"The Voice of the New Due Process Army" ————– Musings on Events in U.S. Immigration Court, Immigration Law, Sports, Music, Politics, and Other Random Topics by Retired United States Immigration Judge (Arlington, Virginia) and former Chairman of the Board of Immigration Appeals Paul Wickham Schmidt and Dr. Alicia Triche, expert brief writer, practical scholar, emeritus Editor-in-Chief of The Green Card (FBA), and 2022 Federal Bar Association Immigration Section Lawyer of the Year. She is a/k/a “Delta Ondine,” a blues-based alt-rock singer-songwriter, who performs regularly in Memphis, where she hosts her own Blues Brunch series, and will soon be recording her first full, professional album. Stay tuned! 🎶 To see our complete professional bios, just click on the link below.
Elizabeth Gibson Managing Attorney National Immigrant Justice Center Publisher of “The Gibson Report”
Weekly Briefing
Note: The briefing is back after a short hiatus while I transitioned to a new position at NIJC. It will be coming from my gmail for a few weeks while I set up a more long-term distribution system. In the meantime, please add egibson@heartlandalliance.org to your trusted contact list so that any future messages do not go to spam.
CONTENTS (click to jump to section)
PRACTICE ALERTS
NEWS
LITIGATION & AGENCY UPDATES
RESOURCES
EVENTS
PRACTICE ALERTS
eROPs: EOIR has begun digitizing some paper records of proceedings (ROPs). Once an ROP is an eROP, only ECAS electronic filing will be permitted on that case. However, this will be a lengthy process and it sounds like EOIR is prioritizing conversion of smaller records first.
DHS: Individuals eligible for TPS under this designation must have continuously resided in the United States since March 1, 2022. Individuals who attempt to travel to the United States after March 1, 2022 will not be eligible for TPS.
USCIS: U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services today announced that it is updating the USCIS Policy Manual to consider deferred action and related employment authorization for noncitizens who have an approved Form I-360, Petition for Amerasian, Widow(er), or Special Immigrant, for Special Immigrant Juvenile (SIJ) classification but who cannot apply to adjust status to become a lawful permanent resident (LPR) because a visa number is not available.
AP: A federal appeals court on Friday upheld sweeping asylum restrictions to prevent spread of COVID-19 but restored protections to keep migrant families from being expelled to their home countries without a chance to plead their cases. Almost simultaneously, a federal judge in another case ruled that the Biden administration wrongly exempted unaccompanied children from the restrictions and ordered that they be subject to them in a week, allowing time for an emergency appeal.
Bloomberg: The estimated wait time for a work permit has risen to eight to 12 months, up from about three months in 2020, according to data from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.
Law360: Texas’ Operation Lone Star border security initiative has expanded over the past year despite courtroom setbacks revealing cracks in its legal foundation, and it appears poised to grow further unless the federal government steps in to confront it.
SCOTUS: “Wooden committed his burglaries on a single night, in a single uninterrupted course of conduct. The crimes all took place at one location, a one-building storage facility with one address. Each offense was essentially identical, and all were intertwined with the others. The burglaries were part and parcel of the same scheme, actuated by the same motive, and accomplished by the same means.”
SCOTUSblog: The Supreme Court on Wednesday [in oral arguments] returned to the scope of the right to sue federal officers for damages under Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents, in a case arising from events surrounding an (unfairly) disparaged inn and suspicious characters near the U.S.-Canada border.
Lexis: As we noted above, while (b)(4) requires “changed country conditions,” (b)(3) does not. Thus, the BIA’s reference to a “material change in country conditions” and the analysis that followed shows that the BIA applied § 1003.23(b)(4). In applying the standard of § 1003.23(b)(4) to a timely filed motion, the BIA acted contrary to law.
Lexis: . After he pled guilty to first-degree home invasion, the Department of Homeland Security initiated removal. But the removal didn’t go as planned: DHS failed to show that Jasso was in fact removable, and the immigration judge terminated the proceeding. So DHS tried again. It started a second removal proceeding based on a new legal theory but the same underlying facts. The problem? The doctrine of claim preclusion prevents parties from litigating matters they failed to raise in an earlier case. Because claim preclusion barred the second removal proceeding, we grant the petition for review, vacate, and remand.
Reuters: A federal appeals court on Monday declined to dismiss an “unprecedented” criminal case filed during the Trump administration against a Massachusetts judge accused of impeding a federal immigration arrest of a defendant in her courtroom.
Law360: Sixteen attorneys general of Democratic-led states, including the District of Columbia, are defending a new Illinois law phasing out immigrant detention contracts and urging the Seventh Circuit to dismiss a challenge by two Illinois counties, saying the policy does not interfere with federal enforcement of immigration law.
NYT: People with health conditions that place them at high risk from Covid-19 have been denied access to coronavirus vaccine booster shots while in federal immigration detention, the American Civil Liberties Union said in a lawsuit filed on Tuesday.
Reuters: The U.S. Embassy in Havana announced on Thursday it would increase staffing and resume some visa processing in Cuba several years after the Trump administration slashed personnel at the facility following a spate of unexplained health incidents.
AILA: EOIR will open immigration courts in Hyattsville, Maryland, and Laredo, Texas, today, February 28, 2022. The Hyattsville and Laredo immigration courts will have 16 and 8 immigration judges, respectively. Both courts will hear transferred cases; EOIR is notifying parties whose locations have changed.
AILA: Due to conflict in both regions, DHS will extend and redesignate South Sudan for TPS for 18 months, and designate Sudan for TPS for 18 months. The extension and redesignation of South Sudan is in effect from 5/3/2022, through 11/3/2023. The memo details eligibility guidelines.
AILA: USCIS announced that its website will now feature a Lockbox Filing Location Updates page, where customers can track when lockbox form filing locations are updated. Updates will also be emailed and announced on social media.
USCIS: USCIS has clarified Form I-9 guidance related to Native American tribal documents. We also published new guidance regarding T nonimmigrants (victims of human trafficking) and U nonimmigrants (victims of certain other crimes) in the M-274, Handbook for Employers. USCIS has provided these updates to respond to customer needs.
Thanks for all you do for due process and fundamental fairness in America, Liz! And congrats again to both you and NIJC/Heartland Alliance on your new position!
