10 LEGAL REPAIRS FOR A POST-CLOWN 🤡 WORLD — From Jennifer Rubin @ WashPost

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/07/12/ten-ideas-post-trump-reform/

President Trump granting clemency to his crony Roger Stone, who served as the go-between for the Trump campaign and WikiLeaks, on practically the eve of Stone’s incarceration for multiple crimes attendant to his coverup on behalf of the president, is grotesquely corrupt but unsurprising. Stone virtually confessed to a quid pro quo, telling Howard Fineman, “He [Trump] knows I was under enormous pressure to turn on him. It would have eased my situation considerably. But I didn’t.” Silence for clemency. A separate system of justice for the president’s henchmen. This is the very definition of corruption.

“By this action, President Trump abused the powers of his office in an apparent effort to reward Roger Stone for his refusal to cooperate with investigators examining the President’s own conduct,” House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) and Oversight and Reform Committee Chairwoman Carolyn B. Maloney (D-N.Y.) said in a written statement released Friday. “No other president has exercised the clemency power for such a patently personal and self-serving purpose.”

Stone’s clemency should remind all Americans of the necessity of removing Trump at the ballot box and seeking a full accounting of Attorney General William P. Barr’s role in running interference for the president (e.g., spinning the Mueller report, turning a blind eye toward criminality in the Ukraine scandal, intervening to block Stone’s and Michael Flynn’s punishments). It should remind voters that if not for the spinelessness of every Republican senator save Utah’s Mitt Romney, Trump would not have survived impeachment to seek vengeance on witnesses (e.g., Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman), corruptly protect his friends and incompetently manage a pandemic, leading to the unnecessary deaths of tens of thousands. With the pardon of Stone, we can affirm that Maine Republican Sen. Susan Collins’s assertion that he learned his lesson from impeachment was delusional.

In 2019, The Post’s editorial board argued the president tried to manipulate the justice system, wrongdoing that Congress must not let go. (The Washington Post)

However, we will need far more than an electoral shellacking of Republicans to address the damage Trump has done to the Justice Department and the rule of law. Ten simple measures would begin to repair our justice system:

1. A thorough redo of the special counsel/independent counsel law is necessary. The counsel’s final report should be issued to Congress and/or the courts, depriving a potentially corrupt attorney general or president the opportunity to pre-edit or spin it. Additional legislation should clarify that a special counsel is empowered to make specific findings of illegality. The DOJ guidelines preventing prosecution of the president while still in office should be revisited.

2. Congress must reassert the power of the purse. The executive branch must report all holds/impounds on congressionally appropriated funds. “Emergency” powers should be reexamined, tightened and clarified to prevent the sort of unilateral misappropriation of funds we saw regarding the wall.

3. Severe criminal penalties should be exacted for revealing the identity of whistleblowers or threatening and/or punishing federal employees for providing truthful testimony.

4. A new, speedy enforcement mechanism is required for contempt of Congress citations, allowing lawmakers to get a swift and definitive resolution of its conflicts with the executive branch.

5. We need a barrier between the White House and Justice Department to prevent political interference in specific cases, targets of investigation and prosecutorial recommendations. Any such communications must be logged and made available to the inspector general and/or Congress.

. . . .

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

Get the rest of the article with five more good ideas at the above link.

An essential that should have been #1 on the list: An independent Article I Immigration Court with an open, merit-based judicial selection process involving public input!

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

PWS

07-13-20

🏴‍☠️KAKISTOCRACY UPDATE W/ CATHERINE RAMPELL @ WASHPOST: Trump’s Morally & Financially Bankrupt USCIS Stops Making Green Cards — Literally!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/how-the-trump-administration-is-turning-legal-immigrants-into-undocumented-ones/2020/07/09/15c1cbf6-c203-11ea-9fdd-b7ac6b051dc8_story.html

By Catherine Rampell

July 9 at 7:30 PM ET

The Trump administration is turning legal immigrants into undocumented ones.

That is, the “show me your papers” administration has literally switched off printers needed to generate those “papers.”

Without telling Congress, the administration has scaled back the printing of documents it has already promised to immigrants — including green cards, the wallet-size I.D.’s legal permanent residents must carry everywhere to prove they are in the United States lawfully.

In mid-June, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ contract ended with the company that had been printing these documents. Production was slated to be insourced, but “the agency’s financial situation,” USCIS said Thursday, prompted a hiring freeze that required it to ratchet down printing.

. . . .

USCIS, which is funded almost entirely by fees, is undergoing a budget crisis, largely caused by financial mismanagement by political leadership. The printing disruptions are no doubt a preview of chaos to come if the agency furloughs about 70 percent of its workforce, as it has said it will do in a few weeks absent a congressional bailout.

In recent conversations with congressional staffers about cutting contracts to save money, USCIS mentioned only one contract, for a different division, that was being reduced — and made no reference to this printing contract, according to a person who took part in those discussions. The company that had this contract, Logistics Systems Inc., did not respond to emails and calls this week requesting comment.

The administration has taken other steps in recent months that curb immigration. Presidential executive orders have almost entirely ended issuance of green cards and work-based visas for people applying from outside the country; red tape and bureaucracy have slowed the process for those applying from within U.S. borders. For a while, the agency refused to forward files from one office to another. The centers that collect necessary biometric data remain shuttered.

These pipeline delays are likely to dramatically reduce the number of green cards ultimately approved and issued this year.

Under normal circumstances, immigrants who need proof of legal residency but haven’t yet received their green card would have an alternative: get a special passport stamp from USCIS. But amid covid-related changes, applicants must provide evidence of a “critical need,” with little guidance about what that means.

“The bottom line is that applicants pay huge filing fees, and it appears that these fees have apparently been either squandered through mismanagement or diverted to enforcement-focused initiatives, to the great detriment of applicants as well as the overall efficiency of the immigration process,” says Anis Saleh, an immigration attorney in Coral Gables, Fla. “The administration has accomplished its goal of shutting down legal immigration without actually changing the law.”

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

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

It should come as no surprise that an agency under unqualified White Nationalist Ken “Cooch Cooch” Cuccinelli is being run into the ground and has lost its mission through misdirection and mismanagement. That’s basically Cooch’s story in a nutshell as those of us know in Virginia, where we count ourselves most fortunate not to have him as our Governor.

I have written previously about how the regime’s “malicious incompetence” has bankrupted once self-sustaining USCIS while destroying our legal immigration and asylum systems that benefit the US and individual migrants and refugees in numerous ways. I made the rather obvious point that the House Dems should not bail out this regime on USCIS, but rather require that the money be found by reprograming funds from bloated, wasteful, ineffective, and inhumane DHS enforcement programs, starting with the wall.

https://immigrationcourtside.com/2020/07/07/%f0%9f%8f%b4%e2%80%8d%e2%98%a0%ef%b8%8f%e2%98%a0%ef%b8%8f%e2%9a%b0%ef%b8%8f%f0%9f%a4%ae%f0%9f%91%8ekakistocracy-korner-trumps-malicious-incompetence-bankrupts-once-profitable-immigration-age/

The solution to maliciously incompetent freeloaders like the Trump immigration kakistocracy is not to provide more bailouts as rewards for their misconduct and mismanagement.

A recent report from the American Immigration Council shows how DHS enforcement spending has bloated to over $25 billion annually at then same time the Trump kakistocracy has mismanaged USCIS into bankruptcy. https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/research/the-cost-of-immigration-enforcement-and-border-security

And, we haven’t really gotten much return on that investment, Here’s a key quote from the AIC Report:

What has this spending bought? The United States currently has roughly 700 miles of fencing along the Southern border, record levels of staff for ICE and CBP, as well as a fleet of drones, among other resources. Some of these resources have been spent on ill-conceived projects, such as the $1 billion attempt to construct a “virtual fence” along the Southwest border, a project initiated in 2005 that was later scrapped for being ineffective and too costly. CBP announced a similar project in July 2020 to install a total of 200 “Autonomous Surveillance Towers” along remote areas of the southern border at a reported cost of several hundred million dollars.

Even with record level spending on enforcement, enforcement alone is not sufficient to address the challenges of undocumented migration. It also has significant unintended consequences; according to U.S. Border Patrol statistics, the Southwest border witnesses close to one death per day. All of these efforts that have accumulated in the name of security, however, do not necessarily measure border security properly, or make the border more secure. It is past time for the United States to turn away from costly and haphazard efforts to secure the border and instead focus on reining in the costs of border enforcement.

I argue that the regime’s focus on removing folks who were peacefully residing in the U.S. and contributing to our economy, many with U.S. citizen family members who are then left in dire straits, has actually been detrimental to America, in addition to killing the Immigration Courts.

Likewise, the shutdown of our legal refugee, asylum, and immigration systems without legislation has not only placed our nation among the ranks of human rights violators and harmed or endangered human lives, but also deprived us of individuals with a powerful history of making outsized contributions to our society and our economy.

