⚖️🗽 TGIF: “Thank Goodness It’s (Five Immigration Things on a) Friday” — From Professor Austin Kocher @ Substack!

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

https://substack.com/app-link/post?publication_id=80027&post_id=142434213&utm_source=post-email-title&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1se78m&token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjoxMDgxNTc5OTAsInBvc3RfaWQiOjE0MjQzNDIxMywiaWF0IjoxNzA5OTM1MzU1LCJleHAiOjE3MTI1MjczNTUsImlzcyI6InB1Yi04MDAyNyIsInN1YiI6InBvc3QtcmVhY3Rpb24ifQ.mUNqwD2zV_1Nm3R_LsiIzbFJ-sb2im3l_E6zFUUoLzY

Welcome back, friends. To celebrate the end of the week and the start of the weekend, I am sending you my personal list of Five Things You Might Have Missed. For this issue, I draw from my bucket of many (many) things that I read or saw during the week and share them with you.

Justice Department Silences Immigration Judges

Biden Refers to Immigrants as “Illegals”

How Does Asylum Work Right Now?

The Migrant’s Journey by Adam Isacson

Talking About Immigration in an Election Year

. . . . .

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

Thanks, my friend! 🙏 Read Austin’s complete rundown at the above link!

My favorite quote is from John Washington’s article, #3 on Austin’s list:

In fiscal year 2023, 99.5 percent of all people whose asylum cases were decided by immigration judges showed up to court for their hearings, according to data compiled by Human Rights First. Unlike citizens, people seeking asylum are not entitled to attorneys at government expense. That means that people either pay out of pocket, find willing attorneys to help them pro-bono, or represent themselves in court. According to a January report, only 30% of people in removal proceedings — which means the government is trying to deport them — are represented by attorneys. A 2023 study from Migration Policy Institute shows that having representation improves efficiency, lowers the costs of public resources expended and, for the migrants in court, decreases their chances of being deported.

“The immigration system has been pretty broken— backlogged and needing reform — for 20 years,” [Yael] Schacher [Director of Americas and Europe for Refugees International] said.

Though there are major delays, the overwhelming majority of asylum-seekers follow the system as it is currently functioning, Schacher said.

Yael Schacher
Historian
Director of Americas & Europe for Refugees International

Not only does this cogently refute the restrictionist myth of asylum seekers “gaming” the system, peddled by politicos of both parties yet primarily a GOP talking point, but it points to what should be the real target of reform! Obviously, what’s actually needed here is professionalization, quality control, innovation, increased staffing, and, perhaps most of all, dynamic, expert, due-process focused leadership in the USG’s asylum adjudication and resettlement programs, with a focus on dramatically increasing representation and orientation resources!

Instead, politicos and pundits focus on eliminating the system, rather than fixing it! It’s basically a cowardly attempt to “destroy evidence” of USG misfeasance and incompetence! At the same time, it would unfairly punish the victims of our Government’s systemic failures.

The political response by both parties is totally irresponsible (not to mention immoral) as well as demonstrably unworkable. Yet, so-called “mainstream media” figures are so ill-informed and disinterested in the human trauma and realities of asylum, migration, and the border, that they present the one-sided, nativist nonsense spouted by both parties as a “debate.” It isn’t! Neither party is interested in actually fixing the problems at the border — just in finger-pointing, posturing, and shifting blame for perceived political gain!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

03-09-24

🏴‍☠️🤯 112 NGOs BLAST BIDEN ADMINISTRATION’S BAD APPROACH TO CREDIBLE FEAR, DEMAND IMMEDIATE END (Good Luck With That)! “ — “These policies punish people seeking safety and prioritize political optics over the administration’s stated aim of working to ‘restore and strengthen our own asylum system, which has been badly damaged by policies enacted over the last four years that contravened our values and caused needless human suffering.’”

Border Detention — Due process and fundamental fairness are elusive in DHS’s “New American Gulag!” Administration policy wonks absent themselves from the border to avoid witnessing the unnecessary human trauma and suffering their illegal and ill-advised policies cause.
PHOTO: Public Realm

https://www.refugeesinternational.org/reports/2023/6/5/the-biden-administration-must-immediately-stop-conducting-credible-fear-interviews-in-cbp-custody

Refugees International June 5, 2023

The Honorable Alejandro N. Mayorkas

Secretary

U.S. Department of Homeland Security

2707 Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue, SE

Washington, D.C. 20528

Ur M. Jaddou

Director

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services

5900 Capital Gateway Drive

Camp Springs, Maryland 20588

Troy A. Miller

Acting Commissioner

U.S. Customs and Border Protection

1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW

Washington, D.C. 20229

David L. Neal

Director

Executive Office for Immigration Review

5107 Leesburg Pike

Falls Church, VA 22041

Dear Secretary Mayorkas, Director Jaddou, Acting Commissioner Miller, and Director Neal,

We, the undersigned 112 civil, human rights, faith-based, and immigration groups write to express our deep concern with your return to the Trump-era policy of forcing asylum seekers to explain by phone the life-threatening harms they’re fleeing mere hours after arriving in the U.S., while being held in Customs and Border Protection (CBP) detention, and essentially cut off from legal help. In March 2023, nearly 100 organizations reminded President Biden of his commitment to end the Trump policy, urging him not to rush back to the broken, anti-asylum policies that this administration rightly terminated. We are incredibly disappointed that this administration has chosen to move forward, full steam ahead. We call on the Biden administration to immediately cease conducting credible fear interviews (CFIs) in CBP custody and instead ensure that asylum seekers are given full and fair access to the U.S. asylum system, including meaningful access to counsel.

