Judge Jon S. Tigar – immigrationcourtside.com

🏴‍☠️ ADMINISTRATIONS CHANGE, BUT SCOFFLAW MISTREATMENT OF ASYLUM SEEKERS DOESN’T — US District Judge Jon S. Tigar Blows Away 💨 Biden Administration’s Bogus Asylum Rules — Again! — Round Table 🛡⚔️ Weighs In On Winning Side — Again! — Order Delayed Pending Filing of Appeal, So The Carnage Continues for Now!☠️

Border Death — Dem A.G. Merrick Garland’s indifference to asylum laws, racial justice, due process, and the reality of seeking asylum at the border has become astoundingly grotesque! 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
n order 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

Here’s a report from Hon. “Sir Jeffrey” Chase of the Round Table:

Hi all: As you know, our group filed an amicus brief in East Bay Sanctuary v. Garland, challenging the new rules at the border that would make most of those unable to get an online appointment through an app ineligible to apply for asylum.

District Court Judge Jon Tigar just issued the attached order granting summary judgment to plaintiffs and denying defendants’ motion for summary judgment.

From Judge Tigar’s order:

“Congress granted the agencies authority to impose additional conditions on asylum eligibility, but only those consistent with section 1158…Two of the conditions imposed by the Rule have been previously found to be inconsistent with Section 1158…

The Court concludes that the Rule is contrary to law because it presumes ineligible for asylum noncitizens who enter between ports of entry, using a manner of entry that Congress expressly intended should not affect access to asylum. The Rule is also contrary to law because it presumes ineligible for asylum noncitizens who fail to apply for protection in a transit country, despite Congress’s clear intent that such a factor should only limit access to asylum where the transit country actually presents a safe option.”

The order is stayed for 14 days to allow the government to appeal.

Our group has once again helped make a difference in providing fairness and due process. Congrats to all.

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

Congrats to the plaintiffs and to my Round Table colleagues!

This was basically a blowout for the plaintiffs on all issues! The USG argument essentially was that complying with the law would be too difficult and/or politically unpopular. Therefore, they have chosen to violate the law and to use rather transparent pretexts (actually misrepresentations about the bogus “presumption”) to evade it.

Really, folks, how do we have a Dem AG who 1) approves such complete legal nonsense; 2) advances essentially frivolous and disingenuous arguments in an attempt to defend the indefensible; and 3) can’t make the legal system for asylum work in a fair and legal manner at EOIR or DHS?

How immoral and intellectually dishonest are Garland’s arguments. Here’s one of my favorite passages from Judge Tigar’s opinion:

While they wait for an adjudication, applicants for asylum must remain in Mexico, where migrants are generally at heightened risk of violence by both state and non-state actors.

See, e.g., PC 32446–68 (2022 State Department report noting credible reports of gender-based violence against migrants; reports of migrants being tortured by migration authorities; “numerous instances” of armed groups targeting migrants for kidnapping, extortion, and homicide; and that asylum seekers and migrants were vulnerable to forced labor); PC 22839–42 (NGO report documenting violent crimes against 13,480 migrants in Mexico, by both state and non-state actors, between January 2021 and December 2022); PC 76248–87 (table of crimes summarized in preceding report); PC 21752–58 (2022 NGO report discussing gender-based violence in northern Mexico border cities, including against LGBTQI+ and Black migrants); PC 21610–11 (2022 NGO report concerning gender-based violence against Venezuelan women and LGBTIQ+ migrants in southern Mexico).16

16 In addition to these examples, the record is replete with additional documentation of the extraordinary risk of violence many migrants face in Mexico. See, e.g., PC 22129–30 (2023 news report documenting instances of kidnapping of asylum seekers in northern Mexico); PC 23247–50 (2022 news report quoting Chihuahua state police chief stating that “organized criminal gangs are financing their operations through migrant trafficking”); PC 23082 (2023 NGO report discussing treatment of migrants and asylum seekers); PC 20937–43 (2021 NGO report documenting kidnapping and extortion of Venezuelan migrants in Mexico); PC 29740–29744 (2021 NGO report documenting instances of rape, kidnapping, and other violence experienced by migrant women in Mexico); PC 75946–48 (2022 NGO report documenting violence against migrants in Mexico); AR 4881 (2022 NGO report noting that asylum seekers from Central America have been pursued across the border and found in southern Mexico by their persecutors).

Only somebody who avoids the border, has never represented asylum seekers there, and is impervious to facts and reality could make such outlandish arguments in favor of an outrageously deficient and illegal “policy.” Sounds like something out of the “Stephen Miller Playbook!” Why is it coming from a Dem AG?