I doubt that a rational immigration policy and system that looked at the real national interest, rather than the mythologized White Nationalist, fundamentally racist version of it, would require such a huge, yet largely counterproductive, enforcement apparatus. At a minimum, costs for civil detention and removals could be cut substantially in a better system.

Due Process Forever! More public welfare handouts for the kakistocracy, never!

PWS

07-12-20

🏴‍☠️THE PLAGUE STATES OF AMERICA: Where ☠️ Plague, Stupidity, & Inhumanity Rule, & Your U.S. Passport Is Largely Worthless (Except, If You Are A Person of Color To, Perhaps, Protect You From “Expedited Removal” By ICE & Trump’s Complicit Supremes)! — Welcome To The “Trump Hotel California!”🤮

Last thing I remember

I was running for the door

I had to find the passage back

To the place I was before

“Relax”, said the night man

“We are programmed to receive

You can check out any time you like

But you can never leave”

—— From “Hotel California” by The Eagles

Source: LyricFind

Songwriters: Glenn Lewis Frey / Don Felder / Donald Hugh Henley

Hotel California lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group, BMG Rights Management

Full Lyrics & Music here: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwjZqsKZpcXqAhU0oXIEHaegAiQQwqsBMAp6BAgLEAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DvcmjDPDOk7c&usg=AOvVaw3ay3l2d6R_UlBVOg1k6Fnz

https://medium.com/@indica/the-plague-states-of-america-53b20678a80e?source=email-dafc55faa6fd-1594452458433-digest.reader——0-50——————1f52bfff_711d_4def_918f_7e9b8eddea74-1-1b0c1765_594d_4c73_8665_f93e3a786b9f—-&sectionName=top

American Passports Are Worthless Now (Map)

Oh the places you can’t go

Indi Samarajiva

Follow

America is not united anymore and it’s barely a state. They have crashed right through failed state into a plague state, unwelcome across the world. This has been predicted, including here. Now it has come to pass. Just look at the map.

Americans have gone from having access to most of the world to being banned from most of it. Today, Americans are only allowed in a few Caribbean islands and the Balkans. An American passport is now worthless. Worse than worthless, it’s a plague.

In the absence of a humane government, America is now ruled by COVID-19. Welcome to the Plague States of America.

It’s too late

<img alt=”Image for post” class=”s t u hk ai” src=”https://miro.medium.com/max/6800/1*EoSrvKpq71W0jTbJCKmBfw.png” width=”3400″ height=”2400″ srcSet=”https://miro.medium.com/max/552/1*EoSrvKpq71W0jTbJCKmBfw.png 276w, https://miro.medium.com/max/1104/1*EoSrvKpq71W0jTbJCKmBfw.png 552w, https://miro.medium.com/max/1280/1*EoSrvKpq71W0jTbJCKmBfw.png 640w, https://miro.medium.com/max/1400/1*EoSrvKpq71W0jTbJCKmBfw.png 700w” sizes=”700px”/>

Only America has self-inflicted a second wave

I think it is difficult for Americans to understand that they are, to use an epidemiological term, completely fucked. COVID-19 could have been managed in January, or February, or even now, but not a full year later, in January 2021. Given than you need a functioning government to manage this pandemic, that’s the soonest Americans can get one.

It’s far too late.

The most reliable projections are saying 200,000 dead and 50 million infected by election day in November. Even these projections struggle to account for completely irrational federal actions like denigrating masks, pushing to reopen early, and pushing students back into schools. This is not the absence of public health, this is its opposite.

It is, in effect, governance by COVID-19. Not a failed state. A plague state.

Even after election day, Donald Trump will still be in power for nearly 3 months, until January 20th. Besides impeaching a dead-duck President, there’s nothing America can do but wait, while COVID-19 grows ever stronger. Grows completely out of control. In a pandemic, days matter, hours matter. A year is entirely too late.

America will be lucky to exit this pandemic with less than a million dead and 100 million infected. The living will be lucky to exit their country within the next five years.

The worthless passport

<img alt=”Image for post” class=”s t u hk ai” src=”https://miro.medium.com/max/3200/1*dcgKqItSATd-t8a1R42Sbw.jpeg” width=”1600″ height=”1137″ srcSet=”https://miro.medium.com/max/552/1*dcgKqItSATd-t8a1R42Sbw.jpeg 276w, https://miro.medium.com/max/1104/1*dcgKqItSATd-t8a1R42Sbw.jpeg 552w, https://miro.medium.com/max/1280/1*dcgKqItSATd-t8a1R42Sbw.jpeg 640w, https://miro.medium.com/max/1400/1*dcgKqItSATd-t8a1R42Sbw.jpeg 700w” sizes=”700px”/>

Welcome to the club. Post-colonial bullshit and racism have made my Sri Lankan passport worthless for years. Now the American passport is worse. America has crashed straight through the third world into the fourth.

Here is a list, in total, of all the places Americans can go. Most of them are small Caribbean islands.

<img alt=”Image for post” class=”s t u hk ai” src=”https://miro.medium.com/max/3200/1*ddImUOx1j0smBVcsVeqbPg.png” width=”1600″ height=”1022″ srcSet=”https://miro.medium.com/max/552/1*ddImUOx1j0smBVcsVeqbPg.png 276w, https://miro.medium.com/max/1104/1*ddImUOx1j0smBVcsVeqbPg.png 552w, https://miro.medium.com/max/1280/1*ddImUOx1j0smBVcsVeqbPg.png 640w, https://miro.medium.com/max/1400/1*ddImUOx1j0smBVcsVeqbPg.png 700w” sizes=”700px”/>

ALL THE PLACES YOU CAN GO

1. Albania | 15. Lebanon

2. Antigua and Barbuda | 16. Maldives

3. Aruba | 17. Mexico

4. The Bahamas | 18. North Macedonia

5. Barbados | 19. St. Lucia

6. Belize | 20. St. Maarten

7. Bermuda | 21. St. Vincent &

8. Croatia | 22. Serbia

9. Dominican Republic | 23. Tanzania

10. Ecuador* | 24. Turkey

11. French Polynesia | 25. Turks &

12. Ireland* | 26. Ukraine

13. Jamaica | 27. UAE*

14. Kosovo | 28. UK*

*14 day quarantine required, not included in map.

American now have access to exactly two dozen states, four more (*) if they want to endure a 14-day quarantine on the end. Americans have gone from world power to getting the side-eye from Ecuador in a matter of months. Right now Americans are only really welcome on remote islands or at corralled resorts in Mexico, where they can be isolated from everyone else.

It’s not that other nations don’t want to welcome Americans, they just can’t. The point of a passport is that a sovereign power vouches for its bearer, but America can’t vouch for the health of their citizens at all. America’s public health regime is far less trustworthy than Liberia’s (which is actually quite good). Its sovereign is mad.

At the same time, you can’t trust Americans. Americans have poor hygiene (low masking rate) and at least 40% of the population can’t be trusted to even believe that COVID-19 exists, let alone to take it seriously. They’re likely to refuse testing, not report symptoms, break quarantine, and generally follow rules. Americans have a toxic combination of ignorance and arrogance that makes them unwelcome travelers.

They have a lot of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with them. Some of them, I assume, are good people, but it doesn’t matter. It’s a plague passport. Return to sender.

The Plague States

<img alt=”Image for post” class=”s t u hk ai” src=”https://miro.medium.com/max/4000/1*weJ8xV5Wt2kCaKGnLXj4Hg.png” width=”2000″ height=”1149″ srcSet=”https://miro.medium.com/max/552/1*weJ8xV5Wt2kCaKGnLXj4Hg.png 276w, https://miro.medium.com/max/1104/1*weJ8xV5Wt2kCaKGnLXj4Hg.png 552w, https://miro.medium.com/max/1280/1*weJ8xV5Wt2kCaKGnLXj4Hg.png 640w, https://miro.medium.com/max/1400/1*weJ8xV5Wt2kCaKGnLXj4Hg.png 700w” sizes=”700px”/>

That’s the near future of the United States. An epidemic that spreads largely unchecked until next year. A population to unprotected and ignorant to be allowed anywhere else. A world that largely suppresses the virus — from Mongolia to Ghana to Trinidad & Tobago — but which has to keep America in isolation.

In the end, Trump did what he said. He built a wall around America and made the world pay for it. He just never told Americans that they’d be stuck inside. Welcome to the Plague States of America. You can check out, but you can never leave.

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

Check out the map accompanying the original article at the above link.

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

PWS

07-11-20

🏴‍☠️TRUMP “JUSTICE” — DHS DEATH CAMP ⚰️ IN VIRGINIA — Convicted Criminal Sleezeball Roger Stone Gets Out of Jail Free, But ICE Non-Criminal Prisoners @ Farmville Face COVID-19 Detain Until Dead ☠️ (“DUD”) Policy!🤮

NBC 4 Washington reports in this video:

https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/covid-19-outbreak-at-ice-detention-center-in-virginia/2358116/

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

This is justice? Unhappily, it’s what passes for justice for people of color in the era of Trump.

