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jaimealvaradoassociates · 1 year

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What Types of Family-Based U.S. Immigrant Visas Are Available?

As a nation of immigrants, the United States has always welcomed individuals from all over the world to come and make a new life for themselves. Family reunification is one of the primary reasons why people choose to immigrate to the U.S.

The U.S. government recognizes this and has established various family-based immigrant visas that allow U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents to sponsor their relatives for permanent residency in the country.

In this article, we will explore the different types of family immigration visas, who are eligible for them, and how they work.

What are the different kinds of visas and types of visas for immigrants?

As per El Paso personal injury lawyer, the various visas offered to immigrants may include:

Spouses and Minor Children of U.S. Citizens

One of the most common types of family-based U.S. immigrant visas is for spouses and minor children of U.S. citizens. This visa category allows U.S. citizens to sponsor their foreign-born spouse or child for permanent residency in the United States.

To be eligible for this visa, the spouse must be legally married to a U.S. citizen, and the child must be under 21 years old and unmarried. The process involves filing a petition with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) and providing evidence of the relationship, such as marriage certificates or birth certificates.

Once approved, the spouse or child can apply for an immigrant visa at a U.S. embassy or consulate in their home country. Upon arrival in the United States, they will receive a green card and become a lawful permanent resident.

This type of visa is highly sought after by many families who wish to reunite with their loved ones in the United States. It provides a pathway to citizenship and allows families to build a life together in America.

Parents of U.S. Citizens

If you are a U.S. citizen and your parents live abroad, you may be able to sponsor them for a green card. The experts of law firm in El Paso states that in order to be eligible you must be at least 21 years old and have valid proof of citizenship. Your parents must also meet certain requirements, such as passing a medical exam and background check.

The process can take several months or even years, depending on the backlog of applications and other factors. However, once your parents receive their green cards, they will be able to live and work in the United States permanently.

It's important to note that there are limits on the number of visas available each year for this category, so it's best to start the process as soon as possible.

Adult Children of U.S. Citizens

Our personal injury lawyer in El Paso states that if you are an adult child of a U.S. citizen, you may be eligible for a family-based immigrant visa. This category is available to unmarried sons and daughters over the age of 21. The process can take several years, but it is worth exploring if you are interested in living and working in the United States.

To qualify for this type of visa, your parents must be U.S. citizens and must file a petition on your behalf. You will also need to undergo a medical examination and provide documentation proving your relationship with your parents. Once approved, you will be able to apply for permanent residency and, eventually, citizenship.

Siblings of U.S. Citizens

If you have a sibling who is a U.S. citizen, you may be eligible for a family-based immigrant visa. This type of visa allows siblings of U.S. citizens to come and live permanently in the United States.

To be eligible for this visa, the U.S. citizen sibling must be at least 21 years old and able to provide proof of their citizenship. Additionally, the sibling seeking the visa must meet certain requirements, such as passing a medical exam and background check.

It's important to note that there is often a long waiting period for this type of family visa due to limited availability. However, if you are approved for the visa, you will have the opportunity to live and work in the United States permanently.

Conclusion

Are you in need of a skilled and knowledgeable immigration lawyer in El Paso to handle your legal matters? Look no further than Jaime Alvarado & Associates, PLLC. With over two decades of experience in the legal field, Jaime Alvarado has a deep understanding of the intricate laws surrounding immigration, personal injury, DUI, and criminal law proceedings. At Jaime Alvarado & Associates, PLLC, we believe that prompt decision-making and outstanding professionalism are essential in resolving legal problems. That's why we are dedicated to providing exceptional legal services to every client. We focus on personalized attention and strive to achieve the desired results for our clients. Put your trust in Jaime Alvarado & Associates, PLLC to handle your legal issues with the highest level of care and expertise.

Disclaimer- The information provided in this content is just for educational purposes and is written by a professional writer. Consult us to learn more about US Immigrant Visas.

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#Law Firm in El Paso #immigration lawyer in el paso #lawfirmelpaso #personal injury lawyer

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go-redgirl · 3 years

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Kevin McCarthy challenges Joe Biden to visit border as he slams crisisEmily Goodin, Senior U.S. Political Reporter For Dailymail.com 2 hrs ago

Meanwhile, the White House still refuses to call the thousands of migrant children being held - some without beds or enough food - a 'crisis,' but press secretary Jen Psaki did say it is a 'big problem.'

She also blamed Donald Trump's administration for leaving the border a mess.

'We recognize this is a big problem. The last administration left us a dismantled and unworkable system, and like any other problem, we're going to do everything we can to solve it,' she said.

McCarthy, meanwhile, blamed Biden's executive orders lifting some of Trump's stricter immigration policies for the surge in immigration.

Pressure is increasing on the administration to fix the border in what is rapidly becoming a crisis for the Biden White House.

'It's more than a crisis. This is a human heartbreak,' McCarthy told reporters after he and a group of GOP lawmakers who visited a detention center. 'The sad part about that is this didn't have to happen. This crisis is created by the presidential policies of this new administration.'

'I know the president's going to travel this week. This is where he should bring Air Force,' McCarthy said. 'This is where he should look the people in the eye. This is where he should talk to the border agents, and let them know that this is beyond a crisis.'

Democratic National Committee spokesperson Eduardo Silva said Republicans need to present their own solution and he called the trip a 'political stunt.'

'Republicans for years - including the last four years - did nothing to help with the nation's immigration issues. Unless Republicans come back from the border with a commitment to helping President Biden solve the problem, this visit is nothing more than a political stunt,' he said.

Psaki was asked multiple times if the president would consider a trip to the border. Biden is scheduled to go to Pennsylvania on Tuesday and Georgia on Friday to out his COVID bailout package.

'I don't have any trips to preview at this point in time,' she said during her White House press briefing.

She said Biden's focus 'is on developing solutions, pushing his team, encouraging his team to develop solutions that will expedite processing at the border, that will open more facilities that will ensure kids are treated with humanity and also treated safely. And that's his focus, and so that's where he's putting his efforts on immigration.'

The administration is struggling to house a surge of migrant children as they work to process the minors so the children can be transferred to Department of Health and Human Services shelters where they would stay until they could be united with family members already in the U.S. or with a sponsor.

The children are supposed to be transferred to DHS within three days of being caught by border agents.

Border agents are apprehending more than 400 children a day, however, which is many more than the number of children that HHS is processing and releasing to sponsors.

Video: David Bossie: Biden's border crisis – here's what it should mean for his 'immigration reform' plans (FOX News)

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David Bossie: Biden's border crisis – here's what it should mean for his 'immigration reform' plansClick to expand

And more than 4,200 kids are being held in jail-like stations unfit to house them, according to government records reviewed by CBS News, with 3,000 held past the legal limit.

Additionally the administration is looking at using The Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center in downtown Dallas to house migrants as they run out of space, the Associated Press reported. The center is estimated to be able to hold 3,000 children.

A tent facility operated by the Custom and Border Patrol in Donna, Texas - some 165 miles south of Dallas - is holding more than 1,000 children and teenagers, some as young as 4. Many of the shelters are beyond capacity for taking more kids.

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas has said the facilities are 'no place for a child.'

Media is not being allowed inside the shelters but lawyers are. Some of the attorneys told CBS News that the children told them they are hungry; only showering once in as many as seven days; and are not able to call family members.

Psaki said the situation was 'heartbreaking' for the kids but there were not a lot of options.

'This is heartbreaking. It's a very emotional issue for a lot of people, and it's very difficult and challenging. And obviously, these CBP facilities are not made for kids,' she said.

'It's not acceptable, but I think the challenge here is that there are only there are not that many options,' she said. 'The options here are send the kids back on the journey, send them to unvetted homes or work to expedite moving them into shelters where they can get health treatment by medical doctors, by educational resources, legal counseling, mental health counseling. That's exactly what we're focused on doing.'

But the administration has argued it needs its nominee to led DHS - Xavier Becerra - confirmed to help manage the situation. Biden, however, has yet to name nominees to lead CBP and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, leaving those agencies without top leadership.

Meanwhile, a new center was opened in Midland, Texas, on Sunday to help alleviate the overcrowding caused by the record number of migrants. A shelter also was recently opened in Carrizo Springs, Texas.

The Biden administration also directed the shelters to return to normal capacity, despite the coronavirus pandemic. Previously, social distancing and other health protocols were in place to combat the disease.

Biden lifted the Trump policy that required migrants to remain in Mexico while going through the legal process to enter the U.S., narrowed the ICE's criteria for arrests and deportations and stopped the building of Trump's border wall.

Agroup of people in a room: Migrant children and teenagers at the facility in Midland, TexasNext Slide

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In what was seen as a nod to the growing gravity of the situation, Biden administration officials announced over the weekend that FEMA will help process the influx of children coming into the country.