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

PWS

07-25-23

USDJ JON S. TIGAR REIMPOSES NATIONWIDE INJUNCTION AGAINST TRUMP’S ATTEMPTED END RUN AROUND U.S. ASYLUM LAWS!

http://enewspaper.latimes.com/infinity/article_share.aspx?guid=b683ac87-c10e-4278-9894-269d94563603

Maura Dolan reports for the LA Times:

By Maura Dolan

SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge reinstated a nationwide injunction Monday against a Trump administration rule that would deny asylum to most immigrants at the southern border.

U.S. District Judge Jon S. Tigar, citing the need for a uniform immigration policy, issued a 14-page decision explaining why the injunction should not be limited to the Western states within the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Trump’s new rule makes migrants ineligible for asylum if they passed through another country en route to the U.S. and failed to apply for protection in that country. Most asylum seekers come from Central America.

Tigar first issued a nationwide injunction against the rule in July, but a three-judge 9th Circuit panel decided 2 to 1 to narrow it to the states within the circuit. The appeals court said Tigar had failed to justify the need for a nationwide order.

As a result, border officials in California and Arizona were not allowed to apply the new rule against asylum seekers, but agents in Texas and New Mexico could.

The American Civil Liberties Union, the Center for Constitutional Rights and the Southern Poverty Law Center returned to Tigar’s courtroom last week and asked him to document the need for a nationwide order.

The 9th Circuit has said it would hold a hearing on the case in December.

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So, the rule is now suspended even outside the 9th Circuit, at least until December when the 9th Circuit takes up the case again. But, what about those who were “processed” outside the 9th Circuit during the ill-advised “limitation of the injunction” by the 9th Circuit?

The Administration’s cowardly “war on refugees and asylum seekers” is causing mass confusion, chaos in the courts, and human misery every day.

PWS

09-10-19Dolan

I WAS RIGHT (BARELY): CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS SAVES ASYLUM & RULE OF LAW — ADMINISTRATION’S REQUEST TO IMPLEMENT ORDER TRUNCATING ASYLUM LAW TURNED DOWN 5-4!

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/21/us/politics/supreme-court-asylum-trump.html?rref=collection%2Fbyline%2Fadam-liptak&action=click&contentCollection=undefined&region=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=1&pgtype=collection

By Adam Liptak @ N Tmes:

Dec. 21, 2018

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Friday refused to revive a Trump administration initiative barring migrants who enter the country illegally from seeking asylum.

The court was closely divided, with Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. joining the four-member liberal wing in turning down the administration’s request for a stay of a trial judge’s order blocking the program.

The court’s brief order gave no reasons for its action. Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel A. Alito Jr., Neil M. Gorsuch and Brett M. Kavanaugh said they would have granted the stay.

In a proclamation issued on Nov. 9, President Trump barred migrants from applying for asylum unless they made the request at a legal checkpoint. Only those applying at a port of entry would be eligible, Mr. Trump said, invoking what he said were his national security powers to protect the nation’s borders.

Lower courts blocked the initiative, ruling that a federal law plainly allowed asylum applications from people who had entered the country unlawfully.

“Any alien who is physically present in the United States or who arrives in the United States,” the relevant federal statute says, may apply for asylum — “whether or not at a designated port of arrival.”

Judge Jon S. Tigar of the United States District Court in San Francisco issued a temporary restraining order blocking the initiative nationwide. “Whatever the scope of the president’s authority,” Judge Tigar wrote, “he may not rewrite the immigration laws to impose a condition that Congress has expressly forbidden.”

Mr. Trump attacked Judge Tigar, calling him an “Obama judge.” Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. took issue with the characterization, saying that federal judges apply the law without regard to the policies of the presidents who appointed them.

A divided three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in San Francisco, refused to stay Judge Tigar’s order. The majority opinion was written by Judge Jay S. Bybee, who was appointed by President George W. Bush.

“We are acutely aware of the crisis in the enforcement of our immigration laws,” Judge Bybee wrote. “The burden of dealing with these issues has fallen disproportionately on the courts of our circuit. And as much as we might be tempted to revise the law as we think wise, revision of the laws is left with the branch that enacted the laws in the first place — Congress.”

The Trump administration then urged the Supreme Court to issue a stay of Judge Tigar’s ruling, saying the president was authorized to address border security by imposing the new policy.