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

PWS

07-11-20

CHARLES M. BLOW @ NYT: TIME TO START CALLING IT WHAT IT IS: “It is time for us to simply call a thing a thing: White supremacy is the biggest racial problem this country faces, and has faced. It is almost always the cause of unrest around race. It has been used to slaughter and destroy, to oppress and imprison. It manifests in every segment of American life.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/08/opinion/racism-united-states.html

Blow writes in The NY Times:

Now that we are deep into protests over racism, inequality and police brutality — protests that I’ve come to see as a revisiting of Freedom Summer — it is clear that Donald Trump sees the activation of white nationalism and anti-otherness as his path to re-election. We are engaged in yet another national conversation about race and racism, privilege and oppression.

But, as is usually the case, the language we used to describe the moment is lacking. We — the public and the media, including this newspaper, including, in the past, this very column — often use, consciously or not, language that shields anti-Black white supremacy, rather than to expose it and hold it accountable.

We use all manner of euphemisms and terms of art to keep from directly addressing the racial reality in America. This may be some holdover from a bygone time, but it is now time for it to come to an end.

Take for instance the term “race relations.” Polling organizations like Gallup and the Pew Research Center often ask respondents how they feel about the state of race relations in the country.

I have never fully understood what this meant. It suggests a relationship that swings from harmony to disharmony. But that is not the way race is structured or animated in this country. From the beginning, the racial dynamics in America have been about power, equality and access, or the lack thereof.

Protests, and even violence, have erupted when white people felt their hold on those things was threatened or when Black people — or Indigenous people, or Hispanics — rebelled against those things being denied.

So what are the relations here? It is a linguistic sidestep that avoids the true issue: anti-Black and anti-other white supremacy.

. . . .

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

Read the rest of the article at the link.

White Supremacy is at the core of Donald Trump and today’s GOP. It is willfully enabled by Chief Justice John Roberts and other Supreme Court Justices who refuse to acknowledge the obvious anti-Hispanic and anti-people of color motivations behind unconstitutional and inhuman immigration and asylum restrictions designed by notoriously outspoken neo-Nazi racist Stephen Miller.

Likewise, the intellectually corrupt Supremes’ majority fails to prevent the GOP’s racist strategy of suppressing voting rights of African Americans and Latinos. The unconstitutionality of these schemes to deny the vote and dilute the political power of people of color has been crystal clear under our Constitution since the enactment of the 15th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1870.

You don’t need a Harvard law degree to figure this out. Just honesty, courage, and intellectual integrity — things that I once took for granted among Supreme Court Justices, but now see are sorely missing on today’s Court where extreme rightist ideology identified with white supremacy has replaced judicial qualifications as selection criteria when the GOP was in charge.

Ending white supremacy in America will require ousting Trump and the GOP and ending the GOP’s power to put more unqualified judges who are opposed to racial and social justice in America on the Federal Bench.

This November, vote like your life and our nation’s future depend it it. Because they do!

PWS

07-09-20

🤮☠️🏴‍☠️ ⚰️As American Governance Crumbles, Desperate Neo-Nazi Regime Rolls Out Plans For More “Crimes Against Humanity” Targeting Helpless Refugees Legally Seeking Asylum — These Cowardly, Immoral, & Patently Unconstitutional Deeds Are Being Done in OUR Name While The Complicit Supremes Watch What They Have Enabled & Encouraged By Abandoning Humanity, Our Constitution, Intellectual Integrity, & American Values!

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/immigration/trump-admin-plans-block-asylum-seekers-u-s-citing-public-n1233253

From NBC News:

July 8, 2020, 6:35 PM EDT

By Julia Ainsley and Adiel Kaplan

The Trump administration has proposed a new rule that would allow it to deny asylum to immigrants who are deemed a public health risk.

The soon-to-be published rule would let the Department of Homeland Security and Department of Justice to block immigrants from seeking asylum in the U.S. based on “potential international threats from the spread of pandemics,” according to a notice announcing it Wednesday.

The rule would apply to immigrants seeking asylum and those seeking “withholding of removal” — a protected immigration status for those who have shown they may well face danger if returned to their home countries.

. . . .

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

Read the rest of the article at the link.

This outrageous, totally pretextual, racist proposal violates the Constitution, asylum laws, international agreements, morality, and human values. The factual basis is absurd since there has been no showing that asylum applicants are a source of COVID spread. To the contrary, unnecessarily detained asylum applicants have been victims of Trump’s failed policies. Moreover, if DHS actually were worried about COVID, they could easily test and quarantine to identify and deal constructively and humanely with the few applicants who might have been infected someplace other than DHS facilities.

This is White Nationalist racism at its worst.

We need better judges, and particularly better Justices on the Supremes, for a better America! Judges who will prevent, rather than encourage, racist-driven “crimes against humanity.” Standing up against such crimes, particularly when they are disgracefully directed by a racist Executive at our most vulnerable humans, should be a “no-brainer” for a unanimous Supremes with Justices qualified for the high offices they hold. For the “JR Five” a “no brainer” has too often been a “non-starter.” So, the regime’s gross abuses of migrants and people of color and the damage, societal disorder, wasted time, squandered resources, and the human misery they cause roll on.

“Dred Scottification” is wrong! Period! And Supreme Court Justices who enable it are wrong for America!

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

PWS

07-09-20

🇺🇸👍🏼🗽🏅JULIÁN CASTRO: Former Presidential Candidate, Cabinet Secretary, Mayor, A Tireless Advocate For Equal Justice, & Now Biden Supporter Has Maliciously Incompetent Racist Trump Sized Up: “But he says the ‘scariest’ aspect of the Trump presidency is the fact that people still support ‘someone who is manifestly so unqualified.’”

https://apple.news/AYNljsGEARJmzW3bj8A6Tvw

From salon.com:

Former candidate tells Salon that Biden “gets it” on immigration and police reform, but Trump is “unconscionable”

Dean Obeidallah

Former Democratic presidential candidate Julián Castro may not be on the ticket in 2020, but he’s looking forward to getting rid of Donald Trump, whose strategy he says is designed to deepen the culture war in America. During our recent conversation for Salon Talks, Castro explained why he’s strongly supporting Joe Biden, while at the same time pressing the former vice president on immigration and police reforms.

Castro told me that Trump, even more than in 2016, is “appealing to that sense of white superiority, white nationalism” that got him elected in the first place, But he says the “scariest” aspect of the Trump presidency is the fact that people still support “someone who is manifestly so unqualified.” Castro, who was Secretary of Housing and Urban Development under Barack Obama and before that mayor of San Antonio, is a senior advisor to Voto Latino, a grassroots political organization focused on empowering Latinx voters, who make up the largest ethnic or racial minority group of the electorate.

Castro laid out the top issues of concern to the Hispanic community, which is projected to account for a new high of 13.3 percent of all eligible voters in 2020 at 32 million. One of those is immigration reform, which Castro noted that Bernie Sanders successfully addressed during the 2020 Democratic primaries. Biden was less clear on the issue, but Castro explained that the certain Democratic nominee has since increasingly focused on outreach to the Hispanic community and is committed to bringing forth the “most progressive approach on immigration.”

Watch my Salon Talks episode with Castro embedded below, or read the following transcript — edited for length and clarity — to learn more about what Castro thinks about Biden’s approach to immigration and police reform, and his take on the COVID-19 public health crisis.

. . . .

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

Read the complete article and view the video of the interview at the link!

Yes, it is “scary.” Very much so, to know how many anti-Americans are living in our country. Taking back power from the White Supremacists masquerading as a legitimate political party is the first step to getting to where we need to be as a nation and as compassionate human beings. There will always be doubters and naysayers. But, never again should we let their dark vision control our destiny as a diverse nation of immigrants with equal justice for all!

Julián Castro “gets” it. He’s 10x more qualified than any of the “GOP Five” on the Supremes. Hopefully, he’ll get his chance to be on the Supremes in the future. Gosh knows, we need some real Justices who have the guts and decency to stand against overt racism and bigotry, instead of enabling, justifying, and encouraging it! He’d also be a great Attorney General or DHS Secretary.

Everything starts with replacing Trump with Biden and putting Democrats in every elected office. There is no excuse for Trump and today’s GOP and their morally and Constitutionally bankrupt racist agenda,

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

PWS

07-09-20

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON: The GOP Lets Fly With Its Overtly Racist Vision of America! —A Party Without Ideas, Values, or Human Decency Peddles Hate & Lies As Its Message! ☠️💀🤮👎🏻

From “Letters From An American,” July 7, 2020

. . . .

The administration continues to court its base with a racist vision of the country. Yesterday, Republican National Committee spokeswoman Liz Harrington criticized presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden of advancing “radical left socialism” for saying that “Independence Day is a celebration of our persistent march toward greater justice — the natural expansion of our founding notion from ‘all men are created equal’ to ‘all people are created equal and should be treated equally throughout their lives.’”

On the same day, Trump tweeted an attack on Black racecar driver Bubba Wallace, accusing him of advancing a “HOAX” because someone (not Wallace) had found and reported a noose hanging in his garage. In the same tweet, Trump expressed outrage that NASCAR has banned the use of the Confederate flag at its events. (Republican strategist Karl Rove told the Fox News Channel the president’s defense of the Confederate flag did not help his campaign.)