My good friend Heidi Altman, Director of Policy at NIJC, should be delighted, as Liz is a “distinguished alum” of both the CALS Asylum Clinic at Georgetown Law (where Heidi was a Fellow) and my Refugee Law & Policy class. Liz also served as an Arlington Intern and a Judicial Law Clerk at the NY Immigration Court. Liz has been a “powerful force for due process, clear, analytical writing, and best practices” wherever she has been! So, I’m sure that will continue at NIJC! Clearly, Liz is someone who eventually belongs on the Federal Bench at some level.
Heidi Altman Director of Policy National Immigrant Justice Center PHOTO: fcnl.org
Liz’s mention under “Litigation” of the Supremes’ decision in Wooden v U.S., where Justice Kagan for a unanimous Court interpreted the term “single occasion” broadly in favor of a criminal defendant, raises an interesting immigration issue.
Two decades ago, in Matter of Adetiba, 20 I&N Dec. 506 (BIA 1992), the BIA basically “nullified” the INA’s statutory exemption from deportation for multiple crimes “arising out of a single scheme of criminal misconduct.” Rejecting the 9th Circuit’s contrary ruling, the BIA essentially read the exception out of the statute by effectively limiting it to lesser included offenses.
How narrow was this interpretation? Well, in 21 years on the immigration appellate and trial benches, I can’t recall a single case where the “scheme” did not result in deportation under Adetiba. Taking advantage of the outrageous “doctrine of judicial task avoidance” established by the Supremes in the notorious “Brand X,”the BIA eventually took the “super arrogant” step of nullifying all Circuit interpretations that conflicted with Adetiba! Matter of Islam, 25 I&N Dec. 637 (BIA 2011).
Surprisingly, in my view, in his concurring opinion in Wooden, Justice Gorsuch actually applied the “rule of lenity” — something else the “21st Century BIA” has basically “read out of the law” in their haste to deport! Here’s what Justice Gorsuch said:
Today, the Court does not consult lenity’s rule, but neither does it forbid lower courts from doing so in doubtful cases. That course is the sound course. Under our rule of law, punishments should never be products of judicial conjecture about this factor or that one. They should come only with the assent of the people’s elected representatives and in laws clear enough to supply “fair warning . . . to the world.” McBoyle, 283 U. S., at 27.7
Hon. Jeffrey S. Chase Jeffrey S. Chase Blog Coordinator & Chief Spokesperson, Round Table of Former Immigration Judges
As the ongoing (“backlog enhancing”) “Pereira fiasco” shows, the BIA has had little problem “blowing off” or distinguishing the Supremes to deport or deny when asked by DHS Enforcement to do so. Today’s BIA “rule” for interpreting supposedly “ambiguous” statutes is actually straightforward, if one-sided: Adopt whatever interpretation DHS Enforcement offers even if that means “taking a pass” on a better interpretation offered by the respondent. So, I’m sure that Garland’s current “Miller Lite” BIA will simply distinguish Wooden as dealing with statutory language different from the INA and ignore its broader implications if asked to do so by “their partners” at DHS Enforcement.
But, whether all Circuits will see it that way, and/or allow themselves to continue to be humiliated by “Brand X,” or whether the issue will reach the Supremes, are different questions. In any event, immigration advocates should pay attention to Wooden, even if the BIA is likely to blow it off.
The current Supremes don’t seem to have much difficulty jettisoning their own precedents when motivated to do so! Why they would continue to feel bound by the bogus “Chevron doctrine” or its “steroid laden progeny Brand X” to follow the interpretations of Executive Branch administrative judges on questions of law is beyond me! Somewhere Chief Justice John Marshall must be turning over in his grave!
Trump Judge Mark T. Pittman has a very explicit vision of the future for brown-skinned children seeking protection from “White Nationalist Nation.” EDS NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT – The bodies of Salvadoran migrant Oscar Alberto Mart??nez Ram??rez and his nearly 2-year-old daughter Valeria lie on the bank of the Rio Grande in Matamoros, Mexico, Monday, June 24, 2019, after they drowned trying to cross the river to Brownsville, Texas. Martinez’ wife, Tania told Mexican authorities she watched her husband and child disappear in the strong current. (AP Photo/Julia Le Duc)
ThreadOpen appSee new TweetsConversationAaron Reichlin-Melnick@ReichlinMelnick🚨Absolute madness. The same day the DC Circuit rules that families can’t be expelled under Title 42 to places they will be persecuted, a federal judge in Texas just overruled the CDC and ordered the Biden administration to expel unaccompanied children. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.txnd.347182/gov.uscourts.txnd.347182.100.0_1.pdf…
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Read the rest of Aaron’s feed at the link.
Although the DC Circuit basically confirmed that the evidence produced by plaintiffs showed illegal returns to death and that there was little, if any, support for the draconian Title 42 exclusion order, the relief granted was unacceptably narrow. The order merely directed the Administration to cease returning individuals to countries where they would be persecuted or tortured.
That order is weak because:
It doesn’t specify any particular fair procedure that must be followed by DHS in determining who faces persecution or torture. That appears to leave open the possibility of DHS employing bogus “summary determinations by enforcement agents” rather than using Asylum Officers and having cases referred to Immigration Courts.
There are no limits on the Government’s ability to detain individuals and/or return them to other countries.
The standard for so-called “withholding of removal” to persecution is “more likely than not” as opposed to the more generous “well-founded fear” or “reasonable possibility” standard for asylum (although individuals should be able to invoke the regulatory “presumption of future persecution” arising out of past persecution).
Even if granted, withholding of removal does not provide individuals with “durable legal status” nor does it allow them to access the asylum system, from which they apparently would remain barred under Title 42.
Judge Mark T. Pittman of the Northern District of Texas is a Trump appointee with strong ties to the Federalist Society and a very loose grasp on domestic and international laws and procedures for protecting children.
It’s interesting, if disheartening, to compare the “overt wishy-washiness” of the DC Circuit Judges who were timidly, “sort of” trying to protect at least some minimal legal and human rights with the “in your face,” overtly anti-immigrant, arrogant tone and ridiculous self-assuredness with which activist righty District Judge Mark Pittman advanced his absurdist notion that the White Nationalist agenda of “protecting” America from the “non-threat” of brown-skinned children merited his simultaneous assumption of the roles of President, Secretary of DHS, Attorney General, and for a good measure, Congress.
Obviously, the “judicial restraint,” supposedly a hallmark of modern conservatism, was just a “smoke screen” for the GOP’s activist anti-social, anti-immigrant, racially charged agenda. That’s not news to many of us, although it seems to have gone “over the head” of many in the Biden Administration and many Dems on the Hill.