“The United States has experienced a surge in the number of aliens who enter the country unlawfully from Mexico and, if apprehended, claim asylum and remain in the country while the claim is adjudicated, with little prospect of actually being granted that discretionary relief,” Solicitor General Noel J. Francisco told the justices.

“The president, finding that this development encourages dangerous and illegal border crossings and undermines the integrity of the nation’s borders, determined that a temporary suspension of entry by aliens who fail to present themselves for inspection at a port of entry along the southern border is in the nation’s interest,” Mr. Francisco wrote.

The American Civil Liberties Union, representing groups challenging the policy, said Congress had made a different determination, one that only Congress can alter.

“After World War II and the horrors experienced by refugees who were turned away by the United States and elsewhere, Congress joined the international community in adopting standards for the treatment of those fleeing persecution,” lawyers with the A.C.L.U. wrote. “A key safeguard is the assurance, explicitly and unambiguously codified, that one fleeing persecution can seek asylum regardless of where, or how, he or she enters the country.

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I had observed that attacking Federal Judges and dissing the Supremes and the Federal Courts as an institution was unlikely to help win the heart and mind of Chief Justice Roberts. Disturbingly, however, four of his colleagues appear to be ready and willing to hand the country over to Trump and Putin.

Stay well, RBG! The future of our American Republic depends on you and the your four colleagues who were willing to stand up for the rule of law against tyranny.

PWS

12-21-18

HERE’S WHAT’S BOGUS ABOUT NIELSEN’S LATEST RESTRICTIONIST SCHEME!

Ever the reliable sycophant and incompetent manager, Nielsen rolls out yet another cruel, ill-considered scheme for mistreating asylum seekers instead of doing her job the way it should be done. Like all the rest of these White Nationalist repressive measures, this one’s likely to fail. The only real questions are how and how soon?

HERE’S WHAT’S BOGUS ABOUT NIELSEN’S LATEST RESTRICTIONIST SCHEME!

There is no known evidence of any widespread “asylum fraud” at the Southern Border; most arriving asylum applicants either wait at a port of entry to be processed or turn themselves in to the Border Patrol immediately upon entry;
As pointed out by Judge Sullivan in Grace v. Whitaker, the law requires that a much lower standard be applied at the “credible fear” stage; naturally, that means that many individuals who pass credible fear will not ultimately be granted asylum;
Not being granted asylum by an Immigration Judge does not mean that the asylum application is frivolous or lacks merit; most individuals face actual danger or death upon return, but whether or not they get asylum depends on difficult, somewhat arcane legal determinations about “causation;”
Also, as pointed out by Judge Sullivan in Grace, the Immigration Courts under the Trump Administration have been applying unlawful and unduly restrictive standards to asylum seekers from Central America; these illegal actions undoubtedly have artificially suppressed the asylum grant rate;
Contrary to Nielsen, the Government’s own numbers as analyzed by TRAC show that 35% of asylum applications are granted by Immigration Judges following merits hearings; the merits asylum grant rates for El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras are 23%, 20%, & 18%, much higher than Nielsen’s bogus “nine in ten denied;”
Unquestionably, Immigration Courts grant rates have been suppressed by illegal interpretations by DOJ and, as widely reported, biased anti-asylum attitudes by some U.S. Immigration Judges;
Contrary to Nielsen’s claim, nearly 100% of asylum seekers who are given an opportunity to be represented by counsel appear for their hearings;
It’s highly unlikely that there actually are 786,000 “real” asylum cases in Immigration Court; that’s because court procedures require the filing of all possible applications at the earliest point in time even if they might not actually pursued at the merits hearing; in some cases, asylum is a “backup” application rather than the primary application for relief;
As a result of the Supreme Court’s ruling in Pereira v. Sessions, many asylum seekers are now eligible for “cancellation of removal” based on time in the U.S. and close relatives and will likely pursue that form of relief instead;
The Immigration Court backlog is more the result of shifting priorities, poor enforcement strategies, chronic understaffing, and “Aimless Docket Reshuffling” by successive Administrations than it is because of any actions taken by asylum applicants to delay the process;
Sending more Immigration Judges to border locations to hear cases of those waiting in Mexico is likely to artificially increase the court backlog by diverting resources from cases pending in Immigration Courts in interior locations;
The Administration has yet to put forth a reasonable plan for reducing the Immigration Court backlog;
Given known dangerous conditions in Mexico, vulnerable asylum seekers are unlikely to receive effective protection from the Mexican Government while waiting in Mexico.

What if we had a Government actually committed to making the generous asylum system enacted by Congress and described by Judge Sullivan and Judge Tigar work to protect refugees, rather than working to make it fail to punish and “deter” some of the world’s most courageous, determined, and vulnerable individuals who actually could help our country if they were given a fair chance in a fair system?

PWS

12-20-18

THE HILL: MORE FROM NOLAN ON ASYLUM AT THE BORDER

https://thehill.com/opinion/immigration/419492-most-recent-court-order-on-immigration-will-have-serious-unintended

Nolan writes:

. . . .

Immigration advocacy organizations filed a motion asking a U.S. District Court in Northern California to stop the rule from going into effect.

The parties agreed that the proclamation did not render any alien ineligible for asylum. District Judge Jon S. Tigar found, therefore, that the case did not present the question of whether section 212(f) authorizes the president to directly limit asylum eligibility, so he did not include the proclamation in his decision.

This was a mistake. Although the proclamation doesn’t say that it is making the illegal crossers ineligible for asylum, it prevents them from getting relief of any kind that would allow them to enter the United States.

Judge Tigar granted a temporary restraining order which prohibits any action to continue the implementation of the rule and requires a return to the pre-rule practices for processing asylum applications.

. . . .

Judge Tigar’s restoration of pre-rule practices for processing asylum applications means that the illegal crossers will not be prevented from establishing a credible fear of persecution in the expedited removal proceedings, which will entitle them to an asylum hearing before an immigration judge.

But the immigration judge will have to deny their applications because asylum would permit then to enter the United States – and the proclamation bars their entry.

Moreover, the denial will make them statutorily ineligible for asylum if they file another asylum application later.

The first paragraph in the asylum provisions states that any alien who is physically present in the United States may apply for asylum, but the second paragraph provides three exceptions.

One of the exceptions states that asylum is not available to an alien who has filed a previous application that was denied, unless he can show a change in circumstances which materially affects his eligibility for asylum.

The rule that Judge Tigar suspended would have avoided this problem by preventing the asylum seekers from getting to a hearing before an immigration judge at which their applications would be denied.

It is possible that when the proclamation is terminated, a court will find that the termination materially affects asylum eligibility and therefore that the bar to future asylum applications no longer applies.

But the third paragraph provides that no court shall have jurisdiction to review any determination on the exceptions. The courts, therefore, will not be able to reinstate asylum eligibility on this or on any other basis.

It will be up to Trump to decide whether aliens whose applications are denied on account of the proclamation will be able to file another asylum application when the proclamation is lifted.

Indefinite detention

Illegal crossers, however, may be able to avoid persecution by applying for withholding of removal.

Relief under the withholding provision just prohibits sending an alien to a country where it is more likely than not that he would be persecuted. Consequently, withholding would not violate the entry prohibition in the proclamation.

The relief would apply only to the alien who is at risk of being persecuted. It would not include his spouse or children.

The proclamation, nevertheless, would be a serious problem for aliens who are granted withholding. It would prevent them from being released from detention while arrangements are being made to find a suitable country that is willing to take them, and that may not even be possible, depending on the case.

Asylum seekers who go to ports of entry instead of making an illegal crossing are experiencing problems. Nevertheless, it might be wise to try at least some of the ports of entry before resorting to an illegal crossing.

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Go on over to The Hill at the link to read Nolan’s complete article.

I’m not aware that anyone at DHS or EOIR has actually taken the legal position that Nolan has outlined. If they did, I would expect ACLU to have them instantly back before Judge Tigar on a contempt of court motion.

Also, that this theory hasn’t been pursued before Judge Tigar would make it unlikely that it would be argued before the Supremes, assuming that the case eventually winds up there (which I don’t). I do concede, however, that because the “Supremes are supreme” they basically can do whatever they want, including pursuing theories not argued or decided below. Most of the time, however, they prefer a more judicially (and politically) prudent approach.

I agree with Nolan’s bottom line that notwithstanding the inconvenience and the apparent slowdown by the Administration in asylum processing, asylum applicants would be well advised to patiently and peacefully wait in line to pursue their applications at ports of entry. There are also several cases pending which ultimately could provide some relief from both the intentional slowdown of processing at the ports of entry, and the skewing of the credible fear process against applicants from the Northern Triangle.

Stay tuned.

PWS

12-07-18

NO, IT’S NOT “OBAMA JUDGES IN THE 9TH CIRCUIT” – Federal Judges Across The Spectrum & Throughout The Country Are Handing Scofflaw Prez A Record Number Of Well-Earned Defeats!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2018/11/22/trump-judicial-fantasy-what-chief-justice-roberts-could-have-told-him-didnt/

Fred Barbash reports for the WashPost:

Late Monday, a U.S. district judge in San Francisco blocked the Trump administration from denying asylum to migrants who crossed the southern border illegally, saying the president violated a “clear command” from Congress to allow them to apply. Trump’s reaction was to add “Obama” judges, specifically those sitting on the 9th Circuit out West, to his list of those responsible for what he calls the nation’s “open borders.”

“This was an Obama judge,” the president said. “And I’ll tell you what, it’s not going to happen like this anymore. Everybody that wants to sue the United States, they file their case in — almost — they file their case in the 9th Circuit. And it means an automatic loss no matter what you do, no matter how good your case is.” He strung out the theme on Thanksgiving, demonizing the judges who, he tweeted, will be responsible for “bedlam, chaos, injury and death” for not letting law enforcement do their jobs.

His attack on Judge Jon S. Tigar, who issued the temporary order on asylum, was sufficient to arouse Supreme Court Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. “We do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges,” Roberts said in a statement. “What we have is an extraordinary group of dedicated judges doing their level best to do equal right to those appearing before them.”

Trump clashes with conservative chief justice over judiciary

Chief Justice John Roberts pointedly defended the independence of the federal judiciary on Nov. 21 after President Trump criticized the courts. (Reuters)

As unusual as Roberts’s comments were, he could have said so much more, like maybe, you’ve got to be kidding, Mr. President, if you think your judicial problems are confined to “Obama” judges in a single circuit.

He could have noted that the number of rulings against his administration’s actions now stands somewhere in the range of about 40 to 50, according to a rough estimate by The Washington Post. Norman Siegel, writing at Law.com in January, counted 37 “major” losses, and that was in January, before numerous other rulings that thwarted Trump administration decisions.

And he could have observed that all of this is a bit of a surprise. All presidents lose cases. But a losing streak of this magnitude for a president is a new phenomenon.

Despite the endless decades of rhetoric about “judicial activism,” judges at the district court level are generally a timid lot when it comes to confronting presidents. Historically, they are inclined to do what former federal judge Nancy Gertner calls “duck, avoid and evade.”

“Now,” she wrote in the April issue of NYU Law Review, “I am not so certain. . . . Perhaps ‘judging in a time of Trump’ ” is different, she wrote. “It is one thing to ‘duck, avoid and evade’ when you believe that official actors are acting more or less within constitutional bounds. It is another to do so when you are concerned about real abuse of power.”

An abuse of power was what Tigar found: “Whatever the scope of the President’s authority,” he wrote, “he may not rewrite the immigration laws to impose a condition that Congress has expressly forbidden.” Trump did not discuss Tigar’s actual findings.

The biggest defeats have included four decisions blocking the president’s travel ban before the Supreme Court finally upheld its third iteration; his attempt to rescind Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, blocked by at least four courts; and the proposed ban on transgender people in the military, stopped in its tracks by no fewer than four judges, with two of the rulings upheld by appeals courts. Judges in Chicago and Philadelphia, as well as California, temporarily stopped Trump’s “sanctuary cities” crackdown.

Trump calls court ‘totally out of control’

President Trump slammed the Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit Nov. 22, telling reporters it was “very unfair to law enforcement.” (The Washington Post)

A total of five rulings, by judges in Oregon, New York and the District of Columbia, among other places, enjoined the administration from cutting off funds to teen pregnancy prevention programs that failed to preach abstinence to the satisfaction of the Department of Health and Human Services.

This doesn’t count environmental rulings, like the Nov. 8 one halting construction of the Keystone XL pipeline issued by a judge in Montana. Judge Brian Morris was indeed appointed by President Barack Obama, though he clerked for the most conservative chief justice in modern history, William H. Rehnquist.

Roberts could have noted that those defeats have come at the hands of judges appointed not just by Democratic presidents but by Republicans dating all the way back to Ronald Reagan.

It was U.S. District Court Judge Dana M. Sabraw, for example, a California jurist appointed by President George W. Bush, who ripped the administration repeatedly for its family separation debacle.

[The Trump administration’s crazy losing streak in the courts: No, Jeff Sessions, it’s not about the judges]

And how could Trump forget that it was his own appointee, Timothy J. Kelly of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, who slapped down the effort to ban CNN’s Jim Acosta from the White House.

Many of these judges do indeed sit on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit (which covers a vast swath of territory of nine states — California, Nevada, Arizona, Montana, Washington, Oregon, Hawaii, Alaska and Idaho — and Guam and Northern Marianas, and is a traditional target for conservatives).

But as noted, rulings thwarting Trump have also come from judges sitting in New York, Maryland, the District of Columbia, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Massachusetts, Virginia, Michigan and beyond.

While there’s no scientific way of comparing judicial rhetoric, Republican appointees outside the 9th Circuit have actually seemed more inclined than others to lecture the president about the Constitution.

One of the toughest dressings-down came from a decision blocking Trump’s “sanctuary cities” crackdown written by Judge Ilana Rovner, appointed by President George H.W. Bush to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit, based in Chicago. In a decision joined by a Gerald Ford appointee and a Reagan appointee upholding a lower-court ruling by a Reagan appointee, she lit into the Trump administration for assuming powers to withhold money not granted to it by Congress to punish states and cities that didn’t go along with efforts to round up those in the country illegally.

Her message to Trump and then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions, translated, was basically, who do you think you are?

Our role in this case is not to assess the optimal immigration policies for our country. . . . The founders of our country well understood that the concentration of power threatens individual liberty and established a bulwark against such tyranny by creating a separation of powers among the branches of government. If the Executive Branch can determine policy, and then use the power of the purse to mandate compliance with that policy by the state and local governments, all without the authorization or even acquiescense of elected legislators, the check against tyranny is forsaken.

There was one possibly accurate observation in Trump’s comments: He said his losses sometimes seem “automatic.”

Based on the record, that’s not far from the truth.

But Roberts would never say that.

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Much of what Trump says are outright lies or racist, White Nationalist false narratives. While sadly that has proved to sometimes be a “winning” political strategy (because of a system that allows minority rule), it’s seldom a good litigating strategy in the 21st Century.

So, it’s hardly surprising that Trump is a “Big Loser” in court. It’s predictably outrageous for Trump to make the bogus claim that the courts are “out of control.” In fact, Trump and his scofflaw Administration are totally out of control, particularly in their often illegal and always immoral immigration policies. Indeed, until next January when the Democrats retake control of the House, the Federal Courts have actually been the only meaningful control on Trump. Perhaps their efforts will be enough to save the country from the greatest existential threat since world War II. Only time will tell.

PWS

11-23-18

CHIEF JUSTICE DEFENDS JUDICIAL INDEPENDENCE AS BABY DONALD CONTINUES TO THROW SPITBALLS – Trump Makes Absurd Claims In Desperate Attempt to Deflect Attention From Existential Danger He & His Historically Corrupt Administration Pose To America’s Future!

https://apple.news/ANc5WDrEdTK-LHT9ys0Qtqg

Matthew Choi reports for Politico:

Politics

Trump hits back at Chief Justice Roberts, escalating an extraordinary exchange

The president had originally attacked a District Court judge who ruled against his asylum policy as an ‘Obama judge.’

Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and President Donald Trump took swipes at each other Wednesday in an extraordinary exchange over just how partisan federal courts really are.

Roberts said Wednesday morning there are no “Obama judges or Trump judges” after the president attacked the judge who ruled against his attempt to restrict asylum seekers at the border earlier this week.

“We do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges,” Roberts said in a statement. “What we have is an extraordinary group of dedicated judges doing their level best to do equal right to those appearing before them. That independent judiciary is something we should all be thankful for.”

Later in the afternoon, Trump hit back with two posts on Twitter:

“Sorry Chief Justice John Roberts, but you do indeed have ‘Obama judges,’ and they have a much different point of view than the people who are charged with the safety of our country. It would be great if the 9th Circuit was indeed an ‘independent judiciary,’ but if it is why…..,” the president wrote, followed by: “…..are so many opposing view (on Border and Safety) cases filed there, and why are a vast number of those cases overturned. Please study the numbers, they are shocking. We need protection and security — these rulings are making our country unsafe! Very dangerous and unwise!”

The statement from Roberts, who was appointed by President George W. Bush, was a stark divergence from the chief justice’s stoic aversion to publicly criticizing Trump, even as the president has railed against federal judges who did not rule in his favor.

Carl Tobias, a professor at the University of Richmond School of Law, called Trump’s comments against the judiciary “unprecedented” in modern history and praised Roberts for defending the Judicial branch. Chief justices have historical avoided fighting with the other co-equal branches of government, but Tobias said he was “heartened” by Wednesday’s break from deference to keep Trump in his lane.

“I think it’s great that the chief justice has said something, because the Senate has done nothing on these issues and somebody has to protect the independence of the judiciary,” Tobias said. “So I’m not troubled.”

The Associated Press first reported Roberts’ comments.

Talking to reporters at the White House on Tuesday, Trump criticized Judge Jon Tigar of U.S. District Court in Northern California, who ruled against his policy announced this month that would require migrants to apply for asylum at legal border crossings. Currently, migrants can present themselves to immigration officers after illegally crossing the border and request asylum. Cases from the Northern District of California are appealed to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

A number of advocacy groups sued the Trump administration shortly after it announced the policy, and Tigar issued a temporary restraining order effectively thwarting the president’s efforts. Trump on Tuesday accused Tigar of being an “Obama judge” and called the 9th Circuit a “disgrace.” Tigar was appointed by President Barack Obama in 2012.

“Every case gets filed in the 9th Circuit because they know that’s not law. They know that’s not what this country stands for. Every case that gets filed in the 9th Circuit, we get beaten.” Trump said. “People should not be allowed to immediately run to this very friendly circuit and then file their case.”

He also said, “The 9th Circuit is really something we have to take a look at because it’s not fair.”

Trump added that he felt confident the case over his asylum policy would go to the Supreme Court where his administration would prevail — similar to his travel ban on citizens of several majority Muslim countries. A modified version of that policy was upheld in the Supreme Court after several challenges in lower federal courts, with Roberts writing the majority opinion in that case.

Even before Trump’s presidency, Republicans have tried to fill federal courts with conservative judges, blocking Obama’s Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland from getting a Senate vote. Trump ultimately filled the seat left vacant by Justice Antonin Scalia’s death with Justice Neil Gorsuch.

Senate Republicans stalled several of Obama’s appointees to federal courts until former Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.) unleashed the “nuclear option” to change Senate rules requiring only a simple majority to approve most federal judicial nominations.

This year, Republicans and Democrats engaged in a dramatic fight over the confirmation of Justice Brett Kavanaugh — Trump’s second nominee to the high court — which was mired in allegations of sexual assault. Both parties accused each other of toying with parliamentary procedure and manipulation in order to block or ram through the confirmation.

Trump has a track record of attacking the judiciary. He disparaged a federal judge in Hawaii last year as practicing “unprecedented judicial overreach” when he blocked an executive order barring entry to citizens of some majority Muslim countries.

In another Wednesday tweet, Trump even toyed with dividing the 9th Circuit into two or three circuits because, he said, it is “too big.”

Trump also lambasted U.S. District Court Judge Gonzalo Curiel, who presided over a class-action lawsuit against the now-defunct Trump University in 2016. Trump called Curiel, who is of Mexican descent and was born in Indiana, a “Mexican judge” to discredit his rulings. House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) called the remarks at the time the “textbook definition of a racist comment.”

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I could have told Chief Justice Roberts that his weak-kneed attempt to tell Trump to “cool the rhetoric” and stop “pushing the envelope” in the Travel Ban case would fall on deaf ears. In fact, as I predicted, Trump’s toxic combination of ignorance, arrogance, and corruption was only “fired up” by the disingenuous performance of the Supremes’ majority in that case.

Trump believes that there are now five “bought and paid for GOP Justices,” including Roberts, on the Supremes; he fully intends to exploit and treat them as the same type of cowards and toadies who have done, and continue to do, his dirty work for him in Congress and the Executive Branch.

Statements in support of judicial independence are most welcome and in this case long overdue. But, actions speak louder than words. Until Roberts and the majority of this colleagues start enforcing the Constitution and the rule of law against the all-out assault by a President who neither understands nor believes in American democracy, Trump will continue to treat them as the same type of patsies that he regularly counts on to mindlessly do his bidding (See, e.g., Sen. Chuck Grassley; Sen. Mitch McConnell; Sen. Lindsey Graham; Speaker Paul Ryan, etc.).

The solution is pretty simple: All nine Justices need to pull together in the future (starting now) and “just say no” to Trump’s abuses of the rule of law.

PWS

11-21-18

SCOFFLAWS OUTED AGAIN: U.S. DISTRICT JUDGE BLOCKS TRUMP’S ILLEGAL ATTACK ON ASYLUM LAW: ORDERS PROCESSING OF ALL WHO APPLY TO RESUME! — “Whatever the scope of the president’s authority, he may not rewrite the immigration laws to impose a condition that Congress has expressly forbidden!”

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/20/us/judge-denies-trump-asylum-policy.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage

Miriam Jordan reports for the NY Times:

LOS ANGELES — A federal judge on Monday ordered the Trump administration to resume accepting asylum claims from migrants no matter where or how they entered the United States, dealing at least a temporary setback to the president’s attempt to clamp down on a huge wave of Central Americans crossing the border.