Then, out of the blue, the official White House Twitter account published a photo of Trump and Pence apparently gazing in to the sky, alongside a quotation that said: “Americans are the people who pursued our Manifest Destiny across the ocean, into the uncharted wilderness, over the tallest mountains, and then into the skies and even into the stars.” Manifest Destiny was a term coined in the 1840s by the editor of the Democratic Review magazine to explain why it was the divinely ordained duty of Americans to push west and take over the lands of indigenous peoples and Mexicans, spreading slavery into new lands. The term is widely associated with white supremacy and deadly dominance over people of color.

Meanwhile, the administration continues to move public money toward its supporters. Government data released this week shows that tax-payer funded bailouts went to churches whose leaders are Trump’s allies, as well as organizations traditionally opposed to government programs. Anti-tax advocate Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform Foundation received between $150,000 and $300,000 in loans, while Norquist took a stand against the unemployment insurance in the CARES coronavirus relief act. The Ayn Rand Institute, named for the theorist who opposed government welfare programs despite using them herself, took a loan of between $350,000 and $1 million, calling it “partial restitution for government-inflicted losses.” Multiple businesses close to Trump got money, too; the government loaned as much as $273 million to more than 100 companies with ties to the president.

Also today, excerpts from the book written by Trump’s niece, Mary L. Trump, appeared in the media. Trump tried, unsuccessfully, to stop the publication of the book. The excerpts don’t say much we didn’t already know, but the inside story of the Trump family is likely to get under the president’s skin. Dr. Trump, who holds a doctorate in psychology, portrays the president as a habitual liar who paid someone to take the SAT to get him into college. She shows a narcissist who can think only in terms of himself, and who is calculating and cruel to the point that he was willing to take away health care from a baby in order to gain leverage over his nephew.

After her dissection of Trump’s dangerous personality, Dr. Trump concludes that Trump himself “isn’t really the problem after all.” The problem is his enablers, including the Republican Senators who voted five months ago to acquit him of the charges for which the House of Representatives impeached him.

That those same Senators are now begging off from the upcoming Republican convention is too little a protest, too late.

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

For the rest of Heather’s letter or to subscribe to her letter, click here:https://email.mg2.substack.com/c/eJxtUE1vhCAQ_TXL0QAC6oFDL3vonzAIo5IiGBh3a3992fXUpMkkk7yZl_dhDcKS8qn3VJAcBfLonZasp7RvidPCsV72xJdxzgCb8UFjPoDsxxS8NehTfBE4lW1LVs04TK4bWGcHAczMvVJsskzQdqaMD4q8ZEZzOA_RgoYH5DNFIEGviHu5tR83fq-zgsEVsk3f2dvVZFdSbMoxFTT2q7Fpqz_EV1lOaUd7KoWSQ8OaeQoP_InPztwE3Rb-h0Oy_oQYfVwK4_VuUnjDNctY93ZEj-cI0UwB3BUTr17ervHcQUd4lgCIkC-wZleSi1aRquRSLSjq_8z_AkvpfL0

Take our country back for a brighter future this November! Vote for a better, more inclusive, more just America! Vote to end racism and hate! Vote Trump and the GOP out on every level!🇺🇸👍🏼🗽⚖️

PWS

07-08-20

🏴‍☠️KAKISTOCRACY COSTS: Trump Regime’s White Nationalist Attack on Foreign Students Threatens $40 Billion 💸 Hit on U.S. Economy!

🤡☠️👎🏻

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trump-uses-the-coronavirus-to-impede-immigration-his-aim-at-foreign-students-is-a-new-low/2020/07/07/ec3ca966-c06a-11ea-b178-bb7b05b94af1_story.html

From WashPost Editorial Board:

By Editorial Board

July 7 at 3:54 PM ET

THE TRUMP administration has used the novel coronavirus as license to indiscriminately kill off and impede every sort of immigration — legal and illegal, permanent and temporary, work- and family-based. On Monday, it took aim at the more than 1 million international students enrolled at U.S. colleges and universities, threatening them with deportation if their classes move online, as many already have.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement made the announcement as a growing number of colleges, facing a widening pandemic, have shifted entirely or largely to virtual learning for the fall. International students at those institutions, who represent a sizable cohort, will have to go home or transfer to another school that offers in-person classes.

ICE provided no rationale — unsurprising, given that it is unfair and irrational as a matter of policy. But within hours of its announcement, President Trump sought to make school closings into an election issue. Democrats, he claimed on Twitter, want schools closed “for political reasons, not health reasons,” to help them in the fall elections.

[[Full coverage of the coronavirus pandemic]]

That’s preposterous. Colleges and universities have scrambled to devise plans to operate safely in the fall, in some cases pivoting from one scenario to another as the virus has spread. Last week, the University of Southern California reversed course, scrapping a mix of in-person and online classes at its campus in pandemic-plagued Los Angeles and shifting to a mostly virtual schedule. Those decisions have nothing to do with partisan politics, nothing to do with the fall elections and nothing to do with Mr. Trump.

The new rule means colleges that depend critically on tuition revenue from international students — many from China, India and South Korea — will be under pressure to offer in-person classes even in places where covid-19 is a major threat. International students will face deportation even if their colleges, facing a fresh outbreak, shift mid-semester from in-person to online classes. International students with preexisting conditions will feel forced to attend in-person classes despite the risk to their lives.

Those students, who constitute 5.5 percent of overall higher education enrollment, contributed more than $40 billion to the U.S. economy in the 2019-2020 academic year. They provide a steady stream of energetic, talented youth, some of whom make key contributions to the U.S. economy and form lifelong ties with U.S. businesses and scientific and cultural institutions.

None of that matters to Mr. Trump, who has made it a personal and political crusade to rid the nation, to the extent possible, of foreigners. Last month, his administration suspended work visas for various non-immigrant categories and widened a ban on new green cards for applicants outside of this country. Under cover of the pandemic, asylum seekers have been effectively banned from the United States for the first time in modern history, and many U.S. embassies and consulates remain shut, closing off other avenues of legal entry for visitors, workers and immigrants alike.

The president’s goal is to turn America’s back on the world. Sadly, it is Americans, and institutions like U.S. universities, that will pay the price.

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

This could well put some colleges and universities out of business. Racism is not only stupid and immoral, it costs the U.S. big time, in “real dollars” as well as in goodwill and “moral capital.”

Vote ‘Em Out in November — at all levels! Let America and everyone in it realize their full potential! End racism in America by sending the racists packing!

PWS

07-08-20

THE GIBSON REPORT — 07-06-20 — Compiled By Elizabeth Gibson, Esquire, NY Legal Assistance Group

COVID-19

Note: Policies are rapidly changing, so please verify the latest policies on the relevant government websites and with colleagues on listservs as best you can.

New

Opening dates for some non-detained courts: Hearings in non-detained cases at courts without an announced date, including the New York City non-detained courts, are postponed through, and including, July 24, 2020. Check EOIR site for which courts have announced reopening dates.

USCIS Extends Flexibility for Responding to Certain Agency Requests

Requesting NYS Court Records: Records can be obtained in person or via mail/fax. Visitors have to self-check for symptoms (Instructions in English and Spanish). Security guards will be using infra-red temperature scanners to check visitors before entering. Everyone must wear a mask inside the court house.

Closures

EOIR Operational Status & Standing Orders

EOIR Case Status

ICE Updates (Including ERO and Detention)

USCIS Updates

Consular Updates

NY Courts Updates

Guidance:

IJ Email Filings

BIA Email Filings

EOIR Standing Orders

EOIR Electronic Signature Guidance

EOIR Update Regarding EOIR Practices Related to the COVID-19 Outbreak

USCIS Announces Flexibility for Requests for Evidence, Notices of Intent to Deny

TOP NEWS

A Top Immigration Court Official Called For Impartiality In A Memo He Sent As He Resigned

BuzzFeed: The Trump administration selected Tracy Short, previously the lead ICE prosecutor, for the chief immigration judge role. ICE prosecutors often take up roles as immigration judges, but the selection of Short, formerly ICE’s principal legal adviser, left some claiming the move would undercut the appearance of neutrality at the court. Christopher Santoro, the acting chief immigration judge, appeared to signal that in his message to court employees announcing his resignation.

New Trump immigration policy would disqualify asylum for people from countries with spreading disease

WaPo: The Trump administration is preparing broad new immigration restrictions that would deny humanitarian refuge to anyone from a country with a disease outbreak, deeming those asylum seekers to be a danger to public safety.

The NYPD’s Long History of Targeting Black Immigrants

DocumentedNY: Despite making up only 7.2 percent of the noncitizen population in the US, more than 20 percent of people facing deportation on criminal grounds are Black.