'Our goal is to ensure that unaccompanied children are transferred to HHS as quickly as possible, consistent with legal requirements and in the best interest of the children,' Mayorkas said in a statement.

And ICE has asked for volunteers to help at the border.

Meanwhile, the House will vote this week on two bills aimed at tackling the immigration crisis: The American Dream and Promise Act would establish a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants brought to the country as children - known as the 'Dreamers' - while the Farm Workforce Modernization Act would allow agricultural workers to establish temporary status with an eventual option to become a permanent resident.

Last month, 100,000 migrants were caught trying to cross the southern border - up 30 percent from January.

And numbers are continuing to increase this month, with 125,000 migrants expected to arrive along the border in March, according to current data.

That is the highest number in years - and officials fear the figure will soar even further throughout the spring.

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hudsonmckenzie · 2 years

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Do you really need the help of immigration law firms in London?

When it comes to immigrating to the US or any other country, people get frightened due to the complexity of the immigration law of the US. Since the introduction of the Biden government, immigration rules have only got more stringent and people think twice before making an application for immigration.

Considering this increasing complexity of immigration law and associated procedures, it is quite difficult for people to stay up-to-date with the latest changes. Due to these reasons, it is necessary to have an experienced immigration lawyer with detailed knowledge of each of the stages of an immigration case, including conditions specific to a specific country and region.

According to immigration law experts, it is strongly recommended to have a lawyer by your side. This is even if you think your case is pretty simple and you fulfill all the conditions needed for successful immigration.

We all are aware that the voyage of a thousand miles begins with the first step. But that’s quite absurd. What kind of person would start a thousand-mile trek without asking for directions first? The most valuable service immigration law firms in London can provide isn’t assisting you along your journey (though that’s important, too). The most sought-after thing is to get you to follow the right road!

Getting immigration approval is not an upright process as one needs to come across various stages and steps. And having an immigration lawyer in El Paso means you can sail through all the steps perfectly and effectively. You can choose to communicate with your attorney whenever you want to, and you won’t be charged extra for these questions. By doing this these lawyers can help reduce your stress by giving you the assurance they have precise, competent answers to the various questions that may come out.

It’s also very much necessary to understand the fiduciary duty that immigration law firms in London have to their clients. Lawyers carry an ethical duty to attend to the interests of their clients. This affects far better than the fact that any business strives to gratify its customers. The fiduciary duty simply means that lawyers put their clients’welfaremuch ahead of their own interests.

Time and stress are the two biggest needs in any immigration case. If you have an El Paso immigration attorney, you can make the most of your time and money by getting exactly what you want. In short, the complexity of immigration law is eased by these lawyers in every possible way.

It is necessary to understand immigration is a highly complex subject and this is where opting for the best immigration law firms in London make a difference. These firms are dedicated to helping their clients to address and strategically plan for most of these complex issues. The most commonly followed immigration practice areas include:

· Naturalization

· Citizenship

· Immigration Bond

· Employment-Based Immigration

· Deportation/Removal

· Non-Immigrant Visas

· DREAM ACT

· I601A Provisional Waiver

· Political Asylum

#immigration law firms in London

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esrescuer · 6 years

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Mexican Repatriation

The Mexican Repatriation was a mass deportation of Mexicans and Mexican-Americans from the United States between 1929 and 1936. Estimates of how many were repatriated range from 400,000 to 2,000,000. An estimated sixty percent of those deported were birthright citizens of the United States. Because the forced movement was based on race, and ignored citizenship, the process arguably meets modern legal definitions of ethnic cleansing.

Widely blamed for exacerbating the overall economic downturn of the Great Depression, Mexicans were further targeted because of "the proximity of the Mexican border, the physical distinctiveness of mestizos, and easily identifiable barrios." While supported by the federal government, actual deportations were largely organized and carried out by city and state governments, often with support from local private entities.

Large numbers of Mexican nationals and Mexican-Americans were repatriated during the early 1930s. This followed the Wall Street crash of 1929 and resulting growth in nativist sentiment, exemplified by President Herbert Hoover's call for deportation and a series on the racial inferiority of Mexicans run by the Saturday Evening Post.

Scope of Repatriation

Reliable data for the total number repatriated is difficult to come by. Hoffman estimates that over 400,000 Mexicans left the US between 1929 and 1937, with a peak of 138,000 in 1931. Mexican government sources suggest over 300,000 were repatriated between 1930 and 1933, while Mexican media reported up to 2,000,000 during a similar span. After 1933 Repatriation decreased from the 1931 peak, but was over 10,000 in most years until 1940. Research by California state senator Joseph Dunn concluded that 1.8 million had been repatriated.

This constituted a significant portion of the Mexican population in the US. By one estimate, 1/5th of Mexicans in California were repatriated by 1932, and 1/3rd of all Mexicans in the US between 1931 and 1934. The 1930 Census reported 1.3 million Mexicans in the US, but this number is not believed to be reliable, because some Repatriations had already begun, illegal immigrants were not counted, and the Census attempted to use racial concepts that did not map to how many Spanish-speakers in the Southwest defined their own identities.

Repatriation was not evenly geographically distributed, with midwestern Mexicans being only 3% of the overall US Mexican population but perhaps 10% of repatriates.

Besides coverage in local newspapers and radio, deportation was frequent enough that it was reflected in the lyrics of Mexican popular music.

Justifications for Repatriation

Even before the Wall Street crash, a variety of "small farmers, progressives, labor unions, eugenicists, and racists" had called for restrictions on Mexican immigration. Their arguments focused primarily on competition for jobs and the cost of public assistance for indigents. These arguments continued after the beginning of the Great Depression.

For example, in Los Angeles, C.P. Visel, the spokesman for Los Angeles Citizens Committee for Coordination of Unemployment Relief (LACCCU), wrote to the federal government that deportation was necessary because "[w]e need their jobs for needy citizens". A member of the Los Angeles County board of Supervisors, H.M. Blaine, is recorded as saying "the majority of the Mexicans in the Los Angeles Colonia were either on relief or were public charges." Similarly, Congressman Martin Dies wrote in the Chicago Herald-Examiner that the "large alien population is the basic cause of unemployment." Independent groups such as the American Federation of Labor (AFL) and the National Club of America for Americans also thought that deporting Mexicans would free up jobs for U.S. citizens and the latter group urged Americans to pressure the government into deporting Mexicans. Secretary of Labor William Doak (who at that time oversaw the Border Patrol) "asserted that deportation... was essential for reducing unemployment".

Contemporaries did not always agree with this analysis. For example, in a study of El Paso, Texas, the National Catholic Welfare Conference estimated that deportation of parents who were non-citizens would cost more than roundup and deportation, because previously ineligible remaining children and wives would become eligible for welfare. Modern economic research has also suggested that the economic impact of deportation was negligible or even negative.

Racism was also a factor. Mexicans were targeted in part because of "the proximity of the Mexican border, the physical distinctiveness of mestizos and easily identifiable barrios."

Mechanisms of Repatriation

In response to these justifications, the federal government, in coordination with local governments, took steps to remove Mexicans. These actions were a combination of federal actions that created a "climate of fear", along with local activities that encouraged repatriation through a combination of "lure, persuasion, and coercion".

Early "voluntary" Repatriation

Mexicans were often among the first to be laid off after the crash of 1929. When combined with endemic harassment, many sought to return to Mexico. For example, in 1931 in Gary, Indiana, a number of people sought funding to return to Mexico, or took advantage of reduced-rate train tickets. By 1932, such repatriation was no longer voluntary, as local governments and aid agencies in Gary began to use "repressive measures ... to force the return of reluctant voyagers". Similarly, in Detroit, by 1932 one Mexican national reported to the local consul that police had "dragged" him to the train station against his will, after he had proven his residency the previous year. Mexican Consulates across the country received complaints of "harassment, beatings, heavy-handed tactics and verbal abuse".

Federal government action

As the effects of the Great Depression worsened and affected larger numbers of people, feelings of hostility toward immigrants increased rapidly and the Mexican community as a whole suffered as a result. States began passing laws that required all public employees to be American citizens and employers were subject to harsh penalties such as a five hundred dollar fine or six months in jail if they hired immigrants. Although the law was hardly enforced, "employers used it as a convenient excuse for not hiring Mexicans. It also made it difficult for any Mexican, whether American citizens or foreign born, to get hired." The federal government imposed restrictions for immigrant labor as well, requiring firms that supply the government with goods and services refrain from hiring immigrants and as a result, most larger corporations followed suit and as a result, many employers fired their Mexican employees and few hired new Mexican workers causing unemployment to increase among the Mexican population.

President Hoover publicly endorsed Secretary of Labor Doak and his campaign to add "245 more agents to assist in the deportation of 500,000 foreigners." Doak’s measures included monitoring labor protests or farm strikes and labeling protesters and protest leaders as possible subversives, communists or radicals. "Strike leaders and picketers would be arrested, charged with being illegal aliens or engaging in illegal activities and thus be subject to arbitrary deportation."

Repatriation in Los Angeles

Beginning in the early 1930s, local governments instigated Repatriation programs, often conducted through local welfare bureaus or private charitable agencies. Los Angeles had the largest population of Mexicans outside of Mexico and had a typical deportation approach with a plan for "publicity releases announcing the deportation campaign, a few arrests would be made 'with all publicity possible and pictures,' and both police and deputy sheriffs would assist". This led to complaints and criticisms from both the Mexican Consulate and local Spanish language publication, La Opinión. The raids were significant in scope, assuming "the logistics of full-scale paramilitary operations" with cooperation from Federal officials, country deputy sheriffs and city police who would raid public places who were then "herded" onto trains or buses. Jose David Orozco described on his local radio station the "women crying in the streets when not finding their husbands" after deportation sweeps had occurred."

Several Los Angeles raids included roundups of hundreds of Mexicans with immigration agents and deputies blocked off all exits to the Mexican neighborhood in East LA, riding "around the neighborhood with their sirens wailing and advising people to surrender themselves to the authorities."

After the peak of the Repatriation, Los Angeles again threatened to deport "between 15,000 and 25,000 families" in 1934. While the Mexican government took the threat seriously enough to attempt to prepare for such an influx the city ultimately did not carry through on their threat.

Legal process of deportations

Once apprehended, requesting a hearing was a possibility but immigration officers rarely informed individuals of their rights and the hearings were "official but informal", in that immigration inspectors "acted as interpreter, accuser, judge and jury". Moreover, the deportee was seldom represented by a lawyer, a privilege that could only be granted at the discretion of the immigration officer. This process was likely a violation of US federal due process, equal protection and Fourth Amendment rights.

If no hearing was requested the second option of those apprehended was to voluntarily deport themselves from the US. In theory, this would allow these individuals to reenter the US legally at a later date because "no arrest warrant was issued and no legal record or judicial transcript of the incident was kept". However, many were misled and on departure given a "stamp on their card [which showed] that they have been county charities". This meant that they would be denied readmission, since they would be "liable to become a public charge".

Mexican government response

Mexican governments had traditionally taken the position that it was "duty-bound" to help repatriate Mexicans who lived in the annexed portions of the southwest United States. However, it did not typically act on this stated policy, because of a lack of resources. Nonetheless, because of the large number of Repatriations in the early 1930s, the government was forced to act and provided a variety of services. From July 1930 to June 1931, it underwrote the cost of Repatriation for over 90,000 nationals. In some cases the government attempted to create new villages ("colonias") where Repatriates could live, but the vast majority returned to communities in which relatives or friends lived.

After the peak of the Repatriation had passed, the post-1934 government led by Lázaro Cárdenas continued to speak about encouraging Repatriation, but did little to actually encourage that to occur.

#reparations #mexican #mexican american #citizens #deportation #great depression #ethnic cleansing #birthright #united states

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socialjusticeartshare · 3 years

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Migrant families traumatized by Trump's separations could face lifetime of health problems

Samayra's son stopped eating after he was taken from his father at the Texas border in June 2018 under the Trump administration's zero-tolerance family separation policy.

The boy, who was seven at the time, and his father came to the U.S. seeking refuge after fleeing violence and poverty in their native Honduras.

But after he was sent to a shelter in New York, the boy didn't know if he would ever see his father again. He survived at the shelter mostly on crackers and juice, said Samayra, his mother.

When the boy was finally reunited with his father back in Texas a month later, the boy was so emaciated, his family barely recognized him, Samayra said.

The trauma didn't end after the boy and father were reunited and moved to Los Angeles to live with relatives.

He became quiet and withdrawn. He had trouble at school. He couldn't concentrate on his homework.

"He didn't have a desire to do anything," said Samayra, who agreed to an interview provided that her full name not be used because her immigration case is still pending.

He would get up from bed at night after being woken up by terrible nightmares.

When asked what was wrong, the boy would say he had dreamed he was back at the shelter.

"He was afraid he wasn't going to see his dad again," Samayra said.

The boy's troubles show how families separated at the border under Trump's zero-tolerance policy continue to experience mental health problems as a result of the trauma they endured more than two years ago, mental health experts say.

Despite being reunited, many children and families who were separated continue to struggle with a wide range of mental health problems that include anxiety, depression, trouble sleeping, guilt, fear of separation, and changes in behavior, mental health experts say.

On Friday, President-elect Joe Biden vowed that under his administration, the Justice Department and other investigative agencies will determine who was responsible for the zero-tolerance family separation policy and whether their conduct was criminal.

"I'm not going to tell the Justice Department who they should prosecute and who they should not," Biden said during a press conference to update the transition. "But there will be a thorough, thorough investigation of who was responsible and whether or not the responsibility is criminal."

In November 2019, a federal judge ruled that the Trump administration was liable for the trauma inflicted on families separated at the border under the zero-tolerance policy and ordered the government to provide mental health counseling to children and parents who experienced psychological injury.

CALLING ICE: After SB 1070, Phoenix police connect with immigration agency 7 times a day, on average

California-based agency nonprofit Seneca Family of Agencies was awarded a $14 million contract in March to contact separated families and connect those who wished treatment with mental health care counselors.

The program ends in June and advocates are rushing to contact as many families as possible.

Without counseling, mental health experts say, the children and parents could suffer a lifetime of mental and physical health problems.

"There is strong scientific consensus that early life adversity can lead to not just mental health issues down the road and into adulthood but also physiological and medical complications — heart disease, diabetes, substance abuse, poor socialization, or disruptive attachments," said Dr. Cesar Berdeja, a child and adolescent psychiatry specialist who has worked with unaccompanied migrant children. "So being able to form healthy, sound relationships can be impacted by having endured trauma of this level."

Most of the separations that took place at the border involved families from the Northern Triangle countries of Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras. The families were already "fleeing abhorrent community violence, fear, poverty, domestic violence, trafficking," Berdeja noted.

The family separations that took place under the zero-tolerance policy added to their trauma, he said.

"So to further burden vulnerable individuals that is an important recognition of why these kids and families should be offered services," Berdeja said.

Johanna Navarro-Perez, who oversees the Seneca Family of Agencies program to contact and connect families who were separated at the border with mental health services, echoed those comments.

"We are talking about (people) who were fleeing other sorts of state-sanctioned violence or traumatic events and then came here and at the hands of this government were also subjected to violence and trauma. Having your child ripped away from your arms is violent and traumatic," Navarro-Perez said.

Parents skeptical of help

Contacting the families, many of whom remain in the U.S. while their asylum cases are pending in immigration courts, has not been easy, she said.

Incomplete and outdated information provided by the government had made it difficult to track down many of the families, Navarro-Perez said.

The coronavirus pandemic has added to those difficulties, Navarro-Perez said. Seneca's outreach team couldn't go door-to-door or travel to locate the families, which is their practice. And families who experienced trauma and accepted counseling were unable to receive their therapy face-to-face, and needed to be provided tablets, reliable internet connection and other technical assistance that wasn't anticipated.

Advocates face another challenge. Many of the parents are skeptical of attempts to contact them even if they are experiencing mental health problems because of the mistrust and fear generated from being separated by the government.

"When we call them, they are already going to be skeptical of us," Navarro-Perez said. "If we are calling them and saying, 'Oh, we got your phone number from the federal government, the same federal government that separated you from your child."

Advocates are trying to contact over 2,200 families who are eligible for mental health services.

As of Jan. 6, about 575 families had been contacted. Of those, about 282 families have accepted services. Another 206 have declined services, according to Seneca data. The remainder is undecided.

Fear of abandonment hasn't gone away

More than two years after they were reunited, children who were separated from their parents at the border still live in fear of being abandoned by their parents, Navarro-Perez said.

ICYMI: New Trump administration citizenship test is more difficult for immigrants to pass

"Some of the kids had no idea what was going on and so thought their parents had abandoned them or (left) them and thought that for the duration of the separation," she said. "So that is going to impact the child-parent relationship and the trust between parent and child, even though that is not what actually happened."

Some parents also feel guilty about what their children went through, she said.

"And that can be a very debilitating feeling to carry around with you," she said.

How children and parents separated at the border process the trauma they experienced varies from family to family, said Crystal Reed, Seneca's outreach coordinator.

She has found that younger children were affected the most by the trauma of being separated from their parents, she said.

Some of the children were as young as 18 months old when they were separated from their parents at the border, court filings show. More than 400 of the children were younger than 4.

"I've noticed a little bit of a pattern," Reed said. "In sleeping patterns and eating patterns or personality differences."

Before they were separated some children "might have been a happy, playful, energetic kid," she said. But now they "might be more reserved and withdrawn. ... The things that they enjoyed doing before, they might not enjoy those things anymore."

Others have trouble being dropped off at school because they are afraid they might not see their parent again, Reed said.

Some parents report trouble sleeping at night.

"Some of the parents tell me, 'I can't sleep at night. I'm really stressed all the time. Or just really tearful. When I think about what happened to me, it's either avoidance, like we don't talk about it. I don't want to think about it, or when I do it's just really debilitating, really difficult to go back to that memory,'" Reed said.

Thousands of children separated from parents

In the spring of 2018, nearly 3,000 children were forcibly separated from their parents at the border as part of a zero-tolerance policy. The policy was aimed at deterring a wave of migrant families, mostly from violence and poverty-stricken regions in Central America and Mexico, from coming to the U.S. and asking for asylum.

Trump argued that migrant families aided by human-smuggling organizations were exploiting "loopholes" in the nation's immigration system by traveling to the U.S. without documents and then requesting asylum knowing they would be released while their cases were pending in immigration courts.

Advocates maintained they were fleeing violence and other dangerous conditions and had a right to come to the U.S. to seek asylum.

Under the policy, parents who crossed the southern border illegally faced criminal prosecution and were held in detention centers near the border while their children, some as young as 18 months old, were taken away and sent to shelters all over the U.S.

CHECK OUT: Immigration lawyers worry in-person appearances at Eloy court will increase COVID-19 risk

Trump signed an executive order ending the policy on June 20, 2018, following an international outcry over the separation of children from their parents.

A federal judge ordered the Trump administration on June 26, 2018, to reunite the families.

It was revealed later that more than 1,000 additional families had been separated under a pilot program that the Trump administration ran in the El Paso area for months starting in the fall of 2017.

Parents sue Trump administration

In July 2018, three parents who had been separated from their children under the zero-tolerance policy filed a class-action lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California in San Francisco.

The lawsuit argued that the trauma the Trump administration inflicted on migrant families through its "extraordinary, deliberate and needless" separation policy violated their due process and equal protection rights under the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution.

The government was therefore responsible for providing screening and mental health services to address that trauma, the lawsuit said.

"The legal point was that the government was taking individuals into custody and then creating great and inhumane harm," said Mark Rosenbaum, a lawyer with the pro bono public interest law firm Public Counsel, which along with the law firm, Sidley Austin, represented the families.

"The government can't do that," Rosenbaum said. "The government can take persons into custody for alleged violations of the law. But what it cannot do is expose those individuals to great harm and not remediate that harm."

'Fainted in terror'

One of the parents, a 37-year-old Indigenous woman from Guatemala, identified in the lawsuit as "J.P.," said she had entered the U.S. near San Luis, Arizona, around May 17, 2018, with her 16-year-old daughter.

The woman said she had fled death threats from a former partner who had sexually abused and beaten her, the lawsuit said.

The woman's native language is a Mayan dialect, and she could not speak or understand English and spoke very little Spanish, and therefore she could not communicate with U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials who detained her, the lawsuit said.

The woman said she and her daughter were held with about 150 other detainees in a windowless room with no beds, showers or private toilets and lights kept on 24 hours a day, the lawsuit said.

On about May 20, guards came and took her daughter away, the lawsuit said. The daughter "fainted in terror" when she realized what was happening, and injured her mouth "that left her face swollen for days," the lawsuit said.

The woman was detained at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Irvine, California, while her daughter was held at a shelter in Phoenix, the lawsuit said.

Long-term psychological effects

The woman had no contact with her daughter until June 22, when she was allowed to speak to her by telephone, the lawsuit said.

"Until then, Ms. P feared that she would never see or speak to her daughter again," the lawsuit said.

While at the shelter, the daughter could not speak about being separated from her mother without crying, the lawsuit said.

A social worker who evaluated the daughter said she showed signs of depression, anxiety, adjustment to trauma, and traumatic grief, the lawsuit said.

DIG DEEP: Calls to state child-abuse hotline have declined during pandemic, but impact is less clear

The mother reported "almost always having upsetting thoughts about being

separated from her daughter, and repeatedly experiences bad dreams or nightmares," the lawsuit said.

A social worker who evaluated her said she was displaying symptoms of

post-traumatic stress disorder, the lawsuit said.

The lawsuit also included statements from mental health experts who said that "forcible separation of children from their parents is a traumatic event that can have both immediate and long-term psychological consequences if left unaddressed by professional care."

Judge orders government to pay for mental health care

U.S. District Court Judge John Kronstadt recommended the Trump administration reach a settlement to pay for mental health services, Rosenbaum said.

The families negotiated a settlement with the Trump administration for months but just "when we thought it was all but accomplished," the White House rejected the deal, Rosenbaum said.

"So we had lost real-time in real people's lives where the trauma had created even more suffering," Rosenbaum said.

After the deal fell through, Kronstadt agreed to grant an injunction, and ordered the government to pay for mental health services for children and parents who had been separated, Rosenbaum said.

In his order, Kronstadt rejected the contention by government lawyers that the lawsuit should be dismissed and agreed with the parents that the government was responsible for trauma inflicted on them as a result of the family separations.

Trump administration lawyers initially filed a motion to appeal Kronstadt's ruling, but withdrew the motion in February, clearing the way for the contract to be awarded in March to Seneca Family of Agencies.

The decision to drop the appeal was startling, Rosenbaum said, given that the Trump administration has vigorously appealed other unfavorable rulings to its hard-line immigration policies as far as the Supreme Court.

Rosenbaum saw the decision not to appeal as an acknowledgment that the case was indefensible.

"This deliberate policy, which the government initially denied what was really going on here, it's going to go down in the annals of American history as one of the most cruel attempts in terms of not respecting the sanctity of the human family," Rosenbaum said.

Rosenbaum praised the families who are now coming forward and receiving mental health services.

"It's an extraordinary testament to the strength of these families that they are seeking mental health services and that they are working through" their trauma, Rosenbaum said.

After the contract was awarded in March, Seneca launched a campaign to reach out to separated families across the country and inform them of the program, called Todo Por Mi Familia, which in Spanish means, All For My Family. The states with the largest number of separated families are California, Florida, New Jersey, New York, Texas, and Washington.

The campaign includes a hotline, 844-529-3327, a web page, and Facebook page. Several Latin celebrities have also recorded videos promoting the program, among them actor, singer and former Miss Universe Dayanara Torres, actor Eugenio Derbez, singer Roselyn Sanchez, actor Carlos Ponce and actor Cristian de la Fuente.

Meanwhile, Samayra and her son, who is now 10, have received mental health counseling through the program.

Samayra came separately to the U.S. with her 7-month-old daughter in December 2018 after traveling through Mexico from Honduras to escape dangerous conditions and reunite with her husband and son.

But unlike her son and husband, she and her daughter were not separated after being apprehended by the Border Patrol in Texas, Samayra said.

Samayra said she and her son began receiving mental health counseling in March, making them among the first families to accept treatment under the program.

The counseling her son received has helped him process the trauma he experienced.

"He's doing a lot better," she said.

She also had a message for other families who were separated at the border:

"I want to recommend that other families be open to accepting this help," she said. "It has helped us a lot."

Todo Por Mi Familia

Here are ways to find out more information about Todo Por Mi Familia, the program administered by Seneca Family of Agencies to connect migrant families separated at the border with mental health counseling paid for by the federal government under a court order.

Todo Por Mi Familia Hotline: 844-529-3327

Todo Por Mi Familia Email: [email protected]

Todo Por Mi Familia Facebook Page: facebook.com/Todo-Por-Mi-Familia-110726410630900/

Seneca’s website: senecafoa.org/todopormifamilia/

General questions about Todo Por Mi Familia: 323-326-8287

Reach the reporter at [email protected] or at 602-444-8312. Follow him on Twitter @azdangonzalez.

Support local journalism. Subscribe to azcentral.com today.

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myattorneyusa · 4 years

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Three New Appellate Immigration Judges Appointed to BIA (Aug. 11, 2020)

On August 7, 2020, the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) announced the appointment of three appellate immigration judges to the Board of Immigration Appeals [PDF version]. Each of the three new appellate immigration judges was appointed by Attorney General William P. Barr. The appointments are significant in that the BIA is the highest administrative review body [link] for interpreting and applying the immigration laws. In this post, we will examine the resumes of the three new members of the BIA.

Michael P. Baird, Appellate Immigration Judge

2009-2020: Immigration judge on the Dallas Immigration Court (Texas) and later the Atlanta Immigration Court (Georgia).

2006-2009: Senior assistant district attorney in the Appalachian Judicial Circuit, in Georgia.

2004-2006: Judge in the Municipal Court of Jonesboro, Georgia.

1997-2004: Chief Judge for the Magistrate Court of Clayton County, Georgia.

1995-96; 92-93: Private Practice.

1993-1995: Senior assistant solicitor general at the Clayton County Solicitor's Office.

1986-1990: Police officer.

Obtained Juris Doctorate in 1992 from Georgia State University College of Law.

