Thread: Judge blocks Trump policy forcing asylum-seekers to wait in Mexico

Judge blocks Trump policy forcing asylum-seekers to wait in Mexico

Alan Gomez, USA TODAY
Published 5:36 p.m. ET April 8, 2019 | Updated 6:24 p.m. ET April 8, 2019

Several asylum seekers who are being forced to wait in Mexico while their cases wind through U.S. immigration court told a judge Tuesday that they are afraid to return to Mexico as they await their next hearing. (March 19) AP


A federal judge on Monday blocked the Trump administration's policy requiring Central American asylum-seekers to wait in Mexico while their cases are decided in the U.S., ruling that Department of Homeland Security overstepped its legal authority.

That policy was one of the last attempts by outgoing Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen to gain control of the southern border, which has seen such an increase in illegal crossings that she resigned from her post over the weekend.

U.S. District Judge Richard Seeborg in San Francisco ordered the Trump administration to allow the plaintiffs in the case — 11 migrants from El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras — to enter the U.S. within two days. He issued a nationwide preliminary injunction that prevents the administration from forcing future asylum-seekers back into Mexico. The order goes into effect on Friday.

Seeborg ruled that the policy was not properly implemented and violated both U.S. laws and the 1951 United Nations Convention on Refugees, which the U.S. is a party to. The asylum-seekers, Seeborg ruled, were already fleeing dangerous conditions in their home countries, only to be returned to Mexican border towns "where they face undue risk to their lives and freedom."

The ruling marks the third straight time the Trump administration has been shot down in its attempts to limit or halt asylum-seekers who have been arriving at the U.S. border in record numbers.

"Try as it may, the Trump administration cannot simply ignore our laws in order to accomplish its goal of preventing people from seeking asylum in the United States," said Judy Rabinovitz, deputy director of the ACLU's Immigrants' Rights Project who argued the case.


In December, another federal judge struck down the Department of Justice's attempt to cut off asylum for victims of domestic abuse and gang violence. In November, another federal judge struck down Justice's attempts to cut off asylum for people who crossed into the country illegally, which is allowed under U.S. law.

In that case, U.S. District Judge Jon Tigar wrote that Trump "may not rewrite the immigration laws."

Families hoping to seek asylum in the United States wait on the bridge connecting Reynosa, Mexico, to Hidalgo, Texas, on March 15, 2019. (Photo: Eric Gay, AP)


Monday's ruling follows a suit filed by Central American migrants who were among the first to be returned to Tijuana after requesting asylum at the San Ysidro Port of Entry in southern California, and several humanitarian groups that have been assisting migrants.

The policy, officially called the "Migrant Protection Protocols" but informally referred to as the "Remain in Mexico" plan, started in January at the San Ysidro Port of Entry in southern California. The policy has expanded to the Calexico Port of Entry about 120 miles east of San Ysidro, and Homeland Security officials say the plan is to gradually roll it out to all other ports along the U.S.-Mexico border.

It allows migrants from countries other than Mexico to request asylum at U.S ports of entry, but then requires them to return to Mexico to wait for a decision.

Previously, asylum seekers were released into the U.S. and given a notice to appear in immigration court to proceed with their case.

The U.S. and Mexican governments had been negotiating a joint plan, where Mexico would assume responsibility of the waiting asylum applicants, but when those talks broke down, the Trump administration announced in December it would unilaterally implement the policy, forcing Mexico and collection of humanitarian groups to care for those migrants in Mexico.

Nielsen has argued that the policy is needed — and allowed under law — to stem the flood of Central American migrants who are taking advantage of immigration "loopholes" by requesting asylum knowing they will be allowed to stay in the country.

In the 2017 fiscal year, Border Patrol agents apprehended 6,301 members of family units a month. In 2018, that rose to 8,934 a month. In the first five months of 2019, it jumped to 27,230 a month.

The Trump administration says those numbers represent a security and humanitarian crisis that forced them to implement the new policy forcing all those asylum-seekers to stay in Mexico.

"The (Migrant Protection Protocols are) a lawful implementation of DHS's broad prosecutorial discretion over when and how to initiate removal proceedings…and whether to limit entry into the country during the pendency of those proceedings," Justice Department lawyers wrote in a court filing.

Advocacy groups say the plan puts already-traumatized refugees in yet another traumatizing situation by fending for themselves in northern Mexico, a region that can be incredibly dangerous for people with no family there, no connections, and no protection.

"Instead of being able to focus on preparing their cases, asylum seekers forced to return to Mexico will have to focus on trying to survive," read the lawsuit. "These pressures may deter even those with the strongest asylum claims to give up, rather than endure the wait under such conditions."

Several of the first asylum-seekers returned to Mexico filed a lawsuit in February, leading to Seeborg's decision.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/...co/3244127002/

American's are "afraid" of having these undocumented, unvetted, illegal aliens dumped in our neighborhoods across America.

Where is our Class Action Lawsuit against this!

Send them back!

Obama "rewrote the immigration laws"...if that is the CASE...then deport all DACA and their offspring now!

Originally Posted by JohnDoe2

Judge blocks Trump policy forcing asylum-seekers to wait in Mexico

These tyrannical judges can't do squat to stop Trump's new plan to slow walk incoming commerce from Mexico, which has gotten the attention of Mexico's government who is now assisting in stopping the caravan participants from Central America which are really seeking economic relief from their country's poverty.

JWK

"At the end of the day," a senior administration official said, "the President refuses to understand that the Department of Homeland Security is constrained by the laws."

