"The Voice of the New Due Process Army" ————– Musings on Events in U.S. Immigration Court, Immigration Law, Sports, and Other Random Topics by Retired United States Immigration Judge (Arlington, Virginia) and former Chairman of the Board of Immigration Appeals Paul Wickham Schmidt. To see my complete professional bio, just click on the link below.
Michigan Stadium, America’s largest, holds 107,601. It would take approximately 20 Michigan Stadiums to hold all the 2,000,000 + folks waiting for hearings in Garland’s dysfunctional and backlogged Immigration Courts! And, that doesn’t include their families, communities, employers, co-workers and others affected by their fates! If Garland were the managing partner of a law firm or the CEO of a business, he would be “long gone.” Why aren’t competence and accountability “minimum requirements” for America’s chief lawyer? Michigan Stadium Photo by Andrew Horne, Creative Commons License
Even at this accelerated completion rate, on an annualized basis, I calculate thatEOIR will still be building backlog at a rate of nearly 300,000 annually, based on 800,000 new receipts from DHS.
At approximately 700 completions/year/judge (EOIR’s figure), EOIR would need approximately 400 additional, fully trained, fully productive IJs on the bench just to “break even” and stop creating more backlog.
Nearly 800,000 asylum cases are sitting in the backlog, many ready to try and pending for years. With a better BIA and better trained IJs who actually applied Cardoza-Fonseca, Mogharrabi, and the regulatory presumptions of well-founded fear properly (instead of being “programmed to deny”) the vast majority of these old asylum cases could be prioritized and granted in short hearings.
Even with today’s broken, biased, and unconstitutionally inconsistent Immigration Courts, migrants prevail against deportation in approximately 60% of cases! This suggests that the majority of the Immigration Court’s cases could be prioritized and resolved in the migrant’s favor without lengthy hearings IF the system had a better BIA, better IJs, better training, better practices, and a better working relationship with the private bar and DHS.
Far too few bonds are being granted, and insufficient attention is being paid to inconsistencies in the bond process.
Only an infinitesimally small percentage, .56%, of new cases filed by ICE involve allegations of criminal conduct. This suggests continuing problems with the way ICE allocates enforcement resources and chooses to use Immigration Court time.
Earlier this year, I had predicted that Garland would top the 2 million backlog mark by the end of August 2022.https://wp.me/p8eeJm-7dT
I was off by 3 months, as it actually took him until the end of November 2022 to achieve this negative landmark.
Nevertheless, some things are clear: This system is “beyond FUBAR!” It needs professional leadership, a new appellate board, better judges, better training, better utilization of the private bar, smarter, more creative and innovative practices, and authority to “rein in” in out of control ICE Enforcement. All the same things experts said were needed back at the time of Biden’s election! Ignoring expert advice has resulted in just the continuing, mushrooming disaster at EOIR and in our legal system that experts predicted!
Over two years, Garland has shown that he is not the person for the job. Nor have his political subordinates shown any aptitude for addressing the festering management, legal, and quality control problems @ EOIR!
Experts and advocates should be pushing the Administration and Dems in Congress for a change in leadership at the DOJ! Every day of failure means more backlog, more injustice, more frustration, more lives endangered, and a growing threat to American democracy — from those sworn to protect and uphold it, but aren’t getting the job done!
”Casey is still shaking his head. With so much executive talent and legal expertise available ‘in the market’ how could the Biden Administration’s immigration bureaucracy and their political overlords perform with such disasterous incompetence?” PHOTO: Rudi Reit Creative Commons
Fresh off a recent disaster where they illegally released the names of thousands of vulnerable asylum seekers in the U.S., the DHS announced another major data screw-up. This time it concerned so-called “alternatives to detention.”
ICE has informed TRAC that Alternatives to Detention (ATD) data previously released by the agency on several occasions between August 2022 and December 2022, as well as data previously released for FY 2022, was inaccurate. TRAC therefore urges caution in interpreting the latest numbers ICE has just posted.
The data ICE has been posting for months showed that use of GPS ankle monitors had been increasing which TRAC previously reported. ICE now reports this is incorrect, that ankle monitor usage is in fact way down, not up. Adding to the confusion, ICE frequently posts data, replaces it, and replaces it again without any indication that changes have taken place, or which set are the “correct” numbers.
ICE data reporting problems extend beyond the GPS ankle monitor usage. ICE’s new data for FY 2022 significantly revised the previously numbers for every single one of the ATD reported technologies—not only GPS, but also SmartLINK, and VoiceID, as well. Not only did the use of GPS monitors drop, but the public now learned that one-in-nine (11%) were not being monitored with the use of any technology at all! Also materially revised were the costs for technology during FY 2022 and average lengths in the program, as well as what was happening in a substantial number of local AOR offices across the country.
So, instead of ankle-monitor use increasing, as previously reported, it substantially decreased: The polar opposite. Yet, by the time this “correction” surfaces, media reports and sometimes even actions based on the bogus data have already taken place. Often, the “belated truth” becomes “back-page news,” if news at all.
Let’s be clear. These aren’t minor “rounding errors” or “adjustments or corrections” that don’t materially affect the picture painted by the original “data dump.” They are major screw-ups that basically “change the answer from A to B or from Yes to No.”
This the just the latest stunning indication of management failure within the Biden immigration bureaucracy. It goes along with “task avoidance” on very achievable fixes at the border, endless backlogs, completely dysfunctional Immigration Courts, abandonment of the rule of law, and lack of any overall values-based legal strategy when it comes to immigration, human rights, and racial justice.
You can read the complete TRAC report on the latest DHS bungling here:TRAC DHS Data Wrong. Just “warning” folks not to trust DHS data isn’t enough. In a data-riven world, the public deserves and requires competent management and accurate data from our immigration agencies!
Amanda Frost Professor UVA Law Author, “You Are Not American: Citizenship Stripping from Dred Scott to the Dreamers “ PHOTO: UVA Law
Justice Clarence Thomas has openly flouted the federal law that requires all federal judges, including Supreme Court justices, to recuse themselves from cases in which they cannot be impartial: He has participated in a case in which his wife, Ginni, undeniably has an interest. For a long time, it has felt like there is nothing to be done about this—conventional wisdom says that short of impeachment, Supreme Court justices are immune from penalties for their misconduct. But that is wrong.
Thomas’ eight colleagues have the tools to protect the court’s integrity: They can publicly censure him, bar him from being the decisive vote in cases in which he should have recused, and take away his power to author majority opinions. Whether they will take action is a different story, which may explain why the court’s reputation is at a historic low.
