Biden Border Strategy – immigrationcourtside.com

☠️ ⚰️ DEADLY “BIPARTISAN BORDER POLICIES” CONTINUE TO TAKE AN UGLY HUMAN TOLL 🤮 WHILE FAILING TO DETER REFUGEES FROM SEEKING PROTECTION, EVEN IF THEY DIE IN THE PROCESS! — Melissa Del Bosque Interviews Leader Of “No More Deaths” About Shocking Increase In Preventable Deaths Caused By Cruel, Costly, & Ineffective “Bipartisan Deterrence!” — As Innocents Die, The “Mainstream Media” Take A “Moral & Ethical Holiday!” 🤯

Melissa Del Bosque
Border Reporter
PHOTO: Melissadelbosque.com

Melissa reports in the latest issue of The Border Chronicle:

https://open.substack.com/pub/theborderchronicle/p/a-new-report-shows-skyrocketing-deaths?

Your paid subscription makes a difference at The Border Chronicle. Thank you for your support!

A New Report Shows Skyrocketing Deaths in El Paso, New Mexico Border Region

“It’s really just shocking how close to help a lot of people died,” says Bryce, who led the report for the nonprofit No More Deaths.

MELISSA DEL BOSQUE

APR 9

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Illustration from the new report. Each red dot represents a life lost.

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As safe corridors for migration disappear, more people risk their lives crossing the U.S.-Mexico border. And more people die. A new report by the nonprofit No More Deaths, along with a searchable map and database, documents the increasing number of migrant deaths at the border in New Mexico and far West Texas. Until now, not much research has been done on the deaths of people migrating through this section of the border. The project was led by Bryce, a No More Deaths volunteer (who asked that we not use his last name because the Far Right has recently been targeting the group). He, along with several others, have created the most comprehensive database to date of deaths in the Border Patrol’s El Paso Sector, which includes New Mexico and two counties in Texas, El Paso and Hudspeth. The report covers 15 years, from 2008 to 2023, and it shows many disturbing trends, including the acceleration of deaths that has accompanied “prevention through deterrence,” the U.S. government’s strategy implemented in the 1990s to push migrants into more remote, dangerous crossings. That strategy is now morphing into something all the more tragic as people, increasingly women and children, are barred from accessing asylum and are dying at the doorstep of American cities and towns. In this Q&A, Bryce talks about documenting these deaths, and the discoveries that both shocked and angered him in creating this new report.

Why did you study this particular part of the border in New Mexico and far West Texas?

A couple of years ago, a few of us started getting interested in what’s happening in New Mexico, and whether there’s any need for humanitarian aid out there, just because we hadn’t really heard anything but assumed there must be something happening out there. Quickly, we noticed that there was not much data in general about the area. So I started doing public records requests. And pretty quickly, just with the first batch of data, we got about 20 deaths for 2022. We went to some of those locations to see if we’d see trails. And while we were checking out some of these locations, we found human remains right across the street from a cemetery and about 50 feet from a main road in Sunland Park [New Mexico]. It was not a remote place. It was right in town. So we started looking at the Sunland Park Fire Department’s social media page, and quickly realized that there was a lot happening and quickly. And then 2023 ended up being this record deadly year for the area.

It’s shocking that you found a dead person right there in the middle of Sunland Park. Can you tell me more about this person? Were they identified? How long had the person been there? And how could this have been missed by people who live there?

He was later identified as a man from Colombia. [His name was Johan Orozco Martinez, age 36.] He had been there for a couple of days. I’m not joking when I say he was right across the street from the Memorial Pines Cemetery, and near the shoulder of the road. Many cars drive this road, but I think typically people look toward the cemetery, and I guess they didn’t see him because they were looking in the other direction. He was in his 30s and so older than many of the usually young men you see, for instance, crossing through southern Arizona.

Two findings that really stand out to me from your report are the number of women who have died, and how increasingly people are dying within city limits and no longer just in remote areas that are hard to access. I mean, you found a person in the middle of Sunland Park. What’s going on, do you think?

The dynamics of migration are complex. But one thing that seems pretty clear is that the asylum policies in the last few years have led to an increase in some of these deaths, just from people trying to get asylum and being prevented either by metering or by turnbacks. And then feeling they have no choice but to cross through the desert. A lot of people who are crossing are older, they’re women, they’re people with health problems. The demographics, we found, were much different in the El Paso sector than in southern Arizona, with people being older and more than 50 percent of the deaths in 2023 being of women, which is unusual.

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When did the deaths start increasing? And has the increasing militarization of the border and Operation Lone Star in El Paso contributed to these deaths?

Up until 2015, there were very few deaths in this area. But especially since 2018, the deaths have just been ramping up every single year. We were in New Mexico watching Operation Lone Star soldiers put up a barbed-wire fence between New Mexico and El Paso in an area where a lot of people cross. So once you’re in the United States, even crossing into Texas from the New Mexico side has become more deadly. And you can see National Guard in El Paso patrolling and pushing people back. The more enforcement, the more the deaths increase. In El Paso, there are what I call “moats” because if people climb the border wall, there’s an irrigation canal right on the other side, which at times can be moving very quickly. Then beyond that there’s multiple highways and more canals. So if someone is being chased by Border Patrol or Operation Lone Star, there are multiple deadly obstacles.

In 2022 there was a two-week period when 15 people died in the canals, one right after the other. This was during irrigation season in El Paso. Water is released from a reservoir in New Mexico into the canals and the river to irrigate farmland further east of El Paso. When that happens, the water can be going like 20 miles per hour. Unless somebody physically rescues you, there’s no way of getting out once you’ve fallen in. I watched a news broadcast in El Paso where they made a public service announcement about drowning deaths in El Paso, saying like, “Irrigation season is here, stay away from the canals, watch out for drowning.” But if you read all the autopsy reports, it’s almost all migrants dying. Because the medical examiner doesn’t flag whether it’s a migration-related death, you end up getting these weird statistics about drowning deaths being on the rise in El Paso. And so they’re directing these public safety messages toward El Paso residents who are actually in very little danger of drowning. And the people who are in danger of drowning, the migrants, have no idea.

Did you also find an increase in the deaths of children?

Definitely, yes. In 2018, two eight-year-old Guatemalan kids died. There’s a lot of teenagers dying, crossing the border wall, a lot of them drowning in El Paso city itself. For instance, there was a Russian man and his teenage daughter who both fell into a canal and drowned. They were running from Border Patrol agents. I believe that happened in 2021. We saw fewer deaths of younger people in New Mexico.

You also found that Customs and Border Protection is significantly undercounting deaths related to enforcement. Can you talk about this finding?

CBP is supposed to keep track of migrant deaths and CBP enforcement-related deaths, but we found that the agency is severely undercounting them. There’s been a lot of documentation in the past, talking about that fact, but there hasn’t been a whole lot of quantifying that undercount. Aside from the Arizona data that the Pima County Office of the Medical Examiner and Humane Borders have reported. For example, in one year we found 39 deaths, while CBP reported only 10 deaths.

We looked at investigator reports and so we were able to read the narratives, and learn circumstances around the deaths. We were able to see if someone was chased by Border Patrol, either on foot or by vehicle, or if they died in Border Patrol custody. We found that Border Patrol had tried to underplay some of these deaths.

We found that 15 percent of all migrant deaths in the El Paso sector were caused directly by Border Patrol due to chases or use of force, also due to custody deaths, or falls from the border wall. Humane Borders doesn’t track deaths related to Border Patrol enforcement. So this is the first instance that I’m aware of, where we are able to quantify the CBP undercount of Border Patrol-related deaths.

For 2022, for instance, we found 16 deaths that should have been reported by CBP as CBP-related deaths. CBP had only reported six of those deaths. Of the 16 we found, I think it’s still an undercount, because a lot of the investigative reports use vague or passive language about a person “jumping into the canal,” for instance. So you don’t know if the person was actually chased. So we only included cases where it’s very explicit.

What surprised you most in working on this report?

It’s really just shocking how close to help a lot of people died. I’m used to southern Arizona, where the terrain and trails are very remote. But we found people dying across the street from the cemetery, people dying a short walk from the Dollar General store. We’ve had this narrative of “prevention through deterrence” for the last few decades, which has pushed people away from cities into remote areas where they’re more prone to dying from heat exposure or something else. But now the border is militarized to the point where even Sunland Park, this suburb of El Paso, can be as deadly as the middle of nowhere in southern Arizona.

Last June, for instance, something like 40 percent more people died in Doña Ana County in New Mexico than the entire state of Arizona. Most of these deaths were close to the highway or close to a town. It’s a dynamic that has not really been studied. And the fact that it’s been happening for years without anybody really noticing is really scary.

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With these findings, are No More Deaths and other humanitarian groups mobilizing to do search-and-rescue and water drops in this area?

Like Texas, much of the land in New Mexico where people are dying is privately owned land, so it’s difficult to access for humanitarian groups.

We’ve been going there about once a month for the past year to try to organize some support. There’s a group that doesn’t have a name yet that we’ve started to work with, that’s putting out water in some of these areas. There’s another group from southern Arizona that has moved over to New Mexico to search for remains in the desert.

We’re hoping the news will spread and that others will join to help. We have some money to help out some groups that are forming. We’re really hoping that groups will form on their own for search-and-rescue and putting out water. Because right now, Border Patrol is the only game in town if you call 911 as a migrant. And Border Patrol has a horrible track record of actually helping anybody.

To get involved, learn more, or support humanitarian efforts, contact No More Deaths here.

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Border Death — Too many members of the so-called “mainstream media” are ignoring their moral, professional, and ethical duties to report honestly on the known, preventable “human collateral damage” resulting from both current and proposed anti-asylum “border enforcement” policies! It’s been going on for years, largely “under the political and media radar screens!” This is a monument for those who have died attempting to cross the US-Mexican border. Each coffin represents a year and the number of dead. It is a protest against the effects of Operation Guardian. Taken at the Tijuana-San Diego border.
Tomas Castelazo
To comply with the use and licensing terms of this image, the following text must must be included with the image when published in any medium, failure to do so constitutes a violation of the licensing terms and copyright infringement: © Tomas Castelazo, www.tomascastelazo.com / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 3.0

Two things stand out:

A complete lack of accountability for the misguided politicos and bureaucrats who are dishonestly pushing these immoral and ineffective policies without “owning up” to both the known deadly consequences and the lack of long-term “deterrent” value (even assuming, as I do not, that effective deterrence could justify immoral and illegal policies) of the actions they are touting; and
A complete abdication of professional journalistic standards and performance from the many members of the so-called “mainstream media” who fail to include in each report on draconian “border control” proposals and “policies” the deadly, well-documented human consequences of those policies and who provide a toxic forum for politicos and supposed “pundits” spouting myths and nativist propaganda about “border enforcement,” without presenting experts like Melissa, Todd Miller and many others who have actual experience with the unending trauma and futility caused by our current misguided, often flatly illegal, and clearly immoral approach to “border enforcement.”