The Immigration System Is Set To Come To A Near Halt, And No One Is Paying Attention

BuzzFeed: If Congress does not provide US Citizenship and Immigration Services with emergency funding before Aug. 3, the employees, who make up more than 60% of all staffers, will be furloughed for up to three months due to the budget crisis…While the reasons for the funding shortage are debated — agency officials cite a massive decline in immigration applications due to the pandemic, while immigrant advocates and experts argue that the Trump administration’s policies have played a part in the budget issues — the impact to the immigration system is not.

The Shadow Court Cementing Trump’s Immigration Policy

The Nation: The Board of Immigration Appeals, once an impartial appellate court, has become a new front in the Trump administration’s war against migrants.

USCIS Announces July Naturalization Drive Before Furloughs

Law360: To clear its backlog before the bulk of its workforce is sent home, the agency must naturalize another 45,500 new Americans this month.

Failing Our Liberian Neighbors: Eligibility and Application Rates Under Liberian Refugee Immigration Fairness

CLINIC: The report concludes that in light of the large number of potential applicants, USCIS’ failure to successfully adjudicate and approve a single application four months into the program, and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, Congress should extend the December 20, 2020, deadline for at least an additional year to ensure that all eligible Liberians are able to apply for relief.

Inspector General Report Overlooks Serious Medical Care Issues Within Border Patrol Custody

AIC: While the report critiques the agency for not meeting its own standards, it also allows CBP to avoid meaningful accountability for numerous failures in meeting the health needs of those detained.

How Biden Plans to Undo Trump’s Nativist Agenda

Slate: In a little-noticed announcement, the former vice president committed to a more ambitious refugee policy than existed under Obama.

LITIGATION/CASELAW/RULES/MEMOS

TVPRA Victory in Ramirez v. ICE

NIJC: A federal court has ruled that the failure of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers to consider less restrictive settings before transferring unaccompanied immigrant youth to ICE detention on their 18th birthdays violates U.S. immigration laws.

District Court Vacates Third-Country Transit Ban, Effective Immediately

A federal judge found the government unlawfully promulgated the 2019 interim final rule that categorically disqualified individuals from receiving asylum unless they sought protection in another country before entering the southern border. (CAIR Coalition et al., v. Trump et al., 6/30/20) AILA Doc. No. 20070104

Immigration judges union suing Justice Dept. over policy restricting public speaking

The Hill: The Knight First Amendment Institute, a legal group at Columbia University, filed a lawsuit on Wednesday in federal court on behalf of the National Association of Immigration Judges (NAIJ). The suit alleges that the speech restrictions against immigration judges amount to violations of the First and Fifth Amendments and asks the court to impose a preliminary injunction blocking the policy.

EOIR Director Rules Amicus Curiae Cannot Seek Further Action Once Decision Has Been Rendered in Recognition and Accreditation Proceedings

The EOIR Director ruled that an amicus curiae is not a party in recognition and accreditation proceedings and has no authority to seek further action following the conclusion of an administrative review. Matter of Bay Area Legal Services, Inc., Applicant, 28 I&N Dec. 16 (DIR 2020) AILA Doc. No. 20070208

CA4 Upholds Asylum Denial to Salvadoran Who Feared Persecution by His Brother’s Murderers

The court held that substantial evidence supported the BIA’s conclusion that the attackers who threatened the petitioner were motivated by a desire to prevent him from reporting his brother’s murder to the police, and not by the petitioner’s family ties. (Cedillos-Cedillos v. Barr, 6/26/20) AILA Doc. No. 20070205

CA6 Upholds Denial of Motion to Reopen Where BIA Found Petitioner Had Failed to Overcome Presumption of Receipt of Mailed Notices

Where the evidence was conflicting, the court held that a reasonable adjudicator could conclude that the petitioner had failed to overcome the presumption that he had received notices of his hearing that were mailed to his aunt and uncle’s address. (Valadez-Lara v. Barr, 6/26/20) AILA Doc. No. 20070691

CA7 Rejects Castro-Tum and Holds That IJs Are Not Precluded from Administratively Closing Cases When Appropriate

Granting petition for review, the court rejected Matter of Castro-Tum’s conclusion that administrative closure is not within an IJ’s authority to take “any action” appropriate and necessary for the disposition of cases pursuant to 8 CFR §1003.10(b). (Meza Morales v. Barr, 6/26/20) AILA Doc. No. 20070207

CA8 Finds BIA Did Not Err in Denying CAT Relief to HIV-Positive Member of the Begedi Clan in Somalia

The court upheld the BIA’s denial of petitioner’s application for deferral of removal under the Convention Against Torture (CAT), finding that the IJ had clearly erred in forecasting that petitioner would more likely than not be tortured if returned to Somalia. (Abdi Omar v. Barr, 6/26/20) AILA Doc. No. 20070692

CA9 Affirms District Court’s Grant of a Preliminary Injunction Against Third Country Transit Ban

The court upheld a lower court’s injunction preventing the implementation of DHS/DOJ joint interim final rule that categorically denies asylum to individuals arriving at the U.S./Mexico border. (East Bay Sanctuary Covenant, et al. v. Barr, et al., 7/6/20) AILA Doc. No. 20070636

RESOURCES

Pro se EAD Toolkit

Pro se Asylum Toolkit

Practice Alert: Potential Effects of the June 22 Proclamation on EAD Eligibility for Individuals Subject to Removal

Practice Pointer: Immigrant Visa Processing and NVC Best Practices

Practice Pointer: Behind the Scenes at the Vermont Service Center

CIS Ombudsman Releases 2020 Annual Report to

Summary of Presidential Proclamation 10052 Suspending Entry of Certain Nonimmigrants

Impact on Rosario Class Members: New Rule Eliminating 30-Day Processing Deadline for Adjudication of Employment Applications Filed by Initial Asylum Applicants

Bite-Sized Ethics: Withdrawing When a Client Goes MIA

USCIS Releases 2019 Annual Report on TPS

CRS Releases Report on the Visa Waiver Program

AIC: New Rule Eliminating 30 Day Processing Deadline for Adjudication of Employment Applications Filed by Initial Asylum Applicants

CLINIC: Changes to the Employment Authorization rules for Asylum Seekers

CLINIC: Practice Advisory: Direct Examination

CLINIC: Practice Advisory: Opening Statements and Closing Arguments in Immigration Court

CLINIC: Practice Advisory: Rules of Evidence in Immigration Court Proceedings

CLINIC: Practice Pointer: Refreshing Recollection in Immigration Court Proceedings

CLINIC: Backgrounder: USCIS’ Self-Induced Financial Crisis

Legal Aid: DACA Fact Sheets English | Spanish

Asylum Connect: the world’s first tech resource platform for those fleeing persecution due to sexual orientation or gender identity.

Flow Chart on Penalties for Crimes Involving Moral Turpitude, and updated “All Those Rules”

Matter of L-E-A-: Litigating Family-Based Asylum Claims at the Asylum Office and Immigration Court (available July 21, register case with CGRS)

Honduras Gang Violence Country Conditions Toolkit (available July 21, register case with CGRS)

EVENTS

Note: Check with organizers regarding cancellations/changes

7/7/20 Winning Withholding of Removal and Convention Against Torture Cases

7/8/20 NYIC: Digital Outreach Tools & Strategies

7/15/20 Understanding Motions to Reopen Based on Changed Country Conditions

7/15/20 DACA after the Supreme Court Decision

7/16/20-7/30/20 Webinar Series: Navigating Refugee and Asylee Issues in Turbulent Times

7/20/20 2020 AILA Virtual Annual Conference on Immigration Law

7/20-30/20 NYIC Immigration Court Practice

7/22/20 Tax Issues in Immigration Cases

7/23/20 Defending Immigration Removal Proceedings 2020

7/30/20How to File a Successful Travel Ban Waiver

8/5/20Unraveling Aggravated Felonies and Crimes Involving Moral Turpitude

8/18/20Strategies for I-601 Waivers in Adjustment of Status Cases

6/20/20 2020 AILA Virtual Immigration Court Conference

8/26/20Immigration Legal Services in Rural America

8/27/20Crafting a Winning Particular Social Group for an Asylum Case

9/14/20Working with Domestic Violence Immigrant Survivors: The Intersection of Basic Family Law, Immigration, Benefits, and Housing Issues in California 2020

9/22/20Defenses to Denaturalization

9/23/20-10/7/203-Part Webinar Series: Integrating Technology to Improve Your Immigration Legal Services

10/1/20 Representing Children in Immigration Matters 2020: Effective Advocacy and Best Practices

ImmProf

Monday, July 6, 2020

Antii-Asian Hate Crimes Increase during Pandemic

Immigration Court Watch: A Top Immigration Court Official Called For Impartiality In A Memo He Sent As He Resigned

Sunday, July 5, 2020

Washington Post Editorial Board: “Trump brings Atlantic City-style bankruptcy to America’s immigration agency”

COVID-19 Report: The Shuttering of Los Angeles’s Olvera Street

Drive-Through Naturalizations Make New U.S. Citizens In The COVID-19 Era

Saturday, July 4, 2020

RIP Rudolfo Anaya

Hiking into History: The Donner Summit Tunnels Build by Chinese Workers

Happy July 4! Artists Protest Immigrant Detention

Guest Post, Minyao Wang: U.S. Immigration Responses to the Chinese “National Security” Measures in Hong Kong

Friday, July 3, 2020

Now Streaming: Hamilton

From the Bookshelves: Finding Motherland by Helen Thorpe

Birth Tourism Conviction

Immigration Article of the Day: Judicial Power — Immigration-Style by Jayanth K. Krishnan

Thursday, July 2, 2020

The Role of Federal Courts in Coronavirus-Related Immigration Detention Litigation

Lawsuit: DOJ’s ‘Prior Restraint’ Rule Allegedly Silencing Immigration Judges Violates First Amendment

At the Movies: RUN – The Athlete Refugee Team Story

Thawing the freeze on integration of immigrant workers

From the Bookshelves: Illegal: One immigrant’s life or death journey to the American dream by Laz Ayala

USCIS to Celebrate Independence Day by Hosting Naturalization Ceremonies Across the Country

Cuban Immigrants in the United States

Would African-Americans be granted refugee status in Ireland?