Sunita B. Mahtabfar, Appellate Immigration Judge

2013-2020: Immigration Judge on the El Paso Immigration Court (Texas).

2006-2013: Attorney in the Office of the Assistant Chief Counsel, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Department of Homeland Security, in El Paso, Texas.

2003-2006: Asylum officer in the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Department of Homeland Security.

Obtained Juris Doctorate from Thurgood Marshall School of Law.

Sirce E. Owen, Appellate Immigration Judge

2019-2020: Acting deputy Director of EOIR.

2018-2020: Assistant Chief Immigration Judge, based in Atlanta.

2016-2018: Deputy chief counsel, Office of Chief Counsel, Office of the Principal Legal Advisor, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Department of Homeland Security, in Atlanta.

2008-2016: Assistant chief counsel, Office of Chief Counsel, Office of the Principal Legal Advisor, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Department of Homeland Security, in Atlanta.

2005-2008: Private practice.

Obtained Juris Doctor in 2005 from Georgia State University.

Please visit the nyc immigration lawyers website for further information. The Law Offices of Grinberg & Segal, PLLC focuses vast segment of its practice on immigration law. This steadfast dedication has resulted in thousands of immigrants throughout the United States.

Lawyer website: http://myattorneyusa.com

#immigration #immigrants #US immigration

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businessvisaguide-blog · 4 years

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Why Every Law Office Needs An Online Business

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jaimealvaradoassociates · 1 year

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If you’re looking for an immigration lawyer in El Paso, Texas, you’ve come to the right place. Immigration law can be a complex and confusing field, but with the right legal representation, you can navigate the process with confidence. Whether you’re seeking citizenship, permanent residency, or simply need help resolving a legal issue related to your immigration status, an experienced attorney can provide invaluable guidance and support.

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#law firm in El Paso #immigration lawyer in El Paso

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skilledvisaaustralia-blog · 4 years

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bountyofbeads · 5 years

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Fox News has no comment on its venomous rhetoric

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/08/12/fox-news-has-no-comment-its-venomous-rhetoric/

Fox News has no comment on its venomous rhetoric

By Erik Wemple | Published August 12 at 6:16 PM ET | Washington Post | Posted August 12, 2019 7:59 PM ET ¦

In his 2,300-word manifesto, the gunman who killed 22 people in El Paso earlier this month laid out his views on many topics including the environment, corporations, economics, automation and, most forcefully, the “invaders” who arrive in the United States from other countries. Speaking of Democrats, he wrote, “They intend to use open borders, free healthcare for illegals, citizenship and more to enact a political coup by importing and then legalizing millions of new voters.”

Compare those thoughts to what Fox News host Tucker Carlson said on air on May 17. In a standard anti-immigration riff, Carlson laid out what he saw as the partisan dimensions of the topic:

The left has aligned with business interests that profit from cheap, obedient workers. Low-skilled immigrants have a harder time assimilating into the American mainstream. They stay poor. They learn English more slowly. They’re more likely to remain an ethnic underclass, all of which makes them much more likely to vote Democratic long term. That’s the point, obviously.

Skilled immigrants might assimilate and become less reliable Democratic voters. They might even compete with the children of our ruling class. That’s not allowed. It’s safer to import serfs, and that’s exactly what they’re doing. Don’t let them tell you it’s about civil rights. It’s not; it’s about their convenience and their power.

SEE THE OVERLAP?

Many passages of the shooter’s manifesto, titled “The Inconvenient Truth," read like poorly articulated versions of a Carlson rant. Importing voters? Check. The ills of corporate America? Check. Unwise foreign wars? Check.

In an analysis published on Sunday, the New York Times cross-checked portions of the manifesto with the rhetoric broadcast on conservative media, including Fox News. It found a “shared vocabulary of intolerance that stokes fears centered on immigrants of color. The programs, on television and radio, reach an audience of millions.” Whereas the Texas gunman — who has confessed to killing 22 people at a Walmart — wrote of the “great replacement” of U.S. citizens by immigrants, “Tucker Carlson Tonight” pumped that theme on repeated occasions; whereas the Texas gunman wrote of an immigration “flood,” similar language was common on Rush Limbaugh’s radio show; and whereas the gunman spoke of “invaders," more than 300 Fox News programs across the network lineup in the past year have referenced an immigration “invasion,” according to the Times.

Do the findings draw a causal line between certain media organizations and the El Paso shooter? No. The man’s influences remain shrouded, though he did include this note in the manifesto: “My ideology has not changed for several years. My opinions on automation, immigration and the rest predate Trump and his campaign for president. I putting this here because certain people will blame the President or certain presidential candidates for the attack.”

All that said, it’s hard to avoid Fox News’s influence on immigration or any other contemporary controversy, especially for those inclined to seek out conservative news on the Internet. The influence is malign, too. Yochai Benkler, a scholar affiliated with Harvard’s Berkman Klein Center, has studied the network’s ability to seed its ideas across the web. He told The Post last year:

Our data repeatedly show Fox as the transmission vector of widespread conspiracy theories. The original Seth Rich conspiracy did not take off when initially propagated in July 2016 by fringe and pro-Russia sites, but only a year later, as Fox News revived it when James Comey was fired. The Clinton pedophilia libel that resulted in Pizzagate was started by a Fox online report, repeated across the Fox TV schedule, and provided the prime source of validation across the right-wing media ecosystem.

In 2017 Fox repeatedly attacked the national security establishment and law enforcement whenever the Trump-Russia investigation heated up. Each attack involved significant online activity, but the spikes in attention and transition moments are associated with Hannity, “Fox & Friends” and others like Tucker Carlson or Lou Dobbs.

Which is to say, it is difficult to avoid the influence of Fox News. The Carlsons and the Ingrahams and the Hannitys — they’re the people who coin the language and forge the tone of the country’s immigration debate. If they say there’s an invasion, there must be an invasion. If they say there’s a replacement conspiracy afoot, well, believe it!

The rhetoric was dangerous before the emergence of the El Paso shooter’s manifesto; it will be dangerous once the document fades into the abyss of mass-shooter history. Consider that Carlson last December said that immigration makes the country “dirtier”; that Mexico is trying to change U.S. demographics; and that Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) was “living proof” of U.S. immigration failures. When Carlson unleashed his monologue on Omar, he teetered between policy critique and call for action:

Ilhan Omar is living proof that the way we practice immigration has become dangerous to this country. A system designed to strengthen America is instead undermining it. Some of the very people we try hardest to help have come to hate us passionately.

Maybe that’s our fault for asking too little of our immigrants. We aren’t self-confident enough to make them assimilate so they never feel fully American. Or maybe the problem is deeper than that. Maybe we’re importing people from places whose values are simply in antithetical to ours. Who knows what the problem is, but there is a problem and whatever the cause, this cannot continue. It’s not sustainable.

So Fox News provides the hatred of immigrants; what viewers may choose to do with that hatred is up to them. Some may ignore it; others may vote only for politicians with hard-line stances on the topic; others may denounce immigrants at social functions or shout them down in person. Could yet others grind it into violent ideations?

Whatever the perils, Fox News isn’t talking about them. It had no comment for the New York Times. A follow-up from the Erik Wemple Blog fetched nothing. The same nonresponse greeted this blog’s inquiries about Cesar Sayoc, the confessed domestic terrorist — he mailed improvised explosive devices to prominent Democrats and CNN; they didn’t detonate — whose lawyers claimed in a court filing that he was radicalized in part by Fox News.

It’s gut-check time for Fox News, in other words. The work of its opinion-side hosts in siding with Trump’s racist, anti-immigration agenda is creating fresh exposure for the network, with clear warning signals on the public record. As Peter Maass wrote in the Intercept after Carlson’s attacks on Omar, the outrages are rightly laid at the door not only of the Fox News hosts but more appropriately the Murdoch family, whose trust owns 39 percent of Fox Corp.

How comfortable are the Murdochs with the echoes between a killer’s manifesto and their network’s bread and butter?

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fullspectrum-cbd-oil · 5 years

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Death Toll From Texas Shooting Rampage Rises to 22, Trump to Visit El Paso

Two more victims of a shooting rampage at a Walmart store in El Paso, Texas, died of their wounds on Monday, police said, raising the death toll to 22 in the massacre as U.S. President Donald Trump planned a visit to the stricken community.

The latest fatalities bring to 31 the number of victims killed during the weekend in mass shootings in El Paso and Dayton, Ohio, that have touched off a new furor over gun violence in the United States.

Patrick Crusius, 21, has been charged with a single count of capital murder in the El Paso case, court documents show, in what is likely a legal place holder to keep him in custody while the investigation is under way.

Authorities have cited a lengthy anti-immigrant manifesto, apparently posted online by the suspect before the Saturday morning shooting in the heavily Hispanic border city, which they said was evidence the bloodshed was racially motivated.

Eight of those killed in the attack were Mexican citizens, according to the Mexican government.

The four-page statement uploaded to 8chan, a largely unmoderated online message board often used by extremists, called the Walmart attack “a response to the Hispanic invasion of Texas.”

It also expressed support for a gunman who killed 51 people at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, in March.

The El Paso killings prompted 8chan founder Frederick Brennan, in an interview with the New York Times, to call for the site to be shut down. Brennan no longer has control of 8chan, which is now run from the Philippines by a U.S. Army veteran, the Times reported.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott said Saturday’s rampage appeared to be a hate crime and federal prosecutors called it domestic terrorism. A Texas prosecutor said the state will seek the death penalty against Crusius if he is convicted.

Trump said Americans “must condemn racism, bigotry and white supremacy” and blamed the internet and violent video games for fostering violence.

TRUMP TO VISIT WEDNESDAY

El Paso Mayor Dee Margo told reporters at an afternoon news conference that Trump would visit the city on Wednesday. The mayor asked that the visit amid a divisive gun control debate not be politicized.

U.S. gun control activists say the internet and video games cannot be blamed because they are also are popular in countries where mass shootings are virtually unknown, in part because it is harder to obtain firearms.

It was unclear if Crusius had retained a lawyer or would make an initial court appearance. El Paso Police Chief Greg Allen said the suspect was cooperating with investigators.

The suspect’s grandparents said in a statement read to reporters by a family member outside their home in the Dallas suburb of Allen, 650 miles (1,046 km) east of El Paso, that they were devastated by the attack.

“He lived with us in our house in Allen, Texas, while he attended Collin College,” they said. “He moved out of our house six weeks ago and has spent a few nights here while we were out of town.”

FBI Director Christopher Wray told a congressional panel on July 23 that the bureau had recorded about 100 arrests of domestic terrorism suspects in the preceding nine months and that most investigations of that kind involved some form of white supremacy.

The Texas rampage was followed just 13 hours later by the mass shooting in Ohio and came a week after a man shot dead three people at a California garlic festival before killing himself.

In Dayton, Ohio, a gunman in body armor and a mask killed nine people in less than a minute and wounded 27 others in the downtown historic district before he was shot dead by police.

Police said the El Paso suspect opened fire with a rifle on Walmart shoppers, many of them bargain-hunting for back-to-school supplies, then surrendered to officers who confronted him outside the store.

In El Paso, residents brought crosses representing each of the victims to a growing memorial site near the store on Monday.

A crowd of several hundred classmates, teachers and relatives filled a high school football stadium in the El Paso suburb of Horizon on Monday evening for a memorial service honoring the youngest of the 22 people slain – 15-year-old Javier Rodriguez. Friends said he held dual U.S.-Mexican citizenship.

El Paso and Ciudad Juarez, together with the neighboring city of Las Cruces, New Mexico, form a metropolitan border area of some 2.5 million residents constituting the largest bilingual, bi-national population in North America.

Trump has derided asylum seekers and other immigrants coming across the U.S. southern border as liars and criminals, prompting Democrats to accuse him of racism.

(Reporting by Julio-Cesar Chavez and Daniel Trotta in El Paso; Additional reporting by Jonathan Allen, Barbara Goldberg and Matthew Lavietes in New York and Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles Writing by Dan Whitcomb; Editing by Bill Trott, Matthew Lewis and Paul Tait)

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socialjusticeartshare · 5 years

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She fled a violent Honduran gang to seek asylum in Texas. Now she might be deported because she didn't file paperwork in Mexico.

The Trump administration's policy to deny asylum to migrants who didn't seek protections elsewhere is now being enforced. Immigration attorneys warn the new rule could forever diminish U.S. asylum policy.

BY JULIÁN AGUILAR AND ACACIA CORONADO OCT. 18, 2019

EL PASO — It wasn’t the first time men with guns showed up at Elizabeth's door. But this time, they were coming for her.

Six years after gangsters arrived at her house and took her brother away and killed him, Elizabeth, who as a young girl was teased for liking other girls, was running for her life from the same Honduran gang in April.

“We heard their footsteps and saw that they were armed, and they said, ‘This time we get the lesbian,’” she told an asylum officer, according to a transcript of her credible fear interview with a U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services officer. (Elizabeth is being used as a pseudonym for the woman to protect her safety.)

Elizabeth’s journey from her native Honduras led her and her mother through Guatemala and Mexico on their way to the U.S. In Mexico, they were confronted by members of a cartel, who Elizabeth said kidnapped and sexually assaulted her for days because she and her mother didn’t have any money or any relatives in the United States who could send them cash. After five days, she said, they were abandoned near a U.S. port of entry.

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Elizabeth is now detained in the U.S., but her previous journey through Mexico could spell more trouble for her because of the latest Trump administration policy targeting asylum protections for migrants who didn’t seek asylum in another country before arriving in the U.S.

The rule, announced in July, is the latest salvo in the White House’s efforts to deter asylum seekers from coming into the country, whether they enter the country at ports of entry or illegally by crossing the Rio Grande. It was halted and restarted again after several court battles. When Elizabeth was interviewed by asylum officers in early September, she was told how the rule will affect her.

Elizabeth gave a sworn statement to asylum officers that in 2013, gangsters and corrupt police officers killed her brother because he declined to be part of their group in Honduras, according to the interview transcript. But an asylum officer told Elizabeth that because of the new regulation, she can't apply for asylum in the U.S.

Immigration attorneys argue the rule could forever diminish U.S. asylum policy. Before the rule, the asylum process was still difficult for migrants who didn't receive previous permission to be in the country. But there was a process in place allowing applicants to argue their case and have a chance at an appeal should they be denied. But with the third-country rule, those opportunities are eliminated, attorneys say.

"Our laws require we offer a meaningful chance to seek asylum. This rule denies people that chance," Jeremy McKinney, second vice president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, said when the rule was announced. "If the administration truly wanted to make our asylum system more efficient, maximize the chances that bona fide asylum seekers are protected, and live up to our values, then the steps they should take are clear. This rule isn't one of them."

The regulation was put in place after the controversial Migrant Protection Protocols were implemented late last year. That policy requires migrants to wait in Mexico for their U.S. court dates and has affected more than 50,000 asylum seekers. The combined effects of both policies could lead to the erosion of pathways for asylum seekers, said Linda Corchado, the director of El Paso-based Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center.

“This has been a hard rule for me to stomach because it really has been the gutting of our asylum laws,” she said.

Both regulations have been challenged in federal courts but remain in effect. During a news conference last week, acting Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Mark Morgan said the agency was intent on expanding the third-country rule.

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People like Elizabeth can still obtain relief from deportation if an immigration judge issues an order known as a "withholding of removal." That's applied when migrants prove there is more than a 50% chance they will be persecuted in their home country. But Corchado said that even if that order is granted, it doesn't include a pathway to legal residency and applies only to the migrant, not his or her family. And the relief can always be revoked.

"It feels like if the U.S. [government] feels there’s a change in that person’s country, they can always reopen proceedings and deport them," Corchado said.

The third-country rule is being implemented alongside the Trump administration's metering requirement, which mandates that asylum seekers add their names to a list of thousands of people waiting in Mexico before applying for asylum.

State officials in the Mexican state of Chihuahua said that there are 4,000 to 5,000 people on the waiting list in Ciudad Juárez, though only half of them are still waiting. Hundreds have either gone home or tried to cross the river illegally instead. It’s one sign that the MPP and metering policies are having some effect, Corchado said.

“I think, as a whole, all of these [policies] are compelling asylum seekers to go back,” she said.

Jodi Goodwin, a Brownsville-based immigration attorney, said lawyers expect the third-country rule will be brought up during the merit-hearing stage of the asylum proceedings along the border later this month, and attorneys will have a better idea of how the rule is affecting asylum applications.

But the Trump administration is seeing signs that its policies have had the intended effect.

The number of people who were apprehended by or surrendered to federal immigration officials dipped by nearly 20% last month, the Department of Homeland Security announced last week. After about 64,000 apprehensions in August, the agency reported a September total of about 52,500. That figure is about 40% of July’s estimated 82,000 and is the lowest monthly total of the 2019 fiscal year, which ended Sept. 30, according to government statistics.

Last week, Morgan, the acting CBP chief, touted the four-month decline of apprehensions of migrants on the country’s southern border. Federal officials see the figure as a barometer of how many fewer migrants are attempting to enter the United States.

“While Congress has failed to put forth a single piece of legislation — even be able to introduce it to the floor to address this crisis — we have addressed this crisis,” Morgan said.

The administration has also praised the Mexican government’s efforts to stop migrants from crossing through that country. Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador deployed thousands of federal troops to his country’s southern border to stem the number of people arriving from Central America. The order came after Trump threatened to impose tariffs of up to 25% on Mexican imports if Mexico didn’t secure its border to Trump’s liking. Over the weekend, the show of force from the Mexicans was on full display when National Guard troops detainedabout 1,000 asylum seekers from moving northward.

But unrest is mounting as more migrants who did make the trip north are forced to wait. In the Mexican city of Matamoros, across the border from Brownsville, makeshift tents have sprouted in camps full of migrants with nowhere else to go.

Andrea Rudnik, co-founder of the nonprofit Team Brownsville, which aids migrants across the Gateway International Bridge, said conditions in a refugee camp there are quickly deteriorating. She said the growing number of migrants is causing tension, leading people to grow desperate.

This week, hundreds of migrants protested at the entrance of the Gateway International Bridge in Brownsville, causing it to close for several hours early Thursday morning. Rudnik said the asylum seekers were asking to enter and complaining about the camp conditions. She said they don’t have access to clean water or medical care. She said in the last few weeks she has been visiting the camp, the river in which people bathe has had dead animals, and the lack of hygiene has caused a lice epidemic. Some migrants told her they were turned away at their hearings and told to return when they are clean of lice.

Scenes from the Gateway International Bridge in Matamoros, Mexico: Teenagers seeking asylum learn about factors with playing cards during a class taught by volunteers from the U.S.; memorial crosses on the banks of the Rio Grande honor those who lost their lives this year trying to cross into the U.S. from Matamoros; migrants wait in line to get meals provided by Team Brownsville, an organization that helps people seeking asylum. Verónica G. Cárdenas for The Texas Tribune

There has also been an increase in the number of Mexicans who are lining up just beyond the international ports of entry in Texas to try to seek asylum in the United States. The majority, from southern Mexican states including Michoacán and Guerrero, are fleeing violence they say the government can’t or isn’t willing to stop. Both states are under a “do not travel” alert from the U.S. State Department.

M.Q., a woman from Honduras, said she and her 17-year-old son have been living in a makeshift tent in Matamoros since August. She and her son left when local organized crime threatened her son. They rode on a train commonly referred to as "La Bestia" across Central America, crossed into the U.S. illegally, and were caught and told to remain in Mexico as they sought asylum. She said her tent has fallen to shreds, and she fears the upcoming cold and rain. Her son has been sick for a week and can no longer eat.

"It is hard to be here without my family," said M.Q., who asked not to use her full name to protect her family's safety. "They are asking me for a lot of proof that I don't have the money to have sent over, and my mom is too old to gather. I just hope we get a judge with a good heart."

Julián Aguilar reported from El Paso and Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, and Acacia Coronado reported from Brownsville and Matamoros, Mexico.

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#asylum seeker #mexico asylum seekers #violent honduran gang

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myattorneyusa · 5 years

Photo

18 New Immigration Judges Sworn in on May 10, 2019

Introduction

On May 10, 2019, the Executive Office of Immigration Review (EOIR) held an investiture ceremony to swear in 18 new immigration judges [PDF version]. One of the 18 new immigration judges will serve as an assistant chief immigration judge with supervisory responsibilities. Each of the 18 new immigration judges was selected by Attorney General William Barr. The 18 new immigration judges will serve on 9 immigration courts across the country.

In this article, we will examine the biographies of the new immigration judges — sorted by immigration court — with reference to the EOIR news release. To read about previous immigration judge investiture ceremonies, please see our article index [see article].

Abbreviations:

Department of Justice (DOJ)

Department of Homeland Security (DHS)

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS)

Immigration Courts With New Immigration Judges From May 2019 Investiture

Cleveland Immigration Court (Ohio) [1 new ACIJ and 1 new IJ]

Boston Immigration Court (Massachusetts) [3 new IJs]

Conroe Immigration Court (Texas)

Elizabeth Immigration Court (New Jersey)

Fort Worth Immigration Adjudication Center (Texas) [2 new IJs]

Miami Immigration Court (Florida) [3 new IJs]

Philadelphia Immigration Court (Pennsylvania)

San Antonio Immigration Court (Texas)

San Francisco Immigration Court (California) [4 new IJs]

James. F. McCarthy III, Assistant Chief Immigration Judge, Cleveland Immigration Court

1995-2019: Private practice.

1983-1995: Assistant city solicitor and chief trial counsel for the city of Cincinnati, Ohio.

1983-1995: Judge advocate for the U.S. Navy.

1981-1983: Private practice.

1977-1981: Active duty judge advocate for the U.S. Navy.

Law degree from the Ohio State University College of Law in 1977.

ACIJ McCarthy immediately assumed supervisory duties at the Cleveland Immigration Court upon being sworn in. His legal experience comes exclusively from private practice, the U.S. Navy, and from working for the city of Cincinnati, Ohio.

John M. Furlong Jr., Immigration Judge, Boston Immigration Court

2013-2019: Deputy district director for USCIS, DHS, in Boston, Massachusetts.

2006-2013: Deputy chief counsel for ICE, DHS, in Boston, Massachusetts.

1996-2006: Assistant chief counsel for ICE, DHS, in Boston, Massachusetts.

Law degree from Suffolk University in 1994.

IJ Furlong has over two decades of experience as a lawyer for ICE and USCIS.

Lincoln S. Jalelian, Immigration Judge, Boston Immigration Court

2009-2019: Assistant chief counsel, Office of the Chief Counsel, ICE, DHS, in Boston, Massachusetts.

2008-2009: Assistant attorney general in the Office of the Attorney General of Massachusetts.

2004-2008: Trial attorney in the Organized Crime and Racketeering Section, Criminal Division, DOJ.

2002-2003: Resident legal advisor at the U.S. Office in Pristina, Kosovo.

1992-2004: Assistant district attorney in the Middlesex County District Attorney's Office in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Law degree from Boston University School of Law in 1992.

IJ Jalelian has worked as both a state and federal prosecutor prior to his decade-long stint as an attorney for ICE.

Jennifer A. Mulcahy, Immigration Judge, Boston Immigration Court

2002-2019: Assistant chief counsel for the Office of Chief Counsel, ICE, DHS, in Boston, Massachusetts.

Law degree from Suffolk University School of Law in 2001.

IJ Mulcahy worked for seventeen years as an ICE attorney prior to becoming an immigration judge.

Taresa L. Riley, Immigration Judge, Cleveland Immigration Court

2009-2019: Assistant U.S. attorney, Northern District of Ohio, DOJ, in both the Cleveland and Akron offices, finishing her service as the Attorney-in-Charge, Criminal Division, of the Akron Branch Office.

2008-2009: Assistant prosecuting attorney for the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor's Office in Cleveland, Ohio.

2003-2008: Senior law clerk for the U.S. District Court, Northern District of Ohio.

1999-2003: Law clerk and judicial attorney for Judge John R. Adams in the Court of Common Pleas in Summit County, Ohio.

Law degree from the University of Akron School of Law.

IJ Riley has extensive experience as a federal prosecutor and law clerk prior to taking the immigration bench.

Holly A. D'Andrea, Immigration Judge, Conroe Immigration Court

2011-2019: Assistant U.S. attorney with the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Texas, DOJ, in Brownsville, Texas.

2016-2017: National border and immigration legal issues coordinator with the Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys, DOJ, in Washington D.C.

2008-2010: Assistant prosecuting attorney, assistant county counselor, and city attorney in Washington County, Missouri.

2007-2008: Private practice.

Law degree from Saint Louis University School of Law in 2006.

IJ D'Andrea was a federal and former local prosecutor with a one year stint as a DOJ lawyer dealing with border and immigration issues.

Jason L. Pope, Immigration Judge, Elizabeth Immigration Court

2014-2019: Assistant chief counsel, Office of the Chief Counsel, ICE, DHS, in Baltimore, Maryland.

2007-2012: Private practice specializing in immigration law.

Law degree from Syracuse University College of Law in 2006.

IJ Pope has experience as an ICE attorney and as an immigration lawyer in private practice.

Jacob D. Bashore, Immigration Judge, Fort Worth Immigration and Adjudication Center

2006-2019: Attorney and circuit judge with the U.S. Army.

Law degree from the University of Tennessee College of Law in 2006; Master of Laws degree from The Judge Advocate General's Legal Center and School in 2011.

IJ Bashore's experience comes exclusively as an attorney and judge for the U.S. Army.

Marium S. Uddin, Immigration Judge, Fort Worth Immigration Adjudication Center

2016-2018: Assistant chief counsel with the Office of the Chief Counsel, ICE, DHS, in Dallas, Texas.

2015-2016: Assistant district attorney with the Dallas County District Attorney's Office in Dallas, Texas.

2011-2015: Assistant public defender with the Dallas County Public Defender's Office in Dallas, Texas.

2010-2011: Criminal defense and immigration attorney in private practice.

2005-2010: Assistant district attorney with the El Paso District Attorney's Office in El Paso, Texas (also from 2001-2002).

Law degree from The University of Texas School of Law in 2000.