It shows once again why “Team Garland’s” indolent, often uninformed, and floundering approach to immigrant justice under law is being steamrolled by Trump holdovers and crusading right-wing Federal Judges. And, you wonder why Dems can’t figure out what they stand for and what their “line in the sand” is!
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Garland and other weak-kneed Biden officials can’t decide how much of the leftover “Miller Lite” anti-asylum, anti-humanitarian, anti-due-process policy they want to retain and defend and how much effort, if any, they want to put into re-establishing human rights and the rule of law.
One observation: After more than one-year in office, the Biden Administration is no closer to having an orderly, functional, due-process-oriented asylum system in place and ready for the border than they were on January 20, 2021! The expert Asylum Officers and qualified Immigration Judges who are necessary to operate such a system are still few and far between, and the program to facilitate legal assistance for those seeking legal protection at the border is all but non-existent.
“Every day is ‘Kangaroo Field Day’ @ Garland’s DOJ!” When it comes to immigrant justice, “good enough for government work” is the mantra! https://www.flickr.com/photos/rasputin243/ Creative Commons License
“The BIA “affirm[ed] the Immigration Judge’s decision to deny reopening because the respondent has not sufficiently demonstrated that his brother’s murder represents a material change in country conditions that would affect his eligibility for asylum.” A.R. 4. As we noted above, while (b)(4) requires “changed country conditions,” (b)(3)does not. Thus, the BIA’s reference to a “material change in country conditions” and the analysis that followed shows that the BIA applied § 1003.23(b)(4). See A.R. 4. In applying the standard of § 1003.23(b)(4) to a timely filed motion, the BIA acted contrary to law. … The question for the BIA to consider in evaluating Garcia Hernandez’s motion to reopen was whether Garcia Hernandez offered, in the proper from and with the appropriate contents, evidence that was material and not previously available at the initial hearing. 8 C.F.R. § 1003.23(b)(3). Because the BIA did not analyze that question, and instead evaluated the issue under § 1003.23(b)(4), the BIA abused its discretion. … The BIA held that Zambrano did not apply because the changed circumstances there took place before the petitioner filed a time-barred petition even though here, the purported changed circumstances took place after the time-barred petition was filed and adjudicated. But nothing in Zambrano suggests its holding or reasoning was limited in the way the BIA suggests. Thus, Zambrano’s framework in examining changed circumstances should have been applied to Garcia Hernandez’s asylum application. … [W]e grant Garcia Hernandez’s petition for review. We vacate and remand with instructions to the BIA to consider Garcia Hernandez’s motion to reopen under the appropriate standard. The BIA should also address Garcia Hernandez’s asylum application under the framework of Zambrano and conduct any further proceedings consistent with this opinion.”
Many congrats to Ben and Alex, who were both “regulars” at the Arlington Immigration Court! Alex is also a former Arlington Intern and a “charter member” of the NDPA!😎
The 4th Circuit decision was written by Judge Marvin Quattlebaum, a Trump appointee, for a unanimous panel thatincluded Judge Motz and Judge Thacker. While Judge Q doesn’t always “get it right,” his cogent analysis of the BIA’s lawless behavior in this case is “spot on.”
How does a supposedly “expert” tribunal like the BIA blow the “easy stuff” — like following their own regulations? Clearly it has something to do with an unduly permissive “haste makes waste/rush to deny” anti-immigrant culture at EOIR that Garland has not effectively addressed!
Another obvious problem: Why were Garland’s lawyers at OIL defending this obviously wrong decision?You don’t have to be an “immigration guru” to read the regulations!
Sadly, it’s not the first time under Garland that OIL has chosen to waste judicial resources and undermine our justice system by “defending the indefensible.” It’s what happens when leaders promote an “anything goes/no accountability/good enough for government work” atmosphere!
There are deep substantive, structural, personnel, attitude, and “cultural” problems at EOIR and DOJ. That, over his first year in office, Garland has chosen to ignore these glaring malfunctions of justice @ Justice is an ongoing national disgrace!🤮
It doesn’t have to be this way! But, unfortunately, it is! And, even more disturbingly, no meaningful improvements appear to be on the horizon! That’s a deadly ☠️⚰️ outlook for American justice and for those poor souls caught up in Garland’s unfair, broken, dysfunctional “court” system that bears little resemblance to any commonly understood notion of what a fair, impartial, subject matter expert court should be in America!🤯
One Year In: The Biden Administration and Asylum Policy
Developments in Fourth Circuit Case Law
Increasing Access to Pro Bono Counsel in Underserved Areas: Virginia as a Case Study
Working Across Disciplines: Best Practices for Attorneys and Mental Health Professionals in Asylum Seeker Evaluations
Country Conditions: From Page to Practice
CLE Credit and DOJ Accredited Representative Certifications
This event has been approved for 6.5 credit hours of CLE credit from Virginia and North Carolina. Attorneys seeking CLE credit must purchase tickets indicating that CLE credit is provided (indicated by “CLE” listed by the ticket type).
Attorneys from other jurisdictions who are not seeking CLE credit from Virginia or North Carolina are welcome to attend.
DOJ Accredited Representative certifications will be provided to those who register as DOJ Accredited Representatives seeking certification.
Zoom Webinar Information
Zoom information for the event will be sent to the email address used to register. For security reasons, we do not post the Zoom link information. All Zoom registration information will be provided in a separate email closer to the date of the event.
We would like to cordially invite you to the launch party of CLAW, “Cancellation and Life after Winning” at the CLAW headquarters located at 11710 Bowman Green Drive, Reston, VA 20190 on Sunday, February 27, 2022 at 4 pm.
What is CLAW?
CLAW is a campaign initiated by teenager and immigration activist, Neela Nesari. The campaign aims to bring about a change to increase the 4000 limitation cap on 240A cancellation cases.
Neela is initiating an awareness month about this issue in March of 2022 and needs your help. The goal is to educate, organize and advocate for legislative changes to the immigration system with respect to the defense of cancellation of removal.
We are very excited to announce that CLAW has secured the enthusiastic support of renowned former immigration judge and former chairman of the BIA, Honorable Judge Paul Schmidt, who will be the guest of honor at CLAW’s launch party.
We look forward to your support for this worthy cause. As immigration attorneys and advocates, we know too well that a 42b cancellation case doesn’t just end at the Individual Hearing and our clients face a long road ahead before they can become permanent residents. Why not do something about it?
*Practice outside of NY limited to Federal Immigration Law.