Wednesday, July 1, 2020

Flowcharts, Flowcharts, Flowcharts

The Immigration System Is Set To Come To A Near Halt, And No One Is Paying Attention

Immigrant Integration in the City of San Diego

Gallup: Americans Want More, Not Less, Immigration for First Time

Judge rejects Trump third-country asylum rule

Entry Denied: Immigration Policy in the Time of Trump

Guest Post: Stopping the Trump Administration from Stopping Gender-Based Asylum Claims by Brian Soucek

Tuesday, June 30, 2020

Canada to US: Thanks for the Immigrants

Chief Justice as the New Swing Vote

Latinx in La Migra: Why They Join and Why It Matters

Migration Policy Institute: As #DefundThePolice Movement Gains Steam, Immigration Enforcement Spending and Practices Attract Scrutiny

Monday, June 29, 2020

Call For Papers–AALS 2021, New Voices in Immigration Law

Call For Papers–AALS 2021, Outsourced Borders and Invisible Walls

Nuanced portraits of Asian, Latinx racial dynamics amid COVID-19 and BLM

How universities can expand support for DACA recipients amid COVID-19 cutbacks

Immigration Article of the Day: The First Anti-Sanctuary Law: Proposition 187 and the Transformation of Immigration Enforcement by Rick Su

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

Thanks for keeping us informed, Elizabeth!

PWS

07-08-20

🏴‍☠️☠️⚰️🤮👎KAKISTOCRACY KORNER: Trump’s Malicious Incompetence Bankrupts Once-Profitable Immigration Agency — The Solution Is NOT More Public Assistance For The Regime’s Freeloaders!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trump-brings-atlantic-city-style-bankruptcy-to-americas-immigration-agency/2020/07/03/a4619ff8-bc04-11ea-bdaf-a129f921026f_story.html

From the WashPost Editorial Board:

By Editorial Board

July 4 at 8:30 AM ET

AS A business mogul in Atlantic City, Donald Trump ran casinos that teetered continually toward bankruptcy, costing gullible investors well over $1 billion. Now President Trump’s policies have bankrupted the federal government’s main agency overseeing legal immigration, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, which is on the brink of imposing furloughs on thousands of its employees and is begging Congress for a bailout.

USCIS, which handles green cards for permanent legal residents, manages citizenship procedures and vets visa applicants, depends for its operating revenue almost entirely on fees from “customers,” meaning immigrants. The business model Mr. Trump’s administration devised for USCIS was a recipe for financial ruin: deplete income by driving away fee-paying applicants and pile up expenses by hiring thousands of new employees. Little wonder that after three-and-a-half years, USCIS has gone hat in hand to Congress, pleading for $1.2 billion. Without the extra funds — for an agency meant to be self-sufficient — USCIS has said more than 13,000 employees, of some 20,000 total workers, will be furloughed without pay indefinitely, starting next month.

Under Mr. Trump, USCIS has become a model of dysfunction. Perversely, that may be just fine with a White House that has been intent on deterring not only undocumented migrants but legal immigrants as well. It has done the latter largely through a matrix of policies that have made the agency much less a means by which immigrants are connected with U.S. employers and reconnected with relatives living in this country, and much more a nearly impassable obstacle course.

Well before the pandemic, applications for an array of immigrant categories plummeted as word spread that layers of new rules and vetting were driving down approval rates, and even trivial mistakes such as typos in applications would trigger rejections. In-person interviews were added as requirements for applicants who had not previously needed them, including skilled workers already in the country who needed visa extensions. Green card applications slumped in the Trump administration’s first two years and might fall further as applicants learn they would be disqualified if deemed likely to need public benefits such as subsidized housing or food stamps. The pandemic accelerated the agency’s death spiral as revenue derived from fees has dropped by half since March.

The effect of a mass furlough of USCIS staff would be to throw even more grit into the bureaucratic gears, further slowing approvals for work permits, including for high-skilled immigrants, and green cards. If the administration is intent on breaking the nation’s complex immigration machinery, which has supplied American businesses with the talent and energy of millions of employees, it is on the right path.

Employers are alarmed at the prospect of such a breakdown, with good reason. Virtually every sector of the country’s economy depends on a steady supply of immigrants, which in itself is justification for Congress to reassess USCIS’s fee-based model. Immigrants have provided the spark, drive and muscle that have driven growth and success in the United States since its founding. Given their contributions, it seems a gratuitous burden that they are also required to shoulder the cost of their admission to the country.

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

The solution is actually very simple. Congress should require DHS to reprogram the necessary funds to run USCIS from the unneeded wall, unnecessary and often illegal immigration detention, and counterproductive civil deportations. All private detention contracts should be terminated and the money repurposed to USCIS. There should be a moratorium on DHS removals until USCIS is back in full operation and has eliminated all backlogs. Fee increases should be barred.

Exceptions should be made allowing deportations for those convicted of “aggravated felonies” and those whom the DHS can show by clear and convincing evidence entered the U.S. illegally after the date of enactment, following an opportunity for a full and fair hearing before a U.S. Magistrate Judge at which they will have an opportunity to apply for asylum and other protections without regard to any regulation or precedent decision issued during the Trump Administration. Appeal from any adverse decision may be had by either party to the U.S. District Judge and from there to the Court of Appeals with an opportunity to petition the Supreme Court for review. U.S. District Judges shall have the option of designating sitting U.S. Immigration Judges (but not anyone who has served a BIA Appellate Immigration Judge) with five or more years of judicial experience to serve as a “Special U.S. Magistrate Judge” to hear such immigration cases.

If Democrats can’t get a “veto proof majority” in both houses, they should just let the USCIS remain in bankruptcy until we get better Government. Like the rest of the Trump immigration kakistocracy, USCIS is a dysfunctional mess 🤮 that serves no useful purpose under current conditions.

Welfare Reform: We’ve identified the largest group of “welfare cheats” in U.S. history. Collectively, this gang of public benefits fraudsters is known as “The Trump Administration.” Its Members are worse than useless. We are actually paying them to pollute our environment, inhibit our voting, spread deadly disease, block access to health insurance, undermine scientific truth, destroy our justice system, defend Confederate statues, spread racism and hate, commit crimes against humanity, turn our nation into a despised international laughingstock, and often line their own pockets and pockets of their cronies with ill-gotten loot while doing it.

But we have it in our power to end these gross abuses of our public purse and to throw this dangerous band of indolent sponges on society off the public dole! This November, vote like your life and the future of our nation depend on it! Because they do!

PWS

07-06-20

🏴‍☠️☠️⚰️KAKISTOCRACY WATCH: AILA Blasts Appointment Of Prosecutors Without Judicial Qualifications To Top Judicial Positions in Billy the Bigot’s Weaponized Anti-Due-Process “Court” System — Dysfunction, Bias, Illegitimate Decisions Run Rampant As Congress, Article IIIs Fail to Enforce U.S. Constitution!

Trump Administration Makes Immigration Courts an Enforcement Tool by Appointing Prosecutors to Lead

AILA Doc. No. 20070696 | Dated July 6, 2020

CONTACTS:

George Tzamaras
202-507-7649
gtzamaras@aila.org Belle Woods
202-507-7675
bwoods@aila.org

WASHINGTON, DC — The American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) condemns the Trump administration’s recent ramp-up of efforts to turn the immigration court system into an enforcement tool rather than an independent arbiter for justice. The immigration courts are formally known as the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) and are overseen by the Department of Justice (DOJ).

AILA President Jennifer Minear, noted, “AILA has long advocated for an independent immigration court, one that ensures judges serve as neutral arbiters of justice. This administration has instead subjected the courts to political influence and exploited the inherent structural flaws of the DOJ-controlled immigration courts, which also prosecutes immigration cases at the federal level. The nail in the coffin of judicial neutrality is the fact that the administration has put the courts in the control of a new Chief Immigration Judge who has no judicial experience but served as ICE’s chief immigration prosecutor. No less concerning is DOJ’s recent choice for Chief Appellate Immigration Judge – an individual who also prosecuted immigration cases and advised the Trump White House on immigration policy. This administration continues to weaponize the immigration courts for the sole purpose of accelerating deportations rather than dispensing neutral justice. Congress must investigate these politically motivated appointments and pass legislation to create an independent, Article I immigration court.”

