Tag Archives: Immigration

SCOTUS For The Average Joe

Average Joe SCOTUS: Department of Homeland Security v. Regents of the University of California

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As you know, unless you’ve been under a fucking rock for the last decade, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) under president Obama, started a program called Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA).

The program basically gave work visas to kids who were brought here illegally, presumably not a choice they made themselves, but a decision forced upon them by parents who came here illegally. Since these kids would largely grow up as Americans, Obama and his supporters felt they should be allowed to stay, and this provided a framework for doing so.

Once Trump took office, he instructed the DHS to terminate DACA, as part of his anti-illegal-immigration initiatives he campaigned on. The Trump administration basically argued that Obama was out of line passing this law, and therefore it shouldn’t be law in the first place.

Regents agreed that Trump has the right to set new policy, but because Trump argued that this law was improperly enacted, and that was his reason for ending it, this was an improper cancellation of the law, and lower courts agreed, which is why we’re now here at SCOTUS, and the current DHS is demanding a reversal of that decision.

Regents also argued that because DACA participants had been essentially told they would get to stay and get a work visa, and thus potentially planned their lives accordingly, versus self-deporting on their own terms, this reversal by Trump & Company, would cause irreparable harm.

So SCOTUS has decided to answer the question as to whether this is a matter for the courts to decide, or if this is something for the other two branches to sort the fuck out. And if it is the purview of the courts, was DHS right in winding down DACA?

In a 5:4 decision, where John Roberts sided with the “left-leaning” justices, SCOTUS decided that they did in fact have authority to rule on this, and so they would.

They decided that Trump’s decision to repeal this law was basically some racist bullshit that violates the 5th amendment’s equal protection of the law, statute. They said that it was arbitrary and capricious, which is a fancy term that basically means, it was a decision both made without any reasonable consideration of the facts, but also, he didn’t think about the ramifications of what he did, and how it might had many consequences that are unfair he didn’t think about.

So for now, DACA stays.

SCOTUS For The Average Joe

Average Joe SCOTUS: Barton v. Barr

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8 U.S.C. § 1229b(d)(1)
(a)Cancellation of removal for certain permanent residents. The Attorney General may cancel removal in the case of an alien who is inadmissible or deportable from the United States if the alien—

(1)

has been an alien lawfully admitted for permanent residence for not less than 5 years,

(2)

has resided in the United States continuously for 7 years after having been admitted in any status, and

(3)

has not been convicted of any aggravated felony.

(d)Special rules relating to continuous residence or physical presence

(1)Termination of continuous period

For purposes of this section, any period of continuous residence or continuous physical presence in the United States shall be deemed to end (A) except in the case of an alien who applies for cancellation of removal under subsection (b)(2), when the alien is served a notice to appear under section 1229(a) of this title, or (B) when the alien has committed an offense referred to in section 1182(a)(2) of this title that renders the alien inadmissible to the United States under section 1182(a)(2) of this title or removable from the United States under section 1227(a)(2) or 1227(a)(4) of this title, whichever is earliest.

Jamaican Andre Barton came into the U.S. in 1989 under a visa. In 1992, he applied for permanent status, and received it. In 1996, just under being here for seven years, this dumb motherfucker decided to break bad, and got his dumb ass busted for felony assault, destruction of property, and having a firearm during the commission of a felony. Then in 2007/08 he was charged for, but not convicted of, violating the Georgia Controlled Substances Act

So now, Homeland security was like, “Fuck you buddy, Ja-makin’ us mad. Pack your shit and get out.”

The law says if you do this shit under seven years of being here, your ass can be kicked to the curb.

Barton however was like, “Motherfucker, I’ve been here like 20 fucking years, so I don’t know where you fucking learned math, but that’s more than seven. I’m staying.”

But Homeland Security was like, “Listen asshole, your crimes were committed in just under seven years of being here, and we were cool as shit with you then. But now you’ve went and been an asshole again. There’s this time-stop rule thing we’re gonna deploy here, that says your fucking clock on being here stopped when you committed your felonies in 1996. So again, pack your shit, and get the fuck out.”

Barton’s counsel, being the clever fuck they are, noted that as said above:

(B) when the alien has committed an offense referred to in section 1182(a)(2) of this title that renders the alien inadmissible to the United States under section 1182(a)(2) of this title or removable from the United States under section 1227(a)(2) or 1227(a)(4) of this title, whichever is earliest.