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Unfortunately, in the bizarre and counterintuitive world of U.S. immigration law and our broken Immigration Courts, winning your case, no matter how satisfying, is “only half the battle!” These amazing young people understand how unfair and counterproductive that is and are “walking the walk, not just talking the talk.” Come be inspired by folks who believe in and act for a “Better America” for all of us!
Hon. Jeffrey S. Chase Jeffrey S. Chase Blog Coordinator & Chief Spokesperson, Round Table of Former Immigration JudgesHon. Susan G. Roy Law Office of Susan G. Roy, LLC Princeton Junction, NJ Member, Round Table of Former Immigration Judges
More NDPA Training:Tomorrow and Saturday, the New York Asylum and Immigration Law Conference will be held virtually; Sue Roy and I are among the speakers, along with many other members of the NDPA.
GW Law Immigration Clinic Director Professor Alberto Benítez & Co-Director Paulina Vera
Professor Alberto Benitez at the GW Immigration Clinic reports:
Friends,
Our friend, colleague, and alum Paulina Vera shared this story. Congratulations Daniel!
“A current Immigration Judge shared that he spoke to his colleague, another Immigration Judge (“IJ”), about a recent virtual hearing handled by student-attorney, Daniel Fishelman ’22. IJ complimented the Clinic’s preparation and Daniel’s performance, stating that even though it was for a short matter, she was impressed by the Clinic. This was the Clinic’s first appearance before IJ. Please join us in congratulating Daniel on completing his first hearing and getting positive feedback from Immigration Judges!”
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Many congrats to student-attorney, Daniel Fishelman ’22 on his first engagement as a member of the NDPA!👍🏼😎
Also, congrats to my friends and “due process role models” Alberto and Paulina! So proud that part of Paulina’s “immigration justice journey” went through the Arlington Immigration Court, where she served as an intern.
Alberto and Paulina tell me that after their “standard rigorous prep session” with Daniel, he definitely was “QRFPT” — “Quite Ready For Prime Time!” 😎 That’s as opposed to “NQRFPT” (“Not Quite Ready For Prime Time”) ☹️ — something to be avoided in Immigration Court or any other type of litigation!☠️
This case illustrates what I found on the bench: that “short cases” are almost always the result of superior scholarship, meticulous preparation, and informed dialogue by counsel for both parties before getting to court.
That’s why one grossly underutilized tool for reducing backlogs is investing in and encouraging more and better trained representation for individuals appearing in Immigration Court.
As statistics have shown time after time, universalrepresentation is also the key to achieving high appearance rates.
Additionally, constructing court dockets and scheduling cases locally with input from both counsel is a way of reversing the backlog building “Aimless Docket Reshuffling” (“ADR”) produced by attempting to manage dockets from “on high.” ADR usually results from EOIR unilaterally attempting to satisfy DHS enforcement aims or to accommodate “disconnected political agendas and ill-advised gimmicks” generated by DOJ and White House politicos — invariably clueless about the realities of Immigration Court practice!
The three things always left behind by ADR: due process, fundamental fairness, and practical efficiency!
The Dehumanizing Work of Immigration Law is an analysis piece authored by immprof Jennifer M. Chacón (Berkeley) for the Brennan Center for Justice. It was part of a series of articles examining the “punitive excess that has come to define America’s criminal legal system.”
In her article, Chacón acknowledges that “our immigration laws are exceptionally harsh in ways that frequently defy common sense.” She notes that for many migrants “the notion that there is a ‘right way’ to immigrate is just not true.” Moreover, “our country has not always honored its own legal processes when immigrants are doing things ‘the right way.’” And, for those “long-time lawful permanent residents who have contact with the criminal legal system are often denied the chance to do things ‘the right way.’”
“Again and again,” Chacón writes, “notions of the rule of law are invoked to justify the sundering of families and communities that would, in other circumstances, seem unthinkable.”
Jennifer elegantly articulates a theme that echoes what “Sir Jeffrey” Chase and I often say on our respective blogs: It’s all about gratuitous cruelty and intentional dehumanization of “the other” — primarily vulnerable individuals of color!
But, it need not be that way! Undoubtedly, the current legislative framework is outdated, unrealistic, and often self-contradictory. Congress’s failure to address it with bipartisan, humane, common sense, practical reforms that would strengthen and expand our legal immigration system is disgraceful.
But, there are plenty of opportunities even under the current flawed framework for much better interpretations of law; more expansive, uniform, and reasonable exercises of discretion; creation and implementation of best practices; advancements in due process and fundamental fairness; drastic improvements in representation; improved expert judging; rational, targeted, “results-focused” enforcement; promoting accountability; and teamwork and cooperation among the judiciary, DHS, and the private/NGO/academic sectors to improve the delivery of justice and make the “rule of law” something more than the cruel parody it is today.
Historically, as Jennifer points out, courts have often aided, abetted, and sometimes even disgracefully and cowardly encouraged lawless behavior and clear violations of both constitutional and human rights. But, it doesn’t have to be that way in the future!
Folks like Trump, Miller, Sessions, Barr, Wolf, “Cooch,” Hamilton, McHenry, et al spent four years laser-focused on banishing every last ounce of humanity, fairness, truth, enlightenment, kindness, compassion, reasonableness, efficiency, rationality, equity, public service, racial justice, consistently positive use of discretion, practicality, and common sense from our immigration and refugee systems.
Biden and Harris promised dynamic change, improvement, and a return to a values-based approach to immigration. Once in office, however, they have basically “gone Miller Lite” —preferring to blame and criticize the Trump regime without having a ready plan or taking much positive action to bring about dynamic systemic improvements. In fact, as pointed out by Jennifer, Garland and Mayorkas have continued to apply, defend, and to some extent rely on the very vile policies they supposedly disavowed. Talk about disingenuous!
Drastic improvements in the current system are “out there for the taking,” with or without Congressional assistance. But, the will, skill, and guts to make the “rule of law” something other than an intentionally cruel, failed “throw away slogan” appears to be sorely missing from Biden Administration ldeadership!
Maybe, the beginning of Jennifer’s essay “says it all” about the abject failure of Garland and others to “get the job done:”
During his confirmation hearing to be attorney general, when asked about the Trump administration’s policy of separating children from their parents at the U.S.–Mexico border, Merrick Garland repudiated the policy, stating “I can’t imagine anything worse.”
Yet, now that he is confirmed, Attorney General Garland presides over an agency that represents the U.S. government in court arguing every day that parents should be separated from their children, brothers from sisters, grandchildren from grandparents.