Among the recent actions taken by this administration to bias the immigration courts:

Attempting to decertify the immigration judges’ union.

Blocking immigration judges’ ability to educate the public about the court system.

Endangering lives through haphazard and inconsistent responses to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Attempting to buy out and then outright dismantling the Board of Immigration Appeals.

More AILA resources on the immigration courts can be found at: https://www.aila.org/immigrationcourts.

Cite as AILA Doc. No. 20070696.

CONTACTS:
George Tzamaras 202-507-7649 gtzamaras@aila.org	Belle Woods 202-507-7675 bwoods@aila.org

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

As a friend and former colleague said recently “I would have thought that the one thing everyone could get behind, regardless of political philosophy, would be a neutral court system.” Sadly, not so in today’s crumbling America.

There are three groups blocking the way:

The Trump Administration, where due process only applies to Trump and his corrupt cronies;
GOP legislators whose acquittal of Trump against the overwhelming weight of the evidence shows exactly what due process means to them;
Five GOP-appointed Justices on the Supremes who don’t believe that due process applies to all persons in the US, notwithstanding the “plain language” of Article 5 of our Constitution — particularly if those persons have the misfortune to be asylum seekers of color.

The end result is “Dred Scottification” — that is, dehumanization or “de-personification” of “the other.” The GOP has made it a centerpiece of their failed attempt to govern, from voter suppression, to looting the Treasury for the benefit of the rich and powerful, to immunity for law enforcement officers who kill minorities, to greenlighting cruel, inhuman,and counterproductive treatment of lawful asylum seekers and immigrants. Not surprisingly, this essentially “Whites Only” view of social justice is ripping our nation apart on many levels.

I find it highly ironic that at the same time we are rightfully removing statutes of Chief Justice Roger Taney, a racist who authored the infamous Dred Scott Decision, Chief Justice Roberts and four of his colleagues continue to “Dred Scottify” asylum seekers and other immigrants, primarily those of color, by denying them the due process, fundamental fairness, fair and impartial judges, and, perhaps most of all, racist-free policies that our Constitution demands!

Compare the “due process” afforded Trump by the GOP Senate and the pardon of a convicted civil and human rights abuser like “Racist Sheriff Joe” with the ugly and dishonest parody of due process afforded Sister Norma’s lawful asylum seekers whose “crime” was seeking fair treatment, justice, and an acknowledgement of their humanity from a nation that has turned it’s back on those values.

https://immigrationcourtside.com/2020/07/06/%f0%9f%98%8e%f0%9f%97%bd%e2%9a%96%ef%b8%8fgood-news-9th-cir-deals-another-blow-to-stephen-millers-illegal-white-nationalist-war-on-asylum-now-will-the-supremes-majority-stan/

What Sister Norma’s article did not mention is that those who survive in Mexico long enough to get to “court” have their asylum claims denied at a rate of about 99% by an unfair system intentionally skewed and biased against them. Most experts believe that many, probably a majority, of those being denied actually merit protection under a fair and impartial application of our laws.

But, as pointed out by AILA, that’s not why Billy the Bigot has appointed prosecutors as top “judges” and notorious asylum deniers as “appellate judges.” He intends to perpetuate a highly unfair “deportation railroad” designed by infamous White Nationalist racist Stephen Miller. In other words, our justice system is being weaponized in support of an overtly racist agenda formulated by a racist regime that has made racism the centerpiece of its pitch for remaining in office. Incredible! Yet true!

The Supremes have life tenure. But, the other two branches of our failing Government don’t. And, a better Executive and a better Legislature that believe in our Constitution and equal justice for all is a necessary start on a better Federal Judiciary — one where commitment to due process, fundamental fairness, and equal justice for all is a threshold requirement for future judicial appointments. Time to throw the “non-believers” and their enablers out of office.

This November, vote like your life and our country’s existence depend on it! Because they do!

PWS

07-07-20

😎🗽⚖️GOOD NEWS: 9th Cir. Deals Another Blow To Stephen Miller’s Illegal White Nationalist War On Asylum! Now, Will The Supremes’ Majority Stand For Equal Justice Under Law, Or Will They Again Side With A Racist Regime & Its “Crimes Against Humanity?”🏴‍☠️☠️⚰️👎

https://www.lexisnexis.com/LegalNewsRoom/immigration/b/insidenews/posts/ca9-upholds-injunction-against-asylum-rule

Dan Kowalski reports for LexisNexis Immigration Community:

Immigration Law

Daniel M. Kowalski

6 Jul 2020

asylum

CA9 Upholds Injunction Against Asylum Rule

East Bay Sanctuary Covenant v. Barr

“On July 16, 2019, the Department of Justice and the Department of Homeland Security published a joint interim final Rule without notice and comment, entitled “Asylum Eligibility and Procedural Modifications” (the “Rule”). With limited exceptions, the Rule categorically denies asylum to aliens arriving at our border with Mexico unless they have first applied for, and have been denied, asylum in Mexico or another country through which they have traveled. We describe the Rule in detail below. Plaintiffs are nonprofit organizations that represent asylum seekers. They brought suit in district court seeking an injunction against enforcement of the Rule, contending that the Rule is invalid on three grounds: first, the Rule is not “consistent with” Section 208 of the Immigration and Nationality Act, 8 U.S.C. § 1158; second, the Rule is arbitrary and capricious; third, the Rule was adopted without notice and comment. The district court found that plaintiffs had a likelihood of success on all three grounds and entered a preliminary injunction against enforcement of the Rule, with effect in the four states on our border with Mexico. We hold that plaintiffs have shown a likelihood of success on the first and second grounds. We do not reach the third ground. We affirm.”

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

This isn’t rocket science. Neither the legal nor moral issues are particularly difficult in this case. Indeed, the Supremes should unanimously have tossed Solicitor General Noel Francisco out on his tail the last time he unethically requested their intervention. Instead, they rewarded him, thus enabling and encouraging further “crimes against humanity.”

Unfortunately, this Supremes’ majority has had a hard time seeing people of color, and particularly those seeking asylum and other legal protections under our laws, as human. Even though the lower Federal Courts have essentially made things easy by showing exactly why these racist-inspired policies are illegal, a Supremes majority has chosen to advance Stephen Miller’s White Nationalist agenda, sometimes hiding behind a smokescreen of nonsensical legal gobbledygook, while other times choosing to act without bothering to provide any rationale at all.

One thing is for certain. Someday, after the fall of Trump, and the banishment of Miller, the Justices who advanced their unconstitutional, illegal, racist immigration agenda will try to “save their legacies” by putting some distance between themselves and the neo-Nazi ramifications of their votes. It’s critically important for those of us who see exactly what’s happening to insure that the names of justices and judges who sided with Stephen Miller are inextricably linked for the rest of time with his disgraceful racist legacy of “crimes against humanity.”

There is only one side of history here! And, it’s certainly not with Stephen Miller and his enablers, be they judges, legislators, public officials, or voters.

Read today’s op-ed by Sister Norma Pimentel, of the Missionaries of Jesus, executive director of Catholic Charities of the Rio Grande Valley in Brownsville, Tex whose courage and dedication to human rights and the rule of law puts complicit judges to shame. Sister Pimentel lives and observes every day the grotesque, unforgivable “crimes against humanity” and disparagement of the human dignity of asylum seekers effected by Miller’s judicially-enabled campaign of hate, dehumanization, and abuse of power. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/covid-19-has-come-to-our-migrant-camp-it-makes-ending-the-mpp-policy-even-more-urgent/2020/07/03/455cacf8-bd41-11ea-8cf5-9c1b8d7f84c6_story.html

She writes, in part:

Meanwhile, the pandemic has made it more difficult to care for those who are arriving at the border each day. Since that lone covid-19 case was identified, Mexico’s National Immigration Institute has not allowed the camps to accept any new arrivals. So refugees are being turned away and have no place to go. Some are being placed in hotels or churches, and volunteers are desperately looking for other options.

Within the camp, we have had to limit the volunteers’ activities — there are 10 to 20 volunteers allowed to enter and help provide the people with food, water and basic health care. We have set up areas for washing hands, and try to provide hope and reassurance amid the uncertainty. All this makes it even harder to keep the camps safe from the cartels and gangsters who continue to prey on these largely defenseless asylum seekers.

That young woman who tested positive for the coronavirus has been transferred to a covid-19 center operated by Doctors Without Borders. We pray for her recovery, and we pray for all the families’ safety, for their protection and for a resolution to their untenable situation.

While I know many people in many places are dealing with so much, I urge you not to look away from the border in this moment. Do not ignore the suffering occurring here. It is time that we put an end to it, and to end the MPP policy. Until that happens, we will continue to help those who are defenseless, whose only real “crime” is trying to seek protection for themselves and their families.

