Thread: U.S.'s El Salvador order an immigration loophole

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/met ... 18574.html

July 2, 2006, 12:05AM

U.S.'s El Salvador order an immigration loophole
More people are claiming to fall under clause that was meant to help refugees of war
By HARVEY RICE
Copyright 2006 Houston Chronicle

An 18-year-old federal court order — originally intended to protect refugees from a civil war in El Salvador — has become a gaping hole in the Bush administration's effort to stop the flow of illegal immigrants across the border.

The order, known as the Orantes injunction, became a loophole when the administration ramped up a controversial policy to speed the deportation of illegal immigrants from countries other than Mexico, known as OTMs, by bypassing immigration courts.

The "expedited return" program, which took effect along all of the nation's borders and coastlines in January, is designed to end a practice known as "catch and release," in which illegal immigrants from countries other than Mexico are released after being issued notices to appear in immigration courts.

"We used to call it the notice to disappear," said Zapata County Sheriff Sigifredo Gonzalez, whose border county has become a thoroughfare for illegal crossings.

Though notices to appear formerly were given to all apprehended illegal immigrants from Latin American countries other than Mexico, authorities now aim to reach a point where they are issued only to Salvadorans, because of the Orantes injunction. Others are detained.

As a result, Salvadorans — or people claiming to be Salvadoran — have risen to the top of the list of OTMs apprehended by immigration officials, according to figures from U.S. Customs and Border Protection.


Smugglers' hints
Border Patrol spokesman Todd Fraser acknowledged that smugglers are telling illegal immigrants to masquerade as Salvadorans to avoid deportation.

Authorities say 33,053 Salvadorans were apprehended nationwide during the first eight months of fiscal 2006, which began Oct. 1. That's more than one-third of the total of 83,484 other-than-Mexican illegal immigrants apprehended during that period.

Many Salvadorans surrender to immigration officials because they know they are likely to be released with a notice to appear, said CBP spokesman Xavier Rios.

"As word gets out that Salvadorans are not being subject to expedited removal, we have to go back and rely on the traditional (catch-and-release) removal process," Rios said.

He said immigration officials test claims of Salvadoran nationality with probing questions and by listening for non-Salvadoran accents.

The Bush administration is trying to plug the loophole by asking U.S. District Judge Margaret M. Morrow of Los Angeles to amend the Orantes injunction, which was imposed in 1988 by a federal judge in Los Angeles. The injunction was intended to prevent immigration officials from improperly discouraging Salvadorans who sought political asylum here because of the civil war in their homeland. It was tightened in 1990 after the court found violations by officials in South Texas.

The injunction requires, in part, that Salvadorans be advised of their right to a deportation hearing and an attorney, and to apply for political asylum. The administration argues that it is no longer needed because the civil war has ended.

But Karen Tumlin, spokeswoman for the National Immigration Law Center, which filed the Orantes lawsuit, said many Salvadorans now are fleeing violent gangs that are used as militias for political purposes.


Expedited removal
Linton Joaquin, lead attorney for the plaintiffs in the Orantes case, said the loophole exists only because the administration has chosen to exclude Salvadorans from the expedited removal program, he said.

Even with the injunction, Joaquin said, Salvadorans can be returned under expedited removal as long as they are notified of their right to make an asylum claim.

Expedited removal began as a pilot program in the Laredo and Tucson, Ariz., border areas in 2004, said Fraser, the Border Patrol spokesman. The administration enacted it to take advantage of a 1996 law allowing immigration officials to bypass immigration courts and speed the deportation process.

Authorities began phasing in expedited removal elsewhere last September. It was expanded in January this year.

In January, Fraser said, expedited removal took an average of 16 days, compared with 89 days for those removed without it.

Tumlin said immigration officials are still abusing immigrant rights under expedited removal. A study last year by the congressionally created U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom found "serious, but not insurmountable, problems with expedited removal" in the treatment of immigrants who fear persecution if they are returned to their home countries.

Expedited removal also strains overburdened detention facilities, a problem that requires the continued use of the catch-and-release policy, immigration officials said.

Although expedited removal is in effect nationwide, immigration officials are far from achieving their goal of eliminating catch and release. Of the 76,463 other-than-Mexican illegal immigrants detained during the first seven months of fiscal 2006, more than half were released with notices to appear, according to the CBP.

harvey.rice@chron.com

You can thank the IDIOT Reagan, and his staff of morons, for creating the exodus from El Salvador. Originally the main objective was to use El Salvador as a wedge between the "Marxist" Sandinistas and the Cubans.

Well, here we are 25 years later, and Fidel Castro is still here, El Salvador accomplished nothing, and helped to elect the former Sandinistas in Nicaragua, Hugo Chavez of Venezuela is here, Eva Morales of Bolivia is also here, and, let me go on a limb here---MEXICO WILL ALSO ELECT A LEFT LEANING GOVERNMENT this 2nd of July, 2006!

Now (wtf!) is it that the Republicans do not understand about meddling in others' affairs? Is it the inability to see that displacing citizens in other countries by encouraging armed resistance against indigenous governments will result in mass migration TO THE UNITED STATES?

Whether Korea, Vietnam, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Iraq, or any other number of U.S. "initiatives" in "democracy", it's all the same result---IMMIGRATION!

Along with fighting Illegal Immigration, we also need to look at the ridiculous tenets of U.S. "Foreign Policy" being shoved down Citizens throats by a cabal of idiot politicians disguised as our elected leaders!