicants will use it, which at the same time would allow border law enforcement to focus on real security issues rather than contrived ones. Similarly, more realistic and robust paths for legal immigration, both temporary and long term, will reduce the pressure and incentives for irregular migration. These measures would also tap into the truth about migration being ignored by politicos of both parties:

These [restrictionist] political reactions fail to grapple with a hard truth: in the long run, new migration is nearly always a boon to host countries. In acting as entrepreneurs and innovators, and by providing inexpensive labor, immigrants overwhelmingly repay in long-term economic contributions what they use in short-term social services, studies show. But to maximize that future good, governments must act -rationally to establish humane policies and adequately fund an immigration system equipped to handle an influx of newcomers.

http://time.com/longform/migrants/

Notably, the Biden parole program criticized by Leonhardt not only has been upheld in Federal Court, but has generally been praised and recognized by experts as a great, largely under appreciated, success in both creating an orderly process and reducing border pressures while benefitting American families and fueling our economy. See, e.g., https://www.fwd.us/news/chnv-parole/. (I’ll admit to not initially being a “fan,” but hey, results matter so I’ve come around). The most legitimate criticism is that it has been too limited both in terms of numbers and nationality restrictions!

Bad journalism promoting myths like those spouted by Leonhard misleads the public and enables politicos to get away with policies that are not only illegal, but often harm and even kill the very vulnerable migrants we are supposed to be protecting, or at the very least treating with fairness, respect, and human dignity. America and the migrants who still (against the odds) see us as a beacon of hope in a cruel world deserve better from the NYT!

There are sane, humane ways of solving complex immigration problems. See, e.g., https://immigrantjustice.org/staff/blog/humane-solutions-work-10-ways-biden-administration-should-reshape-immigration-policy. Ignoring them in favor of fear mongering and cruelty is irresponsible. Or, check out this thoughtful “reality based” proposal by Paul Hunker, until recently a Chief Counsel at ICE Dallas. https://www-dallasnews-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.dallasnews.com/opinion/commentary/2024/05/22/rethinking-asylum-applicants-should-not-be-released/?outputType=amp.

Professors Erin Barbato, Sarah McKinnon, and Jorge Osorio of the University of Wisconsin – Madison (one of my alma maters) are actually working with forced migrants in the Darien Gap and Mexico to provide better information, care, and alert them to other viable pathways before they reach the U.S. border through their innovative interdisciplinary organization “Migration in the Americas Project.” See https://immigrationcourtside.com/2024/04/22/%F0%9F%87%BA%F0%9F%87%B8%F0%9F%97%BD%F0%9F%91%8F-filling-the-gap-migration-in-the-americas-project-u-w-madison-creative-interdisciplinary-approach-seeks-to-provide-migrants-with-better-info/.

My UW Law ‘73 classmate retired Wisconsin Judge Tom Lister and I have proposed “Judges Without Borders” as a step that should be high on the the bipartisan “immigration to do list” for Congress. See https://immigrationcourtside.com/2024/04/22/%F0%9F%87%BA%F0%9F%87%B8%F0%9F%97%BD%F0%9F%91%8F-filling-the-gap-migration-in-the-americas-project-u-w-madison-creative-interdisciplinary-approach-seeks-to-provide-migrants-with-better-info/.

Judge Lister also has a plan to donate patented “healthy, sustainable textile technology” developed during the pandemic that could be used to create good jobs in Mexico and other countries beyond our borders.

Professor Michele Pistone at Villanova Law has developed a “scalable” online training course (“VIISTA Villanova”) that is currently being used to graduate more highly-qualified non-lawyer “Accredited Representatives” to close the burgeoning and critical representation gap in Immigration Court, thus “delivering due process with efficiency.” She believes that with more funding, this program could be “ramped up” to produce 10,000 new Accredited Representatives annually! See, e.g., https://www1.villanova.edu/university/professional-studies/academics/professional-education/viista.html.

The Sharma-Crawford Clinic in Kansas City, MO, now has sent more than 150 “alums” of its “Immigration Court Trial Litigation College” out into the “real world” where they are defending due process, winning cases, saving lives, and training and inspiring others. See, e.g., https://immigrationcourtside.com/2024/04/28/%F0%9F%87%BA%F0%9F%87%B8%F0%9F%97%BD%E2%9A%96%EF%B8%8F%F0%9F%91%8D-report-from-kansas-city-the-sharma-crawford-clinic-immigration-court-trial-advocacy-college-reaches-new-heights/.