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

04-10-24

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

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

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

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

Justice Department Silences Immigration Judges

Biden Refers to Immigrants as “Illegals”

How Does Asylum Work Right Now?

The Migrant’s Journey by Adam Isacson

Talking About Immigration in an Election Year

. . . . .

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

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

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

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

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

Yael Schacher
Historian
Director of Americas & Europe for Refugees International

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

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

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

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

03-09-24

😩TIRED OF PANDERING POLITICOS BASHING HUMAN RIGHTS & DEHUMANIZING BORDER COVERAGE BY THE MEDIA? — Here’s Some Straight Talk On The Border From Migration Expert Harvard Law Professor Gerald L. Neuman! ⚖️🗽 — “There is danger that any new legislation would decrease protection, which would mean that we would be taking no steps forward, and several steps backward, and that nonetheless, issues about migration would remain just as divisive as they are now.”🤯

Professor Gerald L. Neuman
J. Sinclair Armstrong Professor of International, Foreign, and Comparative Law
Harvard Law
PHOTO: Harvard Law

https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2024/02/immigration-roars-back-in-headlines-time-finally-come-for-reforms/

Liz Mineo, Staff Writer, interviews Professor Neuman in The Harvard Gazette:

. . . .

What should be done about border security, enforcement, and the immigration court backlog?

In terms of enforcement, there is no easy solution. A border fence is merely a symbol and no solution. Clearly, the adjudication system needs more resources, and adjustments to improve both efficiency and fairness. For both sides, justice delayed is justice denied, and that should be an important part of the focus.

Another priority, contrary to some claims, is to reduce reliance on detention. The U.S. is engaged in arbitrary detention of migrants who really don’t need to be detained; they could be subject to surveillance.

The country should also respect its international obligations not to send people back to countries where they will be persecuted, tortured, or killed. It cannot suspend its international obligations on that front, and it should not openly violate them, as it did under COVID.

What measures should be taken to reduce the flow of migrants into the U.S?

In terms of enforcement, the important point to stress is that this is not an issue that the U.S. can solve unilaterally. There must be a regional solution. It’s obvious to anyone who looks at the logistics of the problem that the solutions depend on cooperation with Mexico. Congress can’t just impose a solution and assume that Mexico will go along with it. More broadly, there are other countries that need to be involved in protecting refugees and in solving some of the problems that lead to migration.

Some experts say the asylum system is a parallel immigration system and that it should be revamped. What’s your take on this?

I’d like to use the term asylum broadly, not legalistically, to cover forms of protection from persecution, killing, and torture. The U.S. asylum system is too opaque and too inconsistent: Valid claims may be rejected, and claims that are made in perfectly good faith may turn out to be invalid.

On the other hand, some people seek desperately to come to the U.S. for reasons that are not covered by asylum, such as poverty, loss of livelihood, or to join family members. The system needs to winnow those claims out while remaining open to valid claims for protection. It would also benefit from greater clarity on which claims are valid, and from more consistent adjudication, but now, the system is not meeting its obligations to persecuted people.

Finally, what are your realistic hopes for changes in immigration policies?

For now, my hopes would be that any new legislation would increase funding and would help give the public the sense that the border situation is being addressed.

And meanwhile that the executive would use the authority that it already has to manage the situation better, including by negotiating with other countries. The executive should resist efforts that obstruct its compliance with its obligations.

There is danger that any new legislation would decrease protection, which would mean that we would be taking no steps forward, and several steps backward, and that nonetheless, issues about migration would remain just as divisive as they are now.

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Read the full (edited) interview at the link.

“Decrease protection” seems to be a toxic bipartisan goal of Congress and the Administration. What’s preventing it? They can’t agree on the amount of cruelty, suffering, and dehumanization to inflict on vulnerable forced migrants who overwhelmingly seek only to have the USG process their legal claims for protection in a fair and timely manner! That reality has clearly been lost in the rancid, one-sided, often secret “negotiations” in Congress; the insipid statements of the Biden Administration promising more border closures, cruel, inhuman, degrading, expensive, and wasteful detention; and treacherous “bipartisan” abrogation of well-established “life or death” legal rights to fair consideration of claims!

Professor Neuman says “this is not an issue that the U.S. can solve unilaterally.” There is general consensus among migration experts on this fundamental truth! Yet, Congress and the Administration keep pretending otherwise, with little critical, informed “pushback” from the media.

Why isn’t Kristen Welker interviewing Professor Neuman and other migration experts, rather than making “Meet the Press” a “Foxlike Forum” for those promoting White Nationalist lies about the border and national security? Welker hasn’t bothered to inform herself about the human lives and human rights involved with forced migration at the border. Therefore, her feeble attempts to stop GOP nativist politicos from rambling on with their border myths are somewhere between ineffective to pathetic, but certainly must be maddening to anyone involved with assisting the actual humans seeking protection under our dysfunctional legal system!

Remarkably, but not surprisingly, many of Professor Neuman’s points relate directly or indirectly to the failure of AG Merrick Garland (amazingly, a former Article III Circuit Judge) and his lieutenants to reform EOIR and get it working in “real time.” The ideas for fixing EOIR and the enlightened expert leadership to do it are available in the private sector. See, e.g., https://immigrationcourtside.com/2023/12/19/⚖%EF%B8%8F🤯👩🏽⚖%EF%B8%8F👨🏻⚖%EF%B8%8F-as-garlands-backlog-hits-3-million-way-past-time-to-clean/.

Garland’s inexcusable failure to fix EOIR and get it working fairly, professionally, expertly, and in real time is a drag on the Biden Administration immigration policies and an existential threat to our democracy!

Inexcusable indeed! 🤯

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

02-08-24

🏭 YES, WE CAN MANUFACTURE THINGS IN THE USA — THEY ARE DOING IT IN MAINE — Asylum Seekers & Other Migrants🗽 Are A Key Part Of It — But, Bad Government Policies Promoted By GOP Restrictionists & Wobbly Dems Undermine Our Nation’s Future As a Manufacturing Powerhouse!🤯

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/05/opinion/american-manufacturing-apparel-clothing.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

Rachel Slade writes in the NYT:

. . . .

That summer, I met Ben and Whitney Waxman, husband-and-wife co-founders of American Roots, who had been making all-U.S.-sourced clothing like hoodies and quarter-zips in Westbrook, just outside of Portland, Maine, since 2015. When the country hit pause, the Waxmans worried that demand for their wares would dry up. Without revenue to pay the rent on their factory space and their workers’ salaries, they knew that they’d lose their company in a few months.

To avoid that fate, they could make things the country desperately needed: masks and face shields. So the Waxmans asked their workers if they would be willing to return if they did all they could to make the factory safe. It was a big ask — vaccines were still a year away and information about how the virus spread was limited. In spite of the risks, every single employee said yes, energized by the idea that they could make a real difference at a moment of crisis.

The Waxmans shut down their factory to retool it for safe mask production. By that summer, they nearly quintupled their staff from 30 to 140-plus workers who were cranking out tens of thousands of American Roots’ custom-designed face masks for emergency workers and employees across the country.

Ben and Whitney had founded their company with a mission: to prove that capitalism and labor can work together to create community, good jobs and great products. They chose apparel making because it was fairly easy to get into and all components could be sourced domestically. All they needed was a few sewing machines and an army of workers willing to show up day after day. For these reasons, apparel manufacturing was one of the first industries to get offshored when tariffs were dropped following the signing of NAFTA in 1992. As a Maine native, Ben believed he was bringing back that lost industry — the state had once been a textile powerhouse — and through his mother, who had founded a locally sourced blanket and cape business, he had connections to get them started.

. . . .

I spent time on the shop floor and in the homes of their dedicated workers, many of whom are new Americans, who, with their families, had fled untenable, dangerous situations in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Iraq, Angola and other countries, and had found themselves in Maine, eager to build new lives there.

While I was learning about the ups and downs of the textile and apparel industry, I was also introduced to labor history. Ben Waxman had spent a decade at the A.F.L.-C.I.O., the largest federation of unions in the country, representing 12.5 million workers, working closely with President Richard Trumka. During that time, he witnessed the impact of offshoring with his own eyes, standing shoulder to shoulder with factory men and women as their livelihoods were shipped abroad and their pensions dwindled.

Haunted by what Ben had seen, he and Whitney made sure their employees were unionized from the get-go, that their workers earned a living wage, and received health insurance, vacation time, and sick leave to care for themselves and their families. “Our company’s economic philosophy is ‘Profit over greed,’ ” he told me. “We have to make a profit, but it will never be at the expense of our workers, our values or our products.” In that way, the Waxmans were well positioned to attract and retain a work force in a tight labor market.

. . . .

But what do manufacturers really need to build a resilient domestic supply chain? Topping their wish list is universal health care, which would unburden small manufacturers of approximately $17,000 per worker with a family per year, allowing American companies to compete with foreign producers, especially the technologically advanced European factories which are attracting high-end brands looking to make quality products closer to home.

But we also need to talk about formulating a new industrial policy, just as Alexander Hamilton and George Washington did at the moment of the country’s founding. A manufacturing-first agenda, one not just focused on green energy production and chip manufacturing, would funnel government resources toward policies that manufacturers need to remain robust. That includes job-training programs, transportation infrastructure, research and development funding, sectorwide coordination and financing support in every industry. The policy would also take a hard look at tariffs and intellectual property laws to protect American innovation, and encompass broad, clear guidelines for collective bargaining and environmental standards.

Shifting this country back to making things requires cleareyed policy that would stimulate all kinds of production that would, in turn, lift up those abandoned by the new tech and service economy. But there are so many additional benefits. Manufacturing jobs pay better than average and require less education for entry than many other industries. Apprentices learn their craft by doing. Manufacturing also offers diverse opportunities for people who aren’t so inclined to sit in front of a computer eight hours a day. We’ll need programmers, machinists, inspectors, thinkers, inventors, tinkerers: people who enjoy building things and working closely with machines that move and learn.

. . . .

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

Read Rachel’s full article at the link.

These are the things that “smart government” should be investing in for our future. Instead, politicos, including some so-called “fiscal conservatives,” are proposing outrageously expensive, cruel, counterproductive immigration enforcement gimmicks supposedly designed to discourage the very workers, innovators, entrepreneurs, and investors that American manufacturing needs, not to mention reducing the potential pool of eventual U.S. consumers.

Repealing or undermining “Obamacare” — as many in the GOP advocate — is pure idiocy! Exactly the WRONG direction for America!

Sound like disconnects? That’s because they are! Ones that responsible voters should no longer put up with!

The GOP’s racist rants about asylum seekers, and the failure of some Dem politicos to push back hard, is bad for America. They fly in the face of two truths: 1) American benefits from immigration, and 2) many of the immigrants we need are already here or at our borders. Instead of thinking of ways to screen and welcome them, we are wasting money and resources trying to deport them, deny or delay their legal work authorization, and discourage them from coming.

A recent report by Don Lee in the LA Times put it very succinctly:

And that resurgence of immigration has not only given the U.S. a modest gain in total population but also done something far more vital for the economy: It has fueled the nation’s workforce in the last year.

https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2024-01-09/california-immigration-driving-population-labor-force-growth?utm_id=123161&sfmc_id=2413253&skey_id=eb7798068820f2944081a20180a0d3a94e025b4a93ea9ae77c7bbe00367c46ef

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-10-24

🗽TIRED OF BORDER BS FROM NATIVIST POLS, MEDIA, & BUREAUCRATS? — Get The “Real Skinny” From The Experts, Yale-Loehr & Chishti on Nov. 7! — Zoom Option Available!

Professor Stephen Yale-Loehr
Cornell Law

Muzaffar Chishti
Senior Fellow
Migration Policy Institute
PHOTO: MPI

The Migrant Surge: What’s Different About It This Time?

Please join us on November 7, 2023, from 12:15 p.m. to 1:15 p.m. in Myron Taylor Hall G85 of Cornell Law School for a lunchtime seminar given by our guest Muzaffar Chishti and moderated by Stephen Yale-Loehr.

Food will be provided during the event, so please RSVP at https://cornell.ca1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_bxQgGPjwGJmgu8K

Join Mr. Chishti and Professor Yale-Loehr as they discuss the history of recent migrant flows to the U.S. border, the current migrant surge at the border, the impact on cities and states beyond the border, and possible impacts on federal immigration policy.

Muzaffar Chishti is a Senior Fellow at the non-partisan Migration Policy Institute (MPI) and Director of MPI’s office at New York University School of Law. He received his LLM from Cornell Law School in 1975.

Steve Yale-Loehr teaches immigration and asylum law at Cornell Law School as Professor of Immigration Practice and is of counsel at Miller Mayer in Ithaca, New York.

Can’t make it to our event in-person? You can attend virtually!

We are also livestreaming the event, so you can sign up to attend via Zoom at this link: https://cornell.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_RwEvxopRTWOfcootUY5-qA

Please feel free to distribute the link to anyone you feel would be interested in the seminar. All are welcome!

This event is co-sponsored by the Cornell Migrations Initiative.

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Sorry, “zoomers,” but you will have to provide your own food!☹️

“Open borders” is a dangerous myth pushed by GOP nativist pols and “closet nativist” Dems. In fact, the border has never been more fortified, inhospitable, and deadly than it is now. See, e.g., https://www.axios.com/2023/10/17/us-mexico-border-open-borders-myth. Border deaths are up. See, e.g., https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwj2_OP3opGCAxXjElkFHQjFDUUQFnoECBMQAw&url=https://www.voanews.com/a/iom-us-mexico-border-the-deadliest-land-crossing-in-the-world-/7297145.html#:~:text=Fatalities%20double%20in%20fiscal%202023,with%2071%20in%20fiscal%202022.&usg=AOvVaw1VipHkDxFBrakZDiwTcyB9&opi=89978449.

The Title 42 farce instituted by Trump, under false pretenses, to unjustly suspend asylum laws has expired. But, the Biden Administration has come up with its own scofflaw regulations and policies intended to “meter” the flow of legal asylum seekers at ports of entry and to improperly “punish” those who exercise their legal rights by entering and turning themselves in to CBP. Biden’s BIA continues to churn out unrealistic hyper-technical asylum precedents (that actually fly in the face of precedents like Cardoza-Fonseca and Mogharrabi) and wrong, anti-asylum decisions intended to “deter and discourage” asylum seekers from applying and to make it unnecessarily difficult, frustrating, and time consuming for pro bono lawyers to represent them!

Yet, desperate forced migrants continue to come. That’s hardly “rocket science” given that the world is experiencing record forced migration from various causes. See https://www.unhcr.org/sites/default/files/2023-06/global-trends-report-2022.pdf.

Contrary to the nativist myths, the U.S. does NOT bear the brunt of increased forced migration! Even in the Western Hemisphere, Colombia has many times more displaced Venezuelans than the U.S. Indeed, the U.S. experience, no matter how much it’s hyped or distorted by nativists and shallow media alarmists, is only a relatively modest slice of the pie. Over three quarters of the world’s forced migrants end up in low and middle income countries outside the U.S. https://www.unhcr.org/sites/default/files/2023-06/global-trends-report-2022.pdf. Yet, you would never know that from listening to the apocalyptic narrative of GOP nativists and their Dem “fellow travelers!”

Years of cruelty, dehumanization, fortification, imprisonment, prosecution, endangerment, harsh laws, family separations, racist rhetoric, illegal turn backs, and summary deportations of asylum seekers in the U.S. and at the border have demonstrably, and quite predictably, failed to stop or materially deter forced migration stemming from causes outside of U.S. legal policies. Yet, most of our “dialogue” about the U.S. border and immigration start with the bogus assumption that closing the border and unilaterally suspending due process and domestic and international legal obligations will effectively create “Fortress America” where no migrant will dare to tread!

A real discussion of the border and migration must reject nativist myths, racist tropes, and media alarmism by starting with the truth. That is:

Human migration is a real and inevitable worldwide phenominon;
No one nation-state can unilaterally stop or prevent human migration;
Because of climate change and political instability in the world, forced migration is likely to increase in the foreseeable future;
Seeking asylum is a basic legal and human right;
The U.S. will have to accept more migrants, whether legally (preferable) or extralegally (the alternative).

Only by “ditching” and getting beyond nativist myths can we develop solutions that will deal realistically and humanely with human migration. I’m hoping that these two knowledgeable migration and legal experts can get us beyond the myths and to a discussion of practical, achievable actions!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

10-25-23

🤮 AMERICAN ASYLUM POLICY: GOP POLITICOS PANDER, ADMINISTRATION BUILDS WALLS, DEMS PREPARE TO THROW ASYLUM SEEKERS UNDER THE BUS (AGAIN) — What Happens To Those Waiting To Use “CBP One” At The Border? — They Get Raped & Extorted! — “It’s the saddest, most horrible thing that can happen to a person!”

""Rape of the Sabine Women" — “Rape of the Sabine Women”
Peter Paul Rubens
Circa 1635
Public Domain

From Reuters:

https://www.voanews.com/a/migrants-being-raped-at-mexico-border-as-they-await-entry-to-us-/7291239.html

REYNOSA, MEXICO —

When Carolina’s captors arrived at dawn to pull her out of the stash house in the Mexican border city of Reynosa in late May, she thought they were going to force her to call her family in Venezuela again to beg them to pay $2,000 ransom.

Instead, one of the men shoved her onto a broken-down bus parked outside and raped her, she told Reuters. “It’s the saddest, most horrible thing that can happen to a person,” Carolina said.

A migrant advocate who assisted Carolina after the kidnapping, who spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity due to security concerns, confirmed all the details of her account.

The attack came amid an increase in sexual violence against migrants in the border cities of Reynosa and Matamoros, both major transit routes for immigrants seeking to enter the U.S., according to data from the Mexican government and humanitarian groups, as well as interviews with eight sexual assault survivors and more than a dozen local aid workers.

“The inhumane way smugglers abuse, extort, and perpetrate violence against migrants for profit is criminal and morally reprehensible,” U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) spokesperson Luis Miranda said in response to questions about the rise in reported rapes.

Criminal investigations into the rape of foreign nationals, excluding Americans, were the highest on record in the two cities this year, according to state data from 2014 to 2023 obtained by Reuters through freedom of information requests.

The U.S. State Department considers Tamaulipas, where the two cities are located, to be the most dangerous state along the U.S.-Mexico border.

. . . .

A Venezuelan migrant said he was kidnapped in May in Reynosa by a cartel while traveling to the border for his confirmed CBP One appointment. He couldn’t raise the full $800 ransom, so he was forced to work for two months to pay off the remaining $200, he said.

Two other migrants who said they were held at the house during the same time period confirmed the man was forced to work against his will, and that they heard female migrants being raped.

On the nights the Venezuelan man was tasked with standing guard over the other migrants, he said he watched the cartel members ask the man in charge of the house for permission to rape the women of their choosing.

He said the answer was always the same: “Take her.”

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

Read the full article at the link.

Walls, detention, eliminating the right to asylum aren’t going to solve this. But, solving it doesn’t seem to be the objective. Blaming the victims is a lot easier than treating them as human beings.

As my friend Debi Sanders (who alerted me to this report) said: “Terrifying!” Yup! 🤯🏴‍☠️

How disingenuous is the Biden Administration’s latest attempt to “get tough” at the border with more proven to fail deterrence? Well, just this week, DHS announced plans to deport more individuals to Venezuela. https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-restarting-direct-deportations-venezuela-senior-official-2023-10-05/

Yet, just a few days earlier, in deciding to extend TPS to nearly a half million Venezuelans in the US, that same DHS found:

Overview

Venezuela continues to face a severe humanitarian emergency due to a political and economic crisis, as well as human rights violations and abuses and high levels of crime and violence, that impacts access to food, medicine, healthcare, water, electricity, and fuel, and has led to high levels of poverty. Additionally, Venezuela has recently experienced heavy rainfall in the spring and summer of 2023 which triggered flooding and landslides. Given the current conditions in Venezuela, these issues contribute to the country’s existing challenges.

Venezuela is experiencing “an unprecedented political, economic, and humanitarian crisis.” ^[5]“Venezuela is suffering one of the worst humanitarian crises in the history of the Western Hemisphere,” which has been characterized by “[h]igh levels of poverty, food insecurity, malnutrition, and infant mortality, together with frequent electricity outages and the collapse of health infrastructure.” ^[6]Though there were some positive developments in Venezuela in 2022 “as the economy stabilized and showed signs of economic growth,” the effects of these changes were not felt across the Venezuelan population and did not offset the impact of the large-scale economic contraction which resulted in significant humanitarian challenges that continue today and will take time to address.^[7]

Political Repression and Human Rights

The Maduro regime has closed off channels for political dissent, restricting enjoyment of civil liberties and “prosecuting perceived opponents without regard for due process.” ^[8]The UN Human Rights Council’s Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela (IIFFM) found in its September 2022 report, “Venezuela’s military and civilian intelligence agencies function as well-coordinated and effective structures in the implementation of a plan” to “repress dissent.” ^[9]

Crime and Insecurity

Venezuela has one of the highest rates of violent deaths in the world.^[10]Additionally, “Venezuelans face physical insecurity and violence from several sources, including irregular armed groups, security forces, and organized gangs.” ^[11]Corruption in Venezuela exacerbates insecurity. InSight Crime has reported that “criminal groups and corrupt state actors together form a hybrid state that combines governance with criminality, and where illegal armed groups act at the service of the state, while criminal networks form within it.” ^[12]Human trafficking remains a serious concern. Traffickers exploit and subject Venezuelans, including those fleeing the country, to egregious forms of exploitation, including sex trafficking and forced labor.^[13]Members of non-state armed groups that operate in the country with impunity, subject Venezuelans to forced labor and forced criminality, and recruit or use child soldiers.^[14]

Economic Collapse

Since 2014, Venezuela has suffered from an “economic recession marked by hyperinflation, shortages of basic goods and a collapse in public services such as electricity and water.” ^[15]Recently, Venezuela’s economy has shown some signs of recovery; however, it is still in a precarious condition.^[16]In a report covering the period from May 2022 through April 2023, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) noted that while economic growth which occurred in 2022 “would bring hope for improved economic prospects, persistent challenges and other factors continued to negatively affect essential public services, transport, education, and health.” ^[17]

In its annual report covering 2022, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) noted “the high rates of poverty and inequality in the country, in which there are estimates that more than 90% of the population lives in poverty.” ^[18]The same report stated that “as of March 2022, HumVenezuela estimated that 94.5% of the population would not have sufficient income to cover items such as food, housing, health, education, transportation and clothing.” ^[19]

Health Crisis

Various sources have referred to severe problems with health systems in Venezuela, including the IACHR, Human Rights Watch, and the Congressional Research Service (CRS).^[20]Per The Associated Press, Venezuela’s “health care system crumbled long before” the start of the COVID–19 pandemic.^[21]Likewise, in its 2022 annual report, the IACHR acknowledged that while the COVID–19 pandemic “has had significant impacts on the health sector and the population, the serious affectations of the system preceded the health emergency.” ^[22]Elaborating on this topic, the IACHR identified “shortages of medicines, supplies, materials and medical treatment” as of 2018, and that the “situation has been worsening since 2014, and it is important to highlight that the health system has reportedly collapsed due to its persistent precariousness, which would have been exacerbated by the pandemic.” ^[23]

According to OHCHR, health centers in Venezuela “report structural underfunding and understaffing resulting in for example, regular blackouts and water shortages.” ^[24]In its report on the humanitarian situation in Venezuela in 2022, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) noted that “[h]ealth services continue to be affected by insufficient water and sanitation conditions and the lack of electricity supply in facilities.” ^[25]Similarly, Human Rights Watch stated in its annual report covering 2022 that “[p]ower and water outages at healthcare centers—and emigration of healthcare workers—were further weakening operational capacity.” ^[26]Furthermore, the IACHR has reported that “98% of the hospitals in the country lack medicines, electrical plants and water, as well as failures in laboratories, reagents and wards. As a result, it is estimated that only between 3 and 10% of the hospitals have medical and surgical material to solve medical circumstances.” ^[27]

Food Insecurity

In a humanitarian response plan published in 2023, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) identified food insecurity as “the most pressing challenge for the population.” ^[28]Human Rights Watch stated in its annual report covering 2022 that HumVenezuela reported in March 2022 that “most Venezuelans face difficulties in accessing food, with 10.9 million undernourished or chronically hungry. Some 4.3 million are deprived of food, sometimes going days without eating.” ^[29]Moreover, the IACHR noted in its 2022 annual report that “32% of children live in a situation of chronic malnutrition.” ^[30]

Heavy Rains and Flooding

Since May 26, 2023, as hurricane season began, Venezuela has experienced heavy rains which resulted in flooding that affected several areas of the country.^[31]According to ACAPS, “Between June and July there have been 19 tropical waves, that have brought heavy rains, floods and landslides across the country.” ^[32]As of July 11, 2023, the meteorological situation in Venezuela indicated “that rainfall and resulting damages are expected to be more severe than previous years.” ^[33]Reports of the damage caused by the heavy rains include 5,100 people affected with damage to houses and blockages in the drainage system in the state of Portuguesa.^[34]In another area—Delta Amacuro state—around 7,500 people are affected by the 2023 floods.^[35]

In summary, extraordinary and temporary conditions continue to prevent Venezuelan nationals from returning in safety due to a severe humanitarian emergency which has resulted in food insecurity and the inability to access adequate medicine, healthcare, water, electricity, and fuel. Additionally, human rights violations and abuses, high levels of poverty, high levels of crime and violence, and heavy rains and flooding prevent Venezuelan nationals from returning in safety and permitting Venezuelan noncitizens to remain in the United States temporarily would not be contrary to the interests of the United States.

Based on this review and after consultation with appropriate U.S. Government agencies, the Secretary has determined that:

• The conditions supporting Venezuela’s designation for TPS continue to be met. See INA sec. 244(b)(3)(A) and (C), 8 U.S.C. 1254a(b)(3)(A) and (C).

• There continues to be extraordinary and temporary conditions in Venezuela that prevent Venezuelan nationals (or individuals having no nationality who last habitually resided in Venezuela) from returning to Venezuela in safety, and it is not contrary to the national interest of the United States to permit Venezuelan TPS beneficiaries to remain in the United States temporarily. See INA sec. 244(b)(1)(C), 8 U.S.C. 1254a(b)(1)(C).

• The existing designation of Venezuela for TPS (Venezuela 2021) should be extended for an 18-month period, beginning on March 11, 2024 and ending on September 10, 2025. See INA sec. 244(b)(3)(C), 8 U.S.C. 1254a(b)(3)(C).

• Due to the conditions described above, Venezuela should be redesignated for TPS beginning on October 3, 2023, and ending on April 2, 2025. See INA sec. 244(b)(1)(C) and (b)(2), 8 U.S.C. 1254a(b)(1)(C) and (b)(2).

For the redesignation, the Secretary has determined that TPS applicants must demonstrate that they have continuously resided in the United States since July 31, 2023.

Initial TPS applicants under the redesignation must demonstrate that they have been continuously physically present in the United States since October 3, 2023, the effective date of the redesignation of Venezuela for TPS.

There are approximately 243,000 current Venezuela TPS beneficiaries who are eligible to re-register for TPS under the extension.

It is estimated that approximately 472,000 additional individuals may be eligible for TPS under the redesignation of Venezuela. This population includes Venezuelan nationals in the United States in nonimmigrant status or without immigration status.

https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2023-10-03/pdf/2023-21865.pdf

Does this sound like a country that will “ensure orderly, safe and legal repatriation?” Duh!

As for the DHS attempt to “blame the victims” for not taking advantage of legal opportunities, the legal right to apply for asylum in the U.S. attaches at the border to ANYONE “who arrives in the United States (whether or not at a designated port of arrival and including an alien who is brought to the United States after having been interdicted in international or United States waters), irrespective of such alien’s status.” INA, section 208.

With huge backlogs at both the Asylum Office and EOIR, and some problematic adjudicators, judges, administrators, and poor precedents, just how could hundreds of thousands of legal removals take place without huge systemic changes that to date the Administration has failed to make at either DHS or EOIR? Sounds like a prescription for massive legal and human rights violations!☠️

Yes, we’re going to hear chants of “we can’t take them all” from all sides. But, the truth that few acknowledge is that we haven’t and won’t be “taking them all” — not by a long shot! Of the more than 7 million who have fled the Maduro regime in Venezuela, only approximately 10% (about 750,000) have come to the U.S.! https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-66875264. The vast, vast majority — approximately 90% — have taken refuge elsewhere in Latin American, in poorer countries far less able than the U.S. to absorb them! But, hey, when does truth and reality ever enter into the U.S. political debate on immigration?

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

10-05-23

🇺🇸🗽💡THE VIEW FROM MAINE IS CLEARER! — Dan Kolbert Of Portland “Gets” What Politicos Of Both Parties Don’t — Migration Happens, Embrace It, Don’t Fear It!😎🇺🇸

https://www.pressherald.com/2023/07/14/maine-voices-no-walls-are-high-enough-to-keep-out-people-desperate-for-a-safe-place/

Dan Kolbert in the Portland Press Herald:

MAINE VOICES Posted Yesterday at 4:00 AM

INCREASE FONT SIZE

Maine Voices: No walls are high enough to keep out people desperate for a safe place

Instead of wasting precious time trying to shut today’s refugees out, we can prepare for them in a way that could benefit all of us.

BY DAN KOLBERTSPECIAL TO THE PRESS HERALD

A young girl jumps rope inside the Portland Expo, home to several hundred asylum seekers. Much of the world’s population will be on the move, trying to survive, as sea levels and temperatures rise. Brianna Soukup/Staff Photographer

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dan Kolbert has lived in Portland’s West End since 1988. He is a building contractor and an author.

In Central America, where corn was first cultivated over millennia and is still the home of many important seed bases, a drought is entering its second decade. It is possible that agriculture will soon be impossible there, along with many parts of Africa and Asia. Rising sea levels will mean many low-lying islands will disappear, and coastal cities will be forced to retreat or be swamped.

All of this means that much of the world’s population will be on the move, searching for a way to survive. Estimates top 1 billion people by mid-century. Here in Portland, we are already seeing previously unimaginable levels of immigration, with hundreds of recent arrivals sleeping in a sports arena, and housing shortages and rising rents forcing many new and established Mainers into the many homeless encampments dotting the city. And we are just getting started.

There are no walls high enough to keep out people desperate for a safe place for them and their families. So we can either spend the precious time that remains on a futile, and cruel, effort to keep people out, or we can prepare for them in a humane way that could have enormous benefits for all of us, new and old Mainers alike.

The first step is housing, and plenty of it. Multi-family housing in Maine has undergone a sea change in recent years. We can build healthy, functional housing with very low heating and cooling loads for much less than all the mediocre, drafty single-family houses we currently build. Greater Portland is home to much of the most expensive real estate in the state, but imagine if we could have planned development surrounding some other cities, like Bangor or Lewiston. Or even smaller population centers like Skowhegan, Farmington or Rumford. We are a sparsely populated state with an aging population – immigrant families could revitalize many parts of the state. In addition to the workforce we desperately need, they would bring children to boost shrinking school enrollments, new cultures and foods, and new outlooks. And of course it would be a big boost to the economies of parts of the state that haven’t always shared in the boom.

Next is finding work for people. We have already seen many immigrants going into health care, and our aging U.S.-born population will only need more services. Some Africans have taken up farming, helping revitalize that economy. In southern Maine, Central Americans are increasingly showing up in construction, where a 20-year-long labor shortage has created enormous demand. And many people show up with important professional skills, needing only some help with language and certifications to resume careers as doctors, engineers, teachers, administrators, etc. Of course we need to reform the work rules, to allow people to find employment much sooner.

It was disappointing to read of the events in Unity. Imagine using this existing, underutilized infrastructure for temporary housing! How many of these new arrivals might see central Maine as a safe, friendly place to establish their new lives?

I am a new Mainer myself, having only lived here for 35 of my 59 years, but my kids can trace their lineage in Maine and Quebec for over 300 years on their mother’s side. As the son of a refugee from the Nazis, I am perhaps more sympathetic to the plight of today’s refugees than others are, but I hope that we can see this as an opportunity to invest in our state, and to demonstrate basic humanity toward people who just want to live.

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

You can listen to the audio version at the link!

Dan definitely has the right idea! Seems like what’s needed is 1) leadership, 2) organization to match people and skills to local needs, and 3) some “seed money” to get an affordable housing program going.

Dan’s clear vision reminds me of a prescient article by author and Time Nation Editor Haley Sweetland Edwards that I featured in Courtside in Jan 2019. https://immigrationcourtside.com/2019/01/27/inconvenient-truth-haley-sweetland-edwards-time-tells-what-trump-miller-cotton-sessions-their-white-nationalist-gang-dont-want-you-to-know-human-migration-is-a-powerful-force-as-old/

Haley said:

The U.S., though founded by Europeans fleeing persecution, now largely reflects the will of its Chief Executive: subverting decades of asylum law and imposing a policy that separated migrant toddlers from their parents and placed children behind cyclone fencing. Trump floated the possibility of revoking birthright citizenship, characterized migrants as “stone cold criminals” and ordered 5,800 active-duty U.S. troops to reinforce the southern border. Italy refused to allow ships carrying rescued migrants to dock at its ports. Hungary passed laws to criminalize the act of helping undocumented people. Anti-immigrant leaders saw their political power grow in the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Sweden, Germany, Finland, Italy and Hungary, and migration continued to be a factor in the Brexit debate in the U.K.

These political reactions fail to grapple with a hard truth: in the long run, new migration is nearly always a boon to host countries. In acting as entrepreneurs and innovators, and by providing inexpensive labor, immigrants overwhelmingly repay in long-term economic contributions what they use in short-term social services, studies show. But to maximize that future good, governments must act -rationally to establish humane policies and adequately fund an immigration system equipped to handle an influx of newcomers.

The unmitigated human rights and racial justice disasters of the Trump years and the troubling difficulty the Biden Administration has had getting beyond that debacle reinforce the accuracy and inevitability of what Haley and Dan are saying.

The future will belong to those nations that learn how to welcome migrants, treat them humanely, screen and accept many of them in a timely, orderly, minimally bureaucratic manner, and utilize their energy, determination, ingenuity, and life skills to build a better future for all.

The open question is whether the U.S. will be among those successful future powers. Or, will the cruel, unrealistic, racially-driven, restrictionist nativism of the GOP right drive us to continue to waste inordinate resources fruitlessly trying to deny, deter, and prevent the inevitable, thus ultimately forcing us down to second or even third tier status. TBD.

In the meantime, here’s another great article from the PPH about how Mainers have led the fight to protect individual rights and freedoms while advancing American progressive values in contravention of the authoritarian neo-fascism sweeping over some so-called “red” states.

Maine has tacked left as nation lurches right in culture wars

Embracing the state motto – ‘I lead’ – Maine lawmakers led in a different direction, safeguarding and expanding access to abortion and gender-affirming care.

Read the full article here!

https://www.pressherald.com/2023/07/09/maine-has-tacked-left-as-nation-lurches-right-in-culture-wars/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Daily+Headlines%3A++RSS%3AITEM%3ATITLE&utm_campaign=PH+Daily+Headlines+ND+-+NO+SECTIONS

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

07-15-23

🏴‍☠️🤯 USG’S FAILED DETERRENCE POLICIES HARM ASYLUM SEEKERS, ENRICH & ENABLE CARTELS! — New Report From Insight Crime! — “The prevention through deterrence policies used by the US government have created an increasingly lucrative black market for human smuggling.”

MEXICAN CARTELS NAME STEPHEN MILLER “BIDEN ADMINISTRATION PERSON OF THE YEAR” FOR HIS CONTINUING DEADLY INFLUENCE ON U.S. BORDER POLICIES! Attribution: Stephen Miller Monster by Peter Kuper, PoliticalCartoons.com

Insight Crime reports:

https://substack.com/redirect/16f2dc60-a5f2-48e3-89db-9b2eb639d861?j=eyJ1IjoiMmQzZTIifQ.YnB6oyRxafApuirRPkrfQupKbpWIvJ3g2zVXvim2p28

Executive Summary

In 2019, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP).1 What would become known as “remain in Mexico” was the latest in a decades-long effort by successive Republican and Democrat administrations to curb migration by making it increasingly difficult for migrants to enter and stay in the United States.

However, the policies have had numerous unintended consequences, including bolstering criminal organizations along the US-Mexico border. Whereas the smuggling of drugs and weapons used to dominate the cross-border contraband trade, human smuggling has morphed into one of the most lucrative industries for crime groups. It also has made it increasingly dangerous for migrants who face more risks en route and along the US border.

This report aims to highlight the role US policy has played in this transformation, which continues to evolve today. Specifically, it analyzes the ways in which Mexican organized crime groups have become involved in human smuggling as risks rose, prices surged, and migrants began to move through less-traveled corridors. The goal is to inform policymakers who are looking to address irregular migration and combat Mexico’s criminal organizations. We also aim to provide relevant stakeholders with opportunities for positive intervention to mitigate this human suffering by targeting the most violent criminal actors.

The findings are based on two years of desktop and field research across the Mexican states of Baja California, Chihuahua, Coahuila, Sonora, and Tamaulipas, where human smuggling is prominent. It includes dozens of in- person and remote interviews with migrants, asylum seekers, US and Mexican prosecutors, security experts, government officials, religious leaders, and migrant advocates, among others. In addition, we analyzed government data on human smuggling investigations and prosecutions, judicial cases, and previous studies on the topic.

1 US Department of Homeland Security (DHS), “Migrant Protection Protocols,” 24 January 2019.

insightcrime.org 4

Unintended Consequences: How US Immigration Policy Foments Organized Crime on the US-Mexico Border

2

Major Findings

insightcrime.org 5

1. The prevention through deterrence policies used by the US government have created an increasingly lucrative black market for human smuggling. Transnational criminal networks have assumed greater control over the movement of people and replaced the personalized, community-based nature of human smuggling that once existed.

2. The US government’s immigration policies have provided more opportunities for organized criminal groups to victimize migrants. The policies have, most notably, created a bottleneck along the US-Mexico border where northbound migrants are forced to congregate as they determine whether they are eligible to seek asylum and contemplate alternative ways to enter the country. As a result, they have become highly susceptible to extortion and kidnapping. And over time, restrictive immigration policies have expanded the scope of these lucrative, secondary criminal economies.

3. The US government’s immigration policies and the externalization of immigration enforcement to countries like Mexico have expanded the breadth of official corruption. As the US government has increased its reliance on third countries for enforcement and pushed migrants to remain in these countries, officials from these nations have expanded their illegal operations. These include extortion, kidnapping, and human smuggling rackets.

. . . .

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

Read and listen to the full report at the above link.

In many ways, this detailed report, based on two years of desk and field research, is a “Duh!” It mostly confirms what experts, advocates, and those who truly understand asylum law and border security have been saying for years. Arrogant politicos from both parties have “tuned out the truth” and suggestions for positive changes, for different reasons.

The GOP has no interest in the truth because it conflicts with and undermines their racist false narrative about “open borders” and “replacement theory.” The Dems, by contrast, basically recognize the racist lies behind the GOP “close the border” narrative. But, once in office, Dem “leaders” lack the political and moral courage to stand up for human rights, the rule of law, and to make the refugee, asylum, and legal immigration systems work, at the border, abroad, and in the interior.

In other words, while nominally opposing the GOP’s nativist/racist/alarmist rhetoric (particularly during elections when votes from progressives and ethic communities are needed), Dem leaders basically accept much of the restrictionist premise. That is, that increased regular legal immigration resulting from well-functioning refugee, asylum, and legal immigration systems that comply with existing laws and due process would be politically unpopular and that the Administration lacks the self-confidence and expertise to manage legal immigration, including asylum, in an orderly, professional, and competent manner that ultimately will greatly benefit both our nation and the immigrants.

Thus, experts and advocates find themselves continually isolated in a deadly and frustrating “no-persons’ land!’ They are armed with undeniable truth and the facts to back it up, yet for transcendent reasons, neither party will give them the time of day.

So, those with the answers are stuck in an endless cycle of law suits, toothless protests, letters in opposition, focus groups, op-eds, law review articles, talking heads, and blogs (like this one) none of which offer much hope of a durable solution. And, in the meantime, the cartels are loving every minute of political failure on the part of America!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

07-03-23

☹️ WORLD REFUGEE DAY 2023 (JUNE 20) IN AMERICA: More Asylum Seekers Denied Access; Flubbed Resettlement; Kids Face Court Alone; NGOs Left To Pick Up Slack!

Kids are among the many groups of refugees and asylum seekers ill-served by the Biden Administration’s policies and performance. “World Refugee Day 2023” is a rather grim reminder of America’s failure to live up to its obligations to the world’s most vulnerable!
Creative Commons License

ACCESS DENIED

Hamed Aleaziz reports for the LA Times:

https://apple.news/AnR6bRRRoSxm4nMAHyNOLXQ

A new Biden administration policy has dramatically lowered the percentage of migrants at the southern border who enter the United States and are allowed to apply for asylum, according to numbers revealed in legal documents obtained by The Times. Without these new limits to asylum, border crossings could overwhelm local towns and resources, a Department of Homeland Security official warned a federal court in a filing this month.

The new asylum policy is the centerpiece of the Biden administration’s border efforts.

Under the new rules, people who cross through a third country on the way to the U.S. and fail to seek protections there are presumed ineligible for asylum. Only people who enter the U.S. without authorization are subject to this new restriction.

The number of single-adult migrants who are able to pass initial screenings at the border has dropped from 83% to 46% under the new policy, the Biden administration said in the court filing. The 83% rate refers to initial asylum screenings between 2014 and 2019; the new data cover the period from May 12, the first full day the new policy was in place, through June 13.

Since the expiration of Title 42 rules that allowed border agents to quickly turn back migrants at the border without offering them access to asylum, the administration has pointed to a drop in border crossings as proof that its policies are working.

But immigrant advocates and legal groups have blasted Biden’s new asylum policy, arguing that it is a repurposed version of a Trump-era effort that made people in similar circumstances ineligible for asylum. (Under Biden’s policy, certain migrants can overcome the presumption that they are ineligible for asylum.) The ACLU and other groups have sought to block the rule in federal court in San Francisco, in front of the same judge who stopped the Trump policy years ago.

The new filing provides the first look at how the Biden administration’s asylum policy is affecting migrants who have ignored the government’s warnings not to cross the border.

“This newly released data confirms that the new asylum restrictions are as harsh as advocates warned,” said Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, policy director at the American Immigration Council. “The data contradicts conservative attacks on the rule for being too lenient. Less than 1 in 10 people subject to the rule have been able to rebut its presumption against asylum eligibility.”

. . . .

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

Read Hamed’s full story at the link.

None of the statistics cited in the article actually give a full picture, since the don’t account for 1) families, 2) children, and 3) those processed at ports of entry using the highly controversial “CBP One App.” Nor do they give insights into what happens to those denied access to the asylum adjudication system.

As Aaron Reichlin-Melnick points out, increased rejections of legal access are exactly what experts, including our Round Table of Former Immigration Judges, predicted in vigorously opposing the Administration’s ill-advised regulatory changes. See, e.g., https://immigrationcourtside.com/2023/03/27/⚔️🛡-round-table-joins-chorus-of-human-rights-experts-slamming-biden-administrations-abominable-death-to-asylum-seekers-☠️-proposed/.

In the article, DHS official Blas Nuñez-Neto babbles on about the wonders of mindless extralegal enforcement as a “deterrent.” In a classic example of disingenuous misdirection, Nuñez-Neto appears to suggest that “success” in implementing asylum laws should be measured in terms of the number of individuals denied access or discouraged from applying.

Actually, success in implementing asylum laws should be measured solely by whether 1) all asylum applicants regardless of status or where they apply are treated fairly and humanely; and 2) those eligible for asylum under a properly generous, protection-focused application of asylum laws are actually granted asylum in a timely manner complying with due process. By those measures, there is zero (O) evidence that the Biden Administration’s approach is “successful.”

Moreover, Nuñez-Neto’s comments and much of the media focus skirt the real issue here. Border apprehensions have decreased because asylum seekers in Northern Mexico appear to be “waiting to see” if the “CBP One App System” at ports of entry actually offers them a fair, viable, orderly way of applying for asylum. In other words, does the Biden Administration’s legal asylum processing system have “street credibility?”

So far, CBP One and DHS appear determined to “flunk” that test; the App continues to be plagued with technical and access glitches, and the numbers of appointments available is grossly inadequate to meet the well-known and largely predictable demand.

If the border lurches out of control in the future, it probably will be not the fault of legal asylum seekers. Rather, it will be caused by poorly-conceived and legally questionable Biden “deterrence policies” and the restrictionist politicians (in both parties, but primarily the GOP) who are “egging them on.” That is, an Administration unable to distinguish its friends from its enemies and unwilling to develop a comprehensive strategy for dealing with the inevitably of refugee flows by creatively and positively using and “leveraging” the ample (if imperfect) existing tools under our legal system.

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

ADMINISTRATION’S FLUBBED RESETTLEMENT (NON) EFFORT EMPOWERS GOP WHITE NATIONALISTS, VEXES PROGRESSIVE DEMS

Nick Miroff & Joanna Slater report for WashPost:

NEW YORK — On the fourth day of his new life in New York City, Antony Reyes set out from the opulent lobby of Manhattan’s Roosevelt Hotelwith an empty wallet and the address of a juice bar on Broadway possibly offering some work.

Reyes had been staying at the crowded hotel-turned-emergency service center, hunting odd jobs during the day along with other newly arrived Venezuelans who navigated the streets of midtown using “Las Pantallas”— the Screens (a.k.a. Times Square) as a landmark.

“I just want to work,” Reyes said in Spanish. “I didn’t come here to be a burden on anyone.”

Reyes, 23, was among the tens of thousands of migrants who rushed to cross the U.S.-Mexico border ahead of May 11, when the Biden administration lifted the pandemic policy known as Title 42. The largest group were Venezuelans, who have been arriving to the United States in record numbers since 2021.

Unlike previous waves of Latin American immigrants who gravitated to communities where friends and family could receive them, the most recent Venezuelan newcomers tend to lack those networks in the United States. Many have headed straight to New York, whose shelter system guarantees a bed to anyone regardless of immigration status.

City officials say they are housing more than 48,000 migrants across an array of hotels, dormitories and makeshift shelters that now spans 169 emergency sites.

New York has spent $1.2 billion on the relief effort since last summer. The ballooning costs have left Mayor Eric Adams feuding with local leaders upstate over who should take responsibility for the migrants, and he has also called out President Biden, a fellow Democrat, for not sending more aid.

Other U.S. cities are struggling with the influx too. Denver, Philadelphia and Washington — all cities with Democratic mayors — have received migrants bused from Texas as part of a campaign by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott to denounce Biden administration border policies. In Chicago, migrants have slept in police stations while awaiting shelter beds.

Officials in those cities are scrambling to find bed space and clamoring for more federal assistance. But the ad hoc nature of the humanitarian effort raises questions about the ability of New York City and other jurisdictions to receive and resettle so many newcomers.

The flow of Venezuelans crossing the southern border has dropped since the Title 42 policy ended, even as many continue arriving in cities in northern Mexico in hopes of reaching the United States. The Biden administration is tightening border controls and urging Venezuelans and others to apply for legal U.S. entry using a mobile app, while expanding the number of slots available for asylum seekers to make an appointment at an official border crossing.

The number of people requesting appointments, however, far outstrips supply.

The influx of migrants in New York has pushed the city’s total shelter population to 95,000, up from 45,000 when Adams took office in January 2022.

“We have reached a point where the system is buckling,” Anne Williams-Isom, deputy mayor for health and human services, told reporters at a news conference in late May.

. . . .

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

Read the rest of Nick’s & Joanna’s article at the link.

This Administration has been in office more than two years, with knowledge of the inevitable flow of asylum seekers, particularly from Venezuela and access to some of the best and most innovative human rights experts in the private sector.

Yet, this Administration has failed to 1) put in place an orderly nationwide resettlement system in partnership with the many NGOs and some localities “already in the business;” 2) construct “regional reception centers” to provide food, shelter, representation, and support to asylum seekers during the legal process, as recommended by many experts, and 3) restore functionality and timeliness to the legal asylum systems at USCIS and EOIR by a) cleaning out the “deadwood” (or worse) accumulated during the Trump Administration, and b) hiring experts, not afraid to properly use asylum and other laws to “protect rather than reject” and to replace the anti-asylum culture and legal regimes installed and encouraged at DHS and EOIR under Tump.

Additionally, most Venezuelans can’t be returned anyway, and the Administration’s apparent hope to “orbit” many of them to Mexico, a country far less able to absorb them than than the U.S., is ill-advised at best.

Consequently, updating TPS for Venezuelans and others, thus providing employment authorization and keeping them out of the already dysfunctional asylum system, should have been a “no brainer” for this Administration.

This is a truly miserable absence of creative, practical problems-solving by a group that ran on promises to do better. Given the shortage of affordable housing in NY and other areas, why not “replicate and update” the CCC, WPA, and other public works projects from FDR’s “New Deal?”

Give those arriving individuals with the skill sets opportunities to construct affordable housing for anyone in need, with an chance to live in the finished product as an added incentive! Let migrants be contributors and view their presence as an opportunity to be built upon rather than as a “problem” that can’t be solved.

Not rocket science! 🚀 But, evidently “above the pay grade” for Biden Administration immigration policy wonks!

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

CONSTITUTION MOCKED BY ALL THREE BRANCHES AS KIDS CONTINUE TO FACE IMMIGRATION COURT ALONE!

https://documentedny.com/2023/06/20/unaccompanied-minors-immigration-court-asylum/

GIULIA MCDONNELL NIETO DEL RIO reports for Documented:

The 10-year-old boy sat in a chair that was too big for him and he asked the immigration judge in Spanish if he could speak to the court.

“Please, don’t deport me,” the boy, Dominick Rodriguez-Herrera, pleaded into the microphone. “I want to stay with my brother.”

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Then he buried his head into his mother’s stomach as they embraced, tears welling in both their eyes. “Don’t cry,” his mother told him softly, with one arm around Dominick, and the other holding her two-month-old son who whined on her shoulder.

Also Read: The Central American Minors Program Struggles to Get Back on Its Feet

The family, from Guatemala, was at the Broadway immigration court in Lower Manhattan last week for an initial hearing in Dominick’s immigration case. Dominick had crossed the U.S.-Mexico border alone in March of 2022, and was designated as an unaccompanied minor.

Dominick’s mother, Nelly Herrera, told Documented the ordeal began when they were both kidnapped in Mexico and separated. She said Dominick escaped their captors and reached the U.S. border. Malnourished and thin from weeks of little food, he managed to squeeze through a wall into California, although she’s not sure where. He was only eight years old, and had no idea where his mother was.

“He doesn’t talk about all that a lot because he says it’s something he doesn’t want to be reminded of anymore,” she said.

After authorities helped Herrera escape her captors in Mexico, she and Dominick were reunited last year. Now, without a lawyer, they are fighting for a chance for Dominick to stay with her in the U.S.

At a time when immigration courts are struggling to manage the high volume of migrants coming to New York City, another section of the system is facing a high volume of deportation cases: those of unaccompanied minors – children who entered the U.S. when they were under the age of 18, without a parent. Many of them show up to court without an attorney, and advocates are concerned that there aren’t enough resources to reach all of them.

“We are definitely seeing an uptick in the numbers,” said Sierra Kraft, executive director of a coalition called the Immigrant Children Advocates Relief Effort (ICARE).

Kraft said she observed the juvenile docket several times this year and found hundreds of children had come to court without legal representation.

“There was a little two year old that was sitting there with a sponsor, and they had no representation and really no idea what to do next. So it’s a real crisis,” Kraft said.

. . . .

At a Senate hearing on the safety of unaccompanied migrant children in Congress last week, Lorie Davidson, Vice President of Children and Family Services at Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, testified that most unaccompanied children do not have an attorney to represent them.

“I do not know of any other circumstances in which a three-year-old would have to represent themselves in court. It is indefensible,” Davidson said at the hearing.

. . . .

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

Read Giulia’s complete article at the link.

Administrations of both parties have employed and disgracefully defended this clearly unconstitutional, due-process-denying process. The “low point” was probably during the Obama Administration when an EOIR Assistant Chief Immigration Judge infamously claimed that he could “teach asylum law to toddlers” — touching off an avalanche of internet satire. See https://www.aclu.org/video/can-toddlers-really-represent-themselves-immigration-court.

But, the Executive has had plenty of help from Congress and the Article III Courts, who both have failed to end this mockery of constitutional due process as well as common sense. It’s hard to imagine a more glaring, depressing example of failure of public officials to take their oaths of office seriously!

On the other hand, NY Immigration Judge Olivia Cassin, mentioned in the full article, is the right person for the job of handling the so-called “juvenile docket” at EOIR. A true expert in immigration and human rights laws, she came to the job several decades ago with deep experience and understanding gained from representing individuals pro bono in Immigration Court.

She is a model of what should be the rule, not the exception, for those sitting on the Immigration Bench at both the trial and appellate levels. Although AG Garland has done somewhat better than his predecessors in “balancing” his appointments, EOIR still skews far too much toward those with only prosecutorial experience or lacking ANY previous immigration and human rights qualifications.

Consequently, poor, inconsistent, and uneven judicial performance remains endemic at EOIR and not sufficiently addressed by Garland in his two plus years in office. Just another reason why Garland’s failing courts are running a 2 million case backlog and are unable to provide the nationwide due process, guidance, leadership, and consistency that EOIR was supposedly created to furnish.

Brilliant, well-qualified, and committed as individuals like Judge Cassin are, they are not going to be able to solve this problem without some help and leadership from above. Sadly, this doesn’t appear got be on the horizon.

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

UPHOLDING THE RULE OF LAW & HUMAN DECENCY FOR REFUGEES HAS BEEN LEFT LARGELY TO NGOs IN LIGHT OF THE USG’S SYSTEMIC FAILURE

Jenell Scarborough, Pathway to Citizenship Coordinator at **EL CENTRO HISPANO INC, reports on Linkedin on a on a more optimistic note about the activities of those who actually are working to preserve and extend the rule of law and human decency to refugees:**

What a way to celebrate World Refugee Day, with a community listening section where we meet community leaders who every day make extraordinary efforts to join forces and serve Immigrants and Refugees. We’re not just hearing from Eva A. Millona Chief, USCIS Office of Citizenship, Partnership and Engagement and the Chief of Foreign Affairs for Foster America.
Thanks to Cristina España for keeping us connected with local government agencies and making visible the work of grassroots organizations, where El Centro Hispano works tirelessly. Without a doubt a great night!

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

Way to go, Jenell. Encouraging to know that you are taking our legal obligations to refugees seriously, even if too many USG officials in all three branches aren’t! (Eva A. Millona of USCIS, mentioned in the post appears to be a rare exception among those in leadership positions within this Administration).

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

🇺🇸 MAKE EVERY DAY WORLD REFUGEE DAY, & Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-21-23

🇺🇸🗽😎 FACED WITH GOP GOV’S CRUEL STUNTS, BIDEN ADMINISTRATION’S INDIFFERENCE TO HUMAN RIGHTS, GOOD FOLKS IN SACRAMENTO JUST “DO THE RIGHT THING” & WELCOME MIGRANTS — “I’m hoping to have a good life here and I was welcomed with open arms,” one woman wrote. “I want to work and serve. We are here to help.”

http://enewspaper.latimes.com/infinity/article_share.aspx?guid=fbb1f5c1-f13f-4dac-b153-d626bff1ae79

Mackenzie Mays reports for the LA Times:

With clothing, food and shelter, church groups aid people flown to California on chartered flights arranged by Florida officials, which many in this state call a political stunt

By Mackenzie Mays

SACRAMENTO — On the same day that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration took responsibility for sending dozens of migrants seeking asylum to California, the volunteers and organizers inside the Trinity Episcopal Cathedral of Sacramento refused to say the Republican politician’s name.

Instead, they wanted to talk about the 36 men and women they’ve cared for this week, who they say were left exhausted, confused and afraid at the doorstep of a local church in what California officials have called a political stunt.

Gabby Trejo, executive director of Sacramento Area Congregations Together, said the migrants she took to church with her on Sunday — some who had walked thousands of miles over the course of several months from Venezuela to the U.S. — reached into their pockets to offer a dollar for the collection plate.

“I said, no, you need it more than our church does today. But they didn’t care. They still put it in the plate,” Trejo said. “In that moment, our new neighbors showed me what it means for them to also be able to contribute to our community.”

Cecila Flores, who has supported the migrants since the first group arrived by plane on Friday, wiped away tears at a news conference on Tuesday.

In their 20s and 30s, most of the migrants are the first in their families to make it to the U.S. and are eager to work, she said. Some are married. One brought along a dog named Gieco.

When she asks them simple questions like what they want for dinner, they are timid. Anything is fine, they always say.

“It’s been years since I’ve been able to pick my own clothes,” one man told Flores, an organizer at Sacramento ACT, after a volunteer took him to the thrift store.

The identities of the migrants, who also came from countries including Colombia and Guatemala, remain undisclosed as the California Department of Justice investigates the incident. Meanwhile, Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom has threatened conservative presidential hopeful DeSantis with kidnapping charges.

Organizers said Tuesday that the migrants had arrived at the Texas border, where they were met by people claiming to be with a relocation program, promising housing and jobs. They were then shuttled to New Mexico and flown to Sacramento on a chartered plane.

. . . .

The people working on the ground with them in Sacramento said that the migrants had no idea where they were headed. Their “American dream” quickly became “a nightmare,” Trejo said, adding they were deceived.

Along with city and county officials, local church leaders and nonprofits have scrambled to help them.

. . . .

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

Where is the leadership, competence, and “good government” the Biden Administration promised during the 2020 campaign?

California needs affordable housing and workers, particularly in agriculture, child care, and health care. Migrants can help with this. They are eager to contribute.

The key is to get them represented, through the system with grants of asylum or other protection that many are eligible for, work authorized, and on their way to durable legal status.

Stunts like De Santis’s, misplaced “deterrence,” lack of creativity, and poor leadership by the Administration and Dems in DC are wasting resources and time that could be used to solve problems, not aggravate them!

Once again, the Biden Administration has left the job of making the flawed immigration system work to individuals without sufficient Federal support or coordination. Yet, they disdain the advice and counsel of these “grass roots experts” in favor of mindless, half-baked deterrence gimmicks derived from Stephen Miller and other GOP neo-fascists! Why?

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-97-23

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

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

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

Refugees International June 5, 2023

The Honorable Alejandro N. Mayorkas

Secretary

U.S. Department of Homeland Security

2707 Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue, SE

Washington, D.C. 20528

Ur M. Jaddou

Director

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services

5900 Capital Gateway Drive

Camp Springs, Maryland 20588

Troy A. Miller

Acting Commissioner

U.S. Customs and Border Protection

1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW

Washington, D.C. 20229

David L. Neal

Director

Executive Office for Immigration Review

5107 Leesburg Pike

Falls Church, VA 22041

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Respectfully,

Acacia Center for Justice

Afghans For A Better Tomorrow

African Human Rights Coalition

Al Otro Lado

Alianza Americas

Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, ACCE

American Friends Service Committee (AFSC)

American Gateways

American Immigration Council

Americans for Immigrant Justice (AI Justice)

Amnesty International USA

Angry Tias and Abuelas

Asian Americans Advancing Justice | AAJC

Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project (ASAP)

Bend the Arc: Jewish Action

Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI)

Bridges Faith Initiative

Border Kindness

Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights Coalition

Center for Constitutional Rights

Center for Gender & Refugee Studies

Center for Victims of Torture

Central American Resource Center of Northern CA – CARECEN SF

Church World Service

Cleveland Jobs with Justice

Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights (CHIRLA)

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

Community Legal Services in East Palo Alto (CLSEPA)

Diocesan Migrant and Refugee Services Inc.

Dorcas International Institute of RI

Fellowship Southwest

First Focus on Children

Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project

Franciscan Action Network

Freedom Network USA

Greater Boston Legal Services

Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinical Program

HIAS

Houston Immigration Legal Services Collaborative

Human Rights First

Human Rights Initiative of North Texas

Immigrant Defenders Law Center

Immigrant Legal Resource Center

Immigration Equality

Immigration Law & Justice Network

Immigration Hub

Innovation Law Lab

Interfaith-RISE

Interfaith Welcome Coalition – San Antonio

International Center of Kentucky

International Institute of Los Angeles

International Institute of New England

International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP)

ISLA: Immigration Services and Legal Advocacy

JAMAAT – Jews and Muslims and Allies Acting Together

Jewish Family Service of San Diego

Jewish Vocational Service of Kansas City

Just Neighbors

Justice in Motion

Kino Border Initiative

Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center

Latino Community Foundation

Lawyers for Good Government

Legal Aid Justice Center

Lost and Found Church of the Nazarene

Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services

Mariposa Legal, program of COMMON Foundation

Massachusetts Law Reform Institute

Metrowest Legal Services

Minnestoa Freedom Fund

MLPB

Mujeres Unidas y Activas

Muslim Advocates

National Employment Law Project

National Immigrant Justice Center

National Immigration Law Center

National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights

National Partnership for New Americans

NCLR (National Center for Lesbian Rights)

Northeastern University School of Law Immigrant Justice Clinic

Open Immigration Legal Services

Oromo Center for Civil and Political Rights

Oxfam America

Phoenix Legal Action Network

Physicians for Human Rights

Public Law Center

RAICES

Refugees International

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

Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights

Rocky Mountain Immigrant Advocacy Network

SIREN, Services Immigrant Rights and Education Network

Southwest Asylum & Migration Institute (“SAMI”)

Student Clinic for Immigrant Justice

Survivors of Torture, International

Team Brownsville

Tennessee Justice for Our Neighbors

The Advocates for Human Rights

The Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc.

The Reformed Church of Highland Park

UC Davis Immigration Law Clinic

Unitarian Universalists for Social Justice

Unitarian Universalist Service Committee

United Sikhs

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

USAHello

Vera Institute of Justice

Washington Office on Latin America

Wind of the Spirit Immigrant Resource Center

Witness at the Border

Women’s Refugee Commission

Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights

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

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

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

06-07-23

HOW THE BORDER BRINGS OUT THE BEST 😇 & WORST ☠️ OF HUMANITY! — “If they recognize what the water is for… they’ll slash it. In hopes people die I guess?”

Dehydration is a nasty way to die!
Théodore Géricault
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0
France-003341B – Raft of the Medusa (16237617902).jpg Copy
[[File:France-003341B – Raft of the Medusa (16237617902).jpg|France-003341B_-_Raft_of_the_Medusa_
PHOTO: Dennis Jarvis, Halifax Nova Scotia

Jasmine Garsd reports for NPR:

https://www.npr.org/2023/05/03/1169010633/desperate-migrants-are-choosing-to-cross-the-border-through-dangerous-u-s-desert

. . . .

In some parts of this new route they are exploring, Arellano and Cordero are already leaving bottles of fresh water in bushy areas, where people may be taking refuge from the sun.

They check to see if anyone drank from them.

Arellano picks up the bottle. “Slashed”, she sighs.

This is where Border Kindness runs into one of the biggest hurdles in drawing a new map: not climate, not geography, but people. Occasionally, when they leave these bottles of water, they return to find them destroyed.

They don’t know who is doing it – but there’s plenty of people out here who disapprove of the work they do.

“If they recognize what the water is for… they’ll slash it. In hopes people die I guess?” Arellano says.

As they move along, Arellano and Cordero find about a dozen destroyed water bottles at various locations. All mangled. They replace them.

Before calling it a day, they drive up to one last spot where a migrant was found dead from dehydration just a few months ago.

In the nearby bushes, there’s the usual: shoes, socks, also, a small child’s pink winter glove, and a tiny winter jacket. It’s baby blue and filled with caked mud. Arellano inspects its tags. “4-T”, she reads out loud. It belonged to a 4-year-old child.

They walk over to check on the water bottle they left here a few days ago, to see if anyone was able to drink.

But it, too, has been slashed open.

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

Read and listen to the complete report at the link.

A sad illustration of one of my sayings: “We can diminish ourselves as a nation, but it won’t stop human migration!”

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

05-05-23

🤯YOU’VE GOT TO BE KIDDING! — Bumbling Administration “Cans” One Of Few Positive Changes In Asylum Adjudication Process!

https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2023-04-12/biden-asylum-processing-rule-pause

Hamed Aleaziz in the LA Times:

The Biden administration will pause its signature effort to reform asylum processing at the border, Department of Homeland Security officials confirmed Wednesday.

The so-called asylum processing rule, which the administration launched with great fanfare in 2022, allowed asylum officers to grant and deny asylum to migrants at the southern border.

Administration officials say the pause is a temporary measure designed to ensure that the country’s immigration agencies are prepared for a potential increase in border crossings after the end of Title 42, a pandemic-era policy that allows border agents to quickly turn back migrants.

But critics say the pause signals President Biden’s latest move away from reforming the asylum process and back toward Trump-style restrictions at the southern border.

. . . .

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

Read Hamed’s complete’s article at the link.

Like the term “temporary,” a “pause” is a bureaucratic “term of art” used to deflect attention from what’s really happening. “Pauses” can last indefinitely. If, after two years to work on it, and touting it as a transformational change, the Biden Administration can’t put this fairly straightforward “no brainer” change into effect, it’s not obvious what the “right time” would be!

Granting much more asylum at the AO level nearer to the time of initial encounter is one way of gaining “leverage” and avoiding the EOIR backlog — without stomping on anyone’s rights! The latter is key!

I think most experts would say that it should have been much easier to implement this positive change than some of the new, tone-deaf, bone-headed “proposed restrictions” on asylum, re-instituting dehumanizing and problematic “family detention,” and removing 30,000 non-Mexicans per month to potential danger, exploitation, and death in Mexico. These moves are guaranteed to provoke strong opposition as well as generating some rather unhappy publicity when the situation in Mexico gets out of control, as it inevitably will.🏴‍☠️

Remember folks, the Biden Administration claimed a year ago that it wanted to terminate Title 42 at the border. After an additional year, they still don’t have a plan for following the law! No wonder some critics perceived that the Biden Administration was actually relieved when a right-wing Federal Judge abused his authority to block the ending of Title 42.

Clown Car — Most experts doubt that the Biden Administration has the “right team” (pictured above) in place to restore fair, competent, due-process-compliant asylum adjudication at the border or anywhere else!
PHOTO CREDIT: Ellin Beltz, 07-04-16, Creative Commons License, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/. Creator not responsible for above caption.

Instead of preparing, planning, and “knocking some heads” within the bureaucracy, the Administration has squandered the last year thinking up new anti-asylum gimmicks, rather than making the long-overdue changes at EOIR, the Asylum Office, and the Refugee Program necessary to admit refugees legally, robustly, and timely — in other words to restore the rule of law as they had promised.

Oh, for some competence, backbone, and leadership in the Biden Administration’s immigration policy bureaucracy! Never has America needed the Ambassadorial Level position of Refugee Coordinator more than now! Unfortunately, that important role established by the Refugee Act of 1980 was “swallowed and digested” by a hostile bureaucracy years ago. Alex Aleinikoff, where are you when your country needs you?

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

03-13-23

🌟🗽⚖️🦸🏻 NDPA SUPERSTAR LAURA LYNCH CONTINUES TO RISE — CONGRATS ON HER NEW POSITION AS SENIOR COUNSEL, BORDER & IMMIGRATION, SENATE HOMELAND SECURITY & GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS COMMITTEE! —She’ll Have Her Work Cut Out, As Biden Administration Takes “Toxic War On Asylum Seekers” To The Canadian Border!☠️

Laura writes:

I’m happy to share that I just started a new position as Senior Counsel, Border & Immigration, for the Senate Homeland Security & Governmental Affairs Committee.

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

Laura most recently was Senior Immigration Policy Attorney at the National Immigration Law Center. Prior to that, she held a similar position at the National Office of the American Immigration Lawyers Association.

She’ll have her work cut out for her! As “leaked” yesterday, President Biden is “celebrating” his trip to Canada by expanding the existing “Safe Third Country Agreement” with Canada to allow summary turn back of asylum seekers without hearings at any point along the 4,000 mile plus border!

Experts on both sides of the border decried this latest gimmick designed to speed the demise of the legal asylum and refugee systems at the border.

Internationally-recognized expert Professor Audrey Macklin of University of Toronto School of Law, a former member of the Canadian Immigration and Refugees Board, told the NY Times:

“But they have to know that anything that closes off ways of entering only amounts to a job-creation program for smugglers and a kind of stimulus package for militarizing the border.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/23/world/canada/biden-migration.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

It’s also likely to increase business for body bag makers and undertakers as desperate asylum seekers are discouraged from turning themselves in to enforcement at or near the border. Instead, this untimely expansion appears “ready made” to encourage asylum seekers to hire smugglers and attempt ever more dangerous journeys into the interior of both the U.S. and Canada to achieve “do it yourself/extralegal refuge.”

Another potential problem: Canada’s Federal Court has already rejected the previous, much more limited, version of the “Safe Third Country Agreement” on the basis that it violates Canada’s obligations under international law. That case currently is pending before Canada’s Supreme Court.

It’s past time for some Senate oversight of the Biden Administration’s disgraceful failure to honor due process, domestic law, and international law by establishing a safe, fair, orderly, and humane asylum and refugee adjudication and admission system as they promised before taking office! I hope Laura can spur some Congressional action (not just rhetoric) on this existentially important issue where the Administration’s lousy approach threatens both democracy and human lives.

Congrats again, and good luck, Laura!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

O3-24-23

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

. . . .

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

PWS

01-07-22

Melissa reports in the latest issue of The Border Chronicle:

Two things stand out:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

Liz Mineo, Staff Writer, interviews Professor Neuman in The Harvard Gazette:

What should be done about border security, enforcement, and the immigration court backlog?

What measures should be taken to reduce the flow of migrants into the U.S?

Some experts say the asylum system is a parallel immigration system and that it should be revamped. What’s your take on this?

Finally, what are your realistic hopes for changes in immigration policies?

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

Rachel Slade writes in the NYT:

Sound like disconnects? That’s because they are! Ones that responsible voters should no longer put up with!

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

From Reuters:

Overview

Political Repression and Human Rights

Crime and Insecurity

Economic Collapse

Health Crisis

Food Insecurity

Heavy Rains and Flooding

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

Dan Kolbert in the Portland Press Herald:

Maine has tacked left as nation lurches right in culture wars

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

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Insight Crime reports:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

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ACCESS DENIED

Hamed Aleaziz reports for the LA Times:

ADMINISTRATION’S FLUBBED RESETTLEMENT (NON) EFFORT EMPOWERS GOP WHITE NATIONALISTS, VEXES PROGRESSIVE DEMS

Nick Miroff & Joanna Slater report for WashPost:

CONSTITUTION MOCKED BY ALL THREE BRANCHES AS KIDS CONTINUE TO FACE IMMIGRATION COURT ALONE!

GIULIA MCDONNELL NIETO DEL RIO reports for Documented:

UPHOLDING THE RULE OF LAW & HUMAN DECENCY FOR REFUGEES HAS BEEN LEFT LARGELY TO NGOs IN LIGHT OF THE USG’S SYSTEMIC FAILURE

Jenell Scarborough, Pathway to Citizenship Coordinator at EL CENTRO HISPANO INC, reports on Linkedin on a on a more optimistic note about the activities of those who actually are working to preserve and extend the rule of law and human decency to refugees:

🇺🇸 MAKE EVERY DAY WORLD REFUGEE DAY, & Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

Mackenzie Mays reports for the LA Times:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

Jasmine Garsd reports for NPR:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

Hamed Aleaziz in the LA Times:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

Laura writes:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

🇺🇸 Due Process Forever!

Related posts:

Jenell Scarborough, Pathway to Citizenship Coordinator at **EL CENTRO HISPANO INC, reports on Linkedin on a on a more optimistic note about the activities of those who actually are working to preserve and extend the rule of law and human decency to refugees:**