Obviously, that’s the problem! Garland actually “can’t imagine” the human impact of government-imposed family separation! Nor can he “imagine” what it’s like to be caught up in his unfair, biased, and broken Immigration “Courts” as a party or a lawyer. The “retail level” of our justice system “passed him by” on his way to his judicial “comfort zone.”
“Justice” Star Chamber Style — “AG Garland ‘can’t imagine’ what it’s like to be caught up in the dysfunctional, abusive, and unfair ‘court system’ that he runs!”
Unless and until we finally get an Attorney General who has either experienced or has the actual imagination necessary to feel the daily horrors and indignity that our unnecessarily broken immigration justice system inflicts on real human beings, American justice and human values will continue to spiral downward! ☠️🤮
And, there will be no true racial justice in America without justice for immigrants!
On the line are millions of futures. Undocumented immigrants who fear being split from their American children and spouses, people facing persecution and death in their countries of origin, or those being sent to countries they haven’t seen in decades are all fighting for fair play and often literally their lives in courts ill-equipped to do them justice.
“Let’s make it absolutely clear: due process is suffering,” said Muzaffar Chishti, a senior fellow at the Migration Policy Institute. “There’s just no way around that.”
Chishti said he sees all the hallmarks of a strong administrative law system suffering in the nation’s immigration courts, which are housed under the Department of Justice in the executive branch of the federal government, not within the judicial branch.
“It is a system in crisis,” he said.
After Trump made hardline anti-immigration policies pivotal to his 2016 presidential campaign, he flooded courts with judges more inclined to order deportations, Reuters reported.
His administration hired so many new immigration judges so hastily that the American Bar Association warned of “under-qualified or potentially biased judges”, many of whom had no immigration experience.
And as officials such as then-attorney general Jeff Sessions made sweeping proclamations that “the vast majority of asylum claims are not valid”, judges simultaneously confronted performance metrics demanding they each race through at least 700 cases a year.
People ranging from asylum seekers forced to wait in Mexico to unaccompanied children crossing the border on foot, to longtime undocumented residents with families stateside end up appearing in court, often without attorneys to help them parse the country’s byzantine laws.
In a process smacking of a zip code lottery, one judge in New York may grant nearly 95% of asylum petitions while colleagues in Atlanta almost universally deny similar requests, creating a patchwork of standards.
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Read Alexandra’s full report at the link.
Garland’s stubbornly indolent approach to racial justice and due process at “Justice” endangers the lives of millions of vulnerable humans! PHOTO: Wikipedia Commons
Not news to Courtside readers or the millions whose lives and futures are caught up in Garland’s totally dysfunctional morass! And, that doesn’t even include hundreds of thousands of migrants orbited to danger under bogus “border closure” gimmicks that Garland and his ethically-challenged DOJ continue to defend!
Sens. Susan Collins and Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., introduced legislation Thursday to shorten the waiting period before asylum seekers are allowed to receive work authorizations.
The bill, co-sponsored by Sen. Angus King, would reduce the waiting period for work authorization eligibility to 30 days after an application for asylum is filed. It comes shortly after Rep. Chellie Pingree introduced a similar proposal in the House.
“The law currently prohibits asylum seekers from working for extended periods of time, which prevents them from supporting themselves and their families as they want to do. It also inadvertently places the burden of care on states and municipalities,” Collins, a Republican, said in a news release.
The bill comes as Maine is seeing an influx of asylum seekers to Portland, many of whom are being housed in hotels paid for with state and federal funds because of a lack of shelter space and available housing. For the week ending Feb. 5, Portland was housing 189 families, a total of 639 people, in hotels.
“Our bipartisan legislation would permit these individuals to work and contribute to the local economy while their asylum claims are being adjudicated,” Collins said. “This commonsense bill would help cities like Portland and their partners in the nonprofit community that are currently caring for a large number of asylum seekers.”
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Read the rest of Rachel’s report at the link. Notably, Senator Krysten Sinema (D-AZ) was also one of the sponsors.
As Senator King says:“Maine has always welcomed asylum seekers, who have made our communities stronger and richer – but current federal laws are blocking these people from pursuing a job to help them support their families and contribute to their local economies!”
Fixing it should have been “Day 1 Low Hanging Fruit” for the Biden Administration. After all, these are simple mostly “no-brainer adjudications” — such that they can barely be called “adjudications” at all. Basically, they require computerized records checks that most high school students probably could be trained to do efficiently in a few days. For example, the “adjudication” of an extension of work authorization is estimated to take about 12 minutes.
I’m old enough to remember the days “before the dreaded EAD” at the “Legacy INS.” Upon filing certain applications with the District Office, the officer simply stamped “Employment Authorized” on the individual’s paper I-94 card or in the passport and returned it to theapplicant on the spot. It wasn’t perfect, but it worked and was reasonably prompt, practical, functional, and inexpensive to administer.
Now, there are 31 pages of instructions for filing an Application for Employment Authorization on Form I-765. Many categories require a rather bloated $410 filling fee and others require an $85 “biometrics fee,” thus making “EAD” issuance and renewal a “profit center” for supposedly largely self-supporting USCIS adjudications.
The only things missing from this “new improved process:” common sense, competence, efficiency, and, most of all, public service, despite Director Jaddou’s recent rewrite of the USCIS mission statement. I wish she’d spend less time thinking and talking about “public service” and more effort fixing the fairly obvious problems interfering with the actual daily delivery of public service by USCIS.
Lips Sewn Shut Public Realm — Biden’s continuation of Trump’s cruel and illegal abrogation of asylum laws at the border, inappropriately defended by Garland’s DOJ, drives desperate people to do desperate things.
Nicole Narea Immigration Reporter Vox.com — Her clear and cogent analysis stands in sharp contrast to the Biden Administration’s often muddled, incoherent, and self-contradictory policies on human rights and racial justice on America.
Migrants stranded in southern Mexico because of US and Mexican border policies are taking increasingly drastic measures to draw attention to their plight. On Tuesday, a dozen migrants staged a protest in which they sewed their lips together and went on a hunger strike.
They are among the thousands staying in what has become known as an “open-air prison” in the city of Tapachula on Mexico’s southern border with Guatemala. Migrants there have struggled to access food and shelter, and have reported being preyed on by government officials.
Facing pressure to find ways to limit the number of migrants requesting entry to the United States, Mexican immigration authorities will not permit the migrants to leave the city unless they have some form of legal immigration status allowing them to move freely through the country, such as asylum. Hundreds tried to escape last month, but were intercepted and detained by Mexican immigration authorities.
. . . .