With so many brilliant, informed, and involved experts out here, with creative positive ideas for improving immigrant justice and restoring the rule of law, it is very disappointing that the NYT and Leonhardt have chosen to uncritically recycle and repeat cruel, failed, legally problematic proposals by irresponsible politicos that would make things worse. Rather, the media should be consulting the experts actually involved in immigration at the “grass roots level” and pressing politicos on both sides of the aisle and the Administration as to why they aren’t concentrating and investing in humane potential solutions rather than deadly and discredited “deterrence through cruelty!”

As Erica Bryant of the Vera Institute of Justice, someone who, unlike Leonhardt, is actually qualified to write about migration, stated in an article I recently republished:

This November, and beyond, voters need to reject lies that demonize immigrants and demand policies that treat each person with dignity and fairness, no matter where they were born.

🤯☠️🤮👎 POLITICOS’ “BIPARTISAN” LIES & FEAR MONGERING ABOUT IMMIGRATION MAKES THINGS WORSE! — “Rebuilding the U.S. immigration system to be both functional and humane requires dismissing harmful myths and inflammatory rhetoric in favor of truth and facts. Here’s the truth!” — The Vera Institute Of Justice ⚖️ Reports! 🗽

Obviously, neither Leonhardt nor the NYT editors got the message. They should!

Thanks again, Dan and Karen, for being the first to speak out and challenge Leonhardt’s dangerous, misleading, and highly irresponsible nativist nonsense!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

05-24-24

🤯☠️🤮👎 POLITICOS’ “BIPARTISAN” LIES & FEAR MONGERING ABOUT IMMIGRATION MAKES THINGS WORSE! — “Rebuilding the U.S. immigration system to be both functional and humane requires dismissing harmful myths and inflammatory rhetoric in favor of truth and facts. Here’s the truth!” — The Vera Institute Of Justice ⚖️ Reports! 🗽

Erica Bryant, Associate Director of Writing:

https://www.vera.org/news/debunking-the-lies-politicians-say-about-immigrants

As critical elections approach, voters are being bombarded with harmful myths, misrepresentations, and outright lies about people who are immigrants. More than 45 million people living in the United States were born elsewhere. Despite their proven contributions to communities nationwide, people seeking office call them “invaders” and make campaign promises for the “largest domestic deportation operation in history.” Inflammatory talking points about “border security” and the “migrant crisis” come from candidates across the political spectrum.

What is missing from this rhetoric is simple: the truth. The United States has failed to align its immigration laws and practices with 21st-century realities, leaving a system that is cruel, dysfunctional, and widely criticized. Bringing the country’s approach to immigration in line with the needs of the moment and building an immigration system that is both functional and humane will require serious effort. False information distracts from the solutions that we know work.

Here’s the truth.

It is perfectly legal to request asylum. People who come to the United States border to ask for help are not breaking the law.

Asylum is a form of protection that allows people to remain in the United States and avoid deportation back to a country where they fear persecution or harm because of their identity, religion, or political beliefs. Under both U.S. and international law, people who face danger in their homelands have the right to go to other nations to seek safety and to have their requests for asylum considered.

Asking for asylum is not a “free ticket” into the United States.

Applying for asylum is a long and complex process. Asylum cases completed in fiscal year 2019 or later took an average of 5.2 years to resolve, according to unpublished analysis of government data conducted by Vera. Currently-pending removal cases have been on the docket for an average of 1.9 years. Dangerous conditions around the world have forced record numbers of people to flee their homes and seek safety. This increase in need, exacerbated by a decades-long lack of investment in infrastructure and capacity to humanely process asylum claims, has created an enormous backlog in processing requests. Vera’s unpublished analysis of government data showed that, as of January 31, 2024, there were 3,353,199 cases pending removal proceedings in the United States.

Undocumented people have far lower crime rates than U.S. citizens.

Political candidates often falsely link undocumented people to crime in the United States. Yet an extensive study of crimes in all 50 states and Washington, DC, from 1990 to 2014, found that undocumented immigration does not increase violent crime. A study of arrests in Texas found that, relative to undocumented people, U.S.-born citizens are more than twice as likely to be arrested for violent crimes, 2.5 times more likely to be arrested for drug crimes, and more than four times more likely to be arrested for property crimes. Another study in Texas found that the criminal conviction rate for undocumented immigrants was 45 percent below that of native-born Texans. Immigrants of any legal status are typically found to be less involved in violence than native-born Americans.

Undocumented people pay taxes and help prop up social security by paying into the system—without receiving benefits.

