Articles Posted in Immigration Law (General)

President Trump’s shutdown of the federal government has further delayed the resolution of thousands of immigration cases—a backlog that the Justice Department and immigration courts across the country have been struggling with.

Several U.S. immigration courts around the country remain closed as the government shutdown enters its third week, putting on hold the already unmanageable backlog of tens of thousands of immigration cases, many of which involve asylum application and other immigration claims.

The migrants involved, which the records office at the University of Syracuse puts at 800,000 in number, have no choice but to wait for the Congress and the Trump administration to arrive at a bipartisan deal that will finally fund government operations.

U.S. and Vietnam officials gathered last Monday to discuss the fate of a repatriation agreement protecting certain Vietnamese nationals from deportation, as reported by immigrants’ rights groups and several media outlets.

The memorandum of understanding, signed by both countries in 2008, defers the immediate deportation of Vietnamese immigrants who came to the United States before diplomatic relations between the two countries were restored in July 12, 1995. Should either country choose to forego renewing the agreement in January 2019, at least 8,000 Vietnamese immigrants stand to face deportation as they become subject to standard immigration law.

A large number of Vietnamese nationals who came to the U.S. during the time period covered by the agreement did so to escape the war in their home country. Doing away with the agreement, lawyers and advocates argue, would have a tremendous impact on the lives of thousands of people who sought safety in the U.S.

A U.S. District Court Judge shot down the Trump administration’s plan to implement a system that would speed up its efforts to deport immigrants seeking asylum, a ruling the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) lauded.

In his 107-page ruling, Judge Emmet G. Sullivan explained that it was unlawful for the United States government to deport foreign nationals coming to the border to seek asylum without first assessing their asylum claims and determining whether they truly face a credible fear of persecution in their home country.

Sullivan pointed out that the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) mandates the process of thoroughly evaluating the legitimacy of asylum claims, thus, the government lacks the legal basis for banning certain types of asylum claims. This, he stressed, emphasizes the authority of Congress in determining the standard for expedited removal and the fact that immigration policies should not bow to the whims of the executive.

USCIS recently published a policy memorandum to clarify the ambiguous “one continuous year out of three years” requirement for L-1 category visas, explaining that the clause refers to the period of time before an individual’s filing.

The L-1 visa is a non-immigrant visa that allows U.S. employers to move a noncitizen executive or manager from one of the company’s affiliated foreign offices to an office on American soil. L-1 visa holders may stay for a period of three months (for Iranian nationals) to up to five years (for Indian, Japanese, and German nationals) with a maximum stay of seven years, should one apply for ample extension.

L-1 visas are typically only offered to employees who provide service in an executive or managerial capacity to multinational companies. Such organizations must have physical offices both in the U.S. and abroad to qualify for L-1 application. As such, these are used mostly for intra-company transfers, to the benefit of several Indian technology services companies.

The Ninth Circuit ruled on Tuesday that encouraging undocumented immigrants to stay in the United States is protected by free speech rights, striking down part of a proposed federal law that criminalized the act

Under the law, it is a felony to “encourage” or “induce” a foreign national to either enter or stay in the US while knowing or recklessly disregarding that it would be illegal for that foreigner to do so.

The court, however, pointed out that statements to that effect mostly come from the family members of foreigners. To criminalize these statements, the court claims, would be tantamount to criminalizing “a substantial amount of constitutionally-protected expression” under the First Amendment.

Immigrants facing removal proceedings for misdemeanor charges can now have their cases decided in jury trials after the New York Court of Appeals ruled 5-2 on Tuesday. The ruling stems from the case of Saylor Suazo, a noncitizen who stayed in the United States even after his visa had already expired. He faced trial for several charges of assault and harassment against the mother of his children, whom he threw to the floor, choked, and beat.

These charges were reduced to class-B misdemeanors, which are punishable by 90-day sentences and can usually be tried without a jury. Suazo, however, still faced deportation—a factor the trial judge did not feel entitled him to a jury trial.

Suazo was found guilty of the assault charge in 2012, a decision that was later affirmed by an appellate panel and then reversed 5-2 at the New York Court of Appeals.