The US could share the load by resuming processing of migrants at its own borders and allowing them to pursue claims to humanitarian protection, as is their legal right. Instead, it has offloaded its immigration responsibilities onto its neighbor.
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As usual, Nicole provides timely, astute, accessible analysis of complex problems. I highly recommend her complete article at the link above.
The Attorney General is supposed to stand up for the rule of law, human rights, and to “just say no” to defending illegal and improper policies. As many of us pointed out during the scofflaw tenures of Sessions and Barr, the AG’s fealty is supposed to be to the Constitution and the laws of the United States, which include treaties that we have ratified and incorporated into our laws. As human rights and legal rights continue to be ignored, deflected, and degraded at our borders and in Immigration “Courts” that don’t operate as “courts” at all in any commonly understood meaning of the term, where is Garland?
Train Dennis Adams, Federal Highway Administration; levels adjustment applied by Hohum Public domain. — Garland’s Deportation Railway retains most of his predecessors’ engineers, conductors, and crew. It’s often slow, unreliable, erratic, and subject to arbitrary unannounced schedule changes. It continues to bypass “Due Processville” and “Fundamental Fairness City.”
Mejia-Velasquez v. Garland, 4th Cir., 02-16-22, published
PANEL: NIEMEYER, MOTZ, and RICHARDSON, Circuit Judges.
OPINION BY: Judge Niemeyer
DISSENT: Judge Motz
KEY QUOTE FROM DISSENT:
Under the current immigration statutes, DHS has good reason to require applicants for relief from removal to submit fingerprints and other biometrics. But before DHS does so, it must first comply with specified notice obligations. Where, as here, DHS fails to do so, I would not fault the applicant. As the Supreme Court explained in Niz-Chavez, “[i]f men must turn square corners when they deal with the government, it cannot be too much to expect the government to turn square corners when it deals with them.” 141 S. Ct. at 1486.
I respectfully dissent.
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The IJ and the BIA relied on a wrong BIA precedent. The 4th Circuit majority judges recognized its incorrectness, but took OIL’s invitation to fashion another rationale for denying this asylum applicant a hearing on the merits of her life or death claim. While the respondent was represented by counsel, the disputed “warnings” and dialogue relating to the missing biometrics were not translated into Spanish, the only language she understood.
While this case was pending, USCIS finally delivered the long and inexplicably delayed biometrics appointment letter to the respondent. But, that made no difference to a group of judges anxious to railroad her back to Honduras (one of the most dangerous and thoroughly corrupt countries in the hemisphere) without a meaningful chance to be heard.
Of all the Federal Judges who looked at this case over the years, only Judge Motz was interested in providing the respondent a due process hearing on her life-determining claim. The rest evidently were more fixated on creating reasons for NOT hearing her case. With the same amount of judicial and litigation effort, likely less, the respondent probably could have received a due process hearing on the merits of her claim. Additionally, there would have been consequences for the BIA’s defective “good enough for government work” precedent.
Of course, like Garland, none of the exalted judges involved in this disgraceful dereliction of duty have actually represented an asylum applicant in Immigration Court and had to deal with the confusing, convoluted, backlogged, and often notoriously screwed up DHS/EOIR biometrics process. See, e.g., “USCIS Biometrics Appointment Backlog,” https://www.stilt.com/blog/2021/02/biometrics-appointment-backlog/.
I suspect that folks contesting a parking ticket get more consideration in our system than this asylum applicant got from Garland’s unfair and dysfunctional Immigration Courts and the OIL lawyers who defend these mis-handled cases. And, in the world of “refugee roulette,” where human lives are treated like lottery tickets, a different Circuit panel of judges might have joined Judge Motz in getting it right.
The problem starts with EOIR — tribunals that receive deference without earning it through expertise, quality scholarship, and prioritizing due process, fundamental fairness, and best practices. It’s aggravated and multiplied by Garland — an Attorney General indifferent to injustice and the trail of broken lives and dashed hopes left in its wake. And, it’s aided, abetted, and enabled by judges like the panel majority here, who can’t be troubled with the hard work of understanding the consequences of their dilatory approach and demanding fair, competent, and reasonable expert judging from EOIR.
As several of my colleagues have said about the broken, dysfunctional, unfair Immigration Court system, the haphazard review by some Circuit Courts, and the disturbing systemic lack of judicial courage when it comes to fairly applying the Due Process Clause of our Constitution to migrants of color: “The cruelty is the point.”
It’s also worthy of note that the failure of all the Federal Judges, save Judge Motz, to make any meaningful inquiry into the respondent’s clearly expressed fear of return to Honduras appears to violate mandatory requirements for withholding of removal under the INA and international conventions. Perhaps that’s not surprising as Federal Judges have allowed Garland, Mayorkas, and their predecessors to use the transparent pretext of “Title 42” to systemically violate the legal and human rights of refugees at our borders — every day!
It’s also worth putting into context the Biden Administration’s continuing pontification about the human rights of Ughyurs, Afghans, women, and other persecuted minorities, as well as their professed commitment to racial justice in the U.S., which has not been matched by actions. Indeed, the Biden Administration’s actual approach to human rights looks much more like “Miller Lite Time” than it does a courageous, competent, and fair reinstitution of the rule of law!
According to recent reports, many of the Ughyurs and Afghans who were fortunate enough to reach the U.S. and avoid arbitrary “turn backs” at our borders, are now mired in the endless, mindless Mayorkas/Garland bureaucracy that masquerades as an “asylum system” — subject to long waits, missing work authorizations, and sometimes arbitrary and secretive “denials” blasted by human rights advocates. In a functional system these would be the “low hanging fruit” that could rapidly be removed from limbo and given the ability to fully function in our society. But, not in the “Amateur Night at the Bijou” atmosphere fostered by Mayorkas and Garland.
“Join the ABA Commission on Immigration for a 3-part series on the Mechanics of Immigration Court. This series covers the nuts and bolts of how to practice in immigration court. Part I takes an in depth look at the Master Calendar Hearing and Filing Applications for Relief with Immigration Court. Topics to be covered include reviewing the Notice to Appear, getting your client’s court file, how to prepare for the initial Master Calendar Hearing and what to expect, best practices for appearing via WebEx and Open Voice, and a brief overview of common forms of relief and prosecutorial discretion. This webinar is designed for pro bono attorneys and immigration practitioners who are new to immigration law, or for anyone who wants to brush up on their practical skills.”
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PLAYING IN HOME, OFFICE, AND CLASSROOM THEATERS NOW!