In addition to highlighting inhumanity, Sister Pimentel shows the gross intellectual fraud and immorality in the Trump Regime’s bogus claim that asylum seekers present a significant threat of spreading COVID-19. If anything, it’s the exact opposite which is most often the case with the Trump regime’s endless racist false narratives and fake “horror stories” about immigration.

It also exposes yet again both the intellectual dishonesty and immorality of those who present “pretextual justifications” for illegal acts being perpetrated by our Government against the most vulnerable and the spineless performance of judges who claim to accept at face value that which any reasonable person knows to be a pretext for racism and inhumanity.

The intent behind these bogus regulation changes and programs like the “Migrant Protection Protocols” (or, more properly, “Let ‘Em Die in Mexico”) is very clear: dehumanize “the other” – in this case primarily brown skinned asylum seekers. But, in the process of letting this happen and tolerating legislators and judges without the decency to stand up for the rights of our fellow humans, WE are the ones who actually are dehumanized. We’re not allowed to look away from the horrors being perpetrated by the Trump regime in our name!

Due Process Forever!

PWS

07-06-20

WE MUST DEFEAT THE “END OF AMERICA” CAMPAIGN: Lacking Constructive Ideas, Positive Achievements, or Human Values, Trump Makes Hate, Racism, & Lies His Message — It’s Joe Biden’s Time to Shine!

By Paul Wickham Schmidt

Courtside Exclusive

July 5, 2020

Upon hearing Donald Trump declare his candidacy for President, I turned to my wife Cathy and said “The guy is totally without values and redeeming qualities.” While I didn’t get the outcome of the election right, I nailed the Trump kakistocracy. If anything, it’s been much worse than my bleak outlook.

Who would have thought that our un-President would dance on the graves of 130,000 dead Americans while urging his followers to “drink the Kool-Aid?” Who would have believed that our supposed leader would urge the maximum spread of deadly disease, intentionally overload an already stressed healthcare system, while looking to insure thousands of unnecessary deaths and disabilities by maliciously seeking to ax health insurance for some of America’s most vulnerable? With a “Jim Jones style” false leader like this, who needs enemies?

But, speaking of “enemies,” why not suck up to Putin while turning against long-time allies like the EU, Canada, and Mexico? Why not give the PRC an opening to subsume Hong Kong, while increasing its influence in Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean as U.S. foreign policy crumbles?

Worldwide pandemic — embrace it. Climate change — deny it. Inevitable increase in worldwide migration driven by the preceding — build walls and prisons. High unemployment — end the Federal supplement. Failing bridges and unsafe highways — who cares. Falling revenues — cut taxes for the rich and services for the poor. Institutional racism — double down and glorify past racists. Voting rights — suppress them. Police brutality — enable it. Free speech —punish it. Environmental degradation — deregulate. Truth — be damned. Human decency — mock it. Justice — only for some. Reports of bounties on American soldiers — look the other way. Hate crimes — encourage them. Trump’s “malicious incompetence,” cruelty, corruption, and downright stupidity is endless and on public display every day.

Now, with no message of hope, healing, improvement, or a better future for all Americans and the world, Trump spews and babbles the only things he actually stands for (other than his own self-aggrandizement): hate and racism. Is this “Know Nothing/KKK Redux” really the message on which the GOP seeks to govern in 21st Century America? Outrageously, the answer clearly is “yes,” even if the Tim Scotts, Clarence Thomases, Herman Cains, and Ben Carsons of the world feign ignorance or believe that their privileged positions will save them, if not their souls.

For the rest of us, the time has come to rise up and throw the imposter out. Joe Biden might not be the “perfect candidate.” Has there ever been such a thing? As humans, we all have our warts and past mistakes. But, unlike Trump, Biden has a message and a plan for healing America, correcting long-standing injustices, and moving forward.

Biden’s July 4 message emphasized the positives that will make a better future for all in America, regardless of race, religion, status, or economic power:

Enhancing voting rights and maximizing participation in elections;
Safeguarding elections from Putin and other corrupt foreign governments leaders;
Reversing inhumane and counterproductive asylum, visa, “baby jails,” and family separation policies;
Reaffirming our identity as a proud nation of immigrants;
Protecting and enhancing judicial independence;
Honoring freedom of the press and independent journalism;
Rooting out institutionalized racism from every part of society where it is now embedded;
Leading the world to better times by example, encouragement, and mutual assistance, rather than constantly issuing threats, reacting with childish petulance to every perceived slight, and spewing the ugly, disproven gospel of selfish nationalism, that has nearly destroyed our world in the past, as the vision of the future.

Joe Biden is an accomplished public servant, capable leader, decent human being, and advocate for true American values. He will restore our humanity, reinvigorate our democratic institutions, bring Americans of goodwill together, rebuild our economy, protect our health, care about our environment, address racism and inequality, maximize everyone’s human potential, and reestablish our international political, economic, and moral leadership.

This is our chance to join together to retake our Government from the forces of darkness and hate and to finally achieve that which our Constitution has demanded for the last century: Equal justice for all. This November, vote like your life, the life of every American, and the future of our world depend on it. Because they do!

JULY 4, 2020: Colbert I. King @ WashPost With a “Declaration of Independence” For Our Time! 🗽👍🏼⚖️💥 — DUMP TRUMP! ☠️🤮⚰️👎🏻

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/our-declaration-this-independence-day-should-be-liberation-from-trump/2020/07/03/bfa53998-bc98-11ea-bdaf-a129f921026f_story.html

. . . .

Yes, the Fourth of July is a date to honor. But this year, it is also a day of sorrow for where we now find ourselves.

The United States of America, created in 1776 by men who put love of country over their own private interests — who staked their lives, fortunes and their sacred honor on the cause of their new nation — is now in the grasp of a man whose entire life has been spent taking, while giving nothing in return.

Trump’s successes are displayed in shrines across the country and around the world emblazoned with his name — Trump towers, Trump plazas, Trump golf courses, Trump casinos, and Trump streets and roads. Trump’s love is limited to his private interests. He stakes his life and fortune only on the cause of Trump.

To further sully the celebration of the most pivotal day in U.S. history, the White House is in the grasp of a president who thinks the United States’ heritage is exemplified by the legacy of the Confederate flag and the traitorous generals who fought under that symbol of white supremacy.

Trump’s meltdown over the attempted takedown of the slaveholding Andrew Jackson’s statue in Lafayette Square is, for instance, of a kind with his cherishing of monuments of the War of Southern Aggression, which started when the Confederacy fired on the American flag at Fort Sumter.

Douglass would be revolted by Trump’s infatuation with a history in which generations of blacks were robbed of their liberty and forced to show obedience to the master. As outraged as I am now.

Trump’s warm embrace of white nationalism on Independence Day 2020 makes a mockery of the concepts of justice and liberty entrusted to the nation in the Declaration.

Gwen and I celebrated our 59th wedding anniversary on July 3. The first four Fourth of Julys of our marriage were spent as citizens of a country with a large swath of areas that had hotels, restaurants and places of entertainment that we were not allowed to enter because we were black. Two of those years I spent proudly wearing the uniform of a U.S. Army commissioned officer.

Try living with that.

Today, we have the bodies of George Floyd, Rayshard Brooks, Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery — with a preening, coldblooded bully ensconced in the Oval Office.

Whose Fourth of July is this?

The Founders discovered themselves faced with an oppressive Crown.

Separation from the Crown was right.

So, too, will be America’s liberation from Donald Trump.

That should be our declaration on this Independence Day.

**********

Read the rest of Colby’s statement at the link.

RESOLVE: To take back our nation from the White Nationalist racist kakistocracy of hate and malicious incompetence that has assumed power as our democratic institutions have failed their “stress test” and plunged us into a daily exhibition of “crimes against humanity.”

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

PWS🇺🇸⚖️🗽👍🏼💥😎

07-04-20

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

Related posts:

Due Process Forever! More public welfare handouts for the kakistocracy, never!

Related posts:

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

Related posts:

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

Related posts:

This November, vote like your life and our nation’s future depend it it. Because they do!

Related posts:

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

Related posts:

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

Related posts:

Take our country back for a brighter future this November! Vote for a better, more inclusive, more just America! Vote to end racism and hate! Vote Trump and the GOP out on every level!🇺🇸👍🏼🗽⚖️

Related posts:

🤡☠️👎🏻

Related posts:

Related posts:

Related posts:

Trump Administration Makes Immigration Courts an Enforcement Tool by Appointing Prosecutors to Lead

This November, vote like your life and our country’s existence depend on it! Because they do!

Related posts:

Immigration Law

CA9 Upholds Injunction Against Asylum Rule

Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

WE MUST DEFEAT THE “END OF AMERICA” CAMPAIGN: Lacking Constructive Ideas, Positive Achievements, or Human Values, Trump Makes Hate, Racism, & Lies His Message — It’s Joe Biden’s Time to Shine!

Related posts:

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

Related posts: