immigrationcourtside – Page 339 – immigrationcourtside.com

BREAKING: Judge Brinkema (USDC, EDVA) Allows Virginia To Intervene In Challenge To Trump Visa Order — Slams Implementation — DOJ & DOS Differ (By A Mere 40,000) On Number Of Visas Revoked!

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/02/trump-travel-ban-virginia-234609

Politico reports:

“Brinkema was also harshly critical of the review and implementation of Trump’s order. “It’s quite clear not all the thinking went into it that should have gone into it,” she said. “As a result, there was chaos.”

During the hearing in federal court in Alexandria, Justice Department lawyer Erez Reuveni said that more than 100,000 visas were canceled as a result of Trump’s order last Friday limiting travel by residents of seven majority-Muslim countries, the Associated Press reported.

However, a State Department official told POLITICO later that the total number of visas canceled was fewer than 60,000. Some of those people are currently in the U.S. Their legal status here is not affected, but their visas will not be valid for re-entry if they travel out of the country, officials said.

. . . .

“At the court hearing, Brinkema said the alarm caused by Trump’s order was widespread. She said no case she has ever handled produced the level of public concern she observed in this one.

“It’s obvious that this put hundreds of thousands of people into a state of great discomfort,” the judge said. “People are really upset.”

Brinkema, an appointee of President Bill Clinton, commended the government for its effort to resolve issues raised by Trump’s order, but said more needs to be done.

“I don’t think it’s far enough,” she said as she ruled to keep the case before her alive.

“There’s no question the president of the United States has almost—almost unfettered “ power over foreign policy and border issues, but “this is not ‘no limit,’” the judge said.

Brinkema said individuals and families had “relied” on decisions made to grant visas. She has not ruled on the merits of the case, but she suggested the government could not reverse course in specific immigration cases without a legitimate reason to do so.”

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Hey, 100,000? 60,000? 40,000 difference? — close enough for Government work. BTW, Judge Brinkema has handled a major terrorist prosecution. So, she actually knows what real terrorism and national security are all about.

Once again, “haste makes waste!”

PWS

02/03/17

HuffPost: 100,000 Visas Revoked Under Trump Order!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-ban-revoked-visas_us_5894b9b9e4b09bd304bb126f?lfqs7aziux8suzyqfr&

Elise Foley Reports on HuffPost:

“WASHINGTON ― The Trump administration provisionally revoked 100,000 visas as part of its ban on travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries, a government lawyer said in court on Friday.

The revelation caused shockwaves on Twitter, but the State Department actually confirmed earlier this week that it had provisionally revoked most visas held by people from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.

State Department officials said later Friday that fewer than 60,000 individuals’ visas were provisionally revoked as a result of the order. “To put that number in context, we issued over 11 million immigrant and non-immigrant visas in fiscal year 2015,” a spokesman for the State Department’s Bureau of Consular Affairs told The Huffington Post.

The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the discrepancy in numbers.”

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As I’ve noted before, to date lawyers have been the only real beneficiaries of the Trump immigration orders.

PWS

01/03/17

Newsweek: Bannon Wants “American Gulag” — Will Anyone Have The Guts To Stop Him?

http://www.newsweek.com/steve-bannon-fever-dream-american-gulag-551472

Jeff Stein writes in this week’s Newsweek:

“Imagine: Miles upon miles of new concrete jails stretching across the scrub-brush horizons of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California, with millions of people incarcerated in orange jumpsuits and awaiting deportation.

Such is the fevered vision of a little-noticed segment of President Donald Trump’s sulfurous executive order on border security and immigration enforcement security. Section 5 of the January 25 order calls for the “immediate” construction of detention facilities and allocation of personnel and legal resources “to detain aliens at or near the land border with Mexico” and process them for deportation. But another, much overlooked, order signed the same day spells out, in ominous terms, who will go.

Trump promised a week after the November elections that he would expel or imprison some 2 million or 3 million undocumented immigrants with criminal convictions—a number that exists mainly in his imagination. (Only about 820,000 undocumented immigrants currently have a criminal record, according to the Migration Policy Institute, a nonpartisan think tank. Many of those have traffic infractions and other misdemeanors.)

Still, the spectre of new, pop-up jails housing hundreds of thousands of people is as powerful a fright-dream for liberals as it is a triumph for the president’s “America first” Svengali, Steve Bannon. But, like the fuzzy Trump order dropping the gate on travelers from seven Muslim-majority states, the deportation measure presents so many fiscal and legal restraints that is also looks suspiciously like just another act of ideological showboating from the rumpled White House strategy chief.

“I’m a Leninist,” Bannon proudly proclaimed to the writer Ronald Radosh at a party at his Capitol Hill townhouse in November 2013. “Lenin,” he said of the Russian revolutionary, “wanted to destroy the state, and that’s my goal too. I want to bring everything crashing down, and destroy all of today’s establishment.”

The executive orders were “not issued as result of any recommendation or threat assessment made by DHS to the White House,” Department of Homeland Security officials conceded in a closed-door briefing on Capitol Hill Wednesday, according to a statement from Missouri Senator Claire McCaskill. They were all Bannon-style revolutionary theater.

. . . .

Expect DHS to start advertising for bids from private prison operators, a much-maligned industry that was collapsing in the latter years of the Obama administration. Two of the largest, GEO Group Inc. and CoreCivic Inc., are already seeing windfalls from their second chance at life: Their stock prices have nearly doubled since the election.

All of which recalls another Leninist idea that Bannon may have forgotten: Prisons are universities for revolution.”

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Stein’s article confirms what many of us had suspected all along — these draconian and unnecessary measures were were “’not issued as result of any recommendation or threat assessment made by DHS to the White House.’” No, they were part of a pre-hatched anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim program cooked up by Bannon and others in the White House to “make good” on Trump’s campaign promises (regardless of whether the measures were necessary of sensible).

But they will be a boon for two important U.S. industries: the private prison industry and the legal industry, as both sides “lawyer up” for a long-term, avoidable, and wasteful fight. Who needs foreign enemies when the Administration is so determined to wage warfare against a large number of our own citizens and residents who disagree with his ill-considered and ill-timed policies?

Stein’s full article (well worth the read) is at the link.

PWS

02/03/17

NYT: Administration Will Allow Iraqi Interpreters To Enter After All — Pentagon Comes To The Rescue Of U.S. War Allies

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/02/world/middleeast/trump-visa-ban-iraq-interpreters.html?smprod=nytcore-iphone&smid=nytcore-iphone-share&_r=0

“BAGHDAD — The Trump administration amended its visa ban on Thursday to allow emigration by the families of Iraqi interpreters who served the United States government and military forces deployed in their country.

The change, recommended by the Pentagon, eased some of the anger generated in Iraq by President Trump’s executive order imposing the ban, which has stoked anxiety and confusion around much of the world since it was issued last week.

The order temporarily blocked all Syrian refugees from entering the United States and suspended visas for applicants from seven Muslim-majority countries, including Iraq. It applied to holders of so-called Special Immigrant Visas issued to interpreters who worked for the United States during its 2003-11 occupation, often at great personal risk, and to their families.

In a statement about the change sent to The New York Times, a United States Embassy official in Baghdad said, “The U.S. government has determined that it is in the national interest to allow Iraqi Special Immigrant Visa (S.I.V.) holders to continue to travel to the United States.” Iraqis who have received the visas, the statement said, may use them, and the “U.S. Embassy in Baghdad will continue to process and issue S.I.V.s to applicants who are otherwise qualified.”

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Wow! Why didn’t they just say that in the first place? Would have saved lots of trouble, heartache, and very bad publicity for the U.S. and the Administration. But, better late than never, I guess.

PWS

02/13/17

AMICUS INVITATION (PROTECTED CLASS OF VICTIMS), DUE MARCH 6, 2017

Amicus Invitation No. 17-02-02
AMICUS INVITATION (PROTECTED CLASS OF VICTIMS), DUE MARCH 6, 2017

FEBRUARY 2, 2017

The Board of Immigration Appeals welcomes interested members of the public to file amicus curiae briefs discussing the below issue:

ISSUE PRESENTED:

(1) Whether, in light of the decision of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in Ortega-Lopez v. Lynch, 834 F.3d 1015 (9th Cir. 2016), a conviction under 7 U.S.C. § 2156(a)(1), constitutes a crime involving moral turpitude under the Immigration and Nationality Act. In this regard, discuss whether a crime involving moral turpitude requires a protected class of victims and, if so, whether animals may constitute a protected class of victims.

Request to Appear as Amicus Curiae: Members of the public who wish to appear as amicus curiae before the Board must submit a Request to Appear as Amicus Curiae (“Request to Appear”) pursuant to Chapter 2.10, Appendix B (Directory), and Appendix F (Sample Cover Page) of the Board of Immigration Appeals Practice Manual. The Request to Appear must explicitly identify that it is responding to Amicus Invitation No. 17-02-02. The decision to accept or deny a Request to Appear is within the sole discretion of the Board. Please see Chapter 2.10 of the Board Practice Manual.

Filing a Brief: Please file your amicus brief in conjunction with your Request to Appear pursuant to Chapter 2.10 of the Board of Immigration Appeals Practice Manual. The brief accompanying the Request to Appear must explicitly identify that it is responding to Amicus Invitation No. 17-02-02. An amicus curiae brief is helpful to the Board if it presents relevant legal arguments that the parties have not already addressed. However, an amicus brief must be limited to a legal discussion of the issue(s) presented. The decision to accept or deny an amicus brief is within the sole discretion of the Board. The Board will not consider a brief that exceeds the scope of the amicus invitation.

Request for Case Information: Additional information about the case may be available. Please contact the Amicus Clerk by phone or mail (see contact information below) for this information prior to filing your Request to Appear and brief.

Page Limit: The Board asks that amicus curiae briefs be limited to 30 double-spaced pages.

Deadline: Please file a Request to Appear and brief with the Clerk’s Office at the address below by March 6, 2017. Your request must be received at the Clerk’s Office within the prescribed time limit. Motions to extend the time for filing a Request to Appear and brief are disfavored. The briefs or extension request must be RECEIVED at the Board on or before the due date. It is not sufficient simply to mail the documents on time. We strongly urge the use of an overnight courier service to ensure the timely filing of your brief.

Service: Please mail three copies of your Request to Appear and brief to the Clerk’s Office at the address below. If the Clerk’s Office accepts your brief, it will then serve a copy on the parties and provide parties time to respond.

Joint Requests: The filing of parallel and identical or similarly worded briefs from multiple amici is disfavored. Rather, collaborating amici should submit a joint Request to Appear and brief. See generally Chapter 2.10 (Amicus Curiae).

Notice: A Request to Appear may be filed by an attorney, accredited representative, or an organization represented by an attorney registered to practice before the Board pursuant to 8 C.F.R. § 1292.1(f). A Request to Appear filed by a person specified under 8 U.S.C. § 1367(a)(1) will not be considered.

Attribution: Should the Board decide to publish a decision, the Board may, at its discretion, name up to three attorneys or representatives. If you wish a different set of three names or you have a preference on the order of the three names, please specify the three names in your Request to Appear and brief.

Clerk’s Office Contact and Filing Address:

To send by courier or overnight delivery service, or to deliver in person:

Amicus Clerk
Board of Immigration Appeals Clerk’s Office
5107 Leesburg Pike, Suite 2000 Falls Church, VA 22041 703-605-1007

Business hours: Monday through Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
Fee: A fee is not required for the filing of a Request to Appear and amicus brief.

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PWS

02/03/17

WSJ: Two Articles Show How “Trump Country” Depends On Foreign Trade And Immigration!

https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-country-might-suffer-more-in-a-trade-war-study-says-1485752403

Bob Davis writes in the WSJ on Jan. 30:

“WASHINGTON—Should the U.S. get embroiled in a trade war, communities that voted for Donald Trump are likely to take a bigger hit than those that voted for Hillary Clinton, according to a study by the Brookings Institution.

Brookings measured what it called the export intensity of urban areas around the country—meaning local goods and service exports as a percentage of local GDP in 2015—to get a picture of those places most dependent on access to the global economy. The most export-intensive places tended to be smaller cities in the Midwest and Southeast—solid Trump country—rather than the big metropolitan areas that went heavily for Mrs. Clinton.
“Trump communities are relatively more reliant on trade,” said Mark Muro, head of Brookings’s metropolitan policy program. “They are smaller communities with less flexibility” to adapt to a cutoff in trade.

“Disruption could be especially troubling for those places,” he said. Brookings said it traces exports back to the point where value is added via production, rather than where goods and services are shipped. The latter gives too much weight to big ports.

Columbus, Ind., a center of machine-making, is the most export-reliant city in the country, Brookings found. The GDP of the city of 46,000, which voted 2 to 1 for Mr. Trump, is 50.6% dependent on exports. Three other Indiana cities—Elkhart, Kokomo and Lafayette—are among the top 10 cities dependent on exports.

The work by Brookings researchers is in some ways the complement to the better-known work of economists David Autor,Gordon Hanson and David Dorn, who identified the localities most vulnerable to Chinese import competition.”

http://www.wsj.com/articles/cities-in-midwest-rust-belt-say-they-need-immigrants-1485890637?emailToken=JRrzcf15YH6Qit0wZsw31UEpY7JNCunMQ1LbM33RJg3WqWfJ5Oisw7lwnNKm5H+vSFc/4d0J4ys+QDjQj3BjWtOK3ucjwQr0KiED9c4=

Will Connors writes in the Jan. 31 WSJ:

“An array of Republican and Democratic officials from across the Rust Belt and Midwest are united in concern about President Donald Trump’s clampdown on refugees and certain immigrants for one overriding reason: Their communities need more people.

Large Democratically-controlled “sanctuary cities” including Chicago, San Francisco and New York have been outspoken in resisting the administration’s ban on refugees and immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries, citing political and moral reasons.

But officials from a second tier of smaller cities, from Columbus, Ohio, to Troy, Mich., to Garden City, Kan., are highlighting the economic importance of welcoming refugees and immigrants to bolster declining populations and add manpower, skills and entrepreneurial know-how.

“I understand that the president is trying to protect the U.S. However, there are many good people that have located here that are escaping wars and political actions, and they’re just looking for a chance to raise their families in a safe environment,” said Janet Doll, a Republican city commissioner in Garden City, Kan. “The immigrants we have here are productive members of society. They have nice jobs and want to contribute to the quality of life in our community.”

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We haven’t even gotten around to the Trump Administration’s next initiative: an attack on legal immigration to the U.S., family members, workers, both temporary and permanent, and refugees, which was covered in one of my earlier blogs.

Perhaps, instead of stirring the pot for a fruitless “can’t win war” on a well-qualified conservative Supreme Court nominee (actually, along with taking Ivanka to be with the family of Chief Special Warfare Operator William “Ryan” Owens at Dover AFB, one of the most reasonable things Trump has done since Jan 20) the Democrats should take the “high road.” Democrats might also want to do some thinking about how to “build bridges” with with some of these folks in “Trump Country” who are more likely to find economic disappointment, than economic success, in the Trump Administration’s blunderbuss assault on loyal allies, trading partners, and immigrants of all types who fuel the success of the real America (not just Washington, D.C. or “big cities”).

President Trump proved that he could win a comfortable (even if not the “landslide” he likes to claim) electoral victory with only 46.1% of the popular vote. That’s about 40% “Trump base” and a critical 6.1% who might have voted for Obama or Bernie Sanders in earlier elections, but pulled the lever for Trump this time around. If the Democrats don’t come up with a workable strategy to connect with and “peel off” at least some of those voters, Trump will likely be headed for a second term even if he never gets support from a majority of American voters. In that case, Democrats will long for the days when screwing around with an otherwise well-qualified conservative Supreme Court nominee was their biggest problem.

HuffPost: N. Rappaport Contests ACLU Exec. Director Romero’s Claim That Trump EO Is “A Muslim Ban Wrapped In A Paper-Thin National Security Rationale.”

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/58922d69e4b0f009905272bc?timestamp=1485983968492

“The ACLU Executive Director, Anthony D. Romero, claims that President Donald Trump’s Executive Order suspending the admission of aliens from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen for 90 days is “a Muslim ban wrapped in a paper-thin national security rationale.”

. . . .

President Trump’s Executive Order directs the Secretary of State and the Director of National Intelligence to determine what information is needed from any country to decide whether one of its nationals who is seeking admission to the United States is who he claims to be and is not a security or public-safety threat.

The Executive Order also requires finding out which countries will be willing to provide the needed information. If the governments of the seven designated countries agree to provide this information, the ban will not be extended, but their nationals will have to pass through the new screening process to get a visa to come to the United States.

In the meantime, the Executive Order permits the Secretaries of State and Homeland Security to waive this ban on a case-by-case basis when a waiver is in the national interest.

DHS already has applied this waiver to the entry of nationals from those countries who are lawful permanent residents returning from a trip abroad. He has stated that, “absent the receipt of significant derogatory information indicating a serious threat to public safety and welfare, lawful permanent resident status will be a dispositive factor in our case-by-case determinations.”

It certainly would have been better if President [Trump] had provided more guidance on such waivers and set up procedures for requesting them before issuing the Executive Order. He also could have delayed its effective date to prevent people from being caught by it in transit to the United States.

Nevertheless, it is apparent that it is not “a Muslim ban wrapped in a paper-thin national security rationale.”

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Read Nolan’s full article which develops his legal arguments further at the above link.

PWS

02/01/17

BREAKING: NYT: Tillerson New Secretary Of State!

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/01/us/politics/rex-tillerson-secretary-of-state-confirmed.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=b-lede-package-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

The NYT reports:

“WASHINGTON — Rex W. Tillerson, the former chairman and chief executive of Exxon Mobil, was confirmed by the Senate on Wednesday in a 56 to 43 vote to become the nation’s 69th secretary of state just as serious strains have emerged with important international allies.

The many votes against Mr. Tillerson’s confirmation made his selection among the most contentious for a secretary of state in recent history, and he takes his post just as many traditional American allies are questioning the policies of President Trump. In the past 50 years, the most contentious confirmations for secretary of state were those of Condoleezza Rice in 2005, who passed by a vote of 85 to 13, and Henry Kissinger in 1973, who was confirmed 78 to 7.

Mr. Trump is the most unapologetically nationalistic president of the modern era who has questioned the value of many of the alliances and multilateral institutions that the United States has nurtured since World War II to keep world order.”

How Mr. Tillerson’s translates Mr. Trump’s vow of “America First” into the kind of polite diplomatic parlance that will maintain vital alliances will be a significant test.”

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Among Secretary Tillerson’s most Important duties as Secretary of State will be supervising the visa issuance process under the Immigration and Nationality Act, dealing with the foreign policy implications of U.S. immigration and refugee policies, negotiating international treaties, and overseeing the preparation of the U.S. Department of State’s Country Reports on Human Rights Conditions which are an important source of background information used in deciding many cases in Immigration Court and at the DHS Asylum Office as well as a tool used by refugee adjudicators in other nations that are signatories to the 1952 U.N. Refugee Convention.

Human Rights is also (or at least has been up until now) an important focus for the Secretary. And, the Administration’s inclination to turn its back on the African continent because there is “nothing in it for us” (after all, what’s the value of saving thousands of human lives compared to profit making business opportunities — America First — Humanity, why bother?) But, at some point, Secretary Tillerson is likely to discover that the Administration’s short-sighted dismissive attitude toward 1.3 billion of the earth’s inhabitants will come back to haunt him (and us).

PWS

02/01/17

From “Sputnik News:” “Trump Selects Three Legal Veterans for Senior Justice Department Posts”

https://sputniknews.com/us/201702011050221283-trump-three-candidates-justice-dept-posts/

“WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — Trump announced he is going to nominate Rod J. Rosenstein of Maryland to be Deputy Attorney General, Rachel B. Brand of Iowa to be Associate Attorney General and Steven Andrew Engel of the District of Columbia to be Assistant Attorney General, according to the release.

Rosenstein was previously US Attorney for the federal, or District Court of Maryland, Brand served as an assistant attorney general under President George W. Bush and Engel was a successful litigator who had served previously as a deputy assistant attorney general.”

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Sounds like the type of candidates most any Republican President would appoint. The “real question” is will they have any real influence on policy at the DOJ or will they be confined to “working out the Xs and Os of daily agency operations” while aides at the White House “pull the strings” with Attorney General Sessions on major legal and policy issues (like the operation of the U.S. Immigration Courts).

Too early to tell, of course. But, it’s something that Democrats should at least raise during the confirmation process. I wouldn’t expect any of these candidates to have difficulty getting confirmed.

PWS

01/01/17

BREAKING: From “The Hill” — Sessions Nomination As AG Approved By Senate Judiciary Committee — Moves To Full Senate Where Approval Is A Foregone Conclusion!

http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/317035-sessions-approved-by-senate-committee

The Hill writes:

“A Senate committee voted to confirm Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) to be attorney general on Wednesday, two days after the growing controversy surrounding President Trump’s travel ban on seven Muslim nations led to the firing of an acting attorney general for insubordination.
The Senate Judiciary Committee approved Sessions 11-9 along party lines. His nomination now goes to the floor, where he is widely expected to be confirmed given the GOP’s 52-seat majority.

The committee vote comes as Senate Democrats have sought to slow progress on other Trump nominees, including Steve Mnuchin, the pick at the Treasury Department, and Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.), Trump’s pick to lead the Health and Human Services Department.

The Alabama senator’s already difficult path to confirmation was made more contentious by Trump’s firing of acting Attorney General Sally Yates, who deemed the president’s order illegal and said she would not have Justice attorneys defend it.”

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As we have known for weeks, Jeff Sessions will soon be the Attorney General of the United States. What exactly does that mean for our justice system and particularly for the beleaguered and backlogged United States Immigration Courts which he will now control?

Among the most immediate questions:

Will he exempt the Immigration Courts from the Administration’s hiring freeze?

If so, what will he do with the many “pipeline candidates” for existing Immigration Judge vacancies who were “caught in limbo” when the hiring freeze went into effect?

Will he continue with the existing DOJ hiring process for the Immigration Judiciary, or will he establish his own recruitment and hiring system for Immigration Judges and BIA Judges.

We’ll soon find out. Stay tuned to immigrationcourtside.com for all the latest!

PWS

02/01/17

Read The Winter 2017 Edition Of “The Green Card” From The FBA — Includes My Article “Immigration Courts — Reclaiming the Vision” (P. 15) & “The Asylumist” Jason Dzubow’s Reprise Of The “Schmidt Interviews” (See “Immigration Rant,” P. 2)!

Green Card Winter 2017 Final

Here are some excerpts:

“Our Immigration Courts are going through an existential crisis that threatens the very foundations of our American Justice System. I have often spoken about my dismay that the noble due process vision of our Immigration Courts has been derailed. What can be done to get it back on track?

First, and foremost, the Immigration Courts must return to the focus on due process as the one and only mission. The improper use of our due process court system by political officials to advance enforcement priorities and/or send “don’t come” messages to asylum seekers, which are highly ineffective in any event, must end. That’s unlikely to happen under the DOJ—as proved by over three decades of history, particularly recent history. It will take some type of independent court. I think that an Article I Immigration Court, which has been supported by groups such as the ABA and the FBA, would be best.

Clearly, the due process focus has been lost when officials outside EOIR have forced ill-advised “prioritization” and attempts to “expedite” the cases of frightened women and children from the Northern Triangle who require lawyers to gain the protection that most of them need and deserve. Putting these cases in front of other pending cases is not only unfair to all, but has created what I call “aimless docket reshuffling” that has thrown our system into chaos.

Evidently, the idea of the prioritization was to remove most of those recently crossing the border to seek protection, thereby sending a “don’t come, we don’t want you” message to asylum seekers. But, as a deterrent, this program has been spectacularly unsuccessful. Not surprisingly to me, individuals fleeing for their lives from the Northern Triangle have continued to seek refuge in the United States in large numbers. Immigration Court backlogs have continued to grow across the board, notwithstanding an actual reduction in overall case receipts and an increase in the number of authorized Immigration Judges.”

Another one:

Former BIA Chairman Paul W. Schmidt on His Career, the Board, and the Purge

“Paul Wickham Schmidt served as Chairman of the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) from 1995 to 2001. He was a Board Member of the BIA from 2001 to 2003, and served as an Immigration Judge in Arlington, Virginia from 2003 until his retirement earlier this year. He also worked in private practice and held other senior positions in government, including Deputy General Counsel and Acting General Counsel at INS. The Asylumist caught up with Judge Schmidt in Maine, where he has been enjoying his retirement, and talked to him about his career, the BIA, and the “purge” of 2003.”

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Read the complete articles plus lots of other “great stuff” both practical and more philosophical at the above link.

And, for all of you “aspiring writers” out there, Green Card Editor and my good friend and former colleague from the U.S. Immigration Court In Arlington, VA, Hon. Lawrence Owen “Larry” Burman, and the Publications Director, Dr. Alicia Triche, are always looking for “new talent” and interesting articles. Instructions on how to submit manuscripts are on page one.

PWS

02/01/17

WSJ: Tension Between Gen. Kelly & White House As DHS Secretary Resisted Effort To Appoint Kris Kobach As Deputy Secretary!

http://www.wsj.com/articles/homeland-security-chief-and-white-house-clash-1485823301

The WSJ reports:

“WASHINGTON—Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly has clashed with the White House over staffing and other decisions in recent days, people familiar with the matter said, leaving the agency without a second-in-command as it tried to institute a new travel ban during a chaotic weekend at the nation’s airports.

When President Donald Trump selected Mr. Kelly, the pick won broad support from Republicans and Democrats in part because they believed the retired Marine general would be willing to speak up and challenge Mr. Trump.

That tension didn’t take long to materialize. Mr. Kelly hasn’t been able to name the deputy he wants at the agency, people familiar with the matter said, and he fought off attempts by the White House to put Kris Kobach, the Kansas secretary of state known as a hard-liner on immigration, into the position.
Mr. Kelly was also frustrated at not knowing the details of the travel ban earlier, so he could prepare his agency to respond, according to people familiar with the matter. Mr. Trump signed the executive order that created the ban late Friday afternoon. Mr. Kelly was only informed of the details that day as he was traveling to Washington, even though he had pressed the White House for days to share with him the final language, the people said.”

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According to the article, President Trump has now decided to nominate Elaine Duke, a former Bush Administration official, to the #2 job at DHS. Have to wonder how long Kelly, a former Marine and a reputed “straight shooter” (in more ways than one) will last in “the circus.”

PWS

01/31/17

Washington Post: Next Trump Targets: Public Charges, Birth Tourists, Foreign Workers!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-administration-circulates-more-draft-immigration-restrictions-focusing-on-protecting-us-jobs/2017/01/31/38529236-e741-11e6-80c2-30e57e57e05d_story.html

The Washington Post reports:

“The Trump administration is considering a plan to weed out would-be immigrants who are likely to require public assistance, as well as to deport — when possible — immigrants already living in the United States who depend on taxpayer help, according to a draft executive order obtained by The Washington Post.

A second draft order under consideration calls for a substantial shake-up in the system through which the United States administers immigrant and nonimmigrant visas, with the aim of tightly controlling who enters the country and who can enter the workforce, and reducing the social services burden on U.S. taxpayers.
The drafts are circulating among administration officials, and it is unclear whether President Trump has decided to move forward with them or when he might sign them if he does decide to put them in place. The White House would not confirm or deny the authenticity of the orders, and White House officials did not respond to requests for comment about the drafts Monday and Tuesday.
If enacted, the executive orders would appear to significantly restrict all types of immigration and foreign travel to the United States, expanding bars on entry to the country that Trump ordered last week with his temporary ban on refugees and people from seven Muslim-majority countries.”

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For copies of the draft Executive Orders and the full story, go over to the Washington Post at the above link.

PWS

01/31/17

New From BIA — Matter of Kim, 26 I&N Dec. 912 (BIA 2017) — CA Mayhem A COV

https://www.justice.gov/eoir/page/file/933996/download

BIA headnote:

“The crime of mayhem in violation of section 203 of the California Penal Code, which requires a malicious act that results in great bodily injury to another person, necessarily involves the use of violent force and is therefore categorically a crime of violence under 18 U.S.C. § 16(a) (2012).”

PANEL: JUDGES PAULEY, MALPHRUS, MULLAINE

Decision by Judge Malphrus

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PWS

01/31/17

Lexis Nexis: “Trump’s Refugee Executive Order a ‘Priceless Recruiting Tool for ISIS’ – Former INS General Counsel David A. Martin”

https://www.lexisnexis.com/legalnewsroom/immigration/b/outsidenews/archive/2017/01/30/trump-39-s-refugee-executive-order-a-39-priceless-recruiting-tool-for-isis-39-former-ins-general-counsel-david-a-martin.aspx?Redirected=true

Dan Kowalski at Lexis Nexis summarizes the most hard-hitting part of Professor Martin’s analysis of the Executive Order on Refugees and Visas:

“30 Jan. 2017 – Prof. David A. Martin (please read his full bio) has annotated President Trump’s 27 Jan. 2017 Executive Order. Among other things, Prof. Martin states, “The order is a priceless recruiting tool for ISIS and similar movements, because it so easily fits their narrative that the United States is the enemy of all Muslims. And it will discourage tips and information from American Muslim communities — information that in the past has proved highly valuable to the thwarting of terrorist acts. Accordingly, the Bush and Obama administrations both strived to avoid all measures that could be painted as broadly anti-Muslim. Much of that vital engagement with Muslim communities has been gravely undone by this order.””

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Go on over to Lexis Nexis at the link for further links to the complete analysis in Vox, Professor Martin’s spectacular biography, and a great picture of Professor Martin.

PWS

01/30/17

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