RATED G — Suitable & Highly Recommended for All Audiences
Win cases, save lives, achieve racial justice, fulfill the wrongfully withheld promises of the U.S. Constitution, force change into a deadly and dysfunctional system that has been weaponized to “Dred Scottify” the other and degrade humanity!
Make an “above the fray” AG finally pay attention to and address the disgraceful, due-process-denying, wasteful mess in “his wholly-owned parody of a court system.” This is what being a lawyer in 21st Century America is all about!
The video is 1 hour and 15 minutes!
“If you can win a case in this system, everything else in law, indeed in life, will be a walk in the park!” — Paul Wickham Schmidt, ImmigrationCourtside
Efiling is not permitted for cases with a preexisting paper file, but all new cases moving forward require efiling with ECAS.
Once a case is fully ECAS, you do not need to serve ICE separately. However, you still need to submit a certificate of service that lists ECAS as the means of service. eService/mail can still be used on paper files. eService is the only method of filing for PD requests.
Also, EOIR apparently has not come up with a system for filing motions to substitute counsel in ECAS. The system physically will not let you file a new primary E-28 if there already is an attorney, and you cannot file a motion without an E-28. The workaround so far has been to file a non-primary E-28 and then to ask the court to change it to primary. Hopefully, EOIR will fix this soon.
Updated Legal Assistant Directories for NYC (attached)
Reuters: The Biden administration will place hundreds of migrants caught at the U.S.-Mexico border on house arrest in the coming weeks as it seeks cheaper alternatives to immigration detention, according to a notice to lawmakers and a U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) official. A 120-day pilot program will be launched in Houston and Baltimore, with 100-200 single adults enrolled in each location, according to the notice, which was sent by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and reviewed by Reuters. See also Immigrant Rights Organizations Call on Biden to Stop Expansion of Surveillance and End the Immigration Detention System as a Whole.
TRAC: As of the end of January 2022, the pace of Immigration Court work continues to lag as a result of the pandemic. There have been not only fewer case completions, but the average time required to dispose of each case has doubled since before the pandemic began.
LAA Weekly: Valentine’s Day has been strategically selected for the “Day Without Immigrants” protest, as it is a day where an abundance of consumer spending occurs, through labor that is often carried out by immigrants.
NYT: These migrants were instructed to register with Immigrations and Customs Enforcement within 60 days to complete the process the border officials started. But in some parts of the country, local ICE offices were overwhelmed and unable to give them appointments. So the Haitian family and other new arrivals have spent months trying in vain to check in with ICE and initiate their court cases.
AP: The new statement unveiled Wednesday by Citizenship and Immigration Services Director Ur Jaddou is symbolic but somewhat restores previous language after the agency removed a reference in 2018 to the U.S. being a “nation of immigrants.”
Law360: A Washington federal judge has ruled that a Salvadoran citizen’s U.S. naturalization application was properly denied because of her admission that she distributes marijuana as co-owner of a state-licensed dispensary.
Law360: The U.S. Department of Justice’s Executive Office for Immigration Review apologized on Tuesday to an attorney after asking her to delete tweets about immigration court hearings for people enrolled in the controversial “Remain in Mexico” program.
WaPo: A patchwork of federal aid kept many families afloat during the pandemic, but families with undocumented parents did not qualify for most of it, including unemployment insurance, the stimulus payments, Medicaid and food stamps.
LITIGATION/CASELAW/RULES/MEMOS
AO issues NOID for Afghan Who Worked for U.S.
Boston AO: A NOID from the asylum office stated that an individual who worked for the U.S. government as a mechanic had not demonstrated a fear of future persecution based on his imputed political opinion. The AO held there was insufficient evidence the Taliban was or would become aware of his imputed political option. The AO also stated the Taliban does not have the capability to persecute all former employees of the U.S. and the applicant had not demonstrated similarly situated people were being targeted. Counsel has submitted a detailed rebuttal with testimony from a US military official, and the applicant’s mother was granted asylum by a different officer.
AILA: A federal district court vacated the final rules “Removal of 30-day Processing Provision for Asylum Applicant-Related Form I-765 Employment Authorization Applications” and “Asylum Application, Interview, and Employment Authorization for Applicants.” (AsylumWorks v. Mayorkas, 2/7/22)
NYLAG: Under the settlement, the Board will be required to place nearly all its opinions into an online reading room, accessible to all in perpetuity, ensuring that immigration advocates will have access to these opinions within six months of when they are issued. The Board also must post its decisions dating back to 2017 as well as some from 2016. Posting will begin in October 2022 and will be phased in over several years.
Law360: The Second Circuit on Wednesday granted a Nigerian man’s petition for review of a Board of Immigration Appeals order that denied him asylum, finding that the agency made several legal and procedural errors and did not adequately explain its reasons.
Law360: The federal government properly charged a Nigerian man as inadmissible to the U.S. rather than removable, because his entry to the country on parole constituted an arrival despite his previous admission, the Third Circuit ruled Friday.
Lexis: We hold that § 706(1) allows the federal courts to command USCIS to hasten an unduly delayed “bona fide” determination, which is a mandatory decision under 8 U.S.C. § 1184(p)(6) and the BFD process. We hold, however, that the federal courts cannot invoke 5 U.S.C. § 706(1) to force USCIS to speed up an unduly delayed pre-waitlist work-authorization adjudication, which is a nonmandatory agency action under 8 U.S.C. § 1184(p)(6) and the BFD process. We hold that Plaintiffs have sufficiently pleaded that USCIS has unreasonably delayed the principal petitioners’ placement on the U-visa waitlist.
Law360: The Ninth Circuit invalidated the subsection of a law that makes it a crime to encourage unlawful immigration, ruling Thursday it is overbroad and covers speech that is protected by the First Amendment.
Law360: The Board of Immigration Appeals need only to consider the possibility — not the reasonableness — of an immigrant’s safe relocation back to their home region when weighing protections under the Convention Against Torture, the Ninth Circuit ruled Wednesday.
Law360: A New Jersey federal judge signed off Wednesday on a class action settlement that would prevent the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services from refusing to place young immigrants on the path to a green card based on Garden State family court findings.
Law360: U.S. Customs and Border Protection is marking the entry records of certain foreign executives’ spouses to show that they are immediately eligible to work in the U.S. without going through the monthslong process of obtaining a work permit.
AILA: EOIR will close the Fishkill Immigration Court due to the closure of the Downstate Correctional Facility in which the court is located. Holding hearings at the location will cease at close of business on February 17, 2022. Pending cases at time of closure will transfer to Ulster Immigration Court.
