Legislation – Page 7 – immigrationcourtside.com

🇺🇸COURTSIDE POLITICS: REP. HILLARY SCHOLTEN (D-MI) IS PART OF A BIPARTISAN GROUP OF NEW HOUSE MEMBERS REACHING ACROSS THE AISLE IN AN ATTEMPT TO GOVERN FOR THE PUBLIC GOOD — WashPost

Marianna Sotomayor Congressional Reporter Washington Post PHOTO: WashPost website

Marianna Sotomayor reports for WashPost:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/02/13/freshman-lawmakers-bipartisan-compromise/

. . . .

‘Focus on what’s in front of you’

Sitting in the chamber after 15 rounds of votes for speaker that felt like “democracy had been hijacked by a handful of extremists,” Rep. Hillary J. Scholten (D-Mich.) was left “wondering what in the world we had gotten ourselves into with this Congress.” But then she found herself clapping alongside Republicans when McCarthy promised that a GOP majority was committed “to stop wasteful Washington spending” while lowering the price of groceries, gas and housing for families. It’s a similar message to what Scholten ran on in a district where she beat a Trump-endorsed Republican and became the first Democrat in decades to represent her part of western Michigan.

“I campaigned a lot on fiscal responsibility,” she said in an interview. “At the center of fiscal responsibility is making sure that we are keeping our government running. I am looking for no-nonsense partners on the other side, and within my own caucus as well, who are not going to play games with the budget and our deficit.”

. . . .

Democrats are keeping an open mind about what legislation to tackle with Republicans, knowing that the GOP sets the tone for which bills to pursue on the floor. Democratic leaders have repeatedly said that their caucus will not support legislation proposed by far-right Republicans or policies that are too extreme, like a border security bill by Rep. Chip Roy (R-Tex.) that detractors say would end all asylum claims.

Scholten has spoken with Republicans about immigration reforms and how best to close supply chains so the United States can remain competitive globally without relying on foreign workers to do so. She and [Rep. Jared] Moskowitz [D-FL] both voted in support of establishing a select committee on China, crossing the aisle for the first time with 144 other Democrats.

In a sign of solidarity, Scholten and freshman Republican Rep. John James (Mich.) decided to sit together during their first State of the Union address to “demonstrate the spirit of bipartisanship” that has already helped them begin finding compromise on clean water legislation and to protect a fighter mission at a local Air National Guard base.

“I think it’s so important, especially in these troubling and trying times, to show that even as neighbors right here in the office and states-mates, that more unites us than divides us,” James said.

“We’re ready to get to work,” Scholten said before they high-fived.

Rep. Hillary J. Scholten (D-Mich.) and other freshman Democrats view President James Madison’s crystal flute, played by Lizzo in September, during a tour last month at the Library of Congress. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)

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As those who know her predicted, Hillary is making her presence felt “right off the bat.” She’s also using her quick grasp of issues, collegiality, and outstanding team building skills that she was known for during her time as an EOIR attorney. Those are important attributes! I might add that they are in short supply at today’s dystopian EOIR, according to sources in the agency as well as those affected by its historically poor, and literally life-threatening, performance (or lack thereof) over the past two Administrations!

Always fun and satisfying to read about “the good guys in life” making progress and getting recognition! You can read the full article at the link!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

02-14-23

🗽 MAINE DELEGATION RENEWS BIPARTISAN PUSH FOR EARLIER EMPLOYMENT AUTHORIZATION FOR ASYLUM SEEKERS! — Effort Has Little Traction In Congress!

https://www.pressherald.com/2023/02/03/maine-lawmakers-continue-push-for-faster-work-permits-for-asylum-seekers/

Randy Billings reports for Portland Press Herald:

Federal and state lawmakers are renewing efforts to shorten the amount of time asylum seekers must wait before they can work and become self-sufficient.

Local officials in communities such as Portland, a destination for waves of people seeking asylum, have called on federal officials for years to reduce the waiting period for work permits, which is a minimum of six months and often much longer. They argue speeding up the process is a way to address workforce shortages as well as reduce the costs of providing financial assistance to asylum seekers who aren’t allowed to support themselves.

But every effort dating to at least to 2015, when Sen. Angus King of Maine submitted a bill to shorten the wait period to 30 days, has failed to gain traction in Congress because the appeals have been caught up in partisan and regional conflicts over immigration reform and border security.

Republican Sen. Susan Collins and Rep. Chellie Pingree, D-1st District, have proposed similar bills in recent years. And both are doing so again this session, while King, an independent, is signing on as a co-sponsor.

. . . .

Despite national polarization over the issue, calls for allowing asylum seekers to work and become self-sufficient are widely supported in Maine by Republicans, Democrats and independents. The fact that Maine has more jobs available than there are workers to fill them is a key reason for the broad support.

Even former Gov. Paul LePage, who opposed efforts to help asylum seekers during his eight years in office, revised his position during the gubernatorial campaign last fall, saying at a debate in Portland that “if asylum seekers are here, and (President) Joe Biden is not going to enforce federal law on immigration … I want to put them to work.”

Collins started pushing for the reform in 2019 and announced on Friday that she introduced a bill with Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, an Arizona independent and former Democrat, that would reduce the waiting period from six months to 30 days for asylum seekers who have gone through preliminary screening. And Pingree plans to reintroduce her bill in the House in the coming weeks.

. . . .

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

Read the full article at the link.

Gosh, when even former GOP right-wing Gov. Paul LePage is on board, seems like it should be a “no-brainer” for Congress. But, that isn’t the way things work (or don’t) on the Hill these days.

As to requesting a “waiver” of the current 180 day statutory “lock out” provision, there currently doesn’t appear to be any process for that. The statute does state that: “An applicant for asylum is not entitled to employment authorization, but such authorization may be provided under regulation by the Attorney General.”

Therefore, it appears that the Biden Administration could establish a waiver process by regulation if it chose to. I’m not aware of any plans by the Administration to propose such a regulation.

The Administration has addressed immediate work authorization in their recently announced parole program for certain nationals of Venezuela, Nicaragua, Haiti, and Cuba. Individuals approved for this program abroad will be “paroled” into the U.S. for two years with work authorization.

The relief for states like Maine under this parole program is limited, because 1) only nationals of the four specified countries can apply; 2) the program applies prospectively only; 3) it’s uncertain what will happen to parolees after two years (one can imagine that any future GOP Administration would terminate the program, given that GOP politicos are now suing to halt it); and 4) the is no clear path to a green card for these paroled individuals.

To date, the Administration has not “leveraged” other potential legal mechanisms to expedite employment authorization.

One option would be to greatly expand use of the new regulatory authority for USCIS Asylum Officers to grant asylum status to applicants arriving at the border. This would result in immediate admission in an orderly, work-authorized asylum legal status and avoid the current 2.1 million Immigration Court backlog. It also would trigger a statutory process for asylees to apply for green cards after being physically present in the U.S. for one year. Additionally, granting asylum expeditiously at the AO would be available to all asylum applicants, not just those from the four specified nations.

Another option, that could be used in conjunction with the first one, would be to ramp up much more robust and inclusive refugee programs outside the U.S. This could be in the countries in crisis or in third countries. Like asylees, refugees enter the U.S. in a legal status that authorizes them to work immediately. Like asylees, they have access to a statutory provision for obtaining a green card after being physically present in the U.S. for one year. Refugee status is potentially available to refugees from any country where the President finds a “special humanitarian concern” following “consultation” with Congress.

Unfortunately, in my view, the Biden Administration has shown little interest in, nor aptitude for, maximizing the mechanisms available to legally admit refugees, from abroad or as asylum seekers. As pointed out above, doing so also would address the issues in Maine and other states who have welcomed refugees and asylum seekers.

Instead, the Administration has relied on a mishmash of:

Trump-era, nativist, deterrence policies, many with questionable legal basis;
A series of ever-changing, ad hoc, subjective, discretionary “exceptions” to those policies administered without any transparency or accountability;
An ad hoc, nationality specific, parole program divorced from the statutory “refugee” definition, having a much more tenuous legal basis than using the established refugee and asylum admission provisions now in the INA, and certainly leaving the future fate of those “paroled” thereunder “up in the air” and subject to maximum political gamesmanship.

The sum total is to leave too many refugees and asylees, and the individuals and communities in the U.S. trying to help them, “dangling in the air” without the necessary support and humanitarian leadership from the Administration.

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

02-05-22

🏴‍☠️SCOFFLAW DOJ: EOIR VIOLATES STIPULATED COURT ORDER ON VIDEO HEARINGS — Garland’s Failed Court System Moves A Step Closer To Contempt, As Federal Judge Tells Dysfunctional Agency 🤡 To Get Its Act Together!

Clown Car — “DOJ/EOIR litigation team arriving at U.S. Courthouse.”
PHOTO CREDIT: Ellin Beltz, 07-04-16, Creative Commons License, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/. Creator not responsible for above caption.

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

Round Table “Fighting Knightess” and NJ Bar honoree Hon. Sue Roy reports from the Garden State:

Hi Everyone and Happy Friday!

Regarding the lawsuit AILA-NJ v. EOIR—WE WON!!! We received an oral ruling from Judge Vazquez today—EOIR lost; it violated the terms of our stipulated agreement by failing to grant (or even rule on) Webex motions. We are preparing another proposed order to submit to the Judge early next week. He stated that if EOIR fails to comply moving forward, he will hold them in contempt.

Sue

PS Please feel free to share, publicize, etc.

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

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

Those seeking more information on this case should contact Judge Roy directly.

The caption “AILA-NJ v. EOIR” basically “says it all” about what it’s like to try to practice before Merrick Garland’s (and Biden’s) dystopian Immigration Courts these days. Such unnecessary trauma; such a waste of resources; such an abuse of public trust! All from a Dem Administration that back in 2020 ran on a platform of returning competency, professionalism, and public service to Government! Most infuriating and disappointing!🤬

Heard on “E-Street:”

“EOIR’s handling of this and the DOJ position are honestly ridiculous!”
“To quote Judy Collins & Stephen Sondheim:
‘Send in the clownsDon’t bother, they’re here.’”
“Great work Sue! But, the problem really is treating a court system like an administrative agency instead of a court system. Problem is baked into the institution.”
“Amazing! Great work, and thanks on behalf of all who will benefit from this.”
“And, maybe it will help with the Article 1 Court position.”
“Great work!”
“Thanks for outing Garland and his scofflaw EOIR again. Seems Garland should be held in contempt if EOIR ignores court order again.”
“All parties acknowledge the case will be moot when the pandemic declaration ends–which Biden said earlier this week will be sometime in May.”
“Thanks to our attorneys, to DHS attorneys, especially Ginnine Fried, and to everyone here who helped!”
“If there’s one thing that can bring ICE and the private/pro bono bar together, it’s EOIR’s incompetence and intransigence. My understanding is that their OWN WITNESS tanked EOIR’s case! Is ANYBODY “supervising” EOIR litigation at DOJ these days?”
“What if EOIR provided public service and acted rationally without Federal Court orders? Isn’t that something that Dems on the Hill should be ‘all over Garland’ to fix? Now!”

🇺🇸 Thanks to Sue and all involved, and Due Process Forever!

PWS

02-04-23

🛡⚔️ “FIGHTING KNIGHTESS OF THE ROUND TABLE” JUDGE (RET.) SUSAN G. ROY HONORED BY NJ STATE BAR ASSN FOR LEGISLATIVE WORK!

Judge Susan G. Roy — Judge (Ret.) Susan G. Roy
Accepting 2023 Legislative Service Award from NJSBA

Sue writes:

I am honored to have received the NJSBA 2023 Distinguished Legislative Service Award, along with several immigration attorney colleagues. It is always so rewarding to be recognized by fellow attorneys. #immigration #immigrationattorney #njsba

According to the NJSBA:

The Annual Distinguished Legislative Service Award is the highest recognition and The Legislative Recognition Award is to acknowledge noteworthy legislative service. These awards are a yearly opportunity to acknowledge commitment to The NJSBA’s legislative goals and members’ willingness to testify before the State Legislature, prepare amendments and contact legislators on the Association’s behalf.

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

Congratulations, my friend and colleague! And, thanks for all you do for our Round Table, due process, and fundamental fairness in America! You are an indefatigable force for justice!

I look forward to being reunited with you, our Round Table colleague Judge Lory Rosenberg, and pro bono maven and course sponsor Rekha Sharma-Crawford on the faculty at the upcoming “Sixth Annual Litigation Trial College” in Kansas City, April 29-May 1! There’s still time to register, here:

https://immigrationcourtside.com/2023/01/11/⚖%EF%B8%8F🗽😎-another-great-ndpa-training-opportunity-join-us-at-the-sharma-crawford-clinic-litigation-boot-camp-in-kansas-city-may-4-6-2023/.

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-29-23

LIVE IN DC ON FEB 24! — SEE “ROCK STAR” 🎸 IMMIGRATION EXPERT PROFESSOR STEPHEN YALE-LOEHR & HIS “RAMBLIN’ BAND OF EXPERTS” TAKE ON IMMIGRATION POLICY @ THE NATIONAL PRESS CLUB! — ONLY DC Area Performance* — Free, In Person or Online! — Just As Administration Rolls Out Idea Steve Has Championed: Private Refuges Sponsorship!

* In Feb. 2023

Immigration Rocks — Immigration law rocks with “Professor Stevie & His Ramblin’ Band of Experts!”
Public Realm

Immigration Reform: Lessons Learned and a Path Forward

Congress has been unable to enact comprehensive immigration reform for over 30 years.

Employers face an unprecedented shortage of workers.
The Dreamers, long-contributing members of our society, face uncertainty due to litigation questioning the legality of the DACA program.
And border security concerns everyone.

Polls suggest Americans want immigration reform. But the conventional wisdom is that “comprehensive immigration reform” is impossible in a divided Congress.

This conference will explore targeted legislation and other policy changes that could be enacted in 2023, focusing on work visa changes to help alleviate our labor shortages, border security and asylum reforms, and a permanent path forward for Dreamers, farmworkers.

Sponsored by the Cornell Law School Immigration Law and Policy Research Program and cosponsored by the Cornell Migrations Initiative.

While we encourage in-person attendance, the conference will be webcast live from the National Press Club. Mark your calendars now for this important event!

Panelists from the following organizations:

American Action Forum, American Business Immigration Coalition, AmericanHort, Bipartisan Policy Center, Compete America, Cornell Law School, Migration Policy Institute, National Association of Evangelicals, National Immigration Forum, Niskanen Center, Service Employees International Union,

Texas Association of Business, TheDream.US, UnidosUS,

United Farm Workers of America, U.S. Chamber of Commerce

A special thanks to the Charles Koch Foundation for sponsoring this event.

DATE

February 24th, 2023

TIME

8:30 a.m. – 3:00 p.m.

*Reception to follow

LOCATION

National Press Club

529 14th St NW,

Washington, DC

20045

REGISTRATION LINK

MORE INFO

Michelle LoParco at:

k.loparco@cornell.edu

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

The U.S. State Department has just announced an initiative promoted by Steve, his colleague Dr. Janine Prantl, and other experts. See, e.g., https://immigrationcourtside.com/2022/10/17/🗽prantl-yale-loehr-ny-daily-news-private-refugee-sponsorship-an-idea-whose-time-has-come-but-the-biden-administration-has-turned-its-back-on-the-legal-human-rig/

Read the information sheet on the “Welcome Corps” here: https://welcomecorps.org/resources/faqs/.

This is a promising idea. Hope it works! I have to wonder, however, why a coordinated effort like this wasn’t implemented for asylum seekers arriving at the Southern Border?

You can register (free) for the Cornell Conference, where this and other timely topics will be discussed by the experts!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-20-23

⚠️☠️🤡🤯👎🏼 “CINOs” (“Courts In Name Only”) — Harvard Law Review Takes On Garland’s Dystopian Immigration “Courts!” — “This Note cuts through that noise to provide a list of reforms that are simpler and less controversial [than Article I], yet still impactful — reforms that the sitting President could implement immediately.”