Judge Jon S. Tigar of the United States District Court in San Francisco issued a temporary restraining order that blocks the government from carrying out a new rule that denies protections to people who enter the country illegally. The order, which suspends the rule until the case is decided by the court, applies nationally.

“Whatever the scope of the president’s authority, he may not rewrite the immigration laws to impose a condition that Congress has expressly forbidden,” Mr. Tigar wrote in his order.

As a caravan of several thousand people journeyed toward the Southwest border, President Trump signed a proclamation on Nov. 9 that banned migrants from applying for asylum if they failed to make the request at a legal checkpoint. Only those who entered the country through a port of entry would be eligible, he said, invoking national security powers to protect the integrity of the United States borders.

Within days, the administration submitted a rule to the federal registry, letting it go into effect immediately and without the customary period for public comment.

But the rule overhauled longstanding asylum laws that ensure people fleeing persecution can seek safety in the United States, regardless of how they entered the country. Advocacy groups, including the Southern Poverty Law Center and the American Civil Liberties Union, swiftly sued the administration for effectively introducing what they deemed an asylum ban.

The advocacy groups accused the government of “violating Congress’s clear command that manner of entry cannot constitute a categorical asylum bar” in their complaint. They also said the administration had violated federal guidelines by not allowing public comment on the rule.

But Trump administration officials defended the regulatory change, arguing that the president was responding to a surge in migrants seeking asylum based on frivolous claims, which ultimately lead their cases to be denied by an immigration judge. The migrants then ignore any orders to leave, and remain unlawfully in the country.

”The president has sought to halt this dangerous and illegal practice and regain control of the border,” government lawyers said in court filings.

Mr. Trump, who had made stanching illegal immigration a top priority since his days on the campaign trail, has made no secret of his frustration over the swelling number of migrants heading to the United States. The president ordered more than 5,000 active-duty troops to the border to prevent the migrants from entering.

The new rule was widely regarded as an effort to deter Central Americans, many of whom request asylum once they reach the United States, often without inspection, from making the journey over land from their countries to the border.

United States immigration laws stipulate that foreigners who touch American soil are eligible to apply for asylum. They cannot be deported immediately. They are eligible to have a so-called credible fear interview with an asylum officer, a cursory screening that the overwhelming majority of applicants pass. As result, most of the migrants are released with a date to appear in court.

In recent years, more and more migrants have availed of the asylum process, often after entering the United States illegally. A record 23,121 migrants traveling as families were detained at the border in October. Many of the families turn themselves in to the Border Patrol rather than queue up to request asylum at a port of entry.

The Trump administration believes the migrants are exploiting asylum laws to immigrate illegally to the United States. Soaring arrivals have exacerbated a huge backlog of pending cases in the immigration courts, which recently broke the one-million mark. Many migrants skip their court dates, only to remain illegally in the country, which Mr. Trump derides as “catch and release.”

But advocates argue that many migrants are victims of violence or persecution and are entitled to seek sanctuary. Gangs are ubiquitous across El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala, where lawlessness and corruption enable them to kill with impunity.

Daniel Victor contributed reporting from Hong Kong.

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Entirely predictable. “Many of the families turn themselves in to the Border Patrol rather than queue up to request asylum at a port of entry.”

Why aren’t ethical requirements being enforced on Government lawyers who present and defend these clearly frivolous positions in court? Knowingly and intentionally depriving individuals of statutory, civil, and constitutional rights, while tying up Federal Judges and other “officers of the court” on frivolous political stunts directed at harming individuals on the basis of race and nationality must, at some point, be deterred!

These are not criminal proceedings, and the Administration is not entitled to a “presumption of innocence” for its lawless actions. At some point, ethical lawyers have an obligation “not to serve” a lawless Administration and to publicly disclose and oppose the Administration’s intentionally illegal actions and intentional wrongdoing aimed at migrants and communities of color in the U.S. “Job security” doesn’t entitle Government employees, let alone those who also are members of the bar, to violate their oaths to uphold the Constitution.

And no, no matter how much the GOP appointees might want to do so, the Supremes can’t authorize the President to rewrite the clear terms of the law at his whim.

PWS

11-20-18

Here’s a report from Hon. “Sir Jeffrey” Chase of the Round Table:

🇺🇸Due Process Forever!

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And no, no matter how much the GOP appointees might want to do so, the Supremes can’t authorize the President to rewrite the clear terms of the law at his whim.

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