AILA: EOIR updated its Operation Status website with information clarifying that alternate filing locations are designated for the purpose of filing emergency motions and explaining how it will treat other filings if a court is closed.
AILA: USCIS updated policy guidance addressing VAWA petitions, specifically changing the interpretation of the requirement for shared residence. The guidance also affects use of INA 204(a)(2), implements the decisions in Da Silva v. Attorney General and Arguijo v. United States, and more.
AILA: DHS, in partnership with the Department of Veterans Affairs and Defense, launched an online center to consolidate resources for noncitizen service members, veterans, and their families, including a request form for current or former service members seeking return to the U.S. after deportation.
USCIS: We are updating our interpretation of the requirement for shared residence to occur during the qualifying spousal or parent-child relationship. Instead, the self-petitioner must demonstrate that they are residing or have resided with the abuser at any time in the past.
We are also implementing nationwide the decisions in Da Silva v. Attorney General, 948 F.3d 629 (3rd Cir. 2020), and Arguijo v. United States, 991 F.3d 736 (7th Cir. 2021). Da Silva v. Attorney General held that when evaluating the good moral character requirement, an act or conviction is “connected to” the battery or extreme cruelty when it has “a causal or logical relationship.” Arguijo v. USCIS allows stepchildren and stepparents to continue to be eligible for VAWA self-petitions even if the parent and stepparent divorced.
After two plus decades of largely wasted time, effort, and resources, EOIR finally moves into the era of E-Filing!
Elizabeth notes one of the “initial workarounds” for motions to substitute counsel. While early glitches are to be expected in any system, this one seems odd because: 1) the system has supposedly been extensively “beta tested;” and 2) motions to substitute counsel have to be one of the most common motions filed at EOIR (particularly with cases often taking many years to complete with the ever-growing 1.6 million case backlog.)
I’d be interested in getting any “practitioner feedback” on how this system (applicable only to newly filed NTAs) is working out for them. You can just put in the “comments box” for this post.
Speaking of backlog, this excellent recent study and analysis from CMS (under “Friday Feb. 11” above) certainly suggests that the majority of the “aged cases” being “warehoused” by Garland’s EOIR relate to law-abiding long-term residents who are already firmly grounded in our society and should be prime candidates for “non-priority” status and removal from the dockets.
Undocumented immigrants contribute to every aspect of the nation’s life.16 During the COVID-19 pandemic, the case for legalization has become increasingly evident to the public and policymakers due, in part, to the fact that a remarkable 74 percent of the nation’s 7.3 million undocumented workers meet DHS’s definition of essential workers (Kerwin and Warren 2020). As the nation ages and its population over age 65 exceeds that under age 15 (Chamie 2021), the need for immigrant workers will only increase. US fertility rates fell for five consecutive years prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the US birth rate decreased by four percent in 2020 (Barroso 2021).17
Legalization programs benefit the larger society: they “raise wages, increase consumption, create jobs, and generate additional tax revenue” (Hinojosa-Ojeda 2012, 191).18 One study has estimated that broad immigration reform legislation, including a legalization program and a flexible, rights-respecting, legal immigration system, would add $1.5 trillion to the US gross domestic product over 10 years (ibid., 176). Another study found that a legalization program would increase the productivity, earnings, and taxes paid by the legalized, resulting in increased contributions to the Social Security (SS) program, which would more than offset the SS benefits that they would receive (Kugler, Lynch and Oakford 2013).
Indeed, the data in the CMS study confirms what many of us have suspected for a long time: That deportation of many of the individuals now occupying the Immigration Court’s mind-boggling docket backlog actually would be a counterproductive “net loss” for the U.S.!
So, why are Garland and Mayorkas letting the backlog fester and ooze disorder and injustice? ☠️ Rather than using largely self-created backlogs to support more “enforcement gimmicks” purporting to lead to theforced removal of many productive members of our society, EOIR is long overdue for some form of the “Chen Markowitz Plan” in anticipation of the types of ameliorative legislation outlined in the CMS study.
Donald M. Kerwin Executive Director Center for Migration Studies — He and his friends at CMS have some great ideas on immigration and human rights backed by some of the best scholarship around! Why are Garland, Mayorkas, and others “tuning them out” while they continue to bungle immigration policy, degrade human rights, and undermine our legal system?
Garland’s disgraceful failure to put a “Progressive A-Team” in charge at EOIR continues to drag down our entire justice system.
Note that Sessions and Barr had no trouble and no hesitation installing their “Miller Time” restrictionist team at DOJ and EOIR despite almost universal outrage and protests from human rights advocates, immigration experts, and some legislators!
Why do Dems keep appointing AG’s who are too “tone deaf,” clueless, and timid to fully “leverage” the almost unlimited potential of reforming EOIR to be a font of due process, best practices, and scholarly, efficient judging?
Why do Dems prefer the equal and racial justice “disaster zone” that they have helped to create, aided, and abetted over the past two decades of abject failure and disorder at EOIR?
There is a reason why Chair Lofgren and others on the Hill are pushing for Article I! But, that in no way diminishes or excuses the failure of Garland to make available due process and best practices reforms at EOIR, including a major shakeup of “Trump holdover” judges and managers who aren’t up to the job of running a system “laser-focused” on due process and fundamental fairness!
From “We’ve Never Been Smuggled Before” by Matthew Aikins in the NYT:
. . . .
But the plight of Afghan refugees can be an opportunity to rework migration and asylum policies for a future that will increasingly blur the distinction between traditional refugees and migrants fleeing economic and social disasters, including those that are the result of climate change.
It’s not just former translators and journalists who need help. Afghans migrating out of hunger and desperation are also the victims of the West’s failed war. Even if mass starvation is averted, Afghans will continue to leave their country, out of a combination of fear and because they want a better life. The Afghan middle class, which has seen its savings and livelihoods evaporate, will use the resources they have to emigrate. The outflow of Afghan migrants will not end in the short term; nor should it. Indeed, Afghan migration should be seen for what it is, a rational strategy undertaken by people who find agency in the midst of great adversity. Afghans are capable of helping their own communities, if we allow them. Remittances, or money sent home by migrants, contribute three times more to the developing world than international aid.
Whether we meet them with compassion and reason, or prejudice and violence, people will never stop trying to cross borders.
. . . .
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Read the complete article at the link.
The future will belong to countries that figure out how to harness the power of human migration and deal with its inevitability.