Undocumented people pay an estimated $31 billion dollars in federal, state, and local taxes each year, including billions of dollars into a social security system from which they can draw very few, if any, benefits. The Social Security Administration (SSA) itself estimated that it collected $13 billion in payroll taxes in 2010 from workers without documentation, while only disbursing about $1 billion in payment attributable to unauthorized work. In a 2013 report, SSA estimated that “earnings by unauthorized immigrants result in a net positive effect on Social Security financial status generally. . . . We estimate that future years will experience a continuation of this positive impact on the trust funds.”

Virtually no fentanyl has been seized from people seeking asylum.

Fentanyl overdoses are increasing in the United States, and real solutions will require investments in treatment and preventative health care infrastructure. Instead, far too many politicians seek cheap political points by falsely blaming people seeking asylum at the southern border for this serious problem. In fact, virtually no fentanyl has been seized from people seeking asylum. In 2023, 93 percent of fentanyl seizures occurred at official border crossings or legal checkpoints. Nearly all of these seizures involved people permitted to cross the border, and more than 70 percent were U.S. citizens.

People with pending immigration cases show up to their court hearings.

Evidence clearly shows that, over the past two decades, most immigrants have shown up for the immigration court hearings that determine whether they have legal standing to remain in the United States. They do not slip into the country and disappear, as some political leaders claim. In fact, those who attend immigration court outside detention, on what are known as “non-detained” dockets, almost always continue to appear for their hearings when they are able to secure legal representation. There is no need to confine people in costly and inhumane immigration prisons.

Not all people at risk of deportation cross the border without documentation. Visa holders, long-term permanent residents, and even U.S. citizens are at risk.

While the spotlight often shines on people who cross the southern border without documentation, there are many ways that people can face the threat of deportation in the United States. Indeed, there are 22 million people in the United States who are at risk of being separated from their families and sent to countries where they may face danger. Tens of thousands of children who were adopted from outside the United States, for example, do not have documentation and are vulnerable to deportation because their complex citizenship paperwork was improperly filed. Additionally, more than one million people were brought to the United States as children by parents who entered the country without documentation or overstayed their visas. And, in 2022, more than 850,000 people from countries around the world overstayed their visas, making their continued presence in the United States unauthorized. Lawful permanent residents, current visa holders, and even U.S. citizens have been subjected to the risk of deportation and forced to defend their right to remain home with their families and in their communities.

Many people at risk of deportation actually have a legal right to remain in the United States—but are deported anyway.

Unlike in criminal court, people facing deportation in immigration court are not entitled to an attorney if they cannot afford one. Immigration attorneys can cost thousands of dollars, making them unaffordable for many. As a result, people seeking asylum, longtime legal residents, parents of U.S. citizens, and even small children are forced to appear in immigration court without an attorney to protect their rights. This makes it much more likely that they will be deported, even if they could have established a legal right to stay in the United States. The Fairness to Freedom Act, which was introduced in Congress last year and would establish a right to federally funded attorneys for all people facing deportation, would help fix this injustice.

Immigrants participate in the labor force and start businesses at higher rates than the native-born population.

One in six people in the United States workforce are immigrants. In fact, immigrants participate in the labor force at a higher rate than the U.S.-born population. Immigrants are also more likely to start businesses than native-born U.S. citizens. Furthermore, millions of people in the United States are employed by immigrant-founded and immigrant-owned companies.

People in the United States view immigration as a positive that benefits the country, and they support protections for people fleeing danger.

The majority of the public believes that immigration brings benefits to the United States, including economic growth and enriching culture and values. Nearly three-quarters of people polled said that people immigrate to the United States for jobs and to improve their lives, and more than half say that the ability to immigrate is a “human right.” Multiple polls show that the majority of people in the United States support protections for people who are trying to escape persecution and torture in their homelands. According to one Pew Research Center poll, 72 percent believe that accepting civilians trying to escape war and violence should be an important goal of U.S. immigration policy.

The United States has much work ahead to reform its dysfunctional and often cruel immigration system. This November, and beyond, voters need to reject lies that demonize immigrants and demand policies that treat each person with dignity and fairness, no matter where they were born.

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

Erica’s “spot on” last sentence is certainly worth repeating:

This November, and beyond, voters need to reject lies that demonize immigrants and demand policies that treat each person with dignity and fairness, no matter where they were born.

While migrants might be the “easy target” of politicos and nativists, because they are vulnerable and “the usual scapegoats” for problems created or fostered by those very politicos and nativists themselves, in the end we ALL are the targets of those who want to inflict gratuitous cruelty while destroying our precious democracy.

As Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., said “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” Each of us has a vested interest in “not looking the other way” while our fellow humans unfairly are stripped of their rights and humanity with “harmful myths, misrepresentations, and outright lies.” YOU could be “next on the list!”

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

05-22-24

🇺🇸⚖️🗽 EXPLODING THE NEGATIVE “BIPARTISAN MYTHS” ABOUT ASYLUM SEEKERS: TRAC’S 10-YR. STUDY SHOWS THAT HUGE MAJORITY (2/3) OF ASYLUM SEEKERS GET FAVORABLE RESULTS IF (A BIG “IF”) THEY CAN GET A DECISION FROM EOIR — Representation Is Critical To Success — Hundreds Of Thousands Who Deserve To Stay Languish In Garland’s Endless Backlogs, While He Continues To Enable “Aimless Docket Reshuffling” (“ADR”), The Bane Of Due Process, Fairness, & Efficiency!

Austin Kocher, Ph.D.
Research Assistant Professor
TRAC-Syracuse
PHOTO: Syracuse U.

From Professor Austin Kocher @ Linkedin:

New Report! “Two-Thirds of Court Asylum Applicants Found Legally Entitled to Remain.”

Out of 1M+ asylum cases decided by immigration judges over the past decade, 685,956 (66%) were legally entitled to remain in the United States due to asylum or other relief.

https://trac.syr.edu/reports/742/

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Remember, this is in a system that has, over decades, been intentionally rigged, manipulated, and skewed AGAINST legal asylum seekers, particularly those of color from certain arbitrarily “disfavored” countries! (Think Haiti, The Northern Triangle, and many African Nations). While this anti-asylum bias has “peaked” in GOP Administrations, Dems have also been guilty including the Biden Administration’s flailing, legally problematic efforts to abuse the asylum adjudication system as a “deterrent” to those legally seeking asylum!

Trial By Ordeal — The U.S. Asylum system over the past two decades has prided itself in making the experience of asylum seekers as restrictive, difficult, complex, arcane, arbitrary, and “user unfriendly” as possible for many of the most vulnerable. Even so, courageous asylum seekers who can actually get a decision persevere and succeed against the odds! What if Administrations of both parties worked to make the system fair and timely, rather than trying to use it as a false “deterrent?” Woman Being “Tried By Ordeal”
17th Century Woodcut
Public Realm
Source: Ancient Origins Website
https://www.ancient-origins.net/history/trial-ordeal-life-or-death-method-judgement-004160

Austin’s post triggered this exchange between Beckie “Deportation Defender” Moriello and me on LinkedIn:

BECKIE: It’s really higher than that, once we factor in all the wrongfully denied cases for clients who can’t afford to appeal.

PWS: Thanks for speaking truth, Beckie! If true asylum experts were on the BIA, IJs were experts who applied or were held by the BIA to the Cardoza, Mogharrabi, Kasinga, 8 CFR 208.13 framework, the asylum adjudication system had dynamic leadership, and individuals were competently represented, many more cases would be granted much more efficiently and backlogs would eventually come under control and start to diminish. In fact, individuals should be considered eligible for asylum even where persecution on a protected ground is “significantly less than probable” — the 10% rule! Moreover, asylum seekers who testify credibly are supposed to be given “the benefit of the doubt.” These and the presumption of future persecution established by past persecution, thereby shifting the burden to DHS, are still too often ignored, misapplied, or manipulated against asylum seekers. There is nothing that will make a backlog at least a decade in the making disappear overnight. But, a legitimate, legally compliant, properly generous asylum adjudication system would benefit all involved. It’s sad that Biden, Harris, Garland, and Mayorkas are afraid to comply with the rule of law for asylum seekers and other migrants!

Beckie “Deportation Defender” Moriello ESQUIREPHOTO: Linkedin — Beckie “Deportation Defender” Moriello ESQUIRE
PHOTO: Linkedin

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

05-21-24

⚖️🗽 REV. CRAIG MOUSIN @ LAWFUL ASSEMBLY PODCAST URGES US TO TELL THE ADMINISTRATION & CONGRESS TO WITHDRAW ANTI-ASYLUM PROPOSED REGS: “Let’s give courage to those who recognize the benefits of a working asylum system. There are many positive ways to cut down on inefficiencies at the border!”

Listen here:

https://www.lawfulpod.com/restrictions-to-an-already-compromised-asylum-system/

MAY 17, 2024

Restrictions To An Already Compromised Asylum System

This week we talk about a proposed rule from the Biden Administration that may change asylum proceedures and allow adjudicators to turn away people without proper research on their background.

Read the proposed rule: https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2024/05/13/2024-10390/application-of-certain-mandatory-bars-in-fear-screenings

Read the NIJC’s breakdown: https://immigrantjustice.org/press-releases/nijc-denounces-new-biden-rule-adding-restrictions-already-compromised-asylum-system

Contact your Representative: https://www.house.gov/representatives/find-your-representative

Contact your Senator: https://www.senate.gov/senators/senators-contact.htm

Craig’s paper he mentions: Health Inequity and Tent Court Injustice

Next week we should have a call to action with templates for you to help submit your comment. Watch this space!

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

Thanks, Craig, for speaking up! Why does the Administration keep proposing likely unlawful restrictionist regulations that won’t help the situation at the border?

As Craig notes, there are “many positive ways” to improve the treatment of legal asylum seekers and promote fair and efficient consideration of their claims! Why is the Biden Administration “tuning out” the voices of those with border expertise who are trying to help them make the legal asylum system work?

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

05-20-24

⚠️ “SIR JEFFREY” OF THE ROUND TABLE ⚔️🛡 SAYS THAT SUCCESSIVE ADMINISTRATIONS HAVE UNDERMINED THE RULE OF LAW BY CONTRAVENING BINDING INTERNATIONAL REFUGEE STANDARDS: “[I]t is only when international law becomes normalized in the process that our asylum law will function as it should.” — Stop Mocking The Rule Of Law At The Border! ☠️

https://www.lexisnexis.com/community/insights/legal/immigration/b/insidenews/posts/proposed-asylum-bar-regs-are-at-odds-with-international-law-and-why-that-matters

Proposed Asylum Bar Regs Are At Odds With International Law (And Why That Matters)

In 2003, the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees published Guidelines for applying the bars to asylum known internationally as the “exclusion clauses” (because they exclude an applicant from being recognized as a refugee under international law). Addressing the proper procedure for applying these bars, the UNHCR Guidelines state:

Given the grave consequences of exclusion, it is essential that rigorous procedural safeguards are built into the exclusion determination procedure. Exclusion decisions should in principle be dealt with in the context of the regular refugee status determination procedure and not in either admissibility or accelerated procedures, so that a full factual and legal assessment of the case can be made.1

This week, the Biden Administration published a proposed rule seeking to do precisely the opposite of what UNHCR advises.2 The rule would empower USCIS asylum officers to apply certain bars to asylum eligibility up front, at the border, as part of a preliminary admissibility determination. The goal is to effect the immediate deportation of certain asylum seekers, foreclosing their ability to have their eligibility for asylum decided by an Immigration Judge pursuant to a full-fledged hearing.

Advocates have already pointed out the dangers of the proposed approach, which will require quick decisions on highly complex issues at a point at which applicants very rarely have access to lawyers or evidence; their responses should be read.3 However, I would like to focus here on the rule’s conflict with international law, and why this is problematic.

Since 1804, the Supreme Court’s decision in Murray v. The Schooner Charming Betsy 4 has required domestic statutes to be interpreted consistently with international law whenever possible.5

This general requirement carries a particular urgency in its application to refugee law. The purpose of the 1951 Refugee Convention (which applied to those made refugees by World War II), and the 1967 Protocol (which extended the 1951 Convention’s definitions and protections to all) was to create a single, universal refugee standard to replace the patchwork of protections that reflected individual states’ own political preferences and biases.

This is not a small matter. International refugee law scholars James C. Hathaway and Michelle Foster have warned that “[i]nconsistency and divergence in interpretation of the Convention definition would clearly undermine the principled goal of ensuring a single, universal standard for access to refugee protection.”6 They further quote a decision of the Australian Administrative Appeals Tribunal in support of this contention: “[i]nconsistency is not merely inelegant; it brings the process of deciding into disrepute, suggesting an arbitrariness which is incompatible with commonly accepted notions of justice.”7

Congress apparently agreed with this approach when enacting the 1980 Refugee Act. In its landmark 1987 decision in INS v. Cardoza-Fonseca, the Supreme Court pointed this out:

If one thing is clear from the legislative history of the new definition of “refugee,” and indeed the entire 1980 Act, it is that one of Congress’ primary purposes was to bring United States refugee law into conformance with the 1967 United Nations Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees, 19 U.S.T. 6223, T.I.A.S. No. 6577, to which the United States acceded in 1968.8

