Department of Justice
Two People Died in Immigration Detention This Week
For more than a decade, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has been criticized for the inadequate medical care available in its detention facilities, which has had deadly repercussions. This week, two more people died while in ICE custody—Jose Leonardo Lemus Rajo, 23, of El Salvador and Igor Zyazin,… Read More
Weekend Reading: Highlights from this week’s immigration news (April 25-29)
On Tuesday, Maryland’s Governor Larry Hogan signed into law the Maryland Seal of Biliteracy Act. The law establishes a program to recognize high school graduates who have attained proficiency in at least one language in addition to English. The Seal of Biliteracy is an important initiative to promote foreign language… Read More
Amicus Arguments at the Ninth Circuit: The Flores Settlement Applies to All Children
Since the summer of 2014, the government has detained thousands of mothers and children fleeing violence in Central America. Although the longstanding Flores settlement guarantees minimum standards for the detention, release, and treatment of children in immigration detention, the Government’s family detention practices have failed to comply with the settlement. Plaintiffs brought suit to enforce the Flores settlement, and a District Court Judge ruled in July and August of 2015 that the settlement applied to all minors, including those detained with family members. The Department of Homeland Security then filed an appeal with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, arguing that the settlement only applies to unaccompanied minors, and not those children arriving with one or more parent. This week, a broad array of organizations filed amicus briefs in support of the plaintiffs and arguing against the Government’s position. Read More
Did You Know That Our Founding Fathers Were All Immigrants?
The hit musical Hamilton explains why. There are plenty of verbal acrobatics in Hamilton, the smash-hit hip-hop musical about the life of America’s first Treasury Secretary, but one simple statement has become a kind of battle cry: “Immigrants, we get the job done!” Sung by Nevis-born Alexander Hamilton and… Read More
What President Obama Proposed on Immigration in His Final Budget
President Obama unveiled his proposed budget for Fiscal Year (FY) 2017 which begins on October 1, 2016. While this is the President’s final budget and is largely seen as a political document, it does set the baseline for the funding of federal programs and new initiatives executive agencies would… Read More
Letter to DHS Outlines Problematic Practices That Undermine Due Process Protections for Asylum Seekers
Even before the recent ICE raids on Central American families began last week, there were serious signs that the government was undermining due process and not providing asylum-seekers a meaningful opportunity to make their cases. Many of the violations were brought to the attention of the immigration agencies by the… Read More
Operation Streamline: Ten Years of Criminalizing Immigrants
For the last 10 years, in federal courts across the Southwest border, the federal government has systematically prosecuted unlawful border crossers in group hearings with little-to-no due process. These prosecutions, often referred to as Operation Streamline, were intended to deter illegal entry and reentry. Instead, they have clogged up the… Read More
Will the Immigration Court Backlog Finally Go Down?
Although our nation’s immigration courts currently have record backlogs, there may be some help on the way. That was the message from Juan Osuna, Director of the Executive Office of Immigration Review (EOIR)—a division within the Department of Justice (DOJ) department which houses the immigration courts—at an oversight hearing… Read More
Rupert Murdoch: Donald Trump is wrong
Rupert Murdoch, the 21st Century Fox/News Corp. chief who has long pushed the Republican Party to embrace immigration reform, took Donald Trump to task over the weekend for his recent controversial remarks about Mexican immigrants: https://twitter.com/rupertmurdoch/status/620352927807377408 https://twitter.com/rupertmurdoch/status/620346262747910144 The public admonition may surprise those who associate Murdoch’s Fox News… Read More
Strain Placed on Russian Entrepreneur’s Business Because of H-1B Visa Cap
Up until 2011, Denis Kiselev was leading a successful career in financial services in his native Russia. He had a postgraduate degree in economics from The Ohio State University, but like so many other foreign-born students, he had returned home after graduation. After fifteen years in financial services, however, Kiselev… Read More
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No one should face the immigration system alone