But Thomas, who has long played fast and loose with recusal laws, has finally gone too far. The issue came to a head last month, when the Supreme Court refused to block the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol from obtaining Arizona GOP Chair Kelli Ward’s phone records. In January 2021, Ward had orchestrated an alternative slate of electors (which included herself) in an effort to subvert the election of Joe Biden as president. Thomas participated in the court’s decision, casting a dissenting vote, even though his wife was intimately involved in these events.
Chances are you heard nothing about this. That’s because the decision was part of the court’s “shadow docket”—orders issued without hearing or written decision—and so it garnered little public attention.
But it should have, because Thomas’ participation in the case was a flagrant violation of the federal law requiring recusal from cases in which it is “known by the judge” that his spouse “ha[s] an interest that could be substantially affected by the outcome.” His vote also transgressed that statute’s broader provision requiring disqualification in “any proceeding in which [a judge’s] impartiality might reasonably be questioned.”
Ginni Thomas’ connection to the case is not in question. She has actively tried to overturn Biden’s election in Arizona and other states. In December 2020, Ginni Thomas sent letters to 29 Arizona lawmakers urging them to “fight back against fraud” and select a “clean slate of Electors” after Biden won the election. She also sent numerous text messages to President Trump’s chief of staff demanding he overturn the election, and attended the rally on the Ellipse on Jan. 6, though she left before the attack on the Capitol. This past September, the Jan. 6 committee subpoenaed and interviewed Ginni Thomas, and she repeated then her unfounded belief that the 2020 presidential election was stolen.
Without question, Ginni Thomas has an “interest that could be substantially affected by the outcome” of the Jan. 6 committee’s subpoena of Ward’s phone records. Also, without question, Justice Thomas knew it when he cast his dissenting vote to bar disclosure.
The eight other justices know it, too. Yet so far, they have done nothing about a fellow justice’s blatant violation of a federal law designed to protect the integrity of the court on which they serve. Understandably, the justices are reluctant to police their colleagues. But Justice Thomas’ extraordinary conduct calls for an extraordinary response.
. . . .
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Read Amanda’s full article at the link.
Failure of one of America’s (supposedly) “top judges” to comply with basic ethical and legal rules undermines democracy! That’s doubly true when the litigation at issue involves an ex-President who has made it abundantly clear that he doesn’t believe the rules apply to him. That’s the same ex-Pres who recently treasonously claimed that the Constitution should be set aside because he lost the 2020 election by more than 7 million votes and can’t accept that truth!
“Oscar Aguado-Cuevas, a Mexican national, petitions for review of the BIA’s decision affirming a denial of his application for relief under the Convention Against Torture. For the reasons below, we GRANT the petition, VACATE the BIA’s decision, and REMAND this case for further consideration of Aguado-Cuevas’s petition for CAT protection. … Aguado-Cuevas filed an application for relief under the Convention Against Torture (“CAT”), arguing that his uncles and cousins in Mexico were cartel members who would kill him if he returned. In September 2020, Aguado-Cuevas, his father, and an expert witness testified in support of Aguado-Cuevas’s CAT application. … Aguado-Cuevas signed a cooperation agreement and began cooperating with federal authorities. Aguado-Cuevas’s cooperation, including his agreement to testify against Adolfo Jr. and CJNG, was leaked to the media and publicized online. … [A]n expert witness testified that Aguado-Cuevas’s chances of potential risk or torture upon returning to Mexico were “[e]xtremely high to [a] near certainty” due to his informant and debtor status. … [T]he BIA erred by not applying the correct legal framework in which it must show that it meaningfully considered “relevant substantial evidence supporting the alien’s claims.” … Although we remand primarily for the BIA to reconsider the state involvement prong of the CAT analysis, we note that both parties acknowledge that the BIA’s likelihood of torture analysis suffers from similar deficiencies. Accordingly, to the extent that the BIA finds that Aguado-Cuevas has shown the requisite level of state involvement upon remand, we order the BIA to also consider the likelihood of torture prong under the proper legal framework. … Aguado-Cuevas claims that he will be murdered by CJNG as punishment for being an informant and debtor following his drug-related activities in the U.S. Concerning the likelihood of torture, Aguado-Cuevas argues—and the Government agrees—that the BIA should have more closely considered evidence of Aguado-Cuevas’s actions in the U.S. that could characterize him to CJNG as an informant and debtor. Specifically, the BIA did not properly consider evidence that (1) Aguado-Cuevas owed CJNG $120,000 after his botched deal; (2) Aguado-Cuevas was identified by the media as an informant in the prosecution of a CJNG member; (3) a text message identified Aguado-Cuevas as a potential target of the CJNG; (4) a residence where Aguado-Cuevas stayed was ransacked; and (5) CJNG routinely kills debtors and informants. Such evidence goes directly to Aguado-Cuevas’s arguments of likelihood of torture as an informant and debtor; such a theory hinges not on events in Mexico but on his actions in the U.S., making him a particular target for torture by CJNG. The BIA failed to properly consider these pieces of evidence. … The complete lack of discussion of the aforementioned evidence suggests that the BIA has not met this standard. As before, the BIA should remand to the IJ for additional factfinding if necessary.”
Many congrats and thanks Carla! There is an”epidemic” of botched CAT cases being “outed” by the Circuits. This one was so horribly mishandled, that even OIL couldn’t defend it!
Yet, the “downbeat goes on” as Garland feigns ignorance of the institutionalized injustice @ EOIR being carried out in his name! On his watch, the BIA has gone from “any reason to deny” to “no reason whatsoever for denying.”
Apparently, as long as the BIA staff attorney drafts the decision so the individual loses, it really doesn’t matter to the “signatory appellate judge” at the BIA what goes above the “bottom line.”
It’s a heck of a way to “run the railroad” 🚂 with human lives at stake and an ever growing, out of control, 2 million case backlog! After 2.5 years bouncing around the EOIR system, this particular case is headed back to the IJ in a never ending quest for competent judging, due process, and fundamental fairness. All three of the foregoing are elusive qualities at Garland’s EOIR!
Garland’sso-called “dedicated dockets” gimmick has been a total failure from a due process and fundamental fairness standpoint. See, e.g.,https://trac.syr.edu/reports/704.
The only “dedicated docket” that Garland REALLY needs at EOIR is one dedicated to getting the results right in the first instance! But, that readily achievable objective (althoughNOT without major, long over due personnel changes in “management,” the BIA, and among some IJs) appears of little interest to Garland or the Biden Administration. Thus, the latest Dem Administration appears content to let the dysfunctional EOIR system limp on spewing injustice, bad law, and insurmountable backlogs on its downward spiral!
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Migrants should be welcomed with dignity and compassion—not turned away or treated inhumanely.
Finally, after over two years, a district court has ruled that the Title 42 expulsion policy- which has blocked most migrants from crossing the U.S.-Mexico border to seek asylum- violates U.S. law and ordered the Biden administration to end it.
This anti-immigrant policy has led to hundreds of thousands of people deported back to dangerous conditions or stranded in makeshift camps. Other migrants have been forced to take dangerous routes through deserts, mountains, rivers, and the ocean—facing extreme heat, violence, even death.
The termination of the policy goes into effect at the end of December, unless the administration attempts to delay this. That is why we are calling on the Biden administration to end this policy IMMEDIATELY and to not accompany this with the expansion of detention.
Sign our petition to speak out against this cruel policy today!
Letter to President
Dear President Biden:
I believe that people fleeing dangerous situations in their home countries should be welcome to the United States with compassion—not dealt overwhelming obstacles to seeking asylum.
That is why I am relieved to hear that after over two years, a district court has ended the cruel and unnecessary use of Title 42. This anti-immigrant policy has led to hundreds of thousands of people deported back to dangerous conditions or stranded in makeshift camps. Under this cruel policy, Black and Brown migrants have suffered disproportionately while some others have been able to seek asylum—evidence of the racism that drives our immigration enforcement policies.
That is why I am calling on the Biden administration to end Title 42 immediately and to not replace it with other inhumane and xenophobic policies that cause similar harm. Additionally, your administration must not accompany this with the expansion of immigration detention. Any efforts to uphold this policy actively supports more family separations, trauma, and violence against Black, Brown, and immigrant communities.
All people—regardless of where they were born, the color of their skin, their culture or religious affiliation—should be able to seek refuge and be welcomed with the compassion, dignity, and respect we all deserve. I urge your administration to do all that you can to end Title 42 immediately—and ensure all migrants can exercise their right to seek asylum.
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The regime that employed this monster to abuse and persecute asylum seekers was voted out of office more than TWO YEARS AGO! Long past time for the Biden Administration to STOP defending, expanding, and carrying out his illegal and immoral policies that inflict “DIRE HARM” on vulnerable LEGAL asylum seekers! Attribution: Stephen Miller Monster by Peter Kuper, PoliticalCartoons.com
”BIDEN DOJ HALL OF SHAME” — Those Who Have Defended or Enabled Stephen Miller’s “Crimes Against Humanity:”
Merrick Garland, Attorney General
Lisa Monaco, Deputy Attorney General
Vanita Gupta, Associate Attorney General
Kristen Clarke, Assistant Attorney General, Civil Rights
Elizabeth Prolager, Solicitor General
When these guys eventually “come out” of their cushy political positions, and are looking for jobs in the “real world” they now blithely ignore, progressives, human rights, and racial justice advocates should remember where they stood and what they did or failed to do when human rights and the rule of law were “on the line!”
🗽DISSENTING OPINION: TRADING AWAY REFUGEE RIGHTS & DUE PROCESS FOR LONG OVERDUE DREAMER PROTECTIONS IS “NOT OK!”
By Paul Wickham Schmidt
Courtside Exclusive
Dec. 6, 2022
I dissent.
I was outraged when I read in this morning’s Washington Post about the horrible “Sinema/Tillis misnamed immigration compromise” (actually a “sellout”) being negotiated during the lame duck session of Congress. In short, that proposal apparently would trade long overdue protection for “Dreamers” for the rights and lives of refugees and asylum seekers.
Incredibly, in the face of U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan’s findings that the intentional illegal use of Title 42 had resulted in countless clear violations of the legal rights of asylum seekers, subjecting them to a litany of horrors and abuses that he described as “dire harm,” these legislators would extend those abuses for an indefinite period! That’s notwithstanding evidence not only of the irreparable harm that Title 42 has caused, but also the rather obvious fact that once we “normalize” those abuses, they will never end.
There will always be another fabricated reason for extending the Title 42 charade. Indeed, once we start mischaracterizing abuse as “law,” we can’t even call it “abuse” and hold the abusers accountable! That’s all part of the dehumanizing or “Dred Scottification” process!
Additionally, in the place of a functioning working asylum and refugee system, the proposal would eventually substitute so called “processing centers” and “expedited procedures” to railroad asylum seekers out of the country without due process. And, it wouldn’t address the total dysfunction and denial of due process in our Immigration “Courts” by enacting another long overdue provision: the “Lofgren Article I Immigration court bill!” What a farce!
Let’s be clear about what’s happening here! The legal and human rights of refugees and asylum seekers are not “ours” to trade away for relief for another deserving group that has long been irrationally denied! “Processing centers” are a euphemism for “immigration prisons” — part of the “New American Gulag.” “Expedited processing” is a euphemism for “railroading.” Both detention and artificially expediting dockets have been proven to be ineffective and unjust, over and over. Yet, here we go again!
My outrage turned to shock and dismay when I learned that some erstwhile defenders of due process, human rights, and racial justice for asylum seekers (incredibly) thought that this type of immoral compromise was a “good idea!” Not me!
Restrictionist/nativist Dems masquerading as “moderates” are a huge problem. They play right into the GOP’s hands.
When committing crimes against humanity or giving away refugees’ rights becomes a “strategy,” “option,” or “bargaining chip,” we’re lost as a nation. And, that’s exactly where we’re heading with horrible, immoral proposals like this.
Human rights and due process are non-negotiable! And, I guarantee that extending Title 42, building additional Gulag (rather than making the existing legal asylum and refugee systems work), and railroading asylum seekers will empower smugglers and lead to further growth of our underground population.
Human migration won’t be stopped by ineffective and immoral “deterrence.” And, although many hate the idea, refugees basically “self-select” and are driven by forces beyond our immediate control.
Refugees are, by definition, folks who can’t return! So, there is no reason to believe that true refugees (of which there are many) are going to be “deterred.” They might be “incentivized” to seek refuge in particular, relatively safe, places; but, nobody seems interested in a “carrot” approach — even though the “stick approach” has failed and continues to do so!
Look at the folks who continue to die in vessels in the Mediterranean even though they are fully aware that they are unwanted and that the EU will stop at no cruelty to keep them out.
And, examine the wealth of documentation that folks forced to “remain in Mexico” — and apply under what we know to be a corrupt and inadequate system — are systematically abused and exploited.
This time, we’re not just “pushing the St. Louis out to sea.” We’re torpedoing her and watching the passengers drown. And Dems are a huge part of the problem!
Other (soon to be former) progressive Democrats might choose to “go along to get along” with heaping additional abuses on largely defenseless refugees and asylum seekers. But, not me! I dissent!
Who would have thought that the Biden Administration would be dumb and treacherous enough to let this neo-Nazi xenophobe and refugee hater “own” human rights “policy” in a Dem Administration? But, it appears they have! Attribution: Stephen Miller Monster by Peter Kuper, PoliticalCartoons.com
From Michael Shear & Eileen Sullivan the NY Times:
WASHINGTON — The Biden administration is considering substantial new limits on the number of migrants who could apply for asylum in the United States, according to people familiar with the proposal, which would expand restrictions similar to those first put in place along the border by former President Donald J. Trump.
The plan is one of several being debated by President Biden’s top aides as the country confronts a high number of illegal crossings at the border. It would prohibit migrants who are fleeing persecution from seeking refuge in the United States unless they were first denied safe harbor by another country, like Mexico.
People familiar with the discussions said the new policy, if adopted, could go into effect as soon as this month, just as the government stops using a public health rule that was put in place at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic by the Trump administration and became a key policy to manage the spike in crossings during Mr. Biden’s tenure. A federal judge has ordered the administration to stop using the health rule on Dec. 21.
But the idea of broadly prohibiting migrants from seeking asylum strikes directly at the heart of decades of American and international law that has shaped the United States’ role as a place of safety for displaced and fearful people across the globe.
. . . .
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Read the complete article at the link.
[U.S. District Judge Emmet ]Sullivan wrote that the federal officials knew the order “would likely expel migrants to locations with a ‘high probability’ of ‘persecution, torture, violent assaults, or rape’ ” — and did so anyway.
“It is unreasonable for the CDC to assume that it can ignore the consequences of any actions it chooses to take in the pursuit of fulfilling its goals,” Sullivan wrote. “It is undisputed that the impact on migrants was indeed dire.”
What part of Judge Sullivan’s very clear ruling on their “crimes against humanity” and knowing violations of U.S. and international law doesn’t the “Biden Administration Clown Show” 🤡 understand? Just follow the asylum law and due process, already! If you can’t do that, resign and let folks who can do the job (of which there are plenty out here in the “real world”) take over and do the job you have been failing at for two years!
In any event, the talent is out here in the private/NGO sector and will resist this latest insult to humanity and degradation of the rule of law and due process that Administration officials are “pondering!” “Studying and deciding whether or not to violate the law (again)?” Sounds like a potential criminal conspiracy to me!
In any event, expert litigators like Lee Gelernt of the ACLU and other NDPA superstars are prepared to “beat the Biden Administration’s brains (if any) out” in court again if they try to implement any more of their illegal and immoral immigration gimmicks!
“If the Biden administration simply substitutes the unlawful and anti-asylum Trump transit ban for Title 42,” Mr. Gelernt said, “we will immediately sue, as we successfully did during the Trump administration.”
The Chair of the Senate Foreign Relations committee was also “not on board” with the Biden Administration’s latest harebrained ideas on diminishing human rights that they have substituted for basic competence over the past two years of disasters, and unforgivable policy screw-ups on immigration, human rights, and racial justice issues:
“If the reported story is true, the Biden administration would further step away from our nation’s commitment to offer refuge to asylum seekers,” Senator Bob Menendez, Democrat of New Jersey and the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, said in a statement on Thursday. “I will firmly oppose this misguided attempt to rewrite our asylum laws without congressional approval, just as I firmly opposed the same efforts under President Trump.”
I also have to wonder how Judge Sullivan will react when he learns how Biden Administration officials are using his “reluctantly granted” five weeks of delay in implementing his “cease and desist order.” Instead of, at long last, getting their collective tails in gear to finally put in place a competent legal system for re-establishing legal asylum at the southern border, these disgraceful petty bureaucrats and so-called “policy” officials have been scheming to evade the rule of law and commit yet more “crimes against humanity.”
The NDPA is not going to let them get away with it. Even if it means ripping apart the “so-called Democratic Coalition” going into the 2024 elections!
🇺🇸 Due Process Forever! Tyranny & Stupidity From either Dems or the GOP, never!
It’s been over 30 years since Congress enacted the most recent set of comprehensive immigration reforms: the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 and the Immigration Act of 1990. These bipartisan yet hotly contested bills passed only after a debate spanning five presidential administrations, eight congressional sessions, and painful compromises by all parties. Even then, both bills died on the House floor before being resurrected at the 11th hour.
Can lessons learned during the last round of reform be applied to future debates? Charles Kamasaki, author of “Immigration Reform: The Corpse That Will Not Die” (Mandel Vilar Press, 2019), thinks so. The book provides a history of how the 1980s-era reforms were enacted, along with a summary of developments since then. It concludes with seven lessons that advocates and lawmakers should consider in advancing future immigration reform.
Join us for a discussion with Mr. Kamasaki, Cornell Law School professor Steve Yale-Loehr, and Wall Street Journal immigration reporter Michelle Hackman about the prospects for immigration reform legislation in 2023.
This webinar is cosponsored by the Cornell Migrations Initiative, the Cornell Law School Immigration Law and Policy Research Program, and Catholic Charities of Tompkins and Tioga Counties.
Dalia Castillo-Granados and Yasmin Yavar. So far this year, the Children’s Immigration Law Academy has responded to more than 300 legal technical assistance questions. It has coordinated five in-depth virtual trainings and hosted eight webinars that attracted more than 1,600 attendees.
Dalia Castillo-Granados had just begun her fellowship with the St. Frances Cabrini Center for Immigrant Legal Assistance, a program of Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston, when she met Yasmin Yavar in 2008.
Like Castillo-Granados, Yavar focused a lot of her attention on special immigrant juvenile status cases as the pro bono coordinator of Kids in Need of Defense’s new office in Houston. Despite changes in the law that allowed more children to apply for this form of immigration relief—which gives those who have been abused, neglected or abandoned a pathway to lawful permanent residence in the United States—attorneys were just beginning to test the waters in this area.
After collaborating on a case, Castillo-Granados and Yavar stayed in touch and created their own support system.
“There was a very small community of attorneys, even nationwide, representing unaccompanied children,” says Castillo-Granados. “In Houston, Yasmin and I were trying to get into state court and educating judges about why we were there. We had each other on speed dial, calling to talk over strategy and get suggestions and push the cases forward.”
Several years later, as an increasing number of unaccompanied children crossed the United States-Mexico border, Castillo-Granados and Yavar wanted to support the legal service providers and volunteer attorneys who were taking their cases. They drafted a plan for a legal resource center focused on children’s immigration law, and Yavar, who had worked with the ABA’s South Texas Pro Bono Asylum Representation Project in Harlingen, Texas, shared it with Commission on Immigration Director Meredith Linsky.
At the time, Linsky met regularly with the ABA Working Group on Unaccompanied Minor Immigrants. Its members liked the idea, and in September 2015, Linsky helped Castillo-Granados and Yavar launch the Children’s Immigration Law Academy.
“We decided to do exactly what we did for each other back when we were starting, but for everyone else,” says Castillo-Granados, who serves as CILA’s director.
. . . .
******************
Read Amanda’s full article at the link.
Here’s an interesting contrast in problem-solving, creative thinking, dynamic leadership, and effectively using resources. Between 2008, when they met, and 2021, Dalia and Yasmin experienced an approximately 15X growth in the number of unaccompanied children, from 8,000 to 120,000. Faced with this stressful situation and a U.S. Government that under Administrations of both parties has displayed a rather callous indifference to child welfare, it would have been easy to give up and take their talents to another area of law!
Because they worked for an NGO, the couldn’t demand more resources or claim that drastic reductions in children’s rights, harsher enforcement, or “deterrence” were the “only solutions.” Interestingly, these were exactly the type of “rote, alarmist, reactionary reactions” that the Obama Administration had and that the Trump Administration tried to “implement” without the benefit of legislation.
Dalia and Yasmin viewed the problem as challenging, yet solvable, came up with a plan, and sold it to other members of the legal community — on its merits, not its “scare value.” They were able to “leverage” their experience, skills, and dynamic leadership to pool resources, create teamwork, and “teach and inspire others to help those in need.”
They actually expanded, improved quality, and increased efficiency, thus multiplying rather than diluting their effectiveness. The also relied largely on existing tools and frameworks, but “leveraged” them in a creative and more efficient manner.
I submit that this is the exact opposite of how the broken bureaucracies at DHS, DOJ, and ORR have reacted to most immigration issues. Given lots of personnel, considerable resources, a workable, if not “perfect,” legal framework, and ample flexibility to redirect and repurpose wasted or misused resources, the last three Administrations have fallen “flat on their overstuffed and moribund bureaucratic faces.”
With billions in taxpayer dollars, thousands of employees, and a legal framework that actually provides plenty of useful options, the USG has underachieved, to put it charitably. It has fallen back on wasteful, disruptive, andinefficient “proven to fail” deterrence “gimmicks;” ludicrous rhetoric; mythical threats; aimless reshuffling and churning of existing workload; bolloxed priorities; victim shaming and blaming; cruelty; and most disturbingly, massive scofflaw actions, crackpot proposals, and blatant curtailment of important human and legal rights.
To make matters worse, at least the Biden Administration has had access to what is probably the greatest “talent pool” of human rights, immigration, and child welfare experts on the face of the earth — almost all of it in the private/NGO/advocacy/academic sectors! Yet, they have resisted sound expert advice and creative solutions, while largely passing over available dynamic and inspiring leadership to overstuff their bloated immigration bureaucracy largely with a mixture of Trump holdovers, Obama retreads, and lesser lights.
Obviously, talented NDPA superstars like Dalia and Yasmin are the wave of our future — not just in immigration and human rights, but in government, politics, our legal system, and American society! The issue is how we can force unwilling, “stuck in reverse” Dem Administrations to grow some backbone, enforce the values they espouse during elections, “clean house” in the bureaucracy and the ranks of ineffective, often clueless, politicos, and “repopulate and reform” the USG immigration bureaucracy and the beyond dysfunctional Immigration Courts with stars like Dalia and Yasmin. That is, courageous, visionary, experts who can actually solve problems rather than creating new ones and blaming the victims and those striving to hep them!
Many thanks to Roberto Blum, Esquire, of Houston Texas for sending this article my way. Roberto says “they are the real heroes!” I concur, my friend, 100%!
But special master appointments are rare, and judges at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit expressed concern at oral arguments that Cannon’s decision set a troubling precedent: allowing the target of a search warrant to go into court and request a special master that could interfere with an executive branch investigation before an indictment is ever issued.
The judges did not back down from that stance in their written opinion Thursday, saying they could not issue an order that would “allow any subject of a search warrant to block government investigations after the execution of the warrant.”
“Nor can we write a rule that allows only former presidents to do so,” the Thursday opinion read. “Either approach would be a radical reordering of our caselaw limiting the federal courts’ involvement in criminal investigations. And both would violate bedrock separation-of-powers limitations.
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I imagine every criminal defendant in America would be delighted to have the benefit of “Judge Loose’s” incredible ruling that the subject of a criminal investigation, basically caught “red handed” with contraband after a lawfully executed search warrant, could block an ongoingcriminal investigation.
It’s notable that all three 11th Circuit panel judges were GOP appointees, two of them Trump appointees like Judge “Loose!” Unlike “Loose,” they actually take the Constitution and their oaths of office to uphold it seriously, at least in this case!
The saga of Trump’s frivolous abuse of our justice system isn’t yet over. He can request review from the Supremes. However, since he lost to Biden, the Supremes’ GOP majority has shown less willingness to bail out the insurrectionist ex-Prez in his dilatory personal battles to avoid accountability for his actions!
Inside the Gulag In the fine tradition of an earlier “Uncle Joe,” like US Presidents before him, Joe Biden finds it useful to have a deadly “due process free zone” to stash “non-persons” and “break their will to resist!” — PHOTO: Public Realm
President Biden vowed in his 2020 campaign to shutter for-profit migrant detention facilities; he repeated the promise after taking office. It hasn’t happened. To the contrary: The administration, overwhelmed by the surge in unauthorized border crossings, now holds roughly 30,000 migrants in detention, about double the count it inherited from the Trump administration. Roughly 4 in 5 detainees are in private facilities overseen by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
That’s a troubling development given ongoing reports of poor conditions and health care for migrant detainees, and evidence that the government has been less than aggressive in seeking remedies in the past. Officials say they are tightening oversight, yet problems persist. Even though the government has stopped housing migrants in some prisons with poor records, more needs to happen. And Mr. Biden’s original promise to close down for-profit migrant detention should still be the goal.
In fact, the president issued an executive order soon after entering office to close down private prisons used to house other federal inmates — who are by and large U.S. citizens. The rationale for closing them was the same as that for shifting away from private migrant prisons: the principle that incarcerating offenders is properly a government obligation, not an opportunity for profit.
If anything, the logic for ending private prisons for migrants is more compelling. Roughly 70 percent of migrant detainees have no criminal record; they face civil immigration proceedings, awaiting adjudication of their asylum and deportation cases. Many of the rest have been charged with relatively minor offenses, including traffic violations, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University, which gathers immigration enforcement data. Only a modest number have committed serious crimes. In other words, few migrant detainees are dangerous.
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Read the complete editorial at the link.
Unfortunately, it’s no surprise to migrants and their advocates that Biden and Harris said one thing about human rights to get elected and did the opposite once in office. The list of broken promises and betrayals of fundamental legal and human values is long and enraging.
With yet more USCIS fee increases apparently in the offing — more money for less service and diminished quality — perhaps DHS should be required to reprogram money and resources from the “New American Gulag” to USCIS adjudications. Might also cut down on litigation and IG investigations, not to mention detainee deaths.
Like most of the Biden Administration’s self-inflicted immigration/human rights/racial justice failures, this isn’t “rocket science.” A Committee appointed by DHS Secretary Johnson during the Obama-Biden Administration recommended that private immigration detention be ended. That was more than six years ago. See, e.g., https://wp.me/p8eeJm-7j.
Additionally, you don’t have to be a lawyer or a deep thinker to grasp that conditions unsuitable for convicted felons shouldn’t be inflicted on so-called “civil detainees” most of whom are just awaiting justice from a system that consistently and illegally treats them as “less than human!”
American poses with dead Haitian revolutionaries after being killed by US Marine machine gun fire – 10-11-1915.jpg. Past US armed invasions of Haiti to protect our interests haven’t done much to improve the lives of the Haitian people. Public Realm
As Haiti Unravels, U.S. Officials Push to Send in an Armed Foreign Force
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U.S. seeks to prompt armed invasion of Haiti by OTHER countries to protect US from Haitian refugees seeking freedom and a new life! What could possibly go wrong?
Nothing shakes up brave US security officials like some unarmed Black individuals in leaky boats risking their lives to “breathe free” and to contribute to the U.S. economy in the process!
Really! There must be about “two Democrats in the world” who think this crackpot scheme is a good idea. Unfortunately, they are employed by the Biden Administration and in charge of “immigration policy!”
Sorry, Casey, but I have to keep saying it: “Can’t anyone here play this game?” Apparently not!
“Casey Stengel might understand the Biden Administration’s immigration policies. The rest of us not so much.” PHOTO: Rudi Reit Creative Commons
Elizabeth Gibson Managing Attorney National Immigrant Justice Center Publisher of “The Gibson Report”
Weekly Briefing
This briefing is designed as a quick-reference aggregation of developments in immigration law, practice, and policy that you can scan for anything you missed over the last week. The contents of the news, links, and events do not necessarily reflect the position of the National Immigrant Justice Center. If you have items that you would like considered for inclusion, please email them to egibson@heartlandalliance.org.
Politico: Experts in the immigration field say they’re expecting a stressful and chaotic transition when a court-ordered deadline to end the Trump directive is hit, one that could drive a new rush to the border and intensify GOP criticism. See also States move to keep court from lifting Trump asylum policy.
Reuters: The United States is in talks with Mexico and other countries to facilitate the return of Venezuelan migrants to their homeland, a senior U.S. official said in a call with reporters on Tuesday.
TRAC: The South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, Texas, which currently houses single adults (mostly females) has more than doubled the number of individuals it is holding since September. ICE reports this facility run by CoreCivic now has the largest average daily population of detainees (1,562) in the country
CBS: McCarthy also threatened to use “the power of the purse and the power of subpoena” to investigate and derail the Biden administration’s immigration and border policies, saying Republican-led committees would hold oversight hearings near the U.S.-Mexico border.
LexisNexis: “Remand is required in this case because the BIA did not give consideration to all relevant evidence and principles of law, as those have been detailed by this Court’s recent decision in Scarlett v. Barr, 957 F.3d 316, 332–36 (2d Cir. 2020). … Because Mejia did not fear torture at the hands of the Guatemalan authorities, the relevant inquiry is whether government officials have acquiesced in likely third-party torture. To make this determination, the Court considers whether there is evidence that authorities knew of the torture or turned a blind eye to it, and “thereafter” breached their “responsibility to prevent” the possible torture.”
LexisNexis: “Having reviewed both the IJ’s and the BIA’s opinions, we hold that the agency did not err in finding that Garcia-Aranda failed to satisfy her burden of proof for asylum and withholding of removal, but that the agency applied incorrect standards when adjudicating Garcia-Aranda’s CAT claim.”
Law360: The Third Circuit has backed a decision denying a Dominican man’s bid for deportation relief based on his fear of being tortured, saying the procedural flaws he claimed tainted his proceedings — including the use of legal jargon and a videoconferencing glitch — did not prejudice him.
Law360: An English-speaking Cameroonian lost her chance to stay in the U.S. after the Eighth Circuit ruled that she failed to provide enough evidence showing that military officers had attacked her for her presumed support of Anglophone separatists.
LexisNexis: “Without record evidence that Phong orally waived his right to appeal before the IJ, we decline to address his alternative arguments that any waiver was unconsidered, unintelligent, or otherwise unenforceable. Rather, we remand to the BIA to develop the record on the waiver issue and, if it deems it appropriate, to consider Phong’s remaining arguments in the first instance.”
Law360: A divided Ninth Circuit on Monday ruled that the federal government was not constitutionally required to provide a Salvadoran immigrant a second bond hearing amid his prolonged detention during removal proceedings, while also bearing the burden to show he was a flight risk or danger to the community.
AP: The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has agreed to pay a Vermont-based immigrant advocacy organization $74,000 in legal fees to settle a lawsuit seeking information about whether advocates were being targeted by immigration agents because of their political activism.
USCIS: Today, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced it is extending and expanding previously announced filing fee exemptions and expedited application processing for certain Afghan nationals.
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Elizabeth Gibson (Pronouns: she/her/ella)
Managing Attorney for Capacity Building and Mentorship
National Immigrant Justice Center
A HEARTLAND ALLIANCE Program
224 S. Michigan Ave., Suite 600, Chicago, IL 60604
T: (312) 660-1688| F: (312) 660-1688| E: egibson@heartlandalliance.org
Folks, it’s about re-instituting the law and screening system for legal asylum seekerswhich was in effect, in one form or another, for four decades before being illegally abrogated by the Trump Administration’s abusive use of Title 42. Outrageously, after promising to do better during the 2020 election campaign, the Biden Administration has “gone along to get along” with inflicting massive human rights violations under the Title 42 facade until finally ordered to comply with the law by U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan last month.
One of Judge Sullivan’s well-supported findings was that the scofflaw actions by both Trump and Biden officials had resulted in knowingly and intentionally inflicting “dire harm” on legal asylum applicants:
Sullivan wrote that the federal officials knew the order “would likely expel migrants to locations with a ‘high probability’ of ‘persecution, torture, violent assaults, or rape’ ” — and did so anyway.
“It is unreasonable for the CDC to assume that it can ignore the consequences of any actions it chooses to take in the pursuit of fulfilling its goals,” Sullivan wrote. “It is undisputed that the impact on migrants was indeed dire.”
Contrary to the “CYA BS” coming from Biden Administration officials, making the law work at the Southern Border requires neither currently unachievable “reform” legislation nor massive additions of personnel! It does, however, require better personnel, expert training, accountability, smarter use of resources, and enlightened, dynamic, courageous, principled, expert leadership currently glaringly lacking within the Biden Administration.
The Administration’s much ballyhooed, yet poorly conceived, ineptly and inconsistently implemented,“revised asylum regulations” have also failed to “leverage” thepotential for success, thus far producing only an anemic number of “first instance” asylum grants. This is far below the rate necessary for the process significantly to take pressure off the backlogged and dysfunctional Immigration Courts, one of the stated purposes of the regulations!Meanwhile, early indications are that Garland’s ill-advised regulatory time limits on certain arbitrarily-selected asylum applications have further diluted quality and just results for EOIR asylum decisions. That, folks, is in a system where disdain for both of these essential judicial traits is already rampant!
It’s not rocket science! It was well within the capability of the Biden Administration to establish a robust, functional asylum system had it acted with urgency and competency upon taking office in 2021:
Better Asylum Officers at USCIS and Immigration Judges at EOIR — well-qualified asylum experts with practical experience in the asylum system who will timely recognize and grant the many valid asylum claims in the first instance;
Cooperative agreements with NGOs and pro bono organizations to prescreen applications in an orderly manner and represent those who can establish a “credible fear;”
A new and improved BIA of qualified “practical scholars” in asylum law who will establish workable precedents and best practices that honestly reflect the generous approach to asylum required (but never carried out in practice or spirit) by the Supremes in Cardoza-Fonseca and the BIA itself in its long-ignored and consistently misapplied precedent in Mogharrabi;
An orderly refugee resettlement program administered under the auspices of the Feds for those granted asylum and for those whose claims can’t be expeditiously granted at the border and who therefore must present them in Immigration Court at some location away from the border.
The Biden Administration has nobody to blame but themselves for their massive legal, moral, and practical failures on the Southern Border! With House GOP nativist/restrictionists “sharpening their knives,” Mayorkas, Garland, Rice, and other Biden officials who have failed to restore the legal asylum system shouldn’t expect long-ignored and “affirmatively dissed” human rights experts and advocates to bail them out!
The massive abrogations of human rights, due process, the rule of law, common sense, and human decency that the GOP espouses — so-called enforcement and ineffective “deterrence” only approach — will NOT resolve the humanitarian issues with ongoing, often inevitable, refugee flows!
But, the Biden Administration’s inept approach to human rights has played right into the hands of these GOP White Nationalist politicos. That’s an inconceivable human tragedy for our nation and for the many legal refugees we turn away without due process or fair consideration of their life-threatening plight! These are refugees — legal immigrants — who should be allowed to enter legally and help our economy and our nation with their presence.
If we want refugees to apply “away from the border,” we must establish robust, timely, realistic refugee programs at or near places like Haiti, Venezuela, and the Northern Triangle that are sending us refugees. In the Refugee Act of 1980, Congress actually gave the President extraordinary discretionary authority to establish refugee processing directly in the countries the refugees are fleeing. This was a significant expansion of the UN refugee definition which requires a refugee to be “outside” his or her country of nationality. Yet, no less than the Trump and Obama Administrations before, President Biden has failed to “leverage” this powerful potential tool for establishing orderly refugee processing beyond our borders!
Meanwhile, down on the actual border, a place that Biden, Harris, Mayorkas, Garland, Rice, and other “high level architects of failed asylum policies” seldom, if ever, deign to visit, life, such as it is, goes on with the usual abuses heaped on asylum seekers patiently waiting to be fairly processed.
A rational observer might have thought that the Biden Administration would use the precious time before Dec. 22, 2022, reluctantly “gifted” to them by Judge Sullivan, to pre-screen potential asylum seekers already at ports of entry on the Mexican side. Those with credible fear and strong claims could be identified for orderly entries when legal ports of entry (finally) re-open on Dec. 22. Or, better yet, they could be “paroled” into the U.S. now and expeditiously granted asylum by Asylum Officers.
This would reduce the immediate pressure on the ports, eliminate unnecessary trips to backlogged Immigration Courts, and expedite these refugees’ legal status, work authorization, and transition to life in the U.S.
I have no idea what the Biden Administration has done with the time since Judge Sullivan “gifted” them a stay. The only noticeable actions have been more BS excuses, blame-shifting, and lowering expectations.
But, in reality, by their indolent approach to humanitarian issues and the law, in the interim the Administration has consciously left the fate of long-suffering and already “direly-harmed” legal asylum seekers to the Mexican Government. According to a recent NBC News report, the Mexican Government forcibly “rousted” many awaiting processing at a squalid camp near the border and “orbited them’ to “who knows where.” https://www.nbcnews.com/now/video/mexican-authorities-evict-venezuelan-migrants-from-border-camps-155516485544
Judge Sullivan might want to take note of this in assessing how the Biden DOJ has used the “preparedness time” that he reluctantly granted them following his order.
Nearly five months later, the Supreme Court will give the Texas case a full hearing on Tuesday. And there’s a good chance that even this Court, where Republican appointees control two-thirds of the seats, will reverse Tipton’s decision — his opinion is that bad.