And in adhering to Congress’s clear intent, the Supreme Court in Cardoza-Fonseca looked for guidance in interpreting the 1980 Refugee Act to UNHCR, citing its Handbook first issued in 1979 as an important tool for interpreting the Convention’s provisions. In a footnote, the Court found that while it was not binding, “the Handbook provides significant guidance in construing the Protocol, to which Congress sought to conform. It has been widely considered useful in giving content to the obligations that the Protocol establishes.”9

As leading scholar Deborah E. Anker has noted, “One of the most important developments in U.S. asylum law is the weight that U.S. authorities – including the USCIS Asylum Office, the Board, and the federal courts – give to the UNHCR’s interpretation of the refugee definition contained in its 1979 Handbook….” Anker noted that UNHCR has issued other interpretive documents since 1979 that “complement and expand on the Handbook.”10 I would argue that those other documents (which include the 2003 guidelines addressing the exclusion clauses that is quoted above) are deserving of the same interpretive weight.

So given (1) the Supreme Court’s Charming Betsy doctrine mandating conformity with international law whenever possible; (2) the stated intent of Congress to bring U.S. asylum law into conformity with international refugee law (as recognized in Cardoza-Fonseca); and (3) the purpose of the 1951 Convention to “ensure a single, universal standard” for refugee status, according great weight to UNHCR guidance in interpreting the Convention provides the best means of adhering to all of the above requirements.

However, another leading scholar, Karen Musalo, provided a recent reminder of how far U.S. law has strayed from international law standards for determining nexus (i.e. when persecution is “on account of” a statutorily protected ground), and in determining the validity of particular social groups. Musalo posits that realignment with international standards would resolve the erroneous interpretations that have arisen under present case law, and would remove unwarranted barriers to protection that presently exist.11 But with its new proposed regulations, the government instead seeks to veer even further off course in its procedures for determining bars to asylum eligibility.

In December 2020, I presented in a blog post a “wish list” for the incoming Biden Administration. One of the items on my list was to create a “Charming Betsy” regulation requiring adherence to international law refugee standards. It included the hope “that the Biden Administration would codify the Charming Betsy doctrine in regulations, which should further require the BIA, Immigration Judges, and Asylum Officers to consider UNHCR interpretations of the various asylum provisions, and require adjudicators to provide compelling reasons for rejecting its guidance.”12

I am not so naive to expect that a regulation like this will be proposed anytime soon. But I do believe that the direct contradiction of the proposed regs with international law guidance should be included in comments and talking points by those both inside and outside of government. Through these rules, the Biden Administration seeks to engage in the type of politically-motivated action that the Refugee Convention and 1980 Refugee Act sought to eliminate. For the above reasons, such action would violate the intent of Congress, our treaty obligations, and over two centuries of U.S. case law.

Moving forward, whether an asylum-related law, rule, policy, or case holding conforms with international law should instinctively be the first question asked by all of us. When refugee protection is viewed in such neutral, legal terms, the urge to politicize decisions will be lessened.

As those scholars referenced above have been saying far longer and more articulately than myself, it is only when international law becomes normalized in the process that our asylum law will function as it should.

Copyright 2024 Jeffrey S. Chase. All rights reserved.

Notes:

UNHCR, Guidelines on International Protection: Application of the Exclusion Clauses: Article 1F of the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, 4 Sept. 2003, https://www.unhcr.org/us/media/guidelines-international-protection-no-5-application-exclusion-clauses-article-1f-1951 (emphasis added).

Application of Certain Mandatory Bars in Fear Screenings, 89 FR 41347 (May 13, 2024), https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2024/05/13/2024-10390/application-of-certain-mandatory-bars-in-fear-screenings.

See, e.g., American Immigration Council, “The Biden Administration’s Proposed Regulations On Asylum Bars: An Analysis,” (May 10, 2024), https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/research/biden-administration-proposed-regulation-asylum-bars-analysis; Human Rights First Press Release (May 9, 2024) https://humanrightsfirst.org/library/human-rights-first-opposes-new-asylum-proposals-that-would-deny-asylum-hearings/.

6 U.S. 64 (1804).

See Weinberger v. Rossi, 456 U.S. 25, 32 (1982) (noting that construing federal statutes to avoid violating international law has “been a maxim of statutory construction since the decision” in Charming Betsy).

James C. Hathaway and Michelle Foster, The Law of Refugee Status (Second Ed.), (Cambridge, 2014) at 4.

Hathaway and Foster, supra at n.18 (quoting Brennan, J., in Re Drake and Minister of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs (No. 2) (1979) 2 ALD 634 (Aus. AAT, Nov. 21, 1979) at 639.