Since taking effect, President Biden’s iteration of this policy has produced systemic due process barriers similar to its predecessor policy, with asylum seekers being rushed through CFIs and immigration judge reviews with little to no access to counsel. President Biden’s asylum ban, another iteration of Trump-era policies, is further exacerbating these mass due process violations and fueling the systematic deportation of individuals who may qualify for protection in the U.S., in violation of the non-derogable principle of non-refoulement.

The Biden administration is effectively denying asylum seekers any meaningful chance to consult with counsel and rushing them through a sham process to quickly deport them, including by:

Conducting CFIs shortly upon an individual’s arrival in CBP detention without providing or allowing them to access the time and resources needed to recover from their journey or the harm they survived;

Barring attorneys from entering the CBP facilities where asylum seekers are jailed and CFIs are conducted;

Truncating the minimum time period individuals have to attempt to telephonically consult with an attorney to a mere 24 hours after receiving notice of the credible fear process. This change is especially absurd given that new policies, such as the asylum ban and the return of certain nationalities to Mexico, expand the content about which an individual may need to consult an attorney;

Failing to provide asylum seekers hard copies of the M-444 Information About Credible Fear Interview in contravention of 8 CFR § 208.30(d)(2), hard copies of the list of pro bono legal service providers, and advanced written notice of the CFI;

Heightening the standard for requests to reschedule a CFI to a showing of “extraordinary circumstances,” likely making it nearly impossible for asylum seekers to reschedule a CFI in order to secure representation or prepare for the interview;

Restricting asylum seekers’ access to telephones, in contravention of 8 CFR § 208.30(d)(4), and denying them writing utensils, in effect forcing them to attempt to commit key information to memory, including their attorney’s contact information and information about the CFI process;

Requiring an applicant’s signature on the Form G-28 for attorneys to enter an appearance with the Asylum Office, which often cannot be timely obtained by attorneys who are remotely representing jailed clients, thereby obstructing their ability to obtain information about their clients;

Conducting CFIs, including outside of normal business hours and on weekends, without the attorney of record present, in contravention of 8 CFR § 208.30(d)(4);

Failing to provide advance written notice to attorneys of record prior to a scheduled CFI or immigration court review hearing, including by not updating the EOIR Cases and Appeals System (ECAS) to reflect upcoming court hearings;

Failing to afford individuals time and opportunity following negative fear determinations to consult with counsel who could advise them about their rights and the review process;

Failing to serve asylum seekers and their attorneys with their record of credible fear determinations in contravention of 8 CFR § 208.30(g)(1);

Blocking attorneys from entering an appearance with the immigration court, including by not docketing immigration court review cases in a timely manner, thereby preventing them from representing their clients;

Refusing to permit attorneys to actively participate in immigration court reviews and rejecting evidence submitted in advance of the immigration court review; and

Conducting Immigration Judge reviews of negative credible fear findings without the attorney of record present.

Forcing asylum seekers in CBP detention to proceed with their CFIs while facing nearly insurmountable barriers to legal counsel –while also subjecting them to an asylum ban – upends any notion of fairness. Instead, it is an evisceration of our asylum system. The installation of new phone booths, which you claim differentiate Biden’s program from the Trump policy, fails entirely to address any of these systemic obstacles. Additionally, the Biden administration’s decision to conduct immigration court reviews immediately following these lightning-fast CFIs, while the individual is still in CBP custody, unacceptably further heightens the due process barriers asylum seekers must overcome to avoid summary deportation.

We have also received troubling reports of the terrible conditions that asylum seekers face in CBP custody while awaiting their CFIs, in line with years of reports of abusive, dehumanizing, and sometimes life-threatening conditions that include medical neglect, inedible food and water, and lack of access to showers and other basic hygiene. It has been less than a month since the unforgivable death of eight-year-old Anadith Tanay Reyes Álvarez, who was jailed in one of the CBP facilities where your administration conducts CFIs. We are horrified that the administration has systematized the detention of asylum seekers in these same deadly conditions while rushing them through fear screenings.

Notably, the administration has a choice: it is not required to use expedited removal and has the authority to refer people for full asylum hearings, rather than subjecting them to rushed CFIs in dehumanizing CBP detention while cut off from legal help. Sacrificing fairness for speed by jailing people fleeing persecution and torture, subjecting them to a ban on asylum, and forcing them to proceed with a life-or-death interview without meaningful access to counsel must not be this administration’s response to people wishing to exercise their fundamental human right to seek asylum. These policies punish people seeking safety and prioritize political optics over the administration’s stated aim of working to “restore and strengthen our own asylum system, which has been badly damaged by policies enacted over the last four years that contravened our values and caused needless human suffering.”