Alfred E. Neumann — Apparently, due process, fundamental fairness, and racial justice for all persons in the U.S., even those who happen to be non-citizens, weren’t part of A.G. Merrick Garland’s Harvard Law education.
PHOTO: Wikipedia Commons

From Dean Kevin Johnson @ ImmigrationProf Blog:

https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/immigration/2023/01/courts-in-name-only-repairing-americas-immigration-adjudication-system-by-the-harvard-law-review.html

Wednesday, January 11, 2023

Courts in Name Only: Repairing America’s Immigration Adjudication System

By the Harvard Law Review

By Immigration Prof

Share

The esteemed Harvard Law Review does not publish much immigration scholarship. A student note on the immigration court system may be of interest to blog readers. The system long has been criticized and, last year, a bill was introduced in Congress that would have brought reform.

Courts in Name Only: Repairing America’s Immigration Adjudication System
By the Harvard Law Review
Noncitizens in the United States face innumerable obstacles, many of which have now become well known. But even the supposedly neutral court system in which noncitizens’ cases are adjudicated currently functions as an executive tool for removal. This Note argues that the current structure of the immigration adjudication system — and the resulting executive control over it — subjects Immigration Judges to a variety of conditions that, taken together, bias the entire system towards removal. It then surveys existing proposals for structural reform and proposes numerous possible intermediate reforms.

KJ

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

Key recommendation from HLR article:

While waiting for Congress to act, however, the executive branch has the authority to implement several crucial reforms that would allow for noncitizens to have their cases heard in fairer proceedings overseen by IJs with true, independent adjudicatory power.

Good News for Harvard Law: Some bright, unidentified, Harvard Law students can cut through the BS and clearly state achievable reforms that could and should have been implemented by the Biden Administration without legislation.

Bad News for Harvard Law: Prominent graduate and Law Review “alum” AG Merrick Garland (‘77), once a step away from a seat on the Supremes, doesn’t “get” it and, in fact, his poor leadership and mis-management are key parts of the problems at EOIR that threaten the stability and credibility of the entire U.S. justice system.

Note to HLR: Follow your own advice to “cut through the noise” and reform yourself. Lose the “historical BS,” move into the 21st century, show some intellectual integrity, and set a better example by clearly identifying and crediting the authorship of this and other student articles, whether by individual(s) or a team. See, e,g., Authorship: Giving Credit Where It’s Due, https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/resources/publishing-tips/giving-credit

It’s not “rocket science!” 🚀 It’s just “Legal & Intellectual Ethics 101” (not to mention standard professional courtesy). As a former judge, albeit only one in the CINOs, I gave little weight to quotations and citations to anonymous or unidentified sources.

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-13-23

🇺🇸⚖️🗽LEADING EXPERT PROFESSOR KAREN MUSALO’S BLUNT MESSAGE TO BIDEN ADMINISTRATION: “Enough with the political games. Migrants have a right to asylum!” — LA Times

https://www-latimes-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2023-01-06/biden-border-immigration-asylum-title-42?_amp=true

President Biden’s seemingly chaotic policy toward asylum seekers at the U.S. border is no accident. It’s carefully crafted to minimize political fallout. The administration should keep it simple instead, by following the law and doing the right thing — admitting those who arrive at our borders seeking asylum.

Give voters a chance, Mr. President. The American people value decency. They don’t respect craven and calculated inconsistency.

This week, the Biden administration announced an expansion of a Trump-era policy to turn away individuals fleeing persecution who reach our borders. This began with a pretext of limiting the spread of COVID-19, using a public health law known as Title 42. Now it’s just a sop to people who oppose immigration.

Until the Trump administration used Title 42 in this way, the nation had honored its obligation to asylum seekers for 40 years, under the 1980 Refugee Act. It grants the right to seek protection. Abrogating that right has resulted in the untold suffering, the return of refugees to persecution and death, and chaos at the U.S.-Mexico border.

In April 2022, the Biden administration stated its intent to end Title 42. Litigation delayed the termination, but in mid-November, a federal judge ruled the policy unlawful, and ordered it to end by Dec. 21. The Supreme Court has stayed that order until it hears arguments next month.

Now, in a head-spinning turn of events, Biden has announced the expansion of Title 42 to Haitians, Nicaraguans and Cubans — nationalities that had not previously been subject to summary expulsion at the border.

If this were not enough of a contradiction, the administration also plans to resurrect another Trump-era policy which Biden had previously denounced, the “transit ban.” This rule bars from asylum any migrants who do not apply for and receive a denial of asylum from the countries they pass through on their way to the U.S.

This “outsourcing” of our refugee obligations to countries of transit, which a federal court found unlawful when implemented by the Trump administration, is ludicrous on its face. The asylum seekers who arrive at our border pass through countries such as Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, with human rights conditions as dire as in the migrants’ nations of origin.

To date, the only country with which we legally have such an arrangement is Canada — which makes sense because it has a robust refugee protection system and an admirable human rights record. And even if there are other countries of transit, such as Costa Rica, that have a well-developed framework for the protection of refugees, and solid records on human rights, they are already taking in numbers of asylum seekers that far exceed their capacity.

. . . .

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

Read Karen’s full op-ed at the above link.

It’s simply appalling, not to mention disingenuous, for Biden to ignore the advice of experts like Karen, the founder and moving force behind the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies at U.C. Hastings Law. (Karen also argued the landmark Kasinga case before the BIA when I was Chair). Instead, disgracefully, he has turned human rights and immigration policies over to a bunch of spineless, scofflaw politicos and “go along to get along” bureaucrats.

He has multiplied the problem by following and adopting their highly politicized program of “carefully crafted chaos” — which both ignores the law and inflicts irreparable harm, including death, on legal asylum seekers! The “crime” of these victims of Biden’s tone-deafness? Seeking to exercise their legal rights under U.S. and international law to apply for asylum!

Biden and some Dems seem to have forgotten the nationwide, grass roots wave of support for admission of refugees in response to Trump’s despicable “Muslim ban!” As Karen points out, rather than “running from” immigration, refugees, and asylum as issues, Biden and other Dems should be embracing them as part of our heritage as a nation of immigrants and a source of strength and shared prosperity for our future! Refugees and asylees are a key component of our legal immigration system.

Making the necessary progressive, due process and fundamental fairness oriented, reforms to enable our nation to welcome those qualified in a timely, humane, and fair manner should be a top priority! As Karen cogently notes, “doing the right thing,” and doing it really well, “is good politics!”

Biden’s latest immigration nonsense will be attacked by litigators on both sides. Both the ACLU and Stephen Miller’s nativist legal group “America First Legal” have pledged to resist various parts of the new policies in court. The irony here is that Biden’s latest anti-asylum efforts incorporate much of the “Miller White Nationalist agenda” that Biden and other Dems campaigned (and fund-raised) against during the 2020 election!

Miller Lite — Biden and his immigration advisors apparently have been overindulging in this stuff lately! It shows in their disturbingly poor performance on asylum, human rights, an “order at the border!”

Karen’s message is the same as mine. “It’s not rocket science!🚀 Migrants have a right to asylum.”🗽 Start with that straightforward truth and everything else falls into place!

Thanks for speaking out so forcefully, articulately, and truthfully, Karen, my friend!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-07-22

🏴‍☠️ BREAKING: SCOFFLAW ALERT: LACKING COMPETENCE & ABILITY TO FAIRLY ADMINISTER REFUGEE & ASYLUM LAWS, LIKE TRUMP BEFORE HIM, BIDEN PROPOSES NEW “GIMMICKS” TO REWRITE LAW BY FIAT RATHER THAN LEGISLATION! — Expanded Use Of “Emergency Parole” To Replace Law’s Existing Refugee & Asylum Programs Appears Illegal!

Biden Border Message — “Border Message”
By Steve Sack
Reproduced under license

Biden’s new immigration plan would restrict illegal border crossings

The measures are likely to draw legal challenges. They would expand rapid expulsion for illegal border crossers but allow more migrants from Cuba, Nicaragua, Haiti and Venezuela.

Read in The Washington Post: https://apple.news/ARS8hkdNCShagYwOQlpmHkA

BY CLEVE R. WOOTSON JR., NICK MIROFF AND MARIA SACCHETTI report for WashPost, January 5, 2023 11:22 AM

President Biden on Thursday will announce new immigration restrictions, including the expansion of programs to remove people quickly without letting them seek asylum, in an attempt to address one of his administration’s most politically vulnerable issues at a time when the nation’s attention is focused on Republican disarray in the U.S. House.

The measures will expand Biden’s use of “parole” authority to allow 30,000 migrants from Cuba, Nicaragua, Haiti and Venezuela to come to the United States each month, as long as a U.S. sponsor applies for them first. But those who attempt to migrate through the region without authorization will risk rapid expulsion to Mexico, as the administration plans to expand its use of the pandemic-era Title 42 public health policy. Mexico has agreed to take back 30,000 border-crossers from those nations each month, U.S. officials told reporters during a briefing Thursday morning.

The measures, which are likely to draw legal challenges from immigration advocacy groups,”will expand and expedite legal pathways for orderly migration and result in new consequences for those who fail to use those legal pathways,” the White House announced.

Biden, who has said he will seek reelection in 2024, is contending with the political and operational fallout of two consecutive years of record numbers of migrants taken into custody at the Mexican border, in part because of his more welcoming policies.

Before taking office, Biden said he wanted an orderly system, not “2 million people on our border.” The number of border apprehensions jumped to 1.7 million during his first year in the White House, however, and soared to nearly 2.4 million in his second year. Biden campaigned on the promise that his administration’s immigration system would be “safe, orderly and humane”; his pivot toward amped up enforcement suggests the White House sees immigration as a 2024 liability.

The administration’s solution is legally thorny and will likely anger immigration advocates and even some Democrats — and will probably do little to silence Biden’s Republican critics.

. . . .

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

Read the complete story at the link:

Biden’s plan effectively imposes arbitrary geographic and ideological restrictions on those seeking protection — something that Congress specifically intended to eliminate when enacting the Refugee Act of 1980;
Biden’s plan leaves out asylum seekers and refugees from the Northern Triangle, some of those most in need of protection;
It imposes arbitrary and illegal numerical limits on those who might otherwise seek asylum;
It continues the illegal and expanded use of Title 42 as a border enforcement mechanism having nothing whatsoever to do with public health — a position that the Administration itself has refuted in Federal Court all the way up to the Supremes;
It leaves those “paroled” in limbo with no clear path to legalization in the U.S., other than perhaps eventually applying for asylum in overloaded and often biased system with a backlog of many years;
Any future path to legal status for these parolees would require legislation agreed to by the GOP — not likely to happen — thus making these individuals “bargaining chips” for nativists seeking further restrictions on legal immigration and the right of asylum;
The “mass use” of parole at a rate of 30,000/month appears a direct violation of section 212(d)(5) of the INA, as amended by the Refugee Act of 1980, which specifically intended to end the “mass use” of parole as a substitute for admitting refugees under the legal framework set up by the Refugee Act of 1980, as amended.

Here’s a “spot on” comment by Margaret Cargioli from the Post article:

Margaret Cargioli, a lawyer with the Immigrant Defenders Law Center said the program was effectively screening out migrants who lack U.S. connections or money to buy airplane tickets. She said Title 42 was “put in place by a racist and xenophobic administration” bent on stopping immigration, not protecting public health.

“It really does go against the nature of … ‘My life is in danger. I need to get out,’ ” she said at a Dec. 29 news conference. “And that is what the essence of an asylum seeker is.”

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-05-23

🤯 ❓QUESTION OF THE DAY: “Biden says he wants to dismantle Title 42,” writes Catherine Rampell @ WashPost, “so why has he expanded it?”

By Catherine Rampell

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/12/29/title42-migrant-asylum-biden-solutions/

The Biden administration has long been saying that it wants to get rid of Title 42.

Why, then, has it been expanding use of this policy?

“Title 42” is shorthand for what is effectively an abuse of a public health authority to circumvent U.S. asylum laws. Beginning in March 2020, the Trump administration used an obscure public health statute to automatically expel migrants without allowing them to first apply for asylum, as is their right under U.S. law and international treaty;PresidentDonald Trump’s pretext was that these immigrants might spread covid-19.

Apparently, Trump considered covid a liberal media hoax except when useful for punishing foreigners.

Human rights advocates and public health experts alike criticized the policy as probably both illegal and lacking a credible epidemiological purpose. Whatever its intentions, it didn’t reduce stress at the border; instead, it increased attempted border crossings, as many people expelled without consequence or due process turned right around and tried again to enter the United States.

That is, if they weren’t kidnapped, tortured, raped or otherwise violently attacked first. This happened in more than 10,000 cases of expelled migrants, as documented by Human Rights First.

As a presidential candidate, Joe Biden pledged to restore the integrity of the asylum system. He promised that anyone qualifying for an asylum claim would “be admitted to the country through an orderly process.” As president, though, Biden dragged his feet in terminating Title 42. He finally agreed to end the program this past spring. But termination has since been delayed by complicated court rulings, which Biden officials seem to have fought only half-heartedly.

This week, the Supreme Court determined that Title 42 must remain in place at least until the court decides a related issue (probably in the coming months). Given the Biden administration’s claims of wanting to end Title 42, the president should theoretically be mad about the delay.

Instead, Biden officials seem to have seized the opportunity to make yet more immigrant groups subject to automatic expulsions. “The administration has taken the position in court that they can no longer justify keeping Title 42 in place, given the lack of any public health justification,” said Lee Gelernt of the American Civil Liberties Union, which is challenging the expulsion policy. “If you look at the administration’s actions, however, it’s clear they’re fine with Title 42 remaining in place.”

. . . .

Americans often complain that immigrants should come here “the right way,” but for many migrants, showing up at the border unannounced and turning themselves in is the only legal pathway available. If given options to come here that don’t require paying gangs and crossing deserts, people would gladly take them — which would in turn alleviate stress at the border.

To its credit, the Biden administration has taken baby steps on that last recommendation.

Its Uniting for Ukraine program, for instance, has vetted and “paroled in” more than 82,000 Ukrainians and their immediate relatives abroad, which has discouraged Ukrainians from showing up en masse at our southern border (as had been the case early in the war). A similar but much more restrictive program was created for Venezuelans, whose numbers are capped at 24,000; a parallel program is reportedly in the works for Cubans, Nicaraguans and Haitians.

But again, these additional legal pathways can be created while still upholding the ability to apply for asylum at our borders. That’s what U.S. law requires — and what Biden has, repeatedly, promised to do.

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

Read Catherine’s full article at the link. “If you look at the administration’s actions, however, it’s clear they’re fine with Title 42 remaining in place.” So true! So outrageous!

Contrary to much of the blather from both parties, refugee and asylum laws are an integral part of our LEGAL immigration system — one that is now being grossly misapplied and under-utilized!

Creating additional legal avenues for immigration by legislation is by no means inconsistent with maintaining robust, well-functioning refugee and asylum programs!

There are lots and lots of improvements that the Biden Administration could and should have made to the legal refugee and asylum programs that already exist under the law! Indeed, I suggest that many of the bogus “gimmicks” and counterproductive, wasteful, unfair “deterrents” devised and implemented by the Biden Administration, including expanded use of Title 42, were in direct or indirect response to Garland’s failed Immigration Courts. Because they are backlogged, inefficient, and dysfunctional, bureaucrats and politicos dream up ways to evade them (as opposed to fixing them so they work)!

It’s all wrong! There are “tons” of cases rotting in Garland’s ever-expanding EOIR backlog that could be granted or otherwise disposed of with relative ease and without stomping on anyone’s due process rights! There are ways of providing proper notice, better scheduling, and a new system for initial adjudications of non-LPR cancellation cases that do NOT require legislation; just better leadership and personnel at DOJ, DHS, and the White House!

The lack of scholarly, progressive, due process oriented precedents and implementation of best judicial practices by the BIA cripples justice in both the Immigration Courts and the USCIS Asylum Offices, even extending to the Refugee Program and other forms of USCIS adjudication of benefits.

For example, the ridiculous, largely self-created, backlogs in USCIS work authorizations is at least partially fueled by never ending backlogs in Immigration Court. Also, bad judicial decisions at EOIR create large amounts of unnecessary litigation in the Article III Courts and promote inconsistencies by allowing too many important issues, including proper application of some of the BIA’s own precedents favorable to respondents, to be resolved by the Circuits.

The system is a godawful mess! Yet, Dems in Congress didn’t even consider pressing for long-overdue Article I legislation, already introduced by Chair Lofgren, as part of their “lame duck push.” Thus, a key part of the immigration and justice systems continues to flounder and fail in Garland’s DOJ!