IJ Uddin brings a variety of experience to the immigration bench from her stints as an ICE attorney, prosecutor, public defender, and immigration attorney in private practice.

Michelle C. Araneta, Immigration Judge, Miami Immigration Court

2000-2019: Prosecutor with the Pima County Attorney's Office in Tucson, Arizona.

1995-1999: Prosecutor with the District Attorney's Office in Riverdale, California.

1991-1995: Associate attorney practicing tax and bankruptcy in Orange County, California.

1989-1991: Law clerk for Judge David N. Naugle of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Central District of California [PDF version].

Law degree from California Western School of Law in San Diego in 1989.

IJ Araneta brings over two decades of experience as a local prosecutor and additional experience in the area of bankruptcy law to the immigration bench.

Thomas M. Ayze, Immigration Judge, Miami Immigration Court

2008-2019: Assistant chief counsel, Office of Chief Counsel, Office of Chief Counsel, ICE, DHS, in Miami, Florida.

2007-2008: Fraud, detection and national security immigration officer with USCIS, DHS, in Miami, Florida.

2003-2007: Asylum officer with USCIS, DHS, in Miami, Florida.

1988-2010: Judge advocate in the U.S. Air Force (active duty 1988-2002; reservist 2003-2010)

Law degree from the University of Florida Levin College of Law in 1988.

IJ Ayze has a wealth of experience with ICE and USCIS, including a four-year stint as an asylum officer. IJ Ayze also served for over two decades as a judge advocate for the U.S. Air Force.

Abraham L. Burgess, Immigration Judge, Miami Immigration Court

2012-2019: Assistant chief counsel, Office of Chief Counsel, ICE, DHS, in Texas and California.

2003-2011: Judge advocate for the U.S. Army.

Law degree from Boston University School of Law in 2002.

IJ Burgess' experience is split between a seven-year stint as an ICE lawyer and an eight-year stint as a judge advocate for the U.S. Army.

Mary C. Lee, Immigration Judge, Philadelphia Immigration Court

2015-2019: Assistant chief counsel for Office of the Principal Legal Advisor, ICE, DHS, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

2003-2015: Assistant chief counsel for Office of the Principal Legal Advisor, ICE, DHS, in Baltimore, Maryland.

2010-2013: Assistant chief counsel for Office of the Principal Legal Advisor, ICE, DHS, in Atlanta, Georgia.

2009-2010: Judicial law clerk in the Superior Court of New Jersey.

2000-2006: Served in the U.S. Air Force.

Law degree from Rutgers University in 2009.

IJ Lee served for nearly a decade as an ICE attorney in three different locations prior to being sworn in.

Rifian S. Newaz, Immigration Judge, San Antonio Immigration Court

2018-2019: Private practice.

2011-2018: Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Texas, DOJ, in El Paso, Texas.

2004-2010: Assistant district attorney for the Harris County District Attorney's Office in Houston, Texas.

Law degree from the University of Texas School of Law in 2004.

IJ Newaz's experience comes primarily as a prosecutor at both the federal and state levels.

Nicholas R. Ford, Immigration Judge, San Francisco Immigration Court

2003-2019: State of Illinois circuit court judge assigned to the criminal division of the Circuit Court of Cook County, Chicago, Illinois.

1997-2003: Judge assigned to the central bond court division of the Circuit Court of Cook County, Chicago, Illinois.

1991-1997: Assistant state's attorney assigned to the federal trial division of the Cook County State's Attorney's Office, Chicago.

1988-1991: Assistant state's attorney assigned to the major narcotics task force in the Cook County State's Attorney's Office.

Law degree from the University of Iowa College of Law in 1988.

IJ Ford has extensive experience as a state judge in Chicago from 1997-2019. Prior to serving as a judge, he was a prosecutor for nearly a decade.

Susan Phan, Immigration Judge, San Francisco Immigration Court

2015-2019: Assistant chief counsel for the Office of the Chief Counsel, ICE, DHS, in San Francisco, California.

2012-2015: Assistant general counsel for the State Bar of California, in San Francisco.

2009-2014: Special assistant U.S. attorney and assistant U.S. attorney for the Northern District of California in San Francisco, and for the Eastern District of California in Fresno.

2005-2019: Assistant attorney general with the District of Columbia Attorney General's Office in Washington, D.C.

Law degree from the University of California, Los Angelis in 2004.

IJ Phan brings experience as an ICE attorney and as a federal and local prosecutor to the immigration bench.

Jason M. Price, Immigration Judge, San Francisco Immigration Court

2007-2019: Assistant chief counsel for the Office of Chief Counsel, ICE, DHS, in San Francisco, California.

2006-2007: Assistant public defender for the Maryland Office of the Public Defender in Hagerstown, Maryland.

2000-2005: Active duty judge advocate for the U.S. Air Force.

Law degree from the West Virginia College of Law in 2000.

IJ Price has extensive experience as an ICE lawyer, public defender, and judge advocate.

Jennifer M. Riedthaler Williams, Immigration Judge, San Francisco Immigration Court

2017-2019: Judicial magistrate with the Lorain County Domestic Relations Court in Elyria, Ohio.

2001-2017: Assistant prosecuting attorney with the Lorain County Prosecutor's Office in Elyria, Ohio, in the felony criminal division and the juvenile and felony non-support division.

Law degree from Case Western Reserve University School of Law in 2001.

IJ Williams worked as a magistrate judge and local prosecutor prior to taking the immigration bench.

Lawyer website: http://myattorneyusa.com

#immigration #immigrants #US immigration

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lodelss · 5 years

Link

Trump Picks Family Separation Advocate Kevin McAleenan to Be Acting Secretary of Homeland Security By elevating McAleenan, the president has signaled that he seeks to maximize cruelty.

With his selection of Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Commissioner Kevin McAleenan to serve as acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), President Trump has once again shown that he has no regrets over his administration’s disastrous policy of separating families.

McAleenan was one of the three DHS officials to recommend the cruel and inhumane policy to outgoing Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, writing that the department’s best option to “increase the consequences for dangerous illegal crossings” was to “direct the separation of parents or legal guardians and minors held in immigration detention so that the parent or legal guardian can be prosecuted.”

Despite signing the family separation memo and overseeing the very agency that implemented the policy, McAleenan stated in an interview with the Los Angeles Times that “we do not have a policy of administrative separation.” He later made the absurd claim that family separation was meant to “protect families and children,” even though child welfare experts had warned that “separating children from their mothers or fathers leads to serious, negative consequences to children’s health and development.”

Alarmingly, the president may bring back an expanded version of his administration’s family separation policy. According to NBC News, McAleenan has already indicated that he would be open to resuming large-scale family separation, and CNN reported that Trump “wanted families separated even if they came in at a legal port of entry and were legal asylum seekers” and “wanted families separated even if they were apprehended within the U.S. He thinks the separations work to deter migrants from coming.” While the president has denied this, he also defended family separation by saying that “once you don’t have it,” migrants will be coming to the country “like it’s a picnic.”

McAleenan’s involvement in family separation ― and his reported willingness to re-open that shameful chapter ― is just one element of his service to Trump’s policies that maximize cruelty.

On his watch, children in CBP custody have been violently abused and neglected. In December, 7-year-old Jakelin Caal Maquin and 8-year-old Felipe Gomez Alonzo died in CBP custody ― deaths that experts have described as preventable. McAleenan failed to notify Congress within 24 hours of Jakelin’s death even though it was required by law and he again omitted the tragedy when testifying before the Senate shortly thereafter. CBP has forced migrant families to sleep in dangerous conditions underneath an El Paso bridge, putting the health of hundreds of people in jeopardy. The agency fired tear gas at asylum-seekers across the border in Mexico, including toddlers. When asked during a CNN interview why the chemical agent was used ― especially in light of children being present ― McAleenan said it was “very unfortunate that parents [were] putting their children at risk and bringing them into that situation to try to rush through the border illegally.” CBP agents are also notorious for committing ethnic profiling, carrying out illegal searches, and seizing religious items, such as bibles and rosaries, from migrants.

McAleenan has also been intimately involved in Trump’s border wall designs and construction, even defending his unconstitutional emergency order to shift funds towards building the wall, contrary to Congress’ constitutional power of the purse.

This latest change in DHS leadership comes after Trump withdrew the nominee to lead Immigration and Customs Enforcement and reports that the head of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and the head DHS lawyer are set to resign. Reports suggest that, even though DHS leadership has repeatedly violated the law and executed blatantly inhumane policies throughout Trump’s tenure, the president is seeking even more compliant officials so that he can ratchet up the illegality and the inhumanity even further.

While we are still waiting to see Trump’s nominee for a permanent head of Homeland Security, by elevating McAleenan, the president has signaled that he seeks to create an even more brutal and lawless department.

Published April 9, 2019 at 11:15PM via ACLU http://bit.ly/2Uu52Kn

#IFTTT #Blogger

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