Respectfully,

Acacia Center for Justice

Afghans For A Better Tomorrow

African Human Rights Coalition

Al Otro Lado

Alianza Americas

Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, ACCE

American Friends Service Committee (AFSC)

American Gateways

American Immigration Council

Americans for Immigrant Justice (AI Justice)

Amnesty International USA

Angry Tias and Abuelas

Asian Americans Advancing Justice | AAJC

Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project (ASAP)

Bend the Arc: Jewish Action

Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI)

Bridges Faith Initiative

Border Kindness

Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights Coalition

Center for Constitutional Rights

Center for Gender & Refugee Studies

Center for Victims of Torture

Central American Resource Center of Northern CA – CARECEN SF

Church World Service

Cleveland Jobs with Justice

Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights (CHIRLA)

Community Action Board of Santa Cruz County, Inc. (CAB)

Community Legal Services in East Palo Alto (CLSEPA)

Diocesan Migrant and Refugee Services Inc.

Dorcas International Institute of RI

Fellowship Southwest

First Focus on Children

Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project

Franciscan Action Network

Freedom Network USA

Greater Boston Legal Services

Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinical Program

HIAS

Houston Immigration Legal Services Collaborative

Human Rights First

Human Rights Initiative of North Texas

Immigrant Defenders Law Center

Immigrant Legal Resource Center

Immigration Equality

Immigration Law & Justice Network

Immigration Hub

Innovation Law Lab

Interfaith-RISE

Interfaith Welcome Coalition – San Antonio

International Center of Kentucky

International Institute of Los Angeles

International Institute of New England

International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP)

ISLA: Immigration Services and Legal Advocacy

JAMAAT – Jews and Muslims and Allies Acting Together

Jewish Family Service of San Diego

Jewish Vocational Service of Kansas City

Just Neighbors

Justice in Motion

Kino Border Initiative

Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center

Latino Community Foundation

Lawyers for Good Government

Legal Aid Justice Center

Lost and Found Church of the Nazarene

Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services

Mariposa Legal, program of COMMON Foundation

Massachusetts Law Reform Institute

Metrowest Legal Services

Minnestoa Freedom Fund

MLPB

Mujeres Unidas y Activas

Muslim Advocates

National Employment Law Project

National Immigrant Justice Center

National Immigration Law Center

National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights

National Partnership for New Americans

NCLR (National Center for Lesbian Rights)

Northeastern University School of Law Immigrant Justice Clinic

Open Immigration Legal Services

Oromo Center for Civil and Political Rights

Oxfam America

Phoenix Legal Action Network

Physicians for Human Rights

Public Law Center

RAICES

Refugees International

Resource Center Matamoros / Asylum Seeker Network of Support, Inc.

Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights

Rocky Mountain Immigrant Advocacy Network

SIREN, Services Immigrant Rights and Education Network

Southwest Asylum & Migration Institute (“SAMI”)

Student Clinic for Immigrant Justice

Survivors of Torture, International

Team Brownsville

Tennessee Justice for Our Neighbors

The Advocates for Human Rights

The Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc.

The Reformed Church of Highland Park

UC Davis Immigration Law Clinic

Unitarian Universalists for Social Justice

Unitarian Universalist Service Committee

United Sikhs

U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (USCRI)

USAHello

Vera Institute of Justice

Washington Office on Latin America

Wind of the Spirit Immigrant Resource Center

Witness at the Border

Women’s Refugee Commission

Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights

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

Interesting way for a Dem Administration to treat human rights, due process, and fundamental fairness! Remarkable rejection of values that got them elected! Is “dismissive dissing” of the views of the “folks who brought you to the dance” really the key to future success?

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-07-23

⏳HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE FROM YAEL SCHACHER @ REFUGEES INTERNATIONAL: Biden Administration’s Bias Against Refugees Fleeing The Northern Triangle Is “Baked Into” The Problematic History Of U.S. Refugee & Asylum Programs!☹️

https://www.washingtonpost.com/made-by-history/2023/01/23/bidens-announced-asylum-transit-ban-undermines-access-life-saving-protection/

Yael Schacher writes in WashPost:

On Jan. 5, the Biden administration announced that it planned to issue a regulation “to provide that individuals who circumvent available, established pathways to lawful migration, and also fail to seek protection in a country through which they traveled on their way to the United States, will be subject to a rebuttable presumption of asylum ineligibility in the United States.”

These two reasons to bar people from seeking asylum — for transiting through other countries and for crossing the U.S. border without authorization — have different rationales and historical origins. But both have been marshaled against Central Americans since the late 1980s — severely undermining access to asylum. Doing so endangers people’s lives and breaks U.S. and international law. History reveals the purpose and perils of such bars.

No such bars stopped earlier waves of refugees seeking protection in the United States, especially those coming from Europe. When people who fled the Bolshevik Revolution applied to be considered “bona fide refugees” under a 1934 U.S. law, it did not matter that they had spent several years during the previous decade in Germany, France, China, Argentina, Cuba, Mexico or Canada and then crossed a land border without getting inspected by a U.S. official — as many did — beginning in the mid-1920s. They told immigration officials that conditions in those countries made it hard for them to live and it would be years before they could qualify for an immigration visa to the United States. So, they made their way to the United States on their own — and their mode of entry, and even their use of fraudulent travel documents, did not preclude them from adjusting to permanent status.

. . . .

The Biden administration insists its regulation will be different because it has opened up new legal pathways from transit countries and it will give asylum seekers a chance to prove why they didn’t use one of the legal pathways available to them. But migrants from Guatemala and Honduras lack parole programs that are newly available only to Venezuelans, Nicaraguans, Cubans and Haitians who have passports and sponsors in the United States. Further, parole, discretionary temporary permission to enter and stay in the United States with no path to citizenship, is a far cry from permanent refugee status. Fifteen thousand refugee resettlement slots this year are for all of the Caribbean and Latin America, where over 7 million Venezuelans are displaced. It is hard not to see this rule as an effort to limit access to asylum in the United States specifically for people from northern Central America and to treat today’s forcibly displaced people from the Americas unlike people seeking refuge from elsewhere in the past.

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

Read Yael’s complete article at the link.

Many of us had believed that the Biden Administration would get beyond the biases, manipulations of law, and implicit or explicit racism of the past to achieve the orderly, legal, timely admission of refugees, including those from Latin America, from abroad and at the border. Unfortunately and outrageously, they haven’t even tried!

Instead, they have turned human rights and border policies into an unholy, largely incomprehensible and arbitrary, mishmash of many of the worst, most ineffective, and invidiously biased policies of the past.

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-25-23

NOLAN RAPPAPORT @ THE HILL TAKES ON THE “LA DECLARATION,” QUOTING SCHACHER & SCHMIDT!

Family Pictures
Nolan Rappaport
Opinion Writer
The Hill

Yael Schacher
Historian
Deputy Director
Refugees International

Hon. Paul Wickham Schmidt
U.S. Immigration Judge (Ret.)
Adjunct Professor, Georgetown Law
Blogger, immigrationcourtside.com.

Biden’s ‘Summit of the Americas’ commitments on immigration more show than substance

Nolan Rappaport, opinion contributor

Former President Bill Clinton established the Summit of the Americas in 1994, to bring all of the countries in the Western Hemisphere — except Cuba — together for discussions on trade, immigration, and democracy. President Joe Biden hosted the event this year.

The participants recorded their immigration agreements in the Los Angeles Declaration on Migration and Protection. It represents a regional partnership to address historic migration flows affecting most of the countries in the region.

The declaration was signed by 20 countries in the region that are committed to protecting the safety and dignity of all migrants, refugees, and asylum seekers, and respecting their human rights and fundamental freedoms. They intend to cooperate to facilitate safe, orderly, humane, and regular migration, consistent with national legislation, the principle of non-refoulement, and their respective obligations under international law.

But will they keep their commitments?

The last line in the declaration acknowledges that its commitments are not legally binding.

Yael Schacher, deputy director of Refugees International, says, “summits have traditionally been a parade of promises that are never fulfilled.”

According to Georgetown Law immigration professor, Paul Schmidt, the declaration is just “more empty rhetoric.”

Highlights

International financial assistance may be needed by the countries the migrants come from and the countries that host large numbers of them after they have left their own countries.

A fact sheet summarizes financial contribution commitments. For instance, the United States commits to making a contribution of an additional $25 million to the Global Concessional Financing Facility, which assists Latin American countries with programs for providing refuge to displaced migrant and refugee populations.

The United States also commits to contributing $314 million in additional funding for humanitarian and development assistance for refugees and other vulnerable migrants.

The United States will establish a $65 million pilot program to support U.S. farmers hiring temporary agricultural workers under the H-2A program.

And the United States commits to expanding its efforts to address the root causes of irregular migration throughout the hemisphere. The Biden administration previously had proposed allocating $4 billion to Central America over four years, including $860.6 million in fiscal 2022.

Read more at https://thehill.com/opinion/immigration/3539483-bidens-summit-of-the-americas-commitments-on-immigration-more-show-than-substance/

Published originally on The Hill.

Nolan Rappaport was detailed to the House Judiciary Committee as an Executive Branch Immigration Law Expert for three years. He subsequently served as an immigration counsel for the Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security and Claims for four years. Prior to working on the Judiciary Committee, he wrote decisions for the Board of Immigration Appeals for 20 years. Follow him at https://www.blogger.com/blog/posts/2306123393080132994

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

Head on over to The Hill to read Nolan’s full article. Internet “hits” help keep him in business!

Always a pleasure to be quoted along with my friend and super-scholar Yael Schacher — a trained historian/archivist in possession of what’s left of the “Schmidt archives!” (Yael stopped me several boxes into my project of using them to fuel our back-yard fire pit. But, Yael’s timely intervention still helped me fulfill my “promise upon retirement” to Cathy to get my boxes of papers out of the attic, basement, and garage. Also, after recently serving as an executor for my cousin, I’m sure our children will be grateful.)

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-29-22

😰NO HAPPY NEW YEAR FOR FAMILIES IN “THE NEW AMERICAN GULAG”☠️⚰️ — As Kakistocracy Of War Criminals 🤮🏴‍☠️ Departs, Will President Biden Have The Wisdom & Guts To Move Beyond “The Dem Border Alarmists” & Get The Progressive Leaders 🦸🏽‍♂️⚖️ From The NDPA In Place To Bring Due Process & Order To The Border?🗽🇺🇸

Trump Dumping Asylum Seekers in Hondiras — Dumping Asylum Seekers in Honduras
Artist: Monte Wolverton
Reproduced under license

Erika Pinheiro, Litigation & Policy Director, Al Otro Lado, speaks at TEDSalon: Border Stories, September 10, 2019 at the TED World Theater, New York, NY Photo: Ryan Lash / TED, Creative Commons License

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/01/family-detention-still-exists-immigration-groups-warn-the-fight-is-far-from-over?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

Amanda Holpuch reports from the Gulag for HuffPost:

. . . .

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) bars asylum seekers and refugees from the US under an order called Title 42. People who attempt to cross the border are returned, or expelled, back to Mexico, without an opportunity to test their asylum claims. More than 250,000 migrants processed at the US-Mexico border between March and October were expelled, according to US Customs and Border Protection data.

The situation is dire. Thousands of asylum-seekers are stuck at the border, uncertain when they will be able to file their claims. The camps they wait in are an even greater public health risk that before.

Outside the border, Al Otro Lado has fought for detained migrants to get PPE and medical releases. Prisons are one of the worst possible places to be when there is a contagious disease and deaths in the custody of US immigration authorities have increased dramatically this year. They have also provided supplies to homeless migrants in southern California who have been shut out of public hygiene facilities.

Pinheiro said there will be improvements with Trump out of office, but some of the Biden campaign promises to address asylum issues at the border will be toothless until the CDC order is revoked. It’s a point she plans to make in conversations with the transition team.

A prime concern for advocates about the Biden administration is that it will include some of the same people from Barack Obama’s administration, which had more deportations than any other president and laid the groundwork for some controversial Trump policies.

While it is a worry for Pinheiro, she has hope that the new administration will build something better. “I would hope a lot of those people, and I know for some of them, have been able to reflect on how the systems they built were weaponized by Trump to do things like family separation or detaining children,” she said.

Family separation, which has left 545 children still waiting to be reunited with their parents, was a crucial issue for many voters and Pinheiro hopes that energy translates to other immigration policies.

“How did you feel when your government committed the atrocity of family separation in your name?” Pinheiro said. “The next step is really understanding that similar and sometimes worse atrocities are still being committed in the name of border security and limiting migration.”

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

Read the complete article at the link.

I totally agree with Erika Pinheiro that there is no excuse for the continuing violations of our Constitution, statutes, international obligations, and simple human decency. The regime’s policies are nothing more than “crimes against humanity” thinly disguised as “law enforcement,” “national security,” and “public health” (from a regime whose “malicious incompetence,” cruelty, and callous intentional undermining of medical advice during the pandemic have contributed to the unnecessary deaths of tens of thousands of Americans).

Even more disgracefully, the Supremes and other Federal Courts have failed in their Constitutional duty to stand up to the abusers and hold the regime’s scofflaw “leaders” (to where, one might ask?) accountable. What’s the purpose of life-tenured judges who lack the training, wisdom, ethics, and most of all courage to enforce the legal and human rights of the most vulnerable against lawless, dishonest, and fundamentally cowardly “Executive bullies” hiding behind their official positions? Not much, in my view! There are deep problems in all three branches of our badly compromised and ailing Government!

I have also spoken out on Courtside against the dangers of putting the same failed Dem politicos who thoroughly screwed up immigration policy, and particularly the Immigration Courts, back in charge again. I agree with Erika’s hope that some of them have gained wisdom and perspective in the last four years. But, why rely on the hope that those who failed in the past have suddenly gotten smarter, when there are “better alternatives” out there ready to step in and solve the problems?

Why not put in place some talented new faces from the NDPA with better, more progressive ideas, tons of dynamic energy, and the demonstrated willingness and courage to stand tall against bureaucratic tyranny? Give them a chance to solve the problems! Erika looks like one of those who should be solving problems and implementing better immigration policies “from the inside” in the Biden-Harris Administration!

The “deterrence only paradigm” that has driven our border enforcement policies over the past half century has been a demonstrable failure, both in terms of law enforcement and the unnecessary and unjustifiable human carnage that it has caused. Why keep doing variations on discredited policies and expecting better results?

We know that ugly, racist rhetoric, jailing families and kids in punitive conditions, weaponizing courts as enforcement tools, suspending the rule of law, denying hearings, and even summarily, illegally, and immorally returning asylum seekers to death won’t stop folks from fleeing unbearable conditions in their native countries! They will continue to seek protection in America, even in the face of predictable abuses, life-threatening dangers, and little chance of success in a system intentionally “gamed” to mistreat and reject them while denying their humanity.

Desperate people do desperate things. They will continue to do them even in the face of inhuman abuses inflicted by those whose better fortunes in life have not been accompanied by any particular compassion, understanding of the predicament of others, or recognition of an obligation to abjure the power to bully and torment those less fortunate in favor of addressing their situations in a fair, reasonable, and humane manner.

Human migration is far older than nation states, zero tolerance, baby jails, family incarceration, biased judging, national selfishness disguised as “patriotism,” and border walls. It has outlasted and outflanked all of the vain attempts to artificially suppress it by force and gimmicks. It’s time for some policies that recognize reality, see its benefits, and work with the flow rather than futilely in opposition to it.

It’s past time to look beyond the failures of yesterday to progressive solutions and new leadership committed to solving problems while enhancing justice, respecting human dignity, and enhancing human rights (which, in the end, are all of our rights)!

Due Process Forever!⚖️🗽🇺🇸 Same old, same old never!

Happy New Year!😎👍🏼

PWS

O1-01-21

DEMS NEED TO STOP REPEATING THE BOGUS 🤥 NARRATIVES ABOUT THE (LARGELY SELF-CREATED & OVERBLOWN) “SOUTHERN BORDER CRISIS:” Channeling “Courtside,” Yale Schacher Sets Forth A Plan For Using Experts To Not Only Reinstitute But Drastically Improve Due Process ⚖️🗽🇺🇸 For Asylum Seekers! — It’s NOT Rocket 🚀 Science!

https://www.refugeesinternational.org/reports/2020/12/17/building-better-not-backward-learning-from-the-past-to-design-sound-border-asylum-policy

Introduction

President-elect Biden has promised a broad array of reforms that would impact refugees, asylum seekers, and other forced migrants. He has indicated he will restore Temporary Protected Status, place a moratorium on deportations, and end prolonged detention and for-profit detention centers. These are all crucially important to the safety and security of migrants and their families in the United States and other countries, especially in the Western Hemisphere. President-elect Biden has also promised to end the Trump administration’s policy of making asylum seekers “remain in Mexico” while awaiting hearings in U.S. immigration court.

However, in recent weeks, a flawed and fatalistic view of migration to the U.S. southern border has taken hold in some media accounts and reports. It goes like this: President Trump’s Remain in Mexico (or MPP) policy has created a logistical and humanitarian crisis at the southern U.S. border that, despite President-elect Biden’s promises, will be very difficult to undo. Further, a combination of pull and push factors (especially in the wake of hurricanes in Central America) will lead to increased migration to the southern U.S. border this spring such that President-elect Biden will have little choice but to keep the border sealed under an order from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), as he attempts to deal with COVID-19 in border states and fulfill other immigration policy promises—including uniting families the Trump administration ripped apart two years ago.

There are several problems with this line of argument, many of which are addressed in this report. Most fundamentally, keeping the border sealed and migrants waiting in Mexico will perpetuate serious abuses. Family separations and other violations of human rights, as well as violations of U.S. law, will continue to occur under a Biden administration that does not implement new policies at the border. Recently, MPP and the CDC border closure have exacerbated smuggling and trafficking at the border, as well as other forms of abuse against migrants. For example, the CDC order has led to the repatriation of Nicaraguan dissidents as well as the return of a sexually abused Guatemalan child. It has also led asylum seekers to try to cross undetected in remote desert areas. Further, unwinding MPP and allowing asylum seekers to ask for protection at the border is not only the right thing to do, but also feasible with the proper planning. Indeed, it presents the incoming administration with an opportunity to rethink migration management, especially for those seeking asylum, and to implement a new screening process that is both more humane and more efficient.

President-elect Biden has invoked President Franklin Delano Roosevelt—healer, rebuilder, and practical problem solver—as a model. During World War II, Roosevelt planned and devoted significant resources to resolving the largest displacement crisis the world had ever known. This planning was part of an effort to ensure that what happened in 1939 to the S.S. St. Louis—a ship of asylum-seeking Jews turned away by the United States and other countries—would not occur again.

During his first week in office, President-elect Biden should issue an executive order on border asylum policy that departs dramatically from that which President Trump put forth during his first week. President Biden’s executive order should give asylum seekers access to the border and provide for cooperation with border states and shelters to safely and humanely receive asylum seekers. It should allocate resources to alternatives to detention, including case management, and to improved adjudication of asylum claims in immigration courts, especially through provision of legal services. It should also commit to ending practices associated with expedited removal of asylum seekers that have resulted in abuses, and to the use of parole to unwind MPP. Finally, through revocation of Trump administration decisions, regulations, and policies, as well as through settlement of lawsuits and the withdrawal of appeals to federal courts regarding these policies, the executive order should commit to restoring asylum eligibility to those who have fled persecution but have been denied or prevented from obtaining protection.

In taking such action, President-elect Biden would be fulfilling not only his campaign promises but the commitment he made when he voted for Senate passage of the Refugee Act of 1980. That law, supported by large majorities of both parties, promised to ensure fair access to asylum at the border.

This report shows why it is imperative that the Biden administration do this rather than keep us mired in a policy framework that does not work and that has led to a cycle of crises. It does so by looking back to a momentous time of transition about thirty years ago. With the Cold War ending, the United States had to rethink its assumptions about who merited refugee status. Only a handful of refugee resettlement slots in the U.S. Refugee Program were allotted to Central Americans, and the United States had not yet developed clear procedures for effectively handling asylum seekers at the southwestern border. Rather than acknowledge the forces pushing people northward, U.S. policymakers adopted a paradigm that was focused primarily, if not exclusively, on deterrence. This is a paradigm that we are still in today.

At different points over the past thirty years, humanitarian and constructive policies have tempered the harshness of this paradigm, and such policies have also brought benefits in terms of cost and efficiency. These policies need to be adapted and scaled up. But they also need to be placed within a welcoming framework that does not presume asylum seekers are a threat. Instead of devoting tremendous resources to a futile and rights-violating attempt to block those already on the move, we have to try to better understand the drivers of migration, which, for Central Americans, include corruption, poverty, insecurity, and violence. We must devote resources instead to humanely receiving asylum seekers and adjudicating their claims fairly. We also have to stop assuming that the best place to manage admissions of all Central Americans seeking protection is at the border.

The Deterrence Paradigm

The deterrence paradigm has been implemented repeatedly using the same counterproductive strategies.

. . . .

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

Read the rear of Yael’s article at the link.

👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼⚖️🗽🇺🇸

Folks like my Round Table 🛡⚔️ colleague Judge Paul Grussendorf and I have been “preaching” for an abandonment of the unlawful, inhumane, incredibly wasteful, and demonstrably ineffective “deterrence paradigm.”

The skill set to establish a lawful, better, humane, efficient asylum system, consistent with our Constitutional, statutory, and international obligations is out there, mainly in the private/NGO/academic communities. I/O/W the “practical scholars, litigators, and advocates” in the NDPA.

It’s a just a question of the incoming Biden/Harris Administration getting beyond the “enforcement only” mentality, personnel, and White Nationalist nativist thinking that currently infects the entire USG immigration bureaucracy, at all levels. Replace the current failed leadership with experts from the NDPA and empower them to work with other experts in the private sector to institute a better system that would be no more costly, likely less, than the current “built to fail” abominations that not only waste resources but destroy human lives and are an ugly stain on our national conscience!

I also appreciate Yael’s recognition of the pressing and compelling need to “end the Clown Show 🤡🦹🏿‍♂️☠️@ EOIR:”

Immigration Court Reform

EOIR policies during the Trump administration have been at odds with principles of due process and judicial independence. These include the imposition of numeric case completion quotas and docket management policies that deprive asylum seekers of procedural protections; appointment of judges who almost exclusively come from prosecutorial backgrounds (especially working at DHS and in law enforcement); promotion to permanent positions on an expanded BIA of judges with asylum denial rates much higher than the national average; and procedures that limit the ability of claimants to effectively appeal their cases. The Biden administration should conduct an urgent review of EOIR hiring practices and immigration court procedures and develop recommendations for regulatory or structural changes consistent with the protection needs of asylum seekers.

The critical “urgent review” should be done by a “Team of Experts from the NDPA” brought in on an immediate temporary basis, if necessary, in accordance with Federal Personnel Rules, to replace the current Senior “Management” @ EOIR as well as the entire BIA. There’s no better way to fix the system than to take over management, restore fairness and order, and get inside the current disastrous mess @ the Clown Show 🤡🦹🏿‍♂️! Importantly, the “Team of Experts” with effective operational control could immediately begin fixing (and conversely stop aggravating and creating) the glaring problems while putting the structure and personnel in place for long-term reforms.

Lives ☠️⚰️ are at stake here! We need ACTION, not merely study and evaluation. “Fixing the system on the fly” may be challenging, but it’s perfectly within the capabilities of the right team of NDPA experts! Dems often prefer study and dialogue to effective actions. As Toby Keith would say: We need “a little less talk and a lot more action.”

(Toby Keith: https://www.google.com/search?q=%22a+little+less+talk+and+a+lot+more+action&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en-us&client=safari)

Due Process Forever! It’s NOT rocket 🚀 science!

PWS

12-30-20

🗽⚖️🇺🇸YAEL SCHACHER @ REFUGEES INTERNATIONAL FILES AMICUS BRIEF ON WHY “REMAIN IN MEXICO” IS A “CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY” — “When I wasn’t visiting border, I was trying to understand how the U.S. government could put in place a policy that seemed the very antithesis of what seeking asylum was supposed to be, as articulated in Refugee Act of 1980.”

https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.refugeesinternational.org/reports/2020/11/25/le4a9nihwqnhgcn0q2l5fufa8fah6v&source=gmail-imap&ust=1606928318000000&usg=AOvVaw0Fc_OTkc3MFgBm5dijso0i

. . . .

When I wasn’t visiting border, I was trying to understand how the U.S. government could put in place a policy that seemed the very antithesis of what seeking asylum was supposed to be, as articulated in Refugee Act of 1980. I had spent my time before coming to Refugees International researching the writing and passage of that law and the development of the contemporary asylum system since 1980. The Remain in Mexico policy is unprecedented. The U.S. government claims the authority for it lies in a provision of the 1996 immigration law that allows for the return of certain applicants for admission to contiguous territory to await processing. I began researching this provision and it became clear that it was not intended to apply to asylum seekers.

In support of a challenge to the Remain in Mexico program in California federal court, Refugees International and I, with attorneys from Sidley Austin LLP, submitted this brief describing why the Refugee Act forbids the program, a reality that the 1996 law does not change. The argument of the brief is that, when the 1980 Refugee Act was enacted, it was intended to establish a uniform process for consideration of asylum claims that would preclude this return to Mexico approach. A lynchpin in the argument is that there were two versions of the asylum provision of the Refugee Act—one proposed by Congresswoman Holtzman and one by Senator Edward Kennedy. Only the House version provided that asylum seekers at a land border be accorded the same ability to seek asylum as those already in the country. When, in conference, Holtzman’s version was accepted, Congress made a conscious choice in pursuit of uniformity in consideration of asylum requests: that the United States would treat asylum seekers at the border the same as it would all others. And the language mandating uniform treatment of asylum seekers in the 1980 Refugee Act was reiterated in the 1996 immigration law.

. . . .

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

The case is Immigrant Defenders Law Center v. Wolf, USDC, C.D. CA.

Read Yael’s intro, her outstanding brief prepared by Sidley Austin LLP, and the “Holtzman Papers” at the above link. Notably, Sidley Austin is one of the great firms that have helped our Round Table with amicus briefs! It’s what happens when you connect the dots among history, research, social justice, and the law. It’s why the Liberal Arts are the wave of a better future and a better Federal Judiciary! It’s all about perspective and problem solving!

Thanks Yael for all that you, Refugees International, and great pro bono lawyers like Sidley Austin do for justice and humanity.

The real problem here: A disgraceful Supremes’ majority 🏴‍☠️ that improperly “greenlighted” this totally illegal, racist-inspired, “crime against humanity,” cooked up by neo-Nazi hate monger Stephen Miller ☠️🤮, after it had properly and timely been enjoined by lower Federal courts. And, a complicit EOIR that consistently fails to provide due process and justice to asylum seekers is a huge part of the problem.

Unlike the Supremes, the EOIR Clown Show 🤡 can be removed and justice at all levels improved just by a putting the right experts from the NDPA in charge right off the bat.

Democratic Administrations, particularly the Obama Administration, have a history of not getting the job done when it comes to achievable immigration reforms within the bureaucracy. If you don’t want four more years of needless death, disorder, demeaning of humanity, and deterioration of the most important “retail level” of our justice system, let the incoming Biden Administration know: Throw out the EOIR Clown Show and bring in the experts from the NDPA to turn the Immigration Courts into real, independent courts of equal justice and humanity that will be a source of pride, not a deadly and dangerous national embarrassment!

Contrary to all the mindless “woe is me” suggestions that it will take decades to undo Stephen Miller’s (is he really that much smarter than any Democrat politico?) racist nonsense, EOIR is totally fixable — BUT ONLY WITH THE RIGHT FOLKS FROM THE NDPA IN CHARGE!

It’s only “mission impossible” if the Biden-Harris Administration approaches EOIR with the same indifference, lack of urgency, and disregard for expertise and leadership at the DOJ that has plagued past Dem Administrations on immigration, human rights, and social justice.

It won’t take decades, nor will it take zillions of taxpayer dollars! With the right folks in leadership positions at EOIR, support for independent problem solving (not mindless micromanagement) from the AG & DOJ, and a completely new BIA selected from the ranks of the NDPA, we will see drastic improvements in the delivery of justice at EOIR by this time next year. And, that will just be the beginning!

No more clueless politicos, go along to get along bureaucrats, toadies, and restrictionist holdovers calling the shots at EOIR, America’s most important, least understood, and “most fixable” court system! No more abuse of migrants and their representatives! No more ridiculous, “Aimless Docket Reshuffling” generating self-created backlogs! No more vile and stupid White Nationalist enforcement gimmicks being passed off as “policies!” No more “Amateur Night at The Bijou” when it comes to administration of the immigrant justice system at the DOJ under Dems!

Get mad! Get angry! Stop the nonsense! Tell every Democrat in Congress and the Biden Administration to bring in the NDPA experts to fix EOIR! Now! Before more lives are lost and futures ruined! It won’t get done if we don’t speak out and demand to be heard!

This is our time! Don’t let it pass with the wrong people being put in charge — yet again! Don’t be “left at the station” as the train of immigrant justice at Justice pulls out with the best engineers left standing on the platform and the wrong folks at the controls! Some “train wrecks” aren’t survivable! 🚂☠️⚰️

Due Process Forever!

PWS

11-28-20

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