The need for so-called “comprehensive immigration reform” does not in any way minimize the responsibility of the Biden Administration for failing to reform the leadership and bureaucracies at DOJ and DHS to produce fairer, more efficient, expert, professional results!

Some cowardly Dem politicos and many Biden officials “run” from the immigration issue; yet, addressing and fixing the parts they control, like EOIR, could well have given them success to tout during the mid-term campaign.

And, as many experts suggest, it might also have helped address labor shortages, inflation and improved the economy. Rather than just “holding off disaster,” by acting more boldly on immigration the Dems might even have maintained and expanded their political control by demonstrating both the competence to solve immigration problems, even without comprehensive legislation, and the benefits of a fair, efficient, functional immigration system to America as a whole.

With the GOP taking over the House, expect many Dems to continue bellyaching that “nothing can be done about immigration.” It’s not like they did much of anything when they controlled both Houses!

There are still things that can be done to make the system fairer, more efficient, and more responsive to the common needs of America. Progressives should not let Dem “naysayers” off the hook!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

12-31-22

🏰🏴‍☠️“FORTRESS EUROPE” HAS RECEDED FROM U.N. REFUGEE CONVENTION — SPOILER ALERT: It Hasn’t Gone Well! — The US Appears Wedded To The Same Path Of Failure & Deadly Human Rights Abuses!☠️⚰️

Chico Harlan & Stefano Pitrelli report for WashPost:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/12/19/migration-europe-numbers-increase/

CROTONE, Italy — On a continent that has spent years trying to cut off undocumented immigration — using fences, surveillance, financial incentives and sometimes even brute force — the close-the-door strategy is faltering

Migration across the Mediterranean has crested to the highest level in five years. New nationalities, most notably from Egypt, have joined the stream of people seeking escape to Europe. And hard-line border policies are merely driving smugglers to adapt: Soon after Greek authorities instituted a practice of harsh pushbacks, boats departing Turkey began charting a longer route — bypassing Greece and heading instead to Italy’s Calabrian coast, an area that used to see almost no arrivals.

“Here comes another,” a law enforcement official at the port of Crotone said one recent morning, watching a vessel with 80 people come into view, just four hours after the arrival of a boat with 81 others.

France accepts migrant rescue ship rejected by Italy as tensions flare

The European Union’s desire to obstruct migration on multiple fronts was reflected in a collection of deals cobbled together in the aftermath of a 2015 mass-scale wave from Africa and the Middle East. And, for a while, the strategy appeared to be working: Mediterranean crossings dipped dramatically. The issue lost political primacy, depriving nationalist parties of kindling.

But an increase in arrivals this year is showing the limits of a Fortress Europe strategy — and reviving the highly contentious issue of how to handle and divvy up those who make it to the E.U. and its borderless travel zone.

“Europe’s expectations were based on a wrong assumption — that mobility across the Mediterranean could be stopped or limited, so it would no longer be politically relevant,” said Roberto Cortinovis, a migration specialist at the Center for European Policy Studies. “And that is impossible.”

. . . .

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Some of the same things are happening here. Nativist/restrictionists, largely, but not exclusively, from the GOP, keep pushing failed “deterrence only” enforcement policies. And, the USG keeps “investing” in them despite decades of proven failure and deadly human results.

Ironically, today should have been the end of the illegal and abominable Title 42 charade. But, as with past fictional “deadlines” for termination, it didn’t happen.

Even today, nativist GOP Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) seeks to “sink” the Omnibus Budget Bill with a “poison pill” amendment that would require the Biden Administration to extend the deadly and illegal Title 42. https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3784529-mike-lee-title-42-drama-holds-up-omnibus-passage/

Just to put Lee’s outrageous abuse of the law and human rights in perspective, remember that U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan recently concluded, on a voluminous record, that the use of Title 42 to deny migrants’ legal rights at the border was: 1) an illegal pretext from the beginning, and 2) causes “stomach churning” dire, irreparable harm, including rape, torture, and death, to legal asylum seekers. Essentially, nativist politicos like Lee are trying to force the Biden Administration to commit even more egregious human rights violations — on top of the hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, they have already committed by enforcing Title 42 over the past two years.

While Lee’s scurrilous and totally misguided amendment is likely to fail, another almost equally bad one, sponsored by Sen. Sinema (I-AZ) to extend Title 42 indefinitely (till a “better plan” is in effect, which will never happen, particularly if the GOP has anything to say about it), is also up for a vote. “Lost in the shuffle” is the simple fact that we have existing laws that could and should be used to timely grant refugee to those legally qualified while expeditiously and summarily removing those with no credible claim. That the Biden Administration has failed to develop a viable plan for re-implementing existing law (which had been in effect for decades before being illegally abrogated by Trump) over the past two years should not be confused with impossibility!

As Nolan Rappaport recently said over on The Hill, “Title 42 is a distraction, not the solution. . . . . And Title 42 didn’t prevent a surge in the number of illegal crossings.” https://thehill.com/opinion/immigration/3782869-bidens-border-crisis-title-42-is-a-distraction-not-the-solution/.

Far from it, as many experts have pointed out, illegally “closing” ports of entry to asylum seekers has made unauthorized entry the “sole and exclusive” way for asylum seekers to exercise their rights! Yet, nativist politicos, the media, and even the Biden Administration ignore or mister present this truth.

As the International Organization on Migration has said, ““Migration is inevitable, necessary and desirable.” https://www.iom.int/news/migration-inevitable-necessary-and-desirable-opening-exhibition-iom-hague. It can be controlled and channeled with wise, realistic, and humane decisions. But, it won’t be stopped by walls, prisons, deportations, racist nationalistic rhetoric, militarization of borders, or cruel and inhumane laws and restrictionist policies.

Or, as I have said before, “We can diminish ourselves as a nation, but it won’t stop human migration.” Sure, the U.S. needs comprehensive, robust immigration reform that recognizes the inevitably and mutual benefits of human migration. But, particularly with a GOP House, it’s not on the horizon.

In the meantime, it is incumbent on the Biden Administration to make existing laws and policies work to timely, efficiently, and humanely screen refugees and asylum seekers at our borders. Those who qualify should be admitted in a reasonable period of time rather than aimlessly sent to wander the U.S. waiting for interviews from USCIS or hearings from EOIR that might never happen because of mismanagement and lack of vision in the current system. Those who don’t have credible claims should be subject to the summary removal procedures of the current law.

That the Biden Administration has, to date, lacked the competence, vision, and expertise to make the existing laws work in an acceptable manner is a shame. Ultimately, it’s one they won’t be able to “run away from” no matter how hard they try!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

12-22-22

🇺🇸⚖️🗽👍🏼REV. CRAIG MOUSIN @ DePAUL WITH A HOLIDAY MESSAGE: “FEAR NOT!” — Listen To Craig On The “Lawful Assembly” Podcast Here!

From ImmigrationProf Blog:

https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/immigration/2022/12/craig-mousin-on-immigration-reform.html

Click this link to listen to immigration law professor Craig Mousin’s podcast Lawful Assembly. He makes the case for not pitting demands for border security against immigration reform and justice for asylum seekers.

.

Mousin explores how the claim for a fully secure border has stalled immigration reform for over three decades. He calls for comprehensive immigration reform to address many of the issues the failed policies of detention and deportation have been unable to resolve.

KJ

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Thanks Craig for speaking truth when so many are spreading false information and advocating trading human rights that aren’t ours to give away for “benefits” that should be conferred on their own merits with no “strings attached.”

Unhappily, even the normally reliable and sensible Greg Sargent @ WashPost is spouting some of this absolute nonsense! He speaks of indefinitely extending massive violations of legal and human rights (“Title 42”), prisons for asylum seekers (“processing centers”), and expedited dockets (“deportation railroads without due process”) as if they are “OK trade-offs” for so-called “immigration reform.”

Notably, there is nothing now stopping the Administration from processing more refugees outside the U.S., providing grants to innovative organizations like “VIISTA Villanova” for training more qualified pro bono asylum representatives without having to rely exclusively on law schools, replacing poorly qualified Asylum Officers and Immigration Judges with asylum and human rights experts, appointing a new expert BIA qualified to establish affirmative precedents to guide Asylum Officers, IJs, and lawyers on both sides in how to recognize, document, and grant asylum in accordance with the generous intent of the law and the U.N. Convention on which it is based, providing grants to NGOs for systemic resettlement of asylees and applicants away from the border, targeting and prosecuting human smugglers, and expeditiously removing those arriving at or near the border who can’t establish a “credible fear” of persecution.

That the Administration has failed to bring in the necessary visionary, dynamic, competent leadership to accomplish any of the foregoing, and that a Dem-controlled Congress has failed in its oversight responsibilities and to push the Administration to fulfill its legal obligations to asylum seekers is a question of competence and will, NOT the fault of asylum seekers and their advocates. Nor is it a basis to reduce the already unfairly and illegally compromised rights of asylum seekers

Craig basically echoes some of the themes I set forth this week in my “Dissenting Opinion!”

🗽DISSENTING OPINION: TRADING AWAY REFUGEE RIGHTS & DUE PROCESS FOR LONG OVERDUE DREAMER PROTECTIONS IS “NOT OK!”

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

12-17-22

🗽DISSENTING OPINION: TRADING AWAY REFUGEE RIGHTS & DUE PROCESS FOR LONG OVERDUE DREAMER PROTECTIONS IS “NOT OK!”

By Paul Wickham Schmidt

Courtside Exclusive

Dec. 6, 2022

I dissent.

I was outraged when I read in this morning’s Washington Post about the horrible “Sinema/Tillis misnamed immigration compromise” (actually a “sellout”) being negotiated during the lame duck session of Congress. In short, that proposal apparently would trade long overdue protection for “Dreamers” for the rights and lives of refugees and asylum seekers.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/12/05/congress-working-strike-last-minute-immigration-deals/

Incredibly, in the face of U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan’s findings that the intentional illegal use of Title 42 had resulted in countless clear violations of the legal rights of asylum seekers, subjecting them to a litany of horrors and abuses that he described as “dire harm,” these legislators would extend those abuses for an indefinite period! That’s notwithstanding evidence not only of the irreparable harm that Title 42 has caused, but also the rather obvious fact that once we “normalize” those abuses, they will never end.

There will always be another fabricated reason for extending the Title 42 charade. Indeed, once we start mischaracterizing abuse as “law,” we can’t even call it “abuse” and hold the abusers accountable! That’s all part of the dehumanizing or “Dred Scottification” process!

Additionally, in the place of a functioning working asylum and refugee system, the proposal would eventually substitute so called “processing centers” and “expedited procedures” to railroad asylum seekers out of the country without due process. And, it wouldn’t address the total dysfunction and denial of due process in our Immigration “Courts” by enacting another long overdue provision: the “Lofgren Article I Immigration court bill!” What a farce!

Let’s be clear about what’s happening here! The legal and human rights of refugees and asylum seekers are not “ours” to trade away for relief for another deserving group that has long been irrationally denied! “Processing centers” are a euphemism for “immigration prisons” — part of the “New American Gulag.” “Expedited processing” is a euphemism for “railroading.” Both detention and artificially expediting dockets have been proven to be ineffective and unjust, over and over. Yet, here we go again!

My outrage turned to shock and dismay when I learned that some erstwhile defenders of due process, human rights, and racial justice for asylum seekers (incredibly) thought that this type of immoral compromise was a “good idea!” Not me!

Restrictionist/nativist Dems masquerading as “moderates” are a huge problem. They play right into the GOP’s hands.

When committing crimes against humanity or giving away refugees’ rights becomes a “strategy,” “option,” or “bargaining chip,” we’re lost as a nation. And, that’s exactly where we’re heading with horrible, immoral proposals like this.

Human rights and due process are non-negotiable! And, I guarantee that extending Title 42, building additional Gulag (rather than making the existing legal asylum and refugee systems work), and railroading asylum seekers will empower smugglers and lead to further growth of our underground population.

Human migration won’t be stopped by ineffective and immoral “deterrence.” And, although many hate the idea, refugees basically “self-select” and are driven by forces beyond our immediate control.

Refugees are, by definition, folks who can’t return! So, there is no reason to believe that true refugees (of which there are many) are going to be “deterred.” They might be “incentivized” to seek refuge in particular, relatively safe, places; but, nobody seems interested in a “carrot” approach — even though the “stick approach” has failed and continues to do so!

Look at the folks who continue to die in vessels in the Mediterranean even though they are fully aware that they are unwanted and that the EU will stop at no cruelty to keep them out.

And, examine the wealth of documentation that folks forced to “remain in Mexico” — and apply under what we know to be a corrupt and inadequate system — are systematically abused and exploited.

This time, we’re not just “pushing the St. Louis out to sea.” We’re torpedoing her and watching the passengers drown. And Dems are a huge part of the problem!

Other (soon to be former) progressive Democrats might choose to “go along to get along” with heaping additional abuses on largely defenseless refugees and asylum seekers. But, not me! I dissent!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

11-06-22

⚖️ YOU’VE READ ABOUT HIM IN “ROLL CALL,” NOW’S YOUR CHANCE TO “CATCH HIM IN ACTION!” — Professor Stephen Yale-Loehr (Cornell Law) & Fellow Experts Charles Kamasaki (scholar/author) & Michelle Hackman (WSJ) Will Discuss Prospects For Immigration Reform in Free Webinar on Tuesday, Dec. 6, 2022 @ 1 PM EST!

Professor Stephen Yale-Loehr
Cornell Law

Charles Kamasaki
Distinguished Visiting Immigration Scholar
Cornell Law

Michelle Hackman
Immigration Reporter
Wall Street Journal

Immigration Reform: Might Past Be Prologue?

Tuesday, December 06, 2022, 1pm EST

Register now at https://ecornell.cornell.edu/keynotes/overview/K120622/

It’s been over 30 years since Congress enacted the most recent set of comprehensive immigration reforms: the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 and the Immigration Act of 1990. These bipartisan yet hotly contested bills passed only after a debate spanning five presidential administrations, eight congressional sessions, and painful compromises by all parties. Even then, both bills died on the House floor before being resurrected at the 11th hour.

Can lessons learned during the last round of reform be applied to future debates? Charles Kamasaki, author of “Immigration Reform: The Corpse That Will Not Die” (Mandel Vilar Press, 2019), thinks so. The book provides a history of how the 1980s-era reforms were enacted, along with a summary of developments since then. It concludes with seven lessons that advocates and lawmakers should consider in advancing future immigration reform.

Join us for a discussion with Mr. Kamasaki, Cornell Law School professor Steve Yale-Loehr, and Wall Street Journal immigration reporter Michelle Hackman about the prospects for immigration reform legislation in 2023.

If you can’t attend the webinar itself, you should still register at https://ecornell.cornell.edu/keynotes/overview/K120622/ so that you can get the recording afterward.

This webinar is cosponsored by the Cornell Migrations Initiative, the Cornell Law School Immigration Law and Policy Research Program, and Catholic Charities of Tompkins and Tioga Counties.

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

Don’t miss this great opportunity!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

12-04-22

⚖️THE GIBSON REPORT — 11-21-22 — CompiledBy Elizabeth Gibson, Managing Attorney, NIJC — HEADLINERS: Garland’s Tardy Rebuke Of Sessions’s 2018 Wrong Precedent Limiting IJ Termination Authority Likely Too Little, Too Late To Save EOIR — As GOP House White Nationalist Absurdists Abandon Economy, Inflation To Push For More Crimes Against Humanity Directed At Black and Brown Folks @ S. Border, Administration’s Failure To Respect Human Rights, Restore Legal Asylum System, Leverage Refugee Processing Leaves Dems With “No Defense!”

Weekly Briefing

This briefing is designed as a quick-reference aggregation of developments in immigration law, practice, and policy that you can scan for anything you missed over the last week. The contents of the news, links, and events do not necessarily reflect the position of the National Immigrant Justice Center. If you have items that you would like considered for inclusion, please email them to egibson@heartlandalliance.org.

CONTENTS (jump to section)

◦NEWS

◦LITIGATION & AGENCY UPDATES

◦RESOURCES

◦EVENTS

PRACTICAL UPDATES

USCIS: Recommendations for Paper Filings to Avoid Scanning Delays

NEWS

Biden Is Still Separating Immigrant Kids From Their Families

Texas Observer: But as the case of Felipe shows, immigration officials have continued to separate parents and children in violation of the policy. From the start of the new administration to August 2022—the latest month for which data has been published—U.S. authorities have reported at least 372 cases of family separation.

Judge orders end to Trump-era asylum restrictions at border

AP: Within hours, the Justice Department asked the judge to let the order take effect Dec. 21, giving it five weeks to prepare. Plaintiffs including the American Civil Liberties Union didn’t oppose the delay.

Democrats confront bleak odds for immigration deal before 2023

Politico: Party leaders are pushing hard for legislation aiding the undocumented population known as “Dreamers” before Republicans take the House. But GOP senators have little interest. See also House Judiciary GOP Highlights First Oversight Targets.

Quality vs Quantity: How Does Sitting on the Dedicated Docket Impact the Judging Process?

TRAC: The outcome for asylum seekers has long been influenced by the identity of the immigration judge assigned to hear their case. This continues to be true as documented by TRAC’s just released judge-by-judge report series, now updated through FY 2022. In Arlington, Virginia, judge denial rates ranged from 15 percent to 95 percent. In Boston, judge denial rates varied from 17 percent to 93.5 percent. In Chicago, they ranged from 16 percent to 90 percent, while in San Francisco one judge denied just 1 percent of the cases while another denied 95 percent.

ICE lifted its ban on family visits, but relatives still struggle to see loved ones

NPR: Individuals held in immigration detention were barred from visits with relatives and friends for more than two years during the pandemic — far longer than federal prisons. In May, ICE lifted the ban, but immigrant advocates and people in detention centers argue that social visits have not been fully nor consistently reinstated.

Second immigrant bus arrives in Philadelphia from Texas, sent by Gov. Greg Abbott

Philly Inquirer: A second bus carrying immigrants from Texas arrived in Philadelphia Monday morning, a twice-in-six-days sequel that propelled the city to offer fresh welcome to more weary, uncertain travelers from the border.

Cubans, Nicaraguans drive illegal border crossings higher

AP: Fewer Venezuelans came after the the Biden administration introduced new asylum restrictions on Oct. 12, but increasing arrivals from other countries more than offset that decline, according to figures released late Monday. See also Mexico steps up immigration controls in south; Cuba, U.S. to hold second round of migration talks in Havana.

Senate: Migrants subject to unnecessary medical procedures

AP: U.S. immigration authorities didn’t do enough to adequately vet or monitor a gynecologist in rural Georgia who performed unnecessary medical procedures on detained migrant women without their consent, according to results of a Senate investigation released Tuesday.

The Public Has Never Seen The U.S. Government Force-Feed Someone — Until Now

Intercept: According to ICE’s Performance-Based National Detention Standards, whenever there is a “calculated use of force,” staff are required to use a handheld camera to record the incident. The Intercept, with Kumar’s consent, requested the video through the Freedom of Information Act. After ICE refused to turn over the footage, The Intercept filed a lawsuit and ICE subsequently agreed to turn over the footage, but the agency redacted the faces and names of everyone who appears in it, aside from Kumar.

Ten years of hurt: how the Guardian reported Qatar’s World Cup working conditions

Guardian: A multi-country investigation by the Guardian finds at least 6,500 migrant workers from south Asia have died in Qatar in the 10 years since it was awarded the right to host the World Cup.

LITIGATION & AGENCY UPDATES

Matter of Coronado Acevedo, 28 I&N Dec. 648 (A.G. 2022)

AG: (1) Matter of S-O-G- & F-D-B-, 27 I&N Dec. 462 (A.G. 2018), is overruled. (2) Pending the outcome of the rulemaking process, immigration judges and the Board of Immigration of Appeals may consider and, where appropriate, grant termination or dismissal of removal proceedings in certain types of limited circumstances, such as where a noncitizen has obtained lawful permanent residence after being placed in removal proceedings, where the pendency of removal proceedings causes adverse immigration consequences for a respondent who must travel abroad to obtain a visa, or where termination is necessary for the respondent to be eligible to seek immigration relief before United States Citizenship and Immigration Services.

Biden Admin. Restores Immig. Courts’ Power To Nix Removals

Law360: The Biden administration on Thursday swept aside a Trump-era decision that mostly stripped immigration judges of their power to end removal proceedings, restoring immigration courts’ ability to terminate some deportation cases while it devises new policy.

Judge Allows Biden 5 Weeks To Wind Down Title 42

Law360: A federal judge on Wednesday granted “with great reluctance” the Biden administration’s request for a five-week stay of his previous day’s order to end expulsions of migrants under Title 42, a public health provision the Trump administration began using at the start of the pandemic.

Split 4th Circ. Orders Rehear Of Removal In Light Of Dimaya

Law360: A split Fourth Circuit panel ordered the U.S. Board of Immigration Appeals to reconsider a Jamaican man’s removal order, criticizing the agency’s reasons for rejecting his claims that he diligently sought reversal of his order following a Supreme Court ruling.

NY IJ Asylum Victory; Guatemala; Feminist Political Opinion

LexisNexis: Michael Shannon writes: “I wanted to share a very good written decision from IJ Barbara Nelson, who granted asylum to my client based on her actual and imputed feminist political opinion under Hernandez-Chacon v. Barr.”

Feds Get OK For Psych Exams Of Migrant Parents

Law360: The federal government got the green light from an Arizona federal judge to conduct psychological examinations of asylum-seeking parents suing for damages for the alleged emotional trauma from being separated from their children at the southwestern U.S. border.

AILA and Partners Send Letter to USCIS, EOIR, and OPLA on Biometrics Appointments

AILA: AILA and partners sent a letter to USCIS, EOIR, and OPLA addressing the unnecessary hurdles non-detained people in removal proceedings face in securing a biometrics appointment prior to their merits hearing.

USCIS Notice of Continuation of TPS Documentation for El Salvador, Haiti, Nicaragua, Sudan, Honduras, and Nepal

AILA: USCIS notice of the automatic extension of the validity of TPS-related documentation for beneficiaries under the TPS designations for El Salvador, Haiti, Nicaragua, Sudan, Honduras, and Nepal set to expire on 12/31/22, through 6/30/24. (87 FR 68717, 11/16/22)

RESOURCES

AILA: Practice Pointer: Title 42 and Asylum Processing at the Southern Border

AILA: Featured Issue: Prosecutorial Discretion

AILA: Practice Alert: ICE Withdraws Attorney Notification Requirements for COVID-19 Risk Factors

AILA: Practice Alert: USCIS Inaccurate Rejection Notices

AILA: Using the VESL Line for Your Client’s Change of Address and Change of Reporting Location

Cardozo Clinic Surveys on Language Access Issues in Detention

Cato: U.S. Has No Immigrant Visa Processing in 67 Countries—Indefinitely

Chase: Understanding Government Acquiescence

CLINIC: Frequently Asked Questions: TPS Terminations and the Ramos v. Mayorkas Litigation

NIJC’s Fall Pro Bono Asylum Training, Nov. 2022

NIJC: Immigrant Prosecutions By the Numbers

OIDO offers documents in additional languages

Round Table Weighs In @ Supremes On Unconstitutional Vagueness Of “Crime Involving Moral Turpitude”

EVENTS

11/29/22 Building an Asylum Claim

11/30/22 CGRS Preserving the Record for Appeal in a Fear-of-Return Claim

12/6/22 Emerging Strategies for Prolonged Detention

12/6/22 Immigration Reform: Might Past Be Prologue?

12/7/22-12/8/22 Defending Survivors: Strategies for Immigrant Survivors Seeking Justice

12/7/22 Parole in Immigration

12/13/22 The Effects of Absences on Naturalization

12/13/22 USCIS: Asylum Quarterly Stakeholder Engagement

12/14/22 Hot Topics in Asylum Law

12/14/22 CLINIC Working Through Vicarious Trauma With Self-Care Strategies

12/15/22 NLG: Obtaining Criminal Records with guest speaker, Gabriela Kahrl

1/10/23 CLINIC: Comprehensive Overview of Immigration Law (COIL)

1/11/22 Preventing and Responding to RFEs and NOIDs for U and VAWA Cases

1/19/23 NLG: Top Ethical Issues Facing Legal Representatives in Removal Hearings with guest speaker, Retired Immigration Judge Dana Marks

To sign up for additional NIJC newsletters, visit: https://immigrantjustice.org/subscribe.

You now can change your email settings or search the archives using the Google Group. If you are receiving this briefing from a third party, you can visit the Google Group and request to be added. If you receive an error, make sure you click request access.

Elizabeth Gibson (Pronouns: she/her/ella)

Managing Attorney for Capacity Building and Mentorship

National Immigrant Justice Center

A HEARTLAND ALLIANCE Program

224 S. Michigan Ave., Suite 600, Chicago, IL 60604
T: (312) 660-1688| F: (312) 660-1688| E: egibson@heartlandalliance.org

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Two years of ineptness, failure to clean house at DOJ and DHS, unkept promises to advocates, lack of guts to quickly reverse Trump’s massive scofflaw program of racist-inspired human rights abuses, arrogant “tuning out” of experts, lack of engagement and presence at the border have been largely ignored by Dems in both Houses. Indeed, other than a hearing on the Article 1 bill before Chair Lofgren (at which Garland was not required to appear and explain his due-process-denying mess and abject failure to reform EOIR), Dems failure to conduct meaningful oversight of the Administration’s mishandling of refugee programs, asylum, detention, asylum seeker resettlement, and Immigration Courts will be “coming home to roost” as insurrectionist, racists from the House GOP take aim at “snuffing” humanity and abolishing the rule of law!

Two years of inept, immoral, “Miller Litism” from the Administration leaves Dems with no defense and no supporters of their actions. Nativist restrictionists wanted “100% kill” @ border! Experts wanted a return to the rule of law, orderly processing, and due process. The Biden Administration delivered neither!

We tried to tell them, but they wouldn’t listen! No, McCarthy and his insurrectionist White Nationalist zany-haters have the floor. Just have to hope that historians are fully documenting the lies and Neo-Nazi views that these GOP hacks will be promoting — to help future generations understand how America “went off the rails” in the 21st century! Understandably, the GOP would rather focus on Biden’s failed immigration policies than on the rampant gun violence, hate crimes, child abuse, forced births, and dumbing down of America at the heart of their vile agenda!

🇺🇸Due Process Forever! The GOP’s “New McCarthyism,” Never!

PWS

11-23-22

🇺🇸🦸🏻‍♀️⚖️🗽👩🏻‍⚖️ PROFILE IN GREATNESS! — Kathleen Guthrie Woods Sits Down With One Of America’s Most Consequential Jurists, NDPA Hall-of-Famer 🥇 Judge (Ret.) Dana Leigh Marks On Leading & Inspiring From the Gritty Trenches Of American Justice & Her Exciting New Role As “NanaDana!” 🥰

Hon. Diana Leigh Marks — Hon. Dana Leigh (“NanaDana”) Marks
U.S. Immigration Judge (Ret.)
San Francisco Immigration Court
Past President, National Association of Immigration Judges; “Founding Mother of U.S. Asylum Law”

https://www.sfbar.org/sfam/q3-2022-unpacking-the-legacy-of-judge-dana-leigh-marks/

By the time she retired from San Francisco’s Immigration Court on December 31, 2021, Judge Dana Leigh Marks* had built an inspiring reputation as a leader, mentor, and advocate. She is known for her fierce advocacy for the court. She is known for her compassion and fairmindedness. She is known for her intelligence and wit, having coined oft-repeated, appropriate zingers that help people better understand the challenges of immigration court, including “Immigration judges do death penalty cases in a traffic court setting” and “Immigration is more complicated than tax law. How do I know this? Because there is no TurboTax for immigration law.”

Talking with her former colleagues—many of whom are now also her friends—is an uplifting experience. They speak of a woman who broke through barriers, applied the law fairly and compassionately, fought hard fights, and inspired others to join her. “She’s the GOAT of immigration judges!” declares Francisco Ugarte, Manager of the Immigration Defense Unit of San Francisco’s Public Defender’s Office.

Who is Judge Marks, and how did she positively influence and impact so many lives?

. . . .

Judge Marks also thrived in this arena because she saw beyond the expectation that her role was solely to facilitate deportations; she saw the humanity inherent in the proceedings. “Every story is individual,” she says, and every person deserves to be heard.

. . . .

“She showed us all how to be fierce advocates for justice—for what is true and right and just—without crossing over lines,” says Judge King. Jamil adds Judge Marks’s “tireless” work for the union and “giving a professional, female voice to immigration judges” to her list of accomplishments. “When she started, she was one of few women. After her, all these really amazing women came to the bench,” says Shugall, women Judge Marks mentored and encouraged to apply for the bench. That roster includes Judges Jamil, King, Miriam Hayward, Stockton, Webber, and Laura Ramirez. “She helped start that trajectory,” says Shugall.

“She helped create an inspiring model for how courts can be,” says Ugarte, and Judge Webber states, simply, “She inspires people all the time.”

“While she has had some limelight in her career, the vast majority of her work has been thankless,” says Judge King. “She perseveres solely because she believes it is important to make a difference wherever you can.”

*Today Judge Marks is known as “NanaDana,” a title that celebrates her role as caretaker for her granddaughter and helps people correctly pronounce her name (“dan-uh,” not “day-nuh”).

Kathleen Guthrie Woods is a long-time contributor to San Francisco Attorney magazine. She first interviewed Judge Marks, then-president of NAIJ, for “Understanding the Crisis in Our Immigration Courts” (Spring 2015).

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Every judge, lawyer, and law student in America, and particularly AG Garland and his lieutenants, should read Kathleen’s interview with Judge Marks (full version at link) about what “American judging” should, and could, be — all the way up to the Supremes!

Dana, my friend and colleague, your inspiring career is yet more evidence of the “then-available” talent who could have led long-overdue change at EOIR and the BIA. Like you, much of that talent has moved on to our Round Table, and we’re stuck with the dysfunctional mess at EOIR. But, others are arising in your image to fight for justice, sanity, and humanity from “the retail level on up” in our Federal Courts.

I will always think of you as the “Founding Mother of US Asylum Law” because of your stellar advocacy in Cardoza-Fonseca and your unending, unapologetic, and highly vocal commitment to due process, independent thinking, and judicial excellence.

As you probably remember, I was in Court for your OA in Cardoza-Fonseca, sitting at the SG’s table as you won the day for your client. My “client,” INS, “lost” that day. But, American justice, due process, and human rights won!

As it was for you and those many you inspired, “realizing the promise of Cardoza-Fonseca” became the “guiding light” of my subsequent judicial career at EOIR, on both the appellate and trial benches. Despite the more than quarter-century since Cardoza, the battle to make judges at all levels actually follow its dictates, and perhaps more importantly, its generous humanitarian spirit, is far from won!

Congrats on your new position as “NanaDana.” 😎 I always look forward to working with you and our amazing Round Table colleagues to give due process and fundamental fairness an unyielding voice before courts throughout America, and to continue the unending fight for best judicial practices in a life-determining system that has “lost its way” as millions needlessly suffer!”

We “Knightesses and Knights of our Round Table” 🛡⚔️ will “never let the bastards grind us down!” You continue to inspire all of us in our never ending quest for justice for the most vulnerable individuals among us!

Due Process Forever! 🗽😎⚖️👩🏻‍⚖️

Your friend & colleague, forever, ❤️

PWS

11-22-22

Marianna Sotomayor reports for WashPost:

‘Focus on what’s in front of you’

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

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Randy Billings reports for Portland Press Herald:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

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Round Table “Fighting Knightess” and NJ Bar honoree Hon. Sue Roy reports from the Garden State:

Heard on “E-Street:”

🇺🇸 Thanks to Sue and all involved, and Due Process Forever!

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Sue writes:

According to the NJSBA:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

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From Dean Kevin Johnson @ ImmigrationProf Blog:

Key recommendation from HLR article:

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

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By Catherine Rampell

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

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Chico Harlan & Stefano Pitrelli report for WashPost:

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From ImmigrationProf Blog:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

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🗽DISSENTING OPINION: TRADING AWAY REFUGEE RIGHTS & DUE PROCESS FOR LONG OVERDUE DREAMER PROTECTIONS IS “NOT OK!”

By Paul Wickham Schmidt

Courtside Exclusive

Dec. 6, 2022

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

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Your friend & colleague, forever, ❤️

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