480 U.S. 421, 436-37 (1987).

Id. at 439.

Deborah E. Anker, Law of Asylum in the United States (2023 Ed.) (Thomson Reuters) at 20-21.

Karen Musalo, “Aligning United States With International Norms Would Remove Major Barriers to Protection in Gender Claims,” International Journal of Refugee Law (2024).

Jeffrey S. Chase, “A Wish List for 2021,” https://www.jeffreyschase.com/blog/2020/12/14/a-wish-list-for-2021 (Dec. 14, 2020).

MAY 16, 2024

Reprinted by permission.

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The Charming Betsy — The schooner Charming Betsy sailed into Supreme Court history. Hon. Jeffrey Chase and other legal experts aren’t “charmed” by AG Merrick Garland’s approach to binding international standards for asylum!
PHOTO: The Constitutional Law Reporter

Thanks, “Sir Jeffrey” for a great and timely analysis!

For the second successive Administration, we have an Attorney General who does not take seriously his oath of office to uphold the Constitution and laws of the United States when it comes to those seeking asylum.

Garland has too often signed off on regulations and policies that are clearly at odds with domestic and international law as well as our Constitution. The current abominable proposed regulations, referenced by Jeffrey and opposed by all experts on asylum law and human rights, are just the latest example. Those politicos behind these toxic policies won’t confront in person or acknowledge the well-documented unnecessary human trauma and degradation caused by scofflaw actions and policies that intentionally fail to make fair, humane, safe, and timely asylum processing available to all who come to legal ports of entry as required by law (not to mention human decency)!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

05-17-24

🇺🇸⚖️🗽HUNDREDS GATHER FOR MPI’S GALA CELEBRATION OF THE INCOMPARABLE DORIS MEISSNER, THE CONSUMMATE “PRACTICAL SCHOLAR/PUBLIC SERVANT!”

By Paul Wickham Schmidt

Exclusive

May 16, 2024

Washington, D.C. — More than 300 “movers and shakers” of the migration world came together last night at the Intercontinental Hotel — Wharf in Washington D.C., to recognize and celebrate the continuing life’s work and leadership of Doris M. Meissner, former Commissioner of Immigration and a Justice Department policy official under administrations of both parties. The event was sponsored by Doris’s current employer, the Migration Policy Institute (“MPI”) where she is Senior Fellow and Director of the U.S. Immigration Policy Program.

I first met my fellow Wisconsinite and University of Wisconsin alum in 1975, during the Ford Administration, when she was a White House Fellow assigned to the Attorney General, and I was a young attorney working in the “Legacy” Immigration & Naturalization Service (“INS”) Office of General Counsel, then part of the Department of Justice (“DOJ”). Our careers intertwined, and Doris was one of my role models and inspirations over five decades of work to make fairer and better immigration, justice, and human rights policies for America. Those are values we both believed in and strived to promote!

The gala raised over $1,000,000 for the newly-established Doris Meissner Innovation Fund” at MPI.

Somewhat predictably, the “Honorary Co-Chairs,” Former President Bill Clinton and Former Wyoming Senator Alan Simpson, did not attend in person, although Senator Simpson contributed a video tribute. Nevertheless, there were plenty of prominent speakers including Muzzafar Chishti (Senior Fellow, MPI), The Honorable Roberta Jacobson (Chair, MPI Board of Trustees), Anthony D. Romero (Executive Director, ACLU), Helene D. Gayle (President, Spelman College, by video), Soren Bjorn (CEO, Driscoll’s, which donated fresh raspberries for the dessert), Andrew Selee (President, MPI), and The Honorable Alejandro Mayorkas (Secretary, DHS).

The highlight of the evening was a short video starring some of Doris’s fellow social justice luminaries sharing their personal recollections of her many achievements and her impact on them. That was followed by some “family commentary” from Doris’s daughter, Christine Meissner and her brother Andy that also brought into the equation the work of their father and Doris’s beloved husband, the late Charles “Chuck” Meissner. “Teamwork” is critical to success, particularly on the family level!

In her remarks, Doris emphasized the influence of family on her work and the cosmic continuing importance of robust migration policies to our “nation of immigrants.” Among the most touching recollections were of those Americans she encountered later in life who had gotten their start as immigrants and naturalized citizens during her tenure at INS. One was a talented physician who performed essential surgery for both Doris and her daughter.

My main “takeaway” was her challenge to “keep the dream alive” — even through tough times — and her recognition of and lifelong commitment to “the human potential of migrants.”