Counsel noted that it had certain rules for being inadmissable, and other rules for removable. Barton was guilty of “Inadmissable” actions, but not “removable” actions. So Barton’s argument is that he wasn’t applying to be admitted, he was only asking not to have his ass sent back to Jamaica. Therefore, he shouldn’t be subject to removal.

Three lower courts all agreed with immigration, that Barton needs to fuck off and go home. Clearly, congress meant to prevent assholes like Barton from staying here, they just kinda wrote a shitty ambiguous law, because congress sucks balls.

But Barton and his lawyer’s are persistent fucks, and here we are at SCOTUS deciding whether the rule above means that Barton’s clock didn’t stop, and that he’s basically an American now, and doesn’t have to go home, even though he’s a first class asshole.

In a partisan 5-4 split, the right wing of SCOTUS told Barton he could go eat a bag of dicks, but he’d have to do it in Jamaica. Get the fuck out!

SCOTUS For The Average Joe

Average Joe SCOTUS: Kansas v. Garcia

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So we all know America has a bit of an illegal immigration problem, right? Well this case is about three specific illegal immigrants who decided to roll up into America, go to work and use someone else’s identification to get a job. They do this, because you need an SSID for an employer to hire you, and if you’re here illegally, well, you don’t have an SSID of your own. So while Garcia is named, there were other cases, too.

You see Garcia was driving to work, and got pulled over for speeding in Kansas. He told the cop he was headed to work. The cop decided to check out his story after seeing that he was already the subject of an investigation. They called his employer, and were sent documents showing his employment, including his I-9. The I-9 had an SSID on it; problem was, it wasn’t Garcia’s. Then they found out he used that shit on other forms too. So Garcia found his ass busted for identity fraud. Similar situation for the other two.

So now SCOTUS is being asked if the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) prevent the government from using information in an I-9 form for purposes of prosecution, if the same info is in other non-IRCA forms?

SCOTUS, in a political split, sided 5:4 with Kansas. That Kansas was well within their rights to use that info to prosecute Garcia, and there’s nothing in the IRCA preventing them from doing so.

Read about the case, and hear oral arguments here.

https://www.oyez.org/cases/2019/17-834

SCOTUS For The Average Joe

Average Joe SCOTUS: Department of Commerce v. New York

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On the 2020 census, the Department of Commerce, at Trump’s request, wanted a question added to the census, that hadn’t been asked since before the Chevrolet Corvette came into being.

They wanted to ask if anyone in the household is not a U.S. Citizen. Their argument being it would help with enforcement of the Voting Rights Act. He argued:

One of the critical elements of Voting Rights Act enforcement is something called Citizen Voting Age Population, or CVAP.

Right now, everything for CVAP comes from the census, with the exception of citizenship.

So population, age, race, all of that comes from the census, except for citizenship, the C in CVAP. So a large amount of voting rights litigation focuses on expert witnesses who try to fill in that missing C and try to estimate that missing C through imputation based on the American Community Survey, which goes to just one in 38 households. And the Department of Justice wanted to get all of the same information from the same database so that critical feature of voting rights litigation, CVAP, all came from the same place.

New York, fearing that homes with an illegal immigrant would say “no” to avoid a visit from ICE, sought to prevent that question from being asked. They want an accurate count, which supports the idea of having the census, since an accurate count helps them understand how many public servants to employ to assist them, and such. Plus, they just think Trump is an asshole, and it’s an asshole question to ask.

So New York decided to depose Trump’s peeps, and ask why the fuck they felt they needed to ask this question in a census, since it seemed politically motivated, and doesn’t help get an accurate count. But the government applied for a stay, basically asking the courts to tell New York to STFU and let them run their goddamn census as they saw fit.

The courts denied this stay, however, and the depositions were allowed to go forward. In the meantime, the district court decided to lay down the law, and tell Trump’s peeps to get rid of the fucking question.

So now SCOTUS was asked by the fed to decide if the district court was out of line, both in handing down their decision, and compelling testimony from Trump’s goons. They were basically trying to get SCOTUS to quash the lower court’s ruling against them.

Breyer and Sotomayor seemed to take particular issue with the fed and their idea that the question wouldn’t cause the census to be less accurate, which was New York’s argument as well, because they laid into Noel Francisco (Solicitor for the fed) on this point like he had slapped their mothers.

In a unanimous decision, SCOTUS told the fed to go fuck themselves—remove the fucking question. The argued the courts did the right thing, and the feds can take their question and shove it up their ass.

Hear oral arguments and read about the case here.

 

SCOTUS For The Average Joe

Average Joe SCOTUS: Nielsen v. Preap

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Mony Preap was a legal immigrant to the United States, a refugