🏴‍☠️🤡BIA’S LATEST ANTI-ASYLUM PRECEDENT CONTINUES ASSAULT ON DUE PROCESS — MATTER OF R-C-R-

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

Matter of R-C-R-, 28 I&N Dec. 74 (BIA 2020)

https://www.justice.gov/eoir/page/file/1311336/download

BIA HEADNOTE:

(1) After an Immigration Judge has set a firm deadline for filing an application for relief, the respondent’s opportunity to file the application may be deemed waived, prior to a scheduled hearing, if the deadline passes without submission of the application and no good cause for noncompliance has been shown.

(2) The respondent failed to meet his burden of establishing that he was deprived of a full and fair hearing where he has not shown that conducting the hearing by video conference interfered with his communication with the Immigration Judge or otherwise prejudiced him as a result of technical problems with the video equipment.

PANEL: MULLANE, KELLY, and GORMAN, Appellate Immigration Judges

OPINION BY: GORMAN, Appellate Immigration Judge

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

30 days to file an application for asylum for an unrepresented, detained, non-English speaking applicant appearing by televideo, huh? “Full and fair hearing?” Only in the “Never Never Land” of EOIR in the 5th Circuit,

I can guarantee that this bogus “30-day-filing standard” will be used to railroad lots of hapless and clueless asylum applicants out without due process.

The good news: Outside the “Judicial Wasteland” of the Fifth Circuit, at least some reviewing Circuits likely will “blow the whistle” on this disingenuous nonsense and abdication of Constitutional duties and send the cases back to the meat packing plant (a/k/a EOIR) for redos, thus adding to the “Aimless Docket Reshuffling” and astronomical backlog.

There is actually a reason why fundamental fairness and competent court management are required by Due Process! In the long run, following the Constitution and the statute, as well as having “judges” with actual expertise, independence, courage, and some “practical common sense,” as opposed to EOIR’s endless “haste makes waste” enforcement gimmicks and one-sided, bias-driven judging, makes for a more efficient justice system for everyone. But, that will require a “full housecleaning” at EOIR.

Due Process Forever!

PWS

09-01-20

“POPPYCOCK!” — Conservative U.S. District Judge Richard Leon “Zeroes In” On Racist, Disingenuous, BS Presented In Court By Trump Regime To Justify “Crimes Against Humanity” Committed Against Asylum Seekers By USG! — Contrasts With Disingenuous Enabling Of Racist Immigration Agenda By Supremes’ Majority! — As Reported By “Legal Clairvoyant” 🔮 Jacqueline Thomsen @ NLJ!

“POPPYCOCK!” — U.S. District Judge Richard Leon’s Characterization Of Trump Regime’s Defense Of Asylum Seeker Abuse By DHS & Barr’s Unethical & Frivolous Arguments!

Jacqueline Thomsen
Courts Reporter
National Law Journal & Legal Clairvoyant

https://link.law.com/click/21370303.6876//5162eb9334b9b0a8048a6907C27093cdb

Due Process “Legal Eagle” Jacqueline Thompsen reports for the National Law Journal’:

. . . .

The federal immigration law requires that officers who conduct the interviews—in which migrants must show they face at least a 10% chance of persecution due to certain factors in order to be eligible for asylum—receive significant training on handling the applications

In responding to the administration’s claims that the border patrol agents received similar training as asylum officers, Leon wrote, “Poppycock! The training requirements cited in the government’s declaration do not come close to being ‘comparable’ to the training requirements of full asylum officers.”

“To make matters worse, the January MOA precludes any individual CBP agent from conducting credible fear interviews for longer than 180 days, meaning that CBP agents cannot gain the experience necessary to appropriately apply the complex asylum laws and regulations,” the judge added. “These procedures plainly violate Congress’s requirements.”

The Trump administration has administered a widespread crackdown on asylum proceedings, adopting a slew of policies that make it more difficult for migrants fleeing persecution in other countries to obtain protections in the United States.

The ruling comes in a lawsuit filed by attorneys with Tahirih Justice Center and the Constitutional Accountability Center, on behalf of four mothers and their seven children from Honduras, Ecuador and Mexico seeking asylum in the U.S. All of the migrants failed to pass the credible fear assessment conducted by CBP agents, which were upheld by immigration judges.

Leon also found in Monday’s ruling that it “would certainly seem unlikely” that CBP agent interviews of migrants could be considered to be “nonadversarial proceedings with a neutral decision-maker,” as required under federal regulations and guidelines. He noted that border patrol agents are considered law enforcement, and said federal authorities’ statements on measures they have taken to minimize the possibility of the interviews becoming adversarial “hardly seems sufficient.”

Leon wrote the training requirements for those conducting the credible fear assessments “are essential for a functioning asylum process, which is why Congress required them,” describing the legal framework surrounding U.S. immigration, asylum, and other similar processes as “complex, to say the least.”

“After all, an asylum officer who is not adequately trained in the applicable legal requirements is less likely to ask the right questions of an asylum seeker, or for that matter, to gather the facts necessary to make an accurate determination of whether an asylum seeker has a credible fear of persecution,” he continued. “Indeed, the record here contains several examples of the effects of inadequate training: one CBP agent failed to follow up with questions about an asylum-seeking plaintiff’s sexual abuse, and another failed to inquire into another asylum-seeking plaintiffs husband’s murder investigation.”

Leon also found the immigrants in the case would face irreparable harm, if he did not issue a preliminary injunction to block their removal from the U.S.

***********

Why isn’t it an ethical and professional problem for “Billy the Bigot’s” DOJ to make nonsense arguments to a Federal Judge in support of unlawful actions? Private members of the bar arguing “poppycock” in a civil case could well find themselves referred for disciplinary action. Why are Cabinet Officials and their attorneys exempt from normal professional and ethical considerations?

You can read Judge Leon’s clearly written and cogently reasoned 22-page decision in A.B.-B. v. Morgan here: https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.216698/gov.uscourts.dcd.216698.32.0.pdf.

If only more judges at all levels could write with such clarity and in plain English!

The rejection at the “credible fear” stage of the bona fide asylum claims described by Judge Leon is beyond appalling! These are essentially totally and intentionally unqualified and biased U.S. Government employees committing “crimes against humanity” and getting away with it! These aren’t “legal errors.” It’s systemic malfeasance, otherwise known as “malicious incompetence” with a heavy dose of racism and misogyny thrown in for a good measure!

If substantiated during the immigration hearing process that should have taken place, all these applicants should have been “slam dunk” grants of asylum, withholding of removal, and/or relief under the Convention Against Torture in a properly functioning justice system. Instead, but for the efforts of pro bono counsel, they would have been illegally returned to harm, torture, and/or death with no legitimate process at all!

No wonder “Billy the Bigot’s” Immigration Courts are out of control and the borders are a deadly mess when individuals who with proper screening and access to competent counsel should have been quickly legally admitted to the U.S. under protection laws are instead being “rejected” by biased and unqualified Border Patrol Agents impersonating Asylum Officers!

Here’s my favorite quote (among many) from Judge Leon’s decision:

Of course, the Government has a strong interest in the “prompt execution of removal orders.” Nken,556 U.S. at 436. However, the Government and public can have little interest in executing removal orders that are based on statutory violations, League of Women Voters of U.S. v. I,{ewby,838 F.3d l,12 (D.C. Cir. 2016) (“There is generally no public interest in the perpetuation of unlawful agency action.”), especially where those statutory violations may compromise the accuracy of such removal orders. R.I.L.-R. v Johnson, 80 F. Supp. 3d 164, 191 (D.D.C. 2015); Grace, 344 F. Supp. 3d at 14144 Indeed, the public has an interest “in preventing aliens from being wrongfully removed, particularly to countries where they are likely to face substantial harm.” Nken,556 U.S. at 436. As such, the balance of interests here weighs in favor of preliminary injunctive relief.

The last point, “the public has an interest ‘in preventing aliens from being wrongfully removed, particularly to countries where they are likely to face substantial harm,’” Nken,556 U.S. at 436, has basically been ignored by the Supremes’ majority recently in sending refugees to their death or into harm’s way without any semblance of due process, based on various lies, distortions, and racist schemes by the Trump regime intentionally mischaracterizing “national security” and “national emergency.” As Judge Leon would say: “Poppycock!”

Perversely, the Trump regime and the Supremes’ have made execution of illegal removal orders, resulting from racist White Nationalist schemes, a “national priority.” Truly, this is a system broken from the top down in need of immediate repair and injections of intellectually honesty, moral courage, and ethics — something that seems “out of vogue” in all three branches of our failing democracy these days

I recently had a conversation with Jacqueline in which she basically predicted this decision based on her study of the arguments and trends among U.S. District Judges, regardless of philosophy or appointing party, in DC. Nice going Jacqueline! Congrats on your clairvoyance!

Those with NLJ access (anyone can get “three free” per month by registering) can read the complete article at the link.

Judge Leon’s linear, straightforward, and “no BS” treatment of the regime’s absurdist, unethical, and scofflaw legal “defense” of essentially “crimes against humanity” contrasts sharply with the disingenuous and essentially “brain dead” treatment of similar BS by the “JR Five” on the Supremes. There, the patently unconstitutional and illegal (not to mention immoral) agenda of neo-Nazi racist Stephen Miller and the unethical maneuvers of SG Noel Francisco are often wrongfully rewarded. By contrast, the the Supremes’ majority routinely trashes the legal and constitutional rights of vulnerable people of color, particularly asylum seekers, migrants, and voters beneath an avalanche of bogus “Dred Scottification” jurisprudence.

Additionally, Judge Leon is “onto something” that has been swept under the carpet by the Supremes and the Circuit Courts when he questions “whether CBP agents could ever lawfully be given authority to conduct asylum interviews and adjudicate asylum claims, see Compl. ‘]Tfl 108-09, it would certainly seem unlikely under these circumstances. After all, law enforcement officers typically “function as adversaries” whose role is “to investigate criminal activity, to locate and arrest those who violate our laws, and to facilitate the charging and bringing of such persons to trial.” New Jersey v T.L.O.,469 U.S. 325,349 (1985) (Powell, J., concurring).”

Similarly, many of us have argued that Immigration “Judges” who work for uber-enforcer and Trump shill “Billy the Bigot” and have been “repurposed” and “weaponized” into DHS enforcement support staff can not possibly be the “fair and impartial” quasi-judicial adjudicators required by the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment!

Better Justices and better Federal Judges for a better America, particularly for people of color and other minorities. It’s actually quite simple and straightforward. It starts with throwing Trump and the GOP out of every political office this Fall.

Then, we need some real Justices and Federal Judges who will stand against systemic racism and enforce equal justice in America! Not, rocket science! Just knowledge of the Constitution, awareness of human rights and immigrants’ rights, a focus on racial justice, courage to speak truth to power, and a demonstrated commitment to human dignity and human decency. One could easily wonder why those haven’t been the minimal requirements for Federal judicial service in the past.

Past is past, particularly for life-tenured judges. But, America can’t afford any more disastrous judicial appointments, at any level, who lack the guts and human decency to stand up to scofflaw, neo-fascist racists like Trump, Miller, and their cronies.

The top to bottom overall failure of the American judiciary to put an end to unconstitutional and unfair racism and “Dred Scottification” of “the other” in our society is aiding and abetting the dark, lawless forces aligned with the regime destabilizing our country and ripping it apart! No more!

Due Process Forever!

PWS

08-31-20

OUTLAW REGIME/COMPLICIT JUDGES/NATION WITHOUT SOUL: Nicaraguan Gov. Pulled Refugee’s Toenails Out: Trump, Miller, & Wolf, Aided By Roberts, Sent Her Back To For More Torture & Perhaps Death Without Any Process!

Star Chamber Justice — The U.S.Asylum System
As Redesigned By Trump, Miller, Wolfman, & Roberts

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/nicaragua-asylum-us-border/2020/08/27/9aaba414-e561-11ea-970a-64c73a1c2392_story.html

Kevin Sieff reports for WashPost:

She was one of the most recognizable activists in Nicaragua, protesting a government that has jailed and killed its opponents. Her photo ran in national newspapers; one called her the “face of the rebellion.” Her video of police firing at student protesters went viral. Her confrontations with the government were cited by the U.S. State Department.

Valeska Alemán, 22, paid a price for that notoriety. She was detained twice. Interrogators pried off her toenails. When she decided to leave the country, the United States seemed a natural destination: The Trump administration has been vocal in its opposition to Nicaragua’s crackdown — and its support of the country’s young protesters.

‘They took my humanity’: Pro-government paramilitaries terrorize Nicaraguan protesters

But by the time Alemán arrived at the U.S. border in July, the administration had launched a pandemic-era policy that sends Nicaraguans directly back to their country without letting them apply for asylum. Seventeen days after crossing into Texas, she was put on a plane back to Managua with more than 100 other Nicaraguans, almost all of them opponents of President Daniel Ortega.

Her backpack was full of documents to show U.S. immigration officials that the government appeared ready to kill her. The officials wouldn’t look at them. When she landed back in Nicaragua, it felt as if she was carrying a ticking bomb, proof that she was trying to flee and accuse the government of abuse.

“I thought, ‘Okay, so they’re going to throw me straight back in jail,’ ” Alemán said. “ ‘I’m going to be tortured all over again.’ ”

Another expelled asylum seeker, Moises Alberto Ortega Valdivia, 38, swallowed five pages of his asylum paperwork, panicked that Nicaraguan police would find it.

Since taking control in 2017, the Trump administration has narrowed the pool of people who qualify for asylum and sent tens of thousands of applicants back to Mexico to await their hearings from squalid tent camps and shelters.

In squalid Mexico tent city, asylum seekers are growing so desperate they’re sending their children over the border alone

During the coronavirus pandemic, the administration has gone further, effectively shutting the asylum system down. Most Central American applicants are simply escorted back to Mexico. But Nicaraguans — including political protesters to whom the United States has given rhetorical support — are flown back to the country they tried to escape.

The administration is using a public health order known as 42 U.S.C. that cites “the danger to the public health” of migrants to justify the asylum system’s closure. Mexico has agreed to accept Salvadorans, Guatemalans and Hondurans. Other nations, such as Cuba and Venezuela, have refused to accept chartered U.S. deportation flights of their own citizens.

The U.S. is putting asylum seekers on planes to Guatemala — often without telling them where they’re going

In the case of Nicaragua, the United States is sending asylum seekers back to a country the State Department describes as violently repressive.

“Throughout Nicaragua, armed and violent uniformed police or civilians in plain clothes acting as police (‘para-police’) continue to target anyone considered to be in opposition to the rule of President Ortega,” the department says in a travel warning. “The government and its affiliated armed groups have been reported to arbitrarily detain pro-democracy protestors, with credible claims of torture and disappearances.”

U.S. Customs and Border Protection did not respond to multiple requests for comment. In a statement, the State Department said it “condemns all forms of political oppression, especially that orchestrated by the corrupt Ortega regime.” But it would not comment on the expulsion of Nicaraguan asylum seekers.

Alemán traveled with a family of Nicaraguan asylum seekers to the Texas border. All were university graduates and students of international affairs. Before they left, they reviewed the asylum laws on a U.S. government website.

. . . .

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

Read the rest of Kevin’s article at the link.

Section 208 of the Immigration & Nationality Act says:

Any alien who is physically present in the United States or who arrives in the United States (whether or not at a designated port of arrival and including an alien who is brought to the United States after having been interdicted in international or United States waters), irrespective of such alien’s status, may apply for asylum in accordance with this section or, where applicable, section 1225(b) of this title.

Very clear. What happened to refugee Valeska Alemán and other asylum seekers at the hands of the Trump regime was totally illegal (not to mention immoral); essentially a “crime against humanity” for which Trump, Miller, Wolfman, and the other “perps” should be held accountable.

But, this is Trump’s America where a majority of the Roberts’ Court favors White Supremacy, racism, and crimes against humanity over the Constitutional, statutory, and human rights of people of color. It’s called “Dred Scottification.” It’s a national and international disgrace that will stain our nation forever!

Think racial justice and equal justice in America will be achieved without a better Executive, throwing the GOP out of legislative power, and better Federal Judges? Guess again!

Due Process Forever!

PWS

08-28-30

🇺🇸⚖️🗽👍🏼🏆👏🏽GOOD GOVERNMENT: BELEAGUERED FEDS WOULD FIND WELCOME RESPITE IN BIDEN ADMINISTRATION! — This Election Could Be “Last Call” For One Of The Cornerstones Of Our Democracy — A Competent, Honest, Career Civil Service!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/biden-federal-workers-unions/2020/08/26/62595932-e71c-11ea-a414-8422fa3e4116_story.html

Joe Davidson reports for WashPost:

If Joe Biden is elected president, he promises to overturn President Trump’s aggression against federal employee unions, support regular pay raises for federal employees and protect their workplace rights.

Biden, the Democratic nominee, has pledged to upend Trump’s actions concerning federal labor organizations on Inauguration Day in January. Trump’s assaults were codified in three executive orders he issued in 2018. They systematically undermined the ability of unions to represent not only their members, but all employees in agency collective-bargaining units.

Saying Trump “has loosed a direct attack on our members’ union rights and dignity on the job,” the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) questionnaire to Biden outlines policies the largest federal union wants reversed.

“This includes purging lawful representational activity from government worksites and equipment, weaponizing the bargaining process to propose, and in some cases impose, one-sided contracts, attacking our statutory right to collect voluntary dues, crippling our ability to mediate disputes on duty time, and more,” says the questionnaire’s introduction. “Taken together, these attacks constitute more than just a threat to our members’ livelihoods, they threaten the survival of the merit-based civil service system on which our government is built.”

AFGE endorsed Biden last month. In two internal polls, AFGE said its members supported Biden over Trump by more than 30 points.

The first question asked Biden to commit to overturning the executive orders and other directives that weaken employee due process and collective bargaining rights “on your first day in office.” Biden agreed and said “the federal government should serve as a role model for employers to treat their workers fairly.”

“On my first day in office,” he added, “I will restore federal employees’ rights to organize and bargain collectively, restore their right to official time, and direct agencies to bargain with federal employee unions.” Official time allows union leaders to represent employees, including those who are not union members, in grievance procedures and matters involving issues such as workplace safety and productivity, while being paid by the government.

[If he gets a presidential Day 1, Biden has a nearly endless list of ways to spend it]

In addition to Biden’s answers, the Democratic Party Platform promises to “strengthen labor rights for the more than 20 million public-sector employees” at all levels by supporting legislation that would “provide a federal guarantee for public-sector employees to bargain for better pay and benefits and the working conditions they deserve.”

While Trump has been relentless in his federal union offensive, all was not copacetic when Biden served as Barack Obama’s vice president. Government workers vehemently opposed three federal pay freezes imposed under Obama, with congressional approval, during an era of budget tightening.

But the Obama-Biden administration did not seek to fundamentally undermine unions as Trump has done or diminish federal workers. Obama’s stated effort to “make government cool again” contrasts sharply with Trump’s “drain the swamp” attitude toward government. Trump did not respond to AFGE’s questionnaire.

. . . .

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Read the complete article at the link.

Just another instance where Biden is going to have to separate himself from some misguided, occasionally weak-kneed and shortsighted, Obama-era policies and establish himself as his own man, with a decidedly more practical, aware, and progressive approach. And, as a long-time public servant himself (albeit an elected one) — whose career has in many ways been built and furthered by the skills, expertise, and contributions of civil servants in all branches of Government — I believe he is up to the task. Indeed, he might well be the best-qualified candidate in my lifetime to save and enhance our now reeling and crumbling civil service — one of the “crown jewels” of American democracy now under unrelenting assault from a thoroughly corrupt Trump and his GOP nihilist “wrecking crew.”

For example, look at how the cowardly and totally unethical “Billy the Bigot” Barr tried to “punish” Judge Ashley Tabaddor and the National Association of Immigration Judges (“NAIJ”) (disclosure: I am a proud retired member) for speaking “truth to power.” As the only ones authorized to speak out on behalf of Immigration Judges (regardless of membership in the NAIJ), Judge Tabaddor and other NAIJ officials exposed the massive corruption, gross mismanagement, improper politicization, and medically dangerous working conditions at EOIR! As a result, Billy tried to silence her and the NAIJ by filing a frivolous action to “decertify” the NAIJ based on bogus reasons, many rejected by the FLRA in the past. This abuse of Government resources and process by Billy has since been dismissed after hearing by a FLRA official, as previously reported in “Courtside.”

As a civil servant for more than 35 years, serving in Administrations of both parties, at levels from “worker bee” to “Senior Exec,” and a veteran of 21 years on both levels of the Immigration Bench (when it actually more resembled a “real court” than the ridiculous parody engineered by Gonzo Apocalypto and Billy the Bigot), I know what I’m speaking about.

Incidentally, I was one of the “founding brothers and sisters” of the BIA employees’ union in the 1970s, and then went on to battle that same union before the FLRA during my tenure as BIA Chair in the late 1990s. So, like many issues in immigration during my career, I understand both sides.

But, I never questioned the BIA union’s authority to speak for the staff. In most ways, it was a good “focal point” for getting important issues out in the open and resolving them, even if the process was occasionally contentious and frustrating. And, I’d have to admit to getting some good ideas on management improvements from union officials. So good, in fact, that I actually hired some of them to become staff managers at the BIA.

Over my career, I was involved in thousands of asylum and refugee cases, many of them successful. Many were fleeing countries with great progressive “paper constitutions” and sometimes even very “facially reasonable” statutory law. A number of these countries had even signed the U.N. Refugee Convention. What often made these countries “persecutors” as opposed to “protectors” was in the “execution” rather than the “black letter law.”

Two characteristics that many of these persecutors had in common were: 1) an authoritarian executive who controlled a corrupt civil service usually “on the take,” staffed with family members, tribe members, or “party regulars,” and personally loyal to the leader rather than the constitution and statutes; and 2) “courts” that were either instruments of the leader and his tribe or party or too feckless to stand up against executive tyranny.

Under Trump and his corrupt GOP cronies, the US is well on its way to this type of “banana republic” public service in all three branches. And, don’t thank that a healthy economy or a robust stock market are “proof” against tyranny. Today’s China, as well as Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan, are prime examples of how “economic success and power” do not necessarily equate with good government, equality, or lack of repression.

This November, vote like your life and the future of our democracy depend on it! Because they do!

PWS

08-26|-20

🇺🇸😎⚖️🗽👍REFUGEE, ASYLUM, IMMIGRATION, & BORDER REFORM – Plenty Of Good Ideas — Shortage Of Political Will To Fix Broken System!

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The following three papers have been prepared as part of a process, organized jointly by the Center for Migration Studies of New York (CMS) and the Zolberg Institute on Migration and Mobility at the New School, to identify ways to strengthen the US immigration and refugee protection systems through administrative action. Additional papers in this collection will be forthcoming, as well as a distinct set of policy recommendations from the directors of CMS and the Zolberg Institute.

Rebuilding the US Refugee Resettlement Program

By Susan Martin (Georgetown University)

This paper offers an historic review of the US refugee resettlement program. It spans the colonial era, to the establishment of the first distinct US admissions policies for persons fleeing persecution in 1917, to the creation of the formal US Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP) in 1980, and to the Trump administrations’ denigration of and attempts to eviscerate the program. It proposes ways that a new administration can rebuild this crucially important program and put it on more secure footing. In particular, it recommends that a new administration:

Reframe the discourse on refugee resettlement to emphasize its central importance to the nation’s identity and the way it serves the national interest.

Rebuild the capacity of the federal government to administer the program and the badly depleted community-based resettlement infrastructure that is central to the program’s success.

Hold emergency consultations with Congress to increase refugee admissions in Fiscal Year (FY) 2021, and consult soon after the inauguration with international, state and local, and non-governmental partners to plan FY 2022 resettlement goals, including a robust admissions ceiling and budget.

Reform and reinvigorate federal consultations with states and localities to ensure their receptivity, capacity and support for refugees, and eliminate the current veto power of states and municipalities over resettlement in their jurisdictions.

Explore legislative fixes to the refugee admissions process and attempt to depoliticize the process by setting a “normal flow level” that does not require an annual Presidential determination.

Join the Global Compact on Refugees, which seeks to expand the availability of durable solutions for refugees, and encourage other nations to follow the US example of resettling larger numbers of refugees.

READ MORE

Border Enforcement Developments Since 1993 and How to Change CBP

By Daniel E. Martínez (The University of Arizona), Josiah Heyman (The University of Texas at El Paso), and Jeremy Slack (The University of Texas at El Paso)

Enforcement along the US-Mexico border has intensified significantly since the early 1990s. Social scientists have documented several consequences of border militarization, including increased border-crosser deaths, the killing of more than 110 people by Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents over the past decade, and expanded ethno-racial profiling in southwestern communities by immigration authorities. Less attention has been paid to the pervasive and routine mistreatment migrants experience on a daily basis in CBP custody.

This paper traces major developments in border enforcement to three notable initiatives: the “prevention-through-deterrence” strategy, the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Consequence Delivery System, initiated in 2011. Despite the massive buildup in enforcement, CBP has operated with little transparency and accountability to the detriment of migrants. The paper provides an overview of the findings of nongovernmental organizations and social scientists regarding migrant mistreatment while in CBP custody. It then highlights important shifts in migration patterns over the past decade, as well as changes in border enforcement efforts during the Trump administration. It discusses how these transformations affect migrants’ everyday encounters with CBP officials.

The paper concludes by providing specific recommendations for improving CBP conduct. Its core theme is the need to emphasize and inculcate lessons of appropriate police behavior, civil rights, and civil liberties in training and recruiting agents and in setting responsibilities of supervisors and administrators. It offers recommendations regarding important but underrecognized issues, including ending the use of CBP agents/officers as Asylum Officers, as well as better-known issues such as militarization and the border wall.

READ MORE

Strengthening the US Immigration System through Legal Orientation, Screening and Representation: Recommendations for a New Administration

By Donald Kerwin (Center for Migration Studies)

This paper highlights the importance of legal orientation, screening, and representation to the US immigration system. It proposes that a new administration facilitate legal representation in order to establish a fairer and more efficient removal adjudication system and to place more immigrants on a path to permanent residence and citizenship. As is well-documented, legal assistance can:

Improve the ability of immigrants to identify and articulate their claims in removal proceedings and produce better-informed case outcomes.

Increase the efficiency and contribute to the integrity of the removal adjudication system.

Lead to better-prepared applications for immigration benefits, and thus a more just and efficient legal immigration system.

Place more non-citizens on a path to permanent residence and naturalization by identifying their potential eligibility for immigration benefits or relief, and, in some cases, their existing US citizenship.

Legal representation and expertise can also contribute to resolving some of the substantial problems that afflict the US immigration system, such as lengthy court and asylum backlogs. In addition, it can identify and help to correct legal and factual errors by immigration adjudicators, and abuses by enforcement officers and private contractors.

The paper’s first section describes federal legal orientation and assistance programs for non-citizens in removal proceedings. The second section discusses the need for large-scale legal screening and representation of US undocumented residents, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients, and Temporary Protected Status (TPS) beneficiaries. Its third section examines the proliferation of universal representation programs—supported by states, localities, and private funders—for non-citizens in removal proceedings before an immigration judge, and in summary removal processes administered by the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The paper concludes with a series of administrative measures that a new administration could take in its first year to strengthen and expand legal representation. It also outlines longer-term policy recommendations that would require legislation.

READ MORE

The Center for Migration Studies (CMS) is a New York-based educational institute devoted to the study of international migration, to the promotion of understanding between immigrants and receiving communities, and to public policies that safeguard the dignity and rights of migrants, refugees, and newcomers. For more information, please visit www.cmsny.org.

Copyright © 2020 Center for Migration Studies, New York, All rights reserved.

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It’s possible that Biden could win and still end up hamstrung by a Senate controlled by “Moscow Mitch” and his “American Nihilist Party.” That’s why all elections are critically important this November!

Gotta work with what you‘ve got. So, in a “second worst case scenario” Biden might have to go the Administrative route. Three major problems:

He’ll have to do much better on the administrative agenda than Obama – that means jettisoning some of his past and getting and empowering more progressive advisors, folks like Kerwin, Susan Martin, Martinez, Hyman, Slack, Michelle Mendez, Karen Musalo, Marielena Hincapie, Heidi Altman, Debbie Anker, Hon. Ilyce Shugall, Michele Pistone, Denise Gilman, Kristina Campbell, Lindsay Harris, David Baluarte, Phil Schrag, Jaya Ramji-Nogales, Andy Schoenholtz, Eleanor Acer, Alice Farmer, Hon. Bob Weisel, Hon. Lory Rosenberg, Hon. Carol King, Lenni Benson, Michelle Brane, Hon. Amiena Khan, Cori Alonso-Yoder, Dree Collopy, Blaine Bookey, Tess Hellgren, Hon. Paul Gussendorf, Simon Sandoval Moshenberg, Tanishka Cruz, Lauren Wyatt, Laura Lynch, Claudia Valenzuela, Aaron Richlin-Melnick, Katie Tobin, Lindsay Jenkins, Hon. Ashley Tabaddor, Jason “The Asylumist” Dzubow, Kevin Johnson, Kit Johnson, Dan Kowalski, Margaret Stock, Ben Winograd, Hon. Rebecca Jamil, Claudia Cubas, Wendy Young, Laura Tuell, Jayesh Rathod, Shoba Wadhia, Hon. Jeffrey Chase, Elizabeth “The Report” Gibson, and a host of others too numerous to list. No shortage of real talent out there to replace the regime’s “maliciously incompetent kakistocracy.”
Without an independent Article I Immigration Court and a drastic “upgrade” in the human rights, immigration, and equal justice credentials of newly appointed Article III Judges, administrative reforms are likely to be less than optimally effective.
“The Lesson of Trump” – Anything the “good guys” can do administratively can be undone by the “bad guys” overnight. And, building can be long and difficult; demolition quick and easy.

This November, vote like your life depends on it. Because it does!

PWS

08-26-20

🏴‍☠️☠️🤮⚰️👎🏻9th BLASTS BILLY THE BIGOT’S BIA’S BLATANTLY BIASED ANTI-ASYLUM ASSAULT — AGAIN — 2 More Losses For Billy’s Illegal “Any Reason To Deny” Program!

Dan Kowalski reports from LexisNexis Immgration Community:

Immigration Law

Q

Daniel M. Kowalski

25 Aug 2020

Somalia

credibility

CA9 on Credibility: Iman v. Barr

Iman v. Barr

“In light of the totality of the circumstances and in the context of the administrative record presented to us, the evidence in this case compels the conclusion that Iman’s testimony was credible. Exercising jurisdiction under 8 U.S.C. § 1252(a)(1), we therefore grant the petition and remand to the BIA for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.”

[Hats of to Doug Jalaie!]

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

CA9 on Asylum, Motions to Reopen: Aliyev v. Barr

Aliyev v. Barr

“We hold that the BIA abused its discretion by determining that a noncitizen who seeks to reopen an earlier application for relief and attaches that application to the motion has failed to attach the “appropriate application for relief” as required by § 1003.2(c)(1). … We therefore grant the petition and remand.”

[Hats off to Corrine Nikolenko and Michael W. Schoenleber!]

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

None of this is “rocket science.” It’s immigration basics. While these 9th Cir. panels “flag” the steady stream of elementary errors, they continue to beg the real question: Why do they allow it to continue?

Due Process Forever!

PWS

08-25-20

SENATORS DEMAND IG INVESTIGATE BIAS, CORRUPTION, GROSS MISMANAGEMENT @ EOIR!

Laura Lynch @ AILA reports:

FYI – On Friday, August 21st, Democratic members of the Senate Judiciary Committee sent a letter to the GAO requesting an investigation into the politicization of the immigration courts and EOIR’s mismanagement of the immigration courts during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Laura A. Lynch, Esq.

Senior Policy Counsel

Direct: 202.507.7627 I Email: llynch@aila.org

American Immigration Lawyers Association

Main: 202.507.7600 I Fax: 202.783.7853 I www.aila.org

1331 G Street NW, Suite 300, Washington, DC 20005

From: Davidson, Richard (Whitehouse) <Richard_Davidson@whitehouse.senate.gov>
Sent: Friday, August 21, 2020 3:24 PM
To: Davidson, Richard (Whitehouse) <Richard_Davidson@whitehouse.senate.gov>
Subject: Senators Call for GAO Investigation of Trump Politicization of Immigration Courts as COVID-19 Crisis Rages

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

August 21, 2020
Contact: Rich Davidson

(202) 228-6291 (press office)

Senators Call for GAO Investigation of Trump Politicization of Immigration Courts as COVID-19 Crisis Rages

Trump attacks on immigration system raise serious concerns about safety during pandemic

More than 1,000 people in immigration detention have tested positive for COVID-19, and five have died

Washington, DC – Today, Senators Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Dick Durbin (D-IL), and Mazie Hirono (D-HI) led a Senate request to the top congressional watchdog to investigate the practices of the Executive Office of Immigration Review (EOIR) under President Trump, including its management of immigration courts during the current COVID-19 pandemic. In a letter to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), the senators raise concerns first voiced to the Justice Department in February about mismanagement of the EOIR under Attorney General William Barr, as well as the Trump administration’s regulatory and procedural changes at the Justice Department that have curtailed the independence of immigration courts. The administration’s mismanagement of and meddling with the immigration courts – done in the name of “efficiency” – are particularly troubling during the COVID-19 pandemic, when an overburdened system can lead to unsafe practices that place individuals at grave risk and jeopardize due process, the senators write to the GAO.

“While the Trump administration has justified its incursions into the independence of immigration courts as efficiency measures, legal service providers have explained that EOIR’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic demonstrates how the agency can use seemingly neutral measures to tip the scales of justice against noncitizens,” the senators write. “In order to defend themselves in immigration court, noncitizens must file motions and other papers in person at physical court locations; obtain counsel; meet with their attorneys; present testimony from family members, employers, and/or expert witnesses; and provide medical records, tax records, and other supporting documents. Yet COVID-19 makes these actions potentially dangerous.”

Joining Whitehouse, Durbin, and Hirono in the request to the GAO are Senators Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Chris Coons (D-DE), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Cory Booker (D-NJ), and Kamala Harris (D-CA).

The senators continue in their letter to GAO, “Immigration courts are now reopening around the country, including in areas that are seeing increases in the number of COVID-19 cases. Because EOIR does not have consistent policies for when attorneys, let alone translators or witnesses, may appear telephonically or by video, participants often must appear in person or not at all. Immigration courts have continued to issue in absentia orders of removal for noncitizens who do not appear, even when the likely cause is COVID-19. Nor has EOIR uniformly extended deadlines or continued cases, despite the difficulty noncitizens face in finding and consulting with counsel, obtaining and filing necessary documents and evidence, or securing the appearance of witnesses. These difficulties are particularly acute for detained clients, who have limited access to phone calls and attorney visits. As a result, noncitizens cannot obtain counsel or litigate their cases, and attorneys cannot effectively represent their clients.”

The Trump administration’s management of the immigration system has come under close scrutiny during the COVID-19 crisis. Reports suggest immigrants face a range of unsafe conditions and practices as a result of Trump administration management decisions, including the detention of children using unaccountable private contractors. More than 1,000 people in immigration detention have tested positive for COVID-19, and five people have died.

Full text of the senators’ request is below. A PDF copy is available here.

August 21, 2020

The Honorable Gene Dodaro

Comptroller General of the United States

United States Government Accountability Office

441 G Street, NW

Washington, DC 20548

Dear Mr. Dodaro:

We are writing to request that the Government Accountability Office (GAO) analyze and audit the Executive Office of Immigration Review’s (EOIR) practices with respect to the hiring, training, and evaluation of immigration judges and staffing of immigration courts, as well as their management of these courts during the current COVID-19 pandemic. GAO’s insight will help Congress determine if additional legislation is necessary to address these issues, as well as inform appropriations decisions.

In February, we wrote to Attorney General William Barr to express our concern that the Trump administration is undermining the independence of immigration courts. As outlined in that letter, attached, we are concerned about the mismanagement of EOIR and troubled by regulatory and procedural changes within the Department of Justice (DOJ) that have curtailed the independence of immigration courts. Although more than six months have passed, we have not received a response from DOJ or EOIR. Instead, in that time, EOIR has continued to use its administrative powers to put its thumb on the scale of justice. Most recently, EOIR attempted to buy out all nine career Board of Immigration Appeals judges who had been hired in prior administrations.[1] When the judges refused, they were reassigned to new roles.[2]

While the Trump administration has justified its incursions into the independence of immigration courts as efficiency measures,[3] legal service providers have explained that EOIR’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic demonstrates how the agency can use seemingly neutral measures to tip the scales of justice against noncitizens. In order to defend themselves in immigration court, noncitizens must file motions and other papers in person at physical court locations; obtain counsel; meet with their attorneys; present testimony from family members, employers, and/or expert witnesses; and provide medical records, tax records, and other supporting documents. Yet COVID-19 makes these actions potentially dangerous. While EOIR initially postponed all hearings for non-detained individuals, proceedings for detained noncitizens continued to move forward unabated.[4] Immigration courts are now reopening around the country,[5] including in areas that are seeing increases in the number of COVID-19 cases. Because EOIR does not have consistent policies for when attorneys, let alone translators or witnesses, may appear telephonically or by video,[6] participants often must appear in person or not at all.[7] Immigration courts have continued to issue in absentia orders of removal for noncitizens who do not appear, even when the likely cause is COVID-19.[8] Nor has EOIR uniformly extended deadlines or continued cases, despite the difficulty noncitizens face in finding and consulting with counsel, obtaining and filing necessary documents and evidence, or securing the appearance of witnesses. These difficulties are particularly acute for detained clients, who have limited access to phone calls and attorney visits.[9] As a result, noncitizens cannot obtain counsel or litigate their cases, and attorneys cannot effectively represent their clients.[10]

EOIR’s facially-neutral policies during the COVID-19 pandemic have raised systemic due process concerns.[11] Immigration judges, staff, and litigators have also expressed concerns about the health risks to them and the litigants who appear in immigration courts.[12] Given GAO’s prior work on immigration courts,[13] it is uniquely suited to conduct an audit and analysis of EOIR. We ask GAO to look into the following questions:

What criteria does EOIR use to hire immigration judges and Board of Immigration Appeals judges? What criteria does EOIR use to determine the number of deputy chief and other management positions for judges, and what criteria does EOIR use to hire for these positions? To what extent does EOIR assess its immigration judge and Board of Immigration Appeals judge hiring efforts? What, if any, challenges has EOIR encountered in recruiting and retaining immigration judges and Board of Immigration Appeals judges? How, if at all, has it addressed them?

How does EOIR determine targets for immigration court and Board of Immigration Appeals case completion time frames and caseloads?

To what extent has EOIR assessed its immigration court and Board of Immigration Appeals staffing needs? What have any such assessments shown? How do current immigration court staffing levels compare to staffing needs EOIR has identified?

How does EOIR assess immigration and Board of Immigration Appeals judge performance?

To what extent has EOIR assessed immigration judge and Board of Immigration Appeals judge training needs? What have any such assessments shown?

How has EOIR’s use of video teleconferencing changed since GAO last reported on it in 2017? What, if any, data is EOIR collecting on hearings using video teleconferencing and the effects of that technology on hearing outcomes?

How do EOIR’s practices compare to other administrative courts?

How, if at all, is EOIR addressing the backlog of cases that were postponed in response to the COVID-19 pandemic?

How, if at all, has EOIR’s response to COVID-19 affected noncitizens’ ability to locate and meet with counsel, obtain and present evidence in their cases, and appear in court? To what extent have the challenges of COVID-19 impacted the number of in absentia orders issued by immigration courts?

Please keep our offices apprised of your review. Thank you for your attention to this matter.

###

[1] Tanvi Misra, DOJ ‘reassigned’ career members of Board of Immigration Appeals, CQ Roll Call, June 9, 2020, available at https://www.rollcall.com/2020/06/09/doj-reassigned-career-members-of-board-of-immigration-appeals/.

[2] Id.

[3] Jeff Sessions, Attorney General, U.S. Dep’t of Justice, Remarks to the Executive Office for Immigration Review Legal Training Program (Jun. 11, 2018), available at https://www.justice.gov/opa/speech/attorney-general-sessions-delivers-remarks-executive-office-immigration-review-legal.

[4] Executive Office for Immigration Review, EOIR Operational Status During Coronavirus Pandemic, https://www.justice.gov/eoir/eoir-operational-status-during-coronavirus-pandemic (last updated Aug. 19, 2020); American Immigration Lawyers Association, “AILA Tracks EOIR’s Historical Operational Status During Coronavirus Pandemic,” https://www.aila.org/eoir-operational-status (last visited Aug. 19, 2020).

[5] American Immigration Lawyers Association, supra note 4.

[6] Id.

[7] Emergency Mot. for a Temporary Restraining Order, Nat’l Imm. Project of the Nat’l Lawyers Guild v. Exec. Office of Imm. Review, No. 1:20-cv-00852-CJN, at 12-18 (D.D.C. Apr. 8, 2020), available at https://www.aila.org/advo-media/press-releases/2020/temporary-restraining-order-requested-to-stop.

[8] Id. at 15-16.

[9] Monique O. Madan, Despite national shortage, immigration lawyers required to bring their own medical gear, Miami Herald, Mar. 22, 2020, https://miamiherald.com/news/local/immigration/artcile241414486.html.

[10] Id. 12-15, 25-26.

[11] Betsy Woodruff Swan, Union: DOJ deportation appeals workers fear overcrowding, Politico, Apr. 23, 2020, https://www.politico.com/news/2020/04/23/doj-union-immigration-deportation-coronavirus-202075 (“That is the feeling the [EOIR] employees have, that [EOIR’s COVID response is] definitely connected to this administration and their desperation to be able to boast about how great they’re doing on their deportation numbers.”).

[12] Nat’l Assoc. of Immigration Judges, Am. Assoc. of Immigration Lawyers, & Am. Fed. Of Gov’t Employees Local 511, Position on the Health and Safety of Immigration Courts During the COVID-19 Pandemic, Mar. 15, 2020, available at https://naij-usa.org/images/uploads/newsroom/2020.03.15.00.pdf.

[13] See, e.g., Gov’t Accountability Office, Immigration Courts: Actions Needed to Reduce Case Backlog and Address Long-Standing Management and Operational Challenges (June 2017).

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

Basically, confirms what AILA, NAIJ, our Round Table, NGOs, and much of the media have been saying for a long time now! Obviously, the Dems lack the power in the Senate to take effective action to eliminate EOIR and replace it with an independent Article I Court, at present. Hopefully, that will be remedied in November.

In the meantime, what’s the excuse of the Article IIIs for continuing to allow this mockery of our Constitution and parody of justice to continue to daily inflict abuse on their fellow humans?

Due Process Forever!

PWS

08-25-20

🏴‍☠️☠️🤮⚰️🆘AMERICA’S SHAME — NATIONAL DISGRACE – SYSTEMIC INSTITUTIONAL FAILURE: From Supremes Who Abandoned Their Key Precedent In Cardoza-Fonseca, To A 5th Cir. Court Of Appeals That Shirked Its Duty To Protect Refugees, To A “Don’t Rock The Boat” BIA That Failed To Enforce Uniformity, To Unqualified & Biased Immigration “Judges” Who Created Illegal, “Asylum-Free Zones,” The U.S. Asylum System Was In Deep Trouble Even Before Trump – Under Trump, It Has Become A “Killing Floor” Programmed To Intentionally Deny & Deport Deserving Refugees To Death, Torture, Or Grotesque Mistreatment, As Indolent, Cloistered Article IIIs, Unwilling To Dig In & Stop The Slaughter Look On!

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/immigration/story/2020-08-23/who-gets-asylum-even-before-trump-system-was-riddled-with-bias-and-disparities

An asylum seeker’s chances at protection hinge on numerous factors that often seem arbitrary — from location to nationality to individual judge assigned — according to a Union-Tribune analysis of immigration court records
By KATE MORRISSEY,
LAURYN SCHROEDER
AUG. 23, 2020
5 AM
For the world’s most vulnerable, protection in the United States has all but disappeared.
Wait times for asylum seekers at the U.S.-Mexico border that already seemed indefinite now seem impossible. Families struggle to find food and shelter to outlast a pandemic order with no end date.
Those who cross north are sent back to Mexico in a matter of hours — or even put onto planes back to the countries from which they fled — without any opportunity to explain why they came.
In its response to COVID-19, the Trump administration achieved what it long sought, a shutdown of the U.S. asylum system. And with new regulations introduced this summer, the administration has moved to squeeze out any real chance at refuge in case the pandemic order is lifted.
But even before the current president began his campaign against asylum in the United States, people often struggled to win protection — no matter how strong their cases appeared to be.
In its 40-year history, the system has chronically fallen short of its promise of safety.
RETURNED: PART II
The second in an occasional series in which the Union-Tribune explores the asylum system through the eyes of people who experience it firsthand, with drastically different outcomes.
The Trump administration has used statistics about grant rates to justify closing off access to asylum, saying that those who lose their cases are illegitimate asylum seekers.
The facts show a different story: Thousands of people turned away based not on the merits of their cases, but on the capriciousness of a system so riven with inequity that many outcomes seem little more than arbitrary.
A San Diego Union-Tribune analysis of 10 years of court outcomes uncovered many symptoms of the system’s biases — shortcomings that date to the system’s creation.
. . . .

***************************
Read the rest of this eye-opening (for those not familiar with this broken, biased, and beyond dysfunctional system) article at the above link.

There can be no excuse for the “horror chamber” that this already broken, battered, and unfair system has devolved into. It will take genuine changes in expertise, attitude, courage, and intellectual integrity across all three branches of Government to get this system functioning in a fair, legal, and constitutional manner consistent with due process and our international obligations.
It also will require much better, more educated, more courageous, more practical, and more intellectually honest judges from the Immigration Courts (which must become independent from the Executive) all the way up to and including the Supremes.

Better judges for a better America! Life tenure means it won’t happen overnight. But, the process needs to begin now for our nation to survive and prosper!

We can’t achieve equal justice for all with so many judges who don’t believe in it, don’t have expertise in and a commitment to human rights, and don’t have the guts to stand up for the legal, constitutional, and human rights of all individuals coming before our justice system. That specifically includes the “most vulnerable among us” – asylum seekers and other of our fellow humans whose humanity and right to live seem to fall below the “radar screen” of the current Supremes’ majority!

Due Process Forever! “Dred Scottification” and complicity, never!

PWS
08-24-20

🏴‍☠️DONALD TRUMP: FAILED FASCIST! — But, Fascism Doesn’t Doesn’t Have To Be “Successful” On Some “Academic Scale” To Threaten The Downfall Of Our Democracy! — We Ignore Trump’s Fascism At Our Peril!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/how-fascist-is-president-trump-theres-still-a-formula-for-that/2020/08/21/aa023aca-e2fc-11ea-b69b-64f7b0477ed4_story.html

By John McNeill in WashPost Outlook:

. . . .

So where does Trump’s administration stand as he is nominated for a second term? He earned 47 of a possible 76 Benitos, or 62 percent. He remains the greatest threat to American democracy since the Civil War, but his exercise of power only partly resembles that of real fascists. He still faces checks and balances in Washington. He hasn’t shut down rival parties or uncompliant media.

He has not directed the armed might of the state against citizens on anything like the scale used by Mussolini, let alone Hitler. He does not have his own obedient “squadristi” eager to beat up foes, even if plenty of his followers advocate (and sometimes indulge in) violence against minorities and Trump’s opponents. He has not arranged the murder of prominent political opponents. The cult of violence is integral to fascism but far less central to Trump. He is not ruling like a genuine fascist.

But he has shown pronounced fascistic leanings. In the right circumstances — a crisis he could manage triumphantly, a more sympathetic military — perhaps he would try to extend his rule beyond whatever the voters allow him and convert the United States into a repressive, racist dictatorship. Or perhaps stage phony elections that hand the reins to Ivanka and Jared. At least a few members of Congress would probably support him, just as many parliamentarians voted to give Mussolini and Hitler emergency powers. Those lawmakers did not know at the time just where fascism might lead. We have a clearer idea.

John McNeill is a professor of history at Georgetown University.

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

Read the complete op-ed at the above link.

I get that Trump’s maliciousness is somewhat tempered by his overall incompetence.

But, with due respect to Professor McNeill, I think he presents a “upper class intellectual” view of Trump’s vileness and danger on the “fascism scale.” His pre-existing privilege have largely shielded him, and likely his family and most of his associates, from the true effects of Trump’s White Nationalist fascism.

However, I think that African Americans who have had family members and friends killed or seriously harmed by police, only to be mocked, threatened, and disenfranchised by the Prez; children and families separated forever; kids and asylum applicants jailed in life-threatening conditions; refugees and other family members stranded forever abroad; lawyers and advocates who risk their health and safety every day to defend the most vulnerable among us; the ghosts of those who have died of COVID-19 in detention; those with family members needlessly lost to COVID-19; ethnic communities who have been terrorized by DHS and who have seen a sharply diminished ability to seek protection from crimes; Asian Americans who have victimized by hate crimes; those who have lost health insurance coverage, jobs, and shelter; Muslims scapegoated for others’ crimes; transgender youth driven to depression and suicide by government endorsed harassment and denial of basic human rights; and a host of others living below McNeill’s radar screen might disagree with his “failed” analysis.

Also, like many academics and intellectuals shielded by the Ivory Tower, McNeill vastly overestimates the effect of “checks and balances.” In fact, Trump has been able to rule lawlessly, if incompetently, without meaningful participation of Congress and with little effective pushback from the Federal Courts.

He’s made mincemeat of the few in the Executive Branch with the guts and integrity to oppose him, without engendering meaningful and anything approaching effective reactions from the other two Branches. His own party has publicly and fully turned against American democracy and the rights, well being, and humanity of the rest (e.g., the majority) of us. That’s pretty effective fascism in my book, even considering the less than competent implementation.

It’s a mark of just how ineffectual our system of “checks and balances” has been that we are, as a nation, without a functioning immigration system; without functioning Immigration Courts; without a national plan or rational response to a dangerous pandemic; without a plan to protect our precious franchise or to insure safe, free, and fair elections this fall; with a failing postal system that has been politicized; without a plan to address the threat of global warning and, indeed, doing everything in our power to make it worse!

This is not “failed fascism!” Rather it is a fascist state run by malicious incompetents and headed by a leader without the attention span, intellectual capacity, or ability to fully develop any intellectual doctrine and implement its full range of destruction. But, that only slightly diminishes his danger to our body politic!

That Trump dares to put forth outrageous ideas like not leaving office following defeat, barring U.S. citizens from re-entering their country, sending police to polling stations, and questioning the citizenship of Kamala Harris shows just how feckless our democratic institutions have been in the face of tyranny and how misguided it is to understate Trump’s fascism.

With his overtly outrageous program of “Dred Scottification” of “the other” — largely and embarrassingly embraced by a Supremes’ majority — Trump has moved our nation as far away from “equal justice for all” as we have been in the supposed “post-Jim-Crow” era!

To rely on the “beneficial effects” of incompetence on malicious would-be fascism is a fool’s errand that could cost us dearly. Indeed, until it was too late, the leaders of Western Democracies rather consistently overplayed the cartoonish characteristics of Hitler’s and Mussolini’s “pseudo-super-macho” personalities and underplayed the potential destructive capacity of their fascism, whether “failed” or not. The threat is real and this is likely to be our last clear chance as a nation to save our democracy!

This November, vote like your life and the future of the world depend on it! Because they do!

PWS

08-24-20

🆘 NDPA ALERT: Immigration Advocates & African Americans Have Been At The Forefront Of The Resistance To The Trump Regime — Immigration Advocates Can’t Be “Stiffed” Like They Were By Obama — Let Joe Know That Appointment Of Child Abuser & Family Imprisonment Advocate Sally Yates, Or Any “Retread” Like Her, As AG Will Be A Breach Of Faith! — No More “Go Along To Get Along” Appointments — Only Someone With Demonstrated Human Rights & Immigrants’ Rights Commitment Can Be AG or DHS Sec. Under Next Dem. Administration!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/08/21/biden-picked-his-vp-now-we-pick-his-dream-cabinet/

Opinions

Here’s who Biden should pick for a dream Cabinet

(Tom Toles/The Washington Post)

Opinion by The Ranking Committee

August 21, 2020 at 9:04 a.m. EDT

Add to listAdd to list

With presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden’s veep picked, convention concluded and campaign cruising ahead of his opponent’s, he might be tempted to start measuring the White House drapes. So to curb that temptation, the Ranking Committee members are doing it for him for Round 69 — starting with whom he should pick for his Cabinet.

. . . .

Attorney General Sally Yates

A courageous civil servant who has demonstrated her commitment to upholding the law even under personally and politically difficult conditions.

— Catherine Rampell

. . . .

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

Hell No! Sorry, Catherine, Yates would be a “Nightmare on Elm Street” ☠️!

Sally Yates presided over families in immigration prison, civil detention abuses, the disintegration of the Immigration Courts through “Aimless Docket Reshuffling,” dilatory hiring practices for Immigration Judges, unrepresented toddlers in Immigration Court, misuse of the justice system as a “deterrent” for immigration, and the steady diminution of both Due Process and judicial independence at the BIA and the Immigration Courts.

She was totally gone deaf on the immigration, human rights, and human decency issues (except for her last act when she was heading out the door), and helped set the table for the gross abuses of human rights inflicted on asylum seekers and immigrants, particularly targeting those of color, by the Trump regime.

She would be a horrible Attorney General and an insult to Hispanics, people of color, immigrants, and ethnic communities that have stood up against Trump’s abuses while many Dems folded their tents and hid.

Either Former HUD Secretary and Presidential candidate Julian Castro or his brother Rep. Joaquin Castro would be far superior choices. They both understand that justice for migrants and asylum seekers, and humane sensible immigration policies are prerequisites for finally attaining equal justice under law, fundamental fairness, and eliminating the institutionalized racism in which Yates played a role.

Immigration advocates must make their opposition to this and other unacceptable choices clear to the Biden campaign in advance of the election and should pledge to testify en masse against any such nomination.

No more Dem AGs who fail to make human rights and equal justice for all, including asylum seekers, immigrants, African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Asian Americans, and all people of color “job number one!” The next Dem AG must also be 100% committed to an independent, Article I Immigration Court to replace the current dysfunctional and insanely unfair mess at EOIR!

Catherine Rampell is generally “spot on.” But, hey, anyone can have a bad day!

There is lots of new talent out there that demands a chance to lead! No excuse for “retreads!”

Due Process Forever! Sally Yates & Other Dem Retreads With Disgraceful Records Of Failure On Human Rights & Immigration, Never!

PWS

08-22-20

CHANNELING COURTSIDE: Billy The Bigot’s Bias, Lies, & Absurdist “Legal Arguments” Have Tanked The DOJ’s Credibility With U.S. Courts – “The problem with bypassing professionals and norms is that the decisions you make instead are often transparently foolish, or appear rigged to achieve an unprincipled or corrupt result,” says WashPost Op-Ed – So, Why Does Billy B Still Have A Law License?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/08/18/justice-departments-extreme-legal-arguments-are-costing-it-court/

Opinion by

George T. Conway III and

Lawrence S. Robbins

August 18, 2020 at 5:12 p.m. EDT

Lawrence S. Robbins is an appellate and trial lawyer at Robbins Russell. George T. Conway III is a lawyer and an adviser to the Lincoln Project, an anti-Trump super PAC. The writers both submitted friend-of-the-court briefs opposing the government’s motion in the Flynn case.

If there’s one thing you can say about President Trump and his administration, it’s that nothing is regular except the irregular, which has had myriad damaging consequences for the nation. And it’s had particularly adverse consequences for the federal government’s ability to defend itself in court.

The latest example comes in the criminal case against Trump’s first, short-tenured national security adviser, Michael Flynn. He pleaded guilty — not once but twice — to charges that he had lied to FBI agents during an interview about his conversations with senior Russian officials during the presidential transition. Despite Flynn’s admissions of guilt, Attorney General William P. Barr filed a motion asking that the case be dismissed — and supporting Flynn’s effort to have that done without even a hearing before the district judge.

Flynn won before an appeals court panel. But when the full court of appeals heard arguments on Flynn’s petition, the judges couldn’t have seemed more bewildered at the Trump administration’s position. The government argued that the district judge couldn’t inquire into the government’s reasons for seeking dismissal even if he’d seen the prosecutor take a bribe, in open court, in exchange for dismissing the case.

The Trump administration has been saying things like that a lot lately — trying to stretch the law in ways that undermine its remaining credibility. It argued that a sitting president’s accountants and bankers can’t be subpoenaed for his personal records during his term in office by either a state grand jury or, without meeting an impossibly high burden, by Congress. It argued that the president’s close aides can’t be called to testify before a congressional committee investigating presidential misconduct. The least trustworthy administration in decades, if not ever, keeps arguing: “You’ve just got to trust us.”

Lawyers have a phrase for the government’s saying “Trust us.” It’s called the “presumption of regularity.” The presumption of regularity means that courts should presume that government officials acted through a “regular” process: that it carefully vetted its policy and scrupulously examined relevant legal precedents.

But, as its name suggests, the presumption of regularity rests on the premise that the government is functioning in a regular way. And the Trump administration is anything but regular. Following the cues of a chief executive who despises what he calls the “deep state,” administration officials have cut corners, displaced career professionals, exiled dissenters and abandoned institutional norms — in short, circumvented the very processes that justify the presumption of regularity in the first place.

The chickens have now come home to roost. Whether they say so explicitly or not, courts have been dispensing with the presumption of regularity. The best example: In the litigation over the 2020 Census, the Supreme Court held that Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross’s decision to add a citizenship question to the census form was arbitrary and capricious. The reason? “Altogether,” Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. wrote, “the evidence does not match the explanation the secretary gave for his decision.” That’s just a polite lawyer’s way of saying Ross lied.

Examples of the administration’s disrespect for regularity are legion, and not just confined to litigated matters. Barr has acted as a virtual one-man band of irregularity: He forced the U.S. attorney in Washington, Jessie K. Liu, out of her job, thereby enabling him to countermand former special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s sentencing recommendation for Roger Stone. And Barr gave a transparently false account of the Mueller report in the week before it was released to the public.

. . . .

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

Read the rest of the op-ed at the above link.

Perhaps the most disturbing thing is that Billy the Bigot actually “runs” a so-called “court system” — the U.S. Immigration Court — that has life or death authority over some of the most vulnerable individuals in our society, indeed in the world! How this stunning violation of both the Fifth Amendment and fundamental human decency (not to mention basic principles of competent management and good governance) continues to grind humanity into a grisly mess 🤮 of human misery ☠️ in plain sight every day is beyond me!

Almost everything in this “spot on” op-ed echoes “Courtside.” I have consistently criticized the irresponsibility and the gross dereliction of Constitutional duty by a Supremes majority that all too often treats Trump’s patently false, racist, xenophobic, and invidious immigration, refugee, and asylum policies as the actions of a “normal Executive” when Trump is nothing of the sort.

Nor does he even claim to be! He ran on overtly racist and hate-driven policies and has promoted racist tropes and lies about immigrants at every turn. Yet, the Supremes often pretend that there is some “legitimate basis” for clearly illegitimate policies and abrogation of important laws without the involvement of Congress and of Constitutional protections without any reasonable, fact-based justification.

If the “chickens have come home to roost” for the corrupt Trump DOJ, so will they eventually come home to roost for Supremes who have disingenuously and intentionally looked the other way and have enabled, or in some cases even encouraged, Trump’s racist and lie-driven dismantling of American democracy and “Dred Scottification” of “the other.” Life tenure protects the jobs of derelict Federal Judges. But, it won’t protect their reputations from the truth of history.

This November, vote like your life and the future of America depend on it! Because they do!

PWS

08-19-20

‍‍‍🏴‍☠️☠️⚰️🤮KAKISTOCRACY WATCH: BIA Continues To Get Pummeled For Absurdist Anti-Asylum “Jurisprudence” – Are The Article IIIs Finally Catching On? – If So, Why Does The BIA Still Exist? – Jeffrey S. Chase Analyzes Latest BIA Debacle From the 9th Cir. — Akosung v. Barr

https://www.jeffreyschase.com/blog/2020/8/16/9th-cir-to-bia-hiding-in-fear-is-not-reasonable-relocation

JEFFREY S. CHASE | OPINIONS/ANALYSIS ON IMMIGRATION LAW
9th Cir. to BIA: Hiding in Fear is Not Reasonable Relocation
In, Akosung v. Barr a young woman from Cameroon had been sentenced against her will to marry the village chieftain, or Fon, in order to settle a family debt. Not wishing to suffer this fate, she first hid locally. After her family’s assets and funds were seized, their crops were destroyed, and they were barred from attending social activities as punishment, she fled town.
Akosung remained a fugitive in Cameroon for over a year. A relative who harbored her in another city for most of that time asked her to leave out of fear of repercussions. After relocating again, she barely evaded capture. The police declined to get involved. Akosung eventually managed to cross into Nigeria, and from there, made her way to the U.S.
After an Immigration Judge denied asylum, the BIA dismissed Akosung’s appeal on two grounds. First, the Board determined that she had not shown harm on account of her membership in a particular social group consisting of “women resistant to forced marriage proposals.” More surprisingly, the Board concluded that, in spite of the above tale of near capture and narrow escape, Akosung could somehow safely relocate to another part of Cameroon.
Asylum will be denied to one who could reasonably relocate within their country. Where a dispute is so localized that it can be ended with a move to the next street, neighborhood, or town, the law sees no reason for international intervention.
However, federal regulations that are binding on immigration judges, asylum officers, and the BIA, recognize the complexity of determining whether such relocation, if possible, would be considered reasonable. Per the regulation:
(3) Reasonableness of internal relocation. For purposes of determinations under paragraphs (b)(1)(i), (b)(1)(ii), and (b)(2) of this section, adjudicators should consider, but are not limited to considering, whether the applicant would face other serious harm in the place of suggested relocation; any ongoing civil strife within the country; administrative, economic, or judicial infrastructure; geographical limitations; and social and cultural constraints, such as age, gender, health, and social and familial ties. Those factors may, or may not, be relevant, depending on all the circumstances of the case, and are not necessarily determinative of whether it would be reasonable for the applicant to relocate.
That’s quite a lot to consider. And in saying that the listed factors may or may not be relevant or determinative, the judge or asylum officer is being told to dive in deep in analyzing what factors exist, and how much they should matter.
Furthermore, the regulations state that where the persecutor is the government, or where the applicant has already suffered persecution, there is a legal presumption that such internal relocation is not reasonable. It’s not clear from the decision whether the issue was considered, but as the facts state that the applicant’s town was ruled by a council, that it was said council that ordered her marriage to the Fon, and that the police ceded jurisdiction over the matter to the council, a strong argument seems to exist that the persecutor in this case is the government.
Not surprisingly, such a detailed, in depth, thoughtful analysis that cedes so much authority to the immigration judge runs contrary to EOIR Director James McHenry’s goal of assembly line, rubber stamp adjudication. Of course, his agency’s recently proposed regulations aimed at destroying asylum directly attack this rule, and seek to replace it with a much simpler one in which the judges would draw a negative inference from the fact that the asylum seeker had managed to reach the U.S. It’s not clear why reaching the U.S. to seek asylum would demonstrate the reasonableness of remaining in the country in which one is being targeted. Perhaps McHenry seeks to imbue an entirely new meaning to the lyric from Frank Sinatra’s ode to my hometown: “If I can make it there, I’ll make it anywhere?”
In Akosung, the Board treated the regulation as if McHenry’s changes were already in effect. It simply saw that it could easily rubber-stamp the IJ’s denial by checking the “internal relocation” box, and certainly did not bother to undertake the analysis that the actual binding regulation requires.
Fortunately, the Ninth Circuit called foul. Noting that the regulation requires a conclusion that, after considering all of the listed factors, it would be reasonable to expect the applicant to relocate, the court noted that “it hardly seems ‘reasonable to expect’ one facing persecution or torture to become a fugitive and live in hiding.”
The court added some additional statements of the obvious: first, that “‘relocate’ most naturally refers to resettlement or a change of residence, not the unstable situation of one who must always be ready to flee.” And also: “living in hiding does little to establish that a person is able to “avoid future persecution.” To the contrary, it establishes the opposite; hence, the hiding.
The Ninth Circuit also found error in the Board’s social distinction determination. The Board upheld the immigration judge’s questioning of “how anyone in society” would be able to recognize someone “as an individual who has declined a marriage proposal from a fon.”
The court first noted that the statement seemed to erroneously apply the “optical visibility” approach to social distinction (i.e. that the group member should be recognizable on sight to members of society), an approach the Board disavowed in Matter of M-E-V-G-. But the court added that even if the Board here meant that society in Cameroon would not recognize the group as distinct, Akosung’s experience, and that of another woman who she described as being successfully hunted down after also attempting to evade marriage to the Fon, demonstrate otherwise.
The court then quoted Matter of M-E-V-G- as requiring the group to be viewed as distinct “within the society in question,” adding that “the Board should have taken that into account.”
The court did not discuss further how “the society in question” should be defined. And the court’s citation was to page 237 of M-E-V-G-. But as I have noted when lecturing on the topic, the Board on page 243 of the same decision clarified that “persecution limited to a remote region of a country may invite an inquiry into a more limited subset of the country’s society, such as in Matter of Kasinga…where we considered a particular social group within a tribe.”
Later, on page 246 of M-E-V-G-, the Board stated that in Matter of Kasinga, “people in the Tchamba-Kunsuntu tribe” would view members of the particular social group in that case to be “a discrete and distinct group that was set apart in a meaningful and significant way from the rest of society.” The Board then stated its conclusion that the social group in Kasinga “was perceived as socially distinct within the society in question.”
Attorneys should cite to Akosung (along with M-E-V-G-) in arguing that the “society in question” to be considered for social distinction purposes is the society their clients inhabit.
Copyright 2020, Jeffrey S. Chase. All rights reserved. Reprinted With Permission.

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

Wow! Talk about absurdly unfair and totally biased!

For a “real judge” who is committed to due process and understands asylum law, this should have been a 30-minute hearing resulting in a grant of asylum! Instead two levels of EOIR “judges” got this grotesquely wrong in an attempt to deny asylum and return a refugee to harm or death when she clearly is entitled to protection. Because, that’s what their political “handlers” at DOJ and its wholly owned subsidiary EOIR want from their weaponized parody of a “court system.”

These aren’t “legal errors” or “legitimate differences of opinion.” No, they are evidence of “malicious incompetence” – deep intellectual dishonesty and corruption on the part of a fraudulent “tribunals” that under this regime have ceased to serve any legitimate function.

And, that also doesn’t say much good about Article III Courts who see these clear errors time and again, recognize them, yet fail to take the strong, systemic corrective action necessary to stop the BIA’s gross abuses of our legal system and humanity and to hold Billy the Bigot and his subordinate toadies accountable for their misfeasance! That’s a denial of due process by the Article IIIs; it means that only those with the wherewithal to get good representation and pursue appeals beyond EOIR can get anything resembling “justice.” I call that dereliction of duty by the Article IIIs!

Think about this! If folks don’t immediately leave after suffering persecution, then corrupt EOIR adjudicators will sometimes find them not to be in “real danger” or use it as specious “evidence” that the claim isn’t “credible.” But, if they do leave, then that nonsensically shows they could somehow “relocate.”

So in typical EOIR Kangaroo Court fashion, the refugee loses no matter what the facts! I guess that reinforces the “don’t come because we won’t protect you no matter” message that the “New EOIR” is there to deliver! The real issue, however, is why EOIR is still in existence and threatening both our legal system and those seeking justice in America?

Systemic racial injustice in America is no mystery! It’s fueled by Article III Courts that fail to intervene to stop the Trump regime’s racist assault on migrants of all types! Trump, Stephen Miller, “Wolfman” (actually illegally serving at DHS) make no secret of their racist agenda. But, life-tenured Article III Justices and Judges literally keep letting them get away with murder!

Due Process Forever! EOIR’s corrupt “Kangaroo Courts,” never!

PWS

08-17-20

🏴‍☠️KAKISTOCRACY WATCH: Billy The Bigot Appoints Another “Death Squad”☠️⚰️ To BIA!🤮👎

EOIR Announces Three New Appellate Immigration Judges

FALLS CHURCH, VA – The Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) today announced the appointment of Michael P. Baird, Sunita B. Mahtabfar, and Sirce E. Owen as appellate immigration judges in EOIR’s Board of Immigration Appeals.

Biographical information follows:

Michael P. Baird, Appellate Immigration Judge

Attorney General William P. Barr appointed Michael P. Baird as an appellate immigration judge in August 2020. Judge Baird received a Bachelor of Business Administration in 1989 from Clayton State University and a Juris Doctorate in 1992 from Georgia State University College of Law. From 2009 to 2020, he served as an immigration judge first in Dallas, Texas and then later transferred to the Atlanta Immigration Court. From 2006 to 2009, he served as a senior assistant district attorney in the Appalachian Judicial Circuit, in Georgia. From 2004 to 2006, he served as a judge in the Municipal Court of Jonesboro, Georgia. From 1997 to 2004, he served as chief judge for the Magistrate Court of Clayton County, Georgia. From 1995 to 1996, he was in private practice. From 1993 to 1995, he served as senior assistant solicitor general at the Clayton County Solicitor’s Office. From 1992 to 1993, he was in private practice. From 1986 to 1990, he was a police officer. Judge Baird has taught as adjunct faculty at the Georgia State University College of Law, Clayton State University and the University of West Georgia. Judge Baird is a member of the State Bar of Georgia.

Sunita B. Mahtabfar, Appellate Immigration Judge

Attorney General William P. Barr appointed Sunita B. Mahtabfar as an appellate immigration judge in August 2020. Judge Mahtabfar earned a Bachelor of Arts in 1994 from the University of Texas at Austin and a Juris Doctorate in 1998 from Thurgood Marshall School of Law. From 2013 to 2020, she served as an immigration judge in the El Paso Immigration Court. From 2006 to 2013, she served as an attorney in the Office of the Assistant Chief Counsel, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Department of Homeland Security (DHS), in El Paso, Texas. From 2003 to 2006, she served as an asylum officer, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, DHS, in Houston. Judge Mahtabfar is a member of the State Bar of Texas.

Communications and Legislative Affairs Division

August 7, 2020

Page 2

Sirce E. Owen, Appellate Immigration Judge

Attorney General William P. Barr appointed Sirce E. Owen as an appellate immigration judge in August 2020. Judge Owen earned a Bachelor of Science in 1996 from Johns Hopkins University, a Master of Business Administration in 2002 from Georgia State University, and a Juris Doctor in 2005 from Georgia State University. From 2018 to 2020, she served as an assistant chief immigration judge, based in Atlanta. From June 2019 to January 2020, she served as acting deputy director of EOIR. From 2016 to 2018, she served as deputy chief counsel, Office of Chief Counsel, Office of the Principal Legal Advisor, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Department of Homeland Security (DHS), in Atlanta. From 2008 to 2016, she served as assistant chief counsel, ICE, DHS, in Atlanta. From 2005 to 2008, she was an associate attorney with Mozley, Finlayson & Loggins LLP, in Atlanta. Judge Owen is a member of the State Bar of Georgia.

— EOIR —

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

Here’s what you really need to know about these so-called “judges.”

Baird – Asylum denial rate 91.4% (74^th highest of 456 ranked)

Mahtabfar – Asylum denial rate 98.7 (8^th highest of 456 ranked – but remember the 7 worse “judges” are probably already on the BIA)

Owen – Didn’t deny enough asylum to make the TRAC charts. Served mostly as a prosecutor and “management judge” (A/K/A “JINO” or “Judge In Name Only”). But rest assured – she hails from the Atlanta Immigration “Court” – deemed an “Asylum Free Zone” in “a petition filed before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR).” https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/these-jurisdictions-have-become-asylum-free-zones/

As my Round Table colleague Judge Jeffrey S. Chase summed it up: “Under [EOIR Director James] McHenry, a “liberal” is defined as one whose asylum denial rate is lower than their body temperature.”

Due Process Forever! The EOIR kakistocracy, never!

PWS

08-11-20

🛡⚔️🗽👍🏼🇺🇸ROUND TABLE SLAMS LATEST BOGUS “KILL ASYLUM” PROPOSED REGS IN COMMENTS TO REGIME!

Comments – Security Bar (COVID) Asylum Reg (PDF)

The Round Table of Former Immigration Judges is composed of 46 former Immigration Judges and Appellate Immigration Judges of the Board of Immigration Appeals. We were appointed and served under both Republican and Democratic administrations. We have centuries of combined experience adjudicating asylum applications and appeals. Our members include nationally- respected experts on asylum law; many regularly lecture at law schools and conferences and author articles on the topic.

We view the proposed rule as an improper attempt to legislate through rule making. The proposed rule is inconsistent with Congressional intent and with our nation’s obligations under international law. The rule is also overly broad, and as worded, could be applied to virtually anyone. It requires determinations to be made based on pure speculation by officials lacking any required expertise in the subject. And the rule fails to consider much lesser, more humane approaches to address the issue.

. . . .

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

Read our complete comment at the above link.

Gimmicks, cruelty, illegally, gimmicks, cruelty, illegality. Over and over the regime targets asylum seekers with “crimes against humanity.”

Although all DHS statistics should be regarded as suspect, the recent assertions that the regime”s killer tactics are protecting America against COVID appear particularly bogus — especially given the Trump regime’s gross failure to protect Americans from the pandemic and the frequent myths and false claims blabbered by Trump in a pathetic attempt to downplay the disaster caused by his stupidity and malicious incompetence.

The net result of all these “Miller-hatched” cruel gimmicks to eliminate legal immigration (without legislative authority) appears to be steadily increasing levels of extralegal immigration. And that’s just the folks who get caught. Who knows how many get through and simply get lost in the interior? So, instead of a rational legal immigration and refugee system that encourages screening, testing where necessary, taxpaying, and data collection, thanks to the stupidity and cruelty of Trump and Miller, the fecklessness of Congress, and the complicity of the Supremes, we have created a larger than ever extralegal immigration system.

Diminishing ourselves as a nation,🤮 won’t stop human migration🗽!

PWS

08|10-20

🏴‍☠️☠️⚰️👎🏻DEATH IN THE GULAG: DHS Racks Up 17th Detainee Kill Of Fiscal Year — Doubling Previous Year’s Body Count ⚰️ With Months To Go As “DUD” Program Hits High Gear! — Death Either Here Or Upon Return To Danger Without Fair Hearings Is The “Ultimate Deterrent” For America’s White Nationalist Regime!

DUD = “Detain Until Dead”

https://apple.news/AEJpCWSaJQMyWS9vMdp33bQ

Danielle Silva reports for NBC News:

More than twice as many immigrants have died in the custody of Immigration and Customs and Enforcement this fiscal year than last after two detainees died this week. That brought this year’s total to 17, compared with eight deaths last year.

A 72-year-old Canadian man who had tested positive for the coronavirus died in ICE custody on Wednesday night at a Virginia hospital, the agency said Friday in a statement.

James Thomas Hill reported feeling shortness of breath to staff at an ICE detention facility in Farmville, Virginia, on July 10 and was admitted to Centra Southside Community Hospital before being transferred to Lynchburg General Hospital the following day, ICE said.

A COVID-19 test administered by hospital staff came back positive on July 11, the agency said.

Hill entered ICE custody on April 11 following his release from the Rivers Federal Correctional Institute in North Carolina after serving 13 years of a 26-year prison sentence for health care fraud and distributing a controlled substance, according to ICE. An immigration judge had ordered his removal on May 12, ICE said. At the time of his death, Hill was in ICE custody pending his removal to Canada, the agency said.

The agency said it had notified the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General, the ICE Office of Professional Responsibility, the Canadian consulate and Hill’s next of kin. His death was first reported by BuzzFeed News.

A 51-year-old Taiwanese man died Wednesday afternoon at a Florida hospital after being a diagnosed with a “massive intercranial hemorrhage,” ICE said in a separate statement Thursday.

Kuan Hui Lee was found unresponsive at the Krome Service Processing Center in Florida on July 31 and taken to the Kendall Regional Medical Center.

. . . .

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

I think this is just the beginning of the true carnage that advocates have been predicting for months. And that doesn’t even count those killed after being “orbited” by DHS in violation of the statute and due process as a complicit Supremes majority egged them on.

The shame of our nation’s intentional dehumanization and mistreatment of asylum seekers and other migrants under the Trump regime won’t be eradicated. What kind of “democracy” runs a “Gulag” for non-criminals where all “sentences” are arbitrary and indefinite and the there is no readily available impartial review of detention by a neutral and detached magistrate? Where Supreme Court Justices worry more about the impact of “nationwide injunctions” and “bogus emergencies” declared by an patently unqualified and invidiously biased Executive than they do about the lives, health, and freedom of individuals whose “crime” is to assert their legal and Constitutional rights?

While the problem starts with a White Nationalist, racist regime and a feckless GOP-controlled Senate under Moscow Mitch, those Federal Judges at all levels who could have put an end to these “crimes against humanity,” but failed to do so, also bear responsibility for the death and destruction of human lives by the regime.

Due Process Forever! Complicit Courts, Never (Again). Better Justices & Judges For A Better America!

PWS

08-08-20

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