The case involves a memo that Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas issued in September 2021, instructing ICE agents to prioritize undocumented immigrants who “pose a threat to national security, public safety, and border security and thus threaten America’s well-being” when making arrests or otherwise enforcing immigration law.
Nevertheless, the Republican attorneys general of Texas and Louisiana asked Tipton to invalidate Mayorkas’s memo. And Tipton defied the statute permitting Mayorkas to set enforcement priorities — and a whole host of other, well-established legal principles — and declared Mayorkas’s enforcement priorities invalid. This is not the first time that Tipton relied on highly dubious legal reasoning to sabotage the Biden administration’s immigration policies.
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Even when the law offers no support for the GOP’s preferred policies, in other words, the Court permits Republicans to manipulate judicial procedures in order to get the results they want. The Texas attorney general’s office can handpick judges who they know will strike down Biden administration policies, and once those policies are declared invalid, the Supreme Court will play along with these partisan judges’ decisions for at least a year or so.
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Once the GOP got the upper hand on the Federal Bench, the “traditional” conservative case for “judicial restraint” went straight down the tubes under an assault by righty ideologues eager to “do in” precedents, laws, and Executive policies that don’t fit their “out of the mainstream” political agenda, no matter how thinly reasoned or often counterfactual their “cover” might be.
And, as usual, Dems have been slow on the uptake about getting younger, staunch defenders of democracy and our Constitution on the bench to counteract the right-wing’s Article III takeover.
As this article points out, the Supremes’ questionable “shadow docket” is manipulated by the Court’s righty majority improperly to favor GOP scofflaw tactics, even where they ultimately can’t concoct a legal basis to uphold them on the merits.
“Karla Iveth Garcia-Aranda petitions for review of two decisions of the Board of Immigration Appeals (“BIA”) denying asylum, withholding of removal, and relief under the Convention Against Torture (“CAT”). Garcia-Aranda, a native and citizen of Honduras, testified before an Immigration Judge (“IJ”) that she and her family had been threatened, kidnapped, and beaten by members of the Mara 18 gang while a local Honduran police officer was present. Garcia-Aranda sought asylum and withholding of removal, arguing that the gang had persecuted her because she was a member of the Valerio family, which ran its own drug trafficking ring in Garcia-Aranda’s hometown. She also sought protection under CAT based on an asserted likelihood of future torture at the hands of the gang with the participation or acquiescence of the local Honduran police. Having reviewed both the IJ’s and the BIA’s opinions, we hold that the agency did not err in finding that Garcia-Aranda failed to satisfy her burden of proof for asylum and withholding of removal, but that the agency applied incorrect standards when adjudicating Garcia-Aranda’s CAT claim. Accordingly, the petition for review is DENIED IN PART and GRANTED IN PART, the decisions of the BIA are VACATED IN PART to the extent they denied Garcia-Aranda’s claim for CAT protection, and the case is REMANDED to the BIA for further proceedings consistent with this decision. … Because of these legal errors, we grant the petition as to Garcia-Aranda’s claim for protection under CAT and vacate the BIA’s decisions regarding CAT protection. See Rafiq v. Gonzales, 468 F.3d 165, 166–67 (2d Cir. 2006) (remanding a CAT claim for proper application of Khouzam). On remand, we direct the agency to consider, in light of all testimony and documentary evidence, whether Garcia-Aranda will more likely than not be tortured by, or at the instigation of, or with the consent or acquiescence of, any public official (or other person) acting under color of law. As more fully described above, that means considering questions such as whether it is more likely than not that the gang will torture Garcia-Aranda, including meeting all the harm requirements for torture under section 1208.18(a), and whether it is more likely than not that local police acting under color of law will themselves participate in those likely gang actions or acquiesce in those likely gang actions. The BIA is also instructed to remand to the IJ for any additional factfinding that is necessary for the BIA to make its determination.”
[NOTE: This PFR was filed in 2018! Hats off to Heather Axford and team!]
Heather Axford Senior Staff Attorney Central American Legal Assistance Brooklyn, NY
“Petition for review of a December 26, 2018 decision of the Board of Immigration Appeals (“BIA”) vacating a July 27, 2017 decision of an Immigration Judge (“IJ”) granting Petitioners’ application for asylum and protection under the Convention Against Torture (“CAT”). UPON DUE CONSIDERATION, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED, ADJUDGED, AND DECREED that the petition for review is GRANTED in part and DENIED in part. Accordingly, the decision of the BIA is VACATED in part, and the case is REMANDED for proceedings consistent with this summary order. … Remand is required in this case because the BIA did not give consideration to all relevant evidence and principles of law, as those have been detailed by this Court’s recent decision in Scarlett v. Barr, 957 F.3d 316, 332–36 (2d Cir. 2020). … Because Mejia did not fear torture at the hands of the Guatemalan authorities, the relevant inquiry is whether government officials have acquiesced in likely third-party torture. To make this determination, the Court considers whether there is evidence that authorities knew of the torture or turned a blind eye to it, and “thereafter” breached their “responsibility to prevent” the possible torture. Scarlett, 957 F.3d at 334 (quoting Khouzam v. Ashcroft, 361 F.3d 161, 171 (2d Cir. 2004)); see 8 C.F.R. § 1208.18(a)(7). … Here, record evidence raises questions as to the Guatemalan government’s inability to protect Mejia, insofar as it indicates that Mejia sought assistance from Guatemalan police and was told that they could not protect her and she should simply hide in her home. … Insofar as the BIA ruled without the benefit of Scarlett, a remand is warranted before this Court conducts any review. We therefore remand for the sole purpose of allowing the BIA to decide, after reasoned consideration of the record, whether the Guatemalan police’s inability to protect Mejia constituted acquiescence.”
Mikhail Usher, Esq. Senior Partner The Usher Law Group PLLC My & New Jersey PHOTO: Usher Law Group
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Congrats to NDPA superstars Heather and Mike!
Here’s commentary from my Round Table colleague Hon. “Sir Jeffrey” Chase on Heather’s performance on Garcia-Aranda v. Garland:
“Heather is a remarkable litigator who did a remarkable job on this case – it was a tough panel that had basically ruled out asylum from the start; it was most impressive to hear Heather persuade the judges over the course of oral arguments as to the CAT standard (during which one of the judges repeatedly referenced proposed Trump regs that had never taken effect, but were nevertheless listed on the government’s eCFR as if it had).
Best, Jeff“
And, here’s my response:
“Heather is truly an NDPA superstar. And, I’m proud that she got her start appearing at the Arlington Immigration Court!