On a personal level, it was great to see many friends and colleagues who had served as senior executives at INS, the Executive Office for Immigration Review (“EOIR”), and “Main Justice” during my 35 years at the Department, spanning five decades, as well as folks I worked with during my time in private practice.

I was particularly delighted to chat with my and Doris’s long-time mutual friend and colleague Jean Lujan. Jean, Doris, and Delia Combs Riso were part of the famous (or infamous) “Asylum Sisters’ Trio” who occasionally entertained at “Legacy INS” events! Sadly, MPI didn’t include an “encore performance” on the night’s program!

It was also wonderful that Doris got this well-deserved acclaim and recognition while her career is ongoing and she is actively inspiring those around her. Too often, I fear, we wait until the “truly great ones” are gone to recognize what we gained by their lives and lost upon their departure. Doris promised that she isn’t going anywhere for a long time! That’s fine and dandy with all of us!

At the same time, I experienced a bit of wistfulness. Here we were in a gathering of perhaps the best minds and problem solvers in the history of American immigration; yet, both the messages of the past and the potential promise for the future are being lost on today’s feckless political leaders and media pundits as they spout myths, spread fear, and recycle failed cruel, ineffective, and wasteful “mega enforcement and rights’ reductions or outright violations” on today’s migrants.

Indeed, some of those in the room had likely come to Washington for “dual purposes:” Not only to honor Doris, but also to valiantly try to inform and convince Congress and the Administration of the cruel, inhuman, and too often deadly results of years of “brain dead” enforcement policies and suppressing or eradicating the due process and human rights of migrants, all while intentionally eschewing enlightened, achievable, common sense reforms to our badly outdated and often intentionally dysfunctional immigration system.

One would search in vain for political leaders with the intellectual prowess, moral courage, human decency, and practical problem solving abilities of Doris Meissner among those driving, influencing, and seeking to dictate today’s misguided, ineffectual, and wildly inconsistent Government immigration policies. Without a moral compass on deck, the ship is veering badly and dangerously off course!

I am, of course, hopeful and encouraged that the new Doris Meissner Innovation Fund at MPI will fulfill its vision of creating “new opportunities to advance pragmatic solutions that work in the interests of all segments of society.” Yet, I am objectively fearful that such essential and potentially transformational efforts will “go in one ear and out the other” of our current political leaders and “pass over the heads” of the voting public which, in the overwhelming majority, owe their very existence to the phenomenon of human migration — of all kinds, types, and populations. How soon we forget where we all came from, and where we are going!

Thanks again, Doris, my friend and fellow Badger, for your unyielding efforts to “keep us on the high road!”

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

05-16-24

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🇺🇸Due Process Forever!⚖️🗽

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“Sir Jeffrey” from NYC:

PWS from Boothbay Harbor, ME (Linekin Bay Side):

DPF!

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Here’s a report on the night’s activities from AYUDAS’s amazing Executive Director Paula Fitzgerald:

Here’s the text of my opening remarks:

Ayuda’s Film Screening of The Courtroom – Opening Remarks by Paul Wickham Schmidt

Georgetown University, McCourt School of Public Policy

September 18, 2024

Due Process Forever!😎

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Well, friends, since “inception” on December 22, 2016:

To mark the occasion, here’s a “reprint” of one of my favorites from that first month, December 2016:

🇺🇸 Thanks for reading and engaging, best wishes and, of course, “Due Process Forever!”

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Catherine writes:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

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From NBA.com:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

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Eduardo Porter writes in WashPost:

Gordon F. Sander, journalist and historian, also writes in WashPost, perhaps somewhat less optimistically, but with the same historical truth in the face of current political lies and gross misrepresentations:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

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Dan writes on Substack:

Here’s the letter that Professor Karen Musalo, Director of the Center for Gender & Refugee Studies at Hastings Law wrote to the NYT:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

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Erica Bryant, Associate Director of Writing:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

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From Professor Austin Kocher @ Linkedin:

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

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Listen here:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

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Proposed Asylum Bar Regs Are At Odds With International Law (And Why That Matters)

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

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🇺🇸⚖️🗽HUNDREDS GATHER FOR MPI’S GALA CELEBRATION OF THE INCOMPARABLE DORIS MEISSNER, THE CONSUMMATE “PRACTICAL SCHOLAR/PUBLIC SERVANT!”

By Paul Wickham Schmidt

Exclusive

May 16, 2024

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

**Ayuda’s Film Screening of The Courtroom – Opening Remarks by Paul Wickham Schmidt**