Trump pushed to close El Paso border, agents not to admit migrants

1% of Honduran, Guatemalan Populations to Arrive in U.S. by 2020

I SAT ALL THE JUDGE ARE ON THE BOOK'S

1. The Trump administration has made very few illegals "wait in Mexico"

2. The President does not have to listen to one court ruling beneath the Supreme Court when that judge tries to change or circumvent the existing immigration laws passed by Congress.

Trump's Policy Of Forcing Asylum-Seekers To Wait In Mexico Has Been Blocked By A Federal Judge

The decision represents the latest in a string of federal court rulings blocking sweeping immigration changes instituted by the Trump administration.

Hamed Aleaziz BuzzFeed News Reporter
Posted on April 8, 2019, at 5:33 p.m. ET


SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge has blocked the Trump administration's policy of returning Central American migrants to Mexico while they wait for their asylum cases to be processed in the US.

The ruling issued by Judge Richard Seeborg in San Francisco states that the preliminary injunction blocking the policy will take effect on Friday at 5 p.m. PT.

"Defendants are hereby enjoined and restrained from continuing to implement or expand the 'Migrant Protection Protocols' as announced in the January 25, 2018 DHS policy memorandum and as explicated in further agency memoranda," Seeborg wrote.

His decision represents the latest in a string of federal court rulings blocking sweeping immigration changes instituted by the Trump administration, including the travel ban, a ban on asylum for those who crossed the border without authorization, and the repeal of DACA, among others.

The latest challenge was focused on a policy titled “migrant protection protocols,” the most recent attempt by the Trump administration to discourage migrants, including asylum-seekers, from trying to enter the US. The policy went into place on Jan. 28 and initially was focused on single adults at the port of entry in Tijuana.

"Perhaps what is most stunning about the end of 'Remain in Mexico' is the record of harsh, start-stop border policies that it joins, including family separation and the asylum ban. It’s both the chaotic implementation of these policies and this administration’s relentlessly hardline rhetoric that seem to be driving the urgency behind the current migration crisis," said Sarah Pierce, an analyst at the Migration Policy Institute.

Since January, the policy has been expanded to the entire San Diego sector, including those who cross the border without authorization, along with the Calexico Port of Entry and the El Paso Port of Entry. Before handing in her resignation,

Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen announced that the policy would be expanded to other locations along the border.

Under the policy, certain migrants at the border receive a “notice to appear” in US immigration court and are returned to Mexico until their hearing date.

The ACLU lawsuit was filed on behalf of 11 individuals seeking asylum who were taken back to Mexico. In January, the Trump administration informed the Mexican government that it was going to be enacting the policy based on a statute stating that certain individuals can be sent back to the contiguous country they had arrived from.

In its lawsuit, the ACLU claimed that the statute could not be used against asylum-seekers, and that it violates legal protections that prohibit the removal of individuals to a country where they would face persecution.

The group also argued that the administration avoided the regulatory process to institute sweeping changes and did not go through the normally deliberative system that allows for public comment before a new rule is implemented.

Seeborg wrote that "the statute that vests DHS with authority in some circumstances to return certain aliens to a 'contiguous territory' cannot be read to apply to the individual plaintiffs or others similarly situated. Second, even assuming the statute could or should be applied to the individual plaintiffs, they have met their burden to enjoin the MPP on grounds that it lacks sufficient protections against aliens being returned to places where they face undue risk to their lives or freedom."

The judge added that the ACLU was "likely to show" that the policy did not comply with the Administrative Procedures Act "because the statute DHS contends the MPP is designed to enforce does not apply to these circumstances, and even if it did, further procedural protections would be required to conform to the government’s acknowledged obligation to ensure aliens are not returned to unduly dangerous circumstances."

One of the plaintiffs, named “Howard Doe,” was kidnapped and held by a Mexican drug cartel for two weeks on his way to the southwestern border, according to the suit. He escaped but fears that the cartel will track him down as he waits in Mexico for his immigration case to proceed. Almost none of the plaintiffs, the ACLU said, were asked about their fear of being returned to Mexico.

In Howard Doe’s case, he was referred to an asylum officer because of his stated fears of returning to Mexico but was still returned to the country without any explanation. Many of the plaintiffs have fears they will be unable to adequately communicate with legal representation in their cases, let alone have a place to sleep at night.

“Plaintiff Frank Doe does not know where he will stay while he prepares his asylum claim,” the suit read. “After being forced to return to Mexico, he attempted to return to the shelter where he resided previously, but officials turned him away because it was full. He was able to find a different shelter to stay for a couple of nights, but he does not have a more permanent residence. Plaintiff Ian Doe was also unable to return to the shelter where he stayed previously.”

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article...-blocked-judge

240 asylum seekers have been sent to wait in Tijuana under a contested Trump administration policy

More than 100 immigrants wait in Juárez

Originally Posted by ALIPAC

1. The Trump administration has made very few illegals "wait in Mexico"

2. The President does not have to listen to one court ruling beneath the Supreme Court when that judge tries to change or circumvent the existing immigration laws passed by Congress.

Additionally, in times of emergency, our President may act in response to those emergencies, and if Congress disagrees, it can nullify, by vote, those actions.


But it is not within a judges authority to second guess the wisdom or merits of those actions, which is exactly what this judge has done.


JWK

…..we are not at liberty to second-guess congressional determinations and policy judgments of this order, however debatable or arguably unwise they may be…The wisdom of Congress' action, however, is not within our province to second guess. _________ELDRED et al. v. ASHCROFT, ATTORNEY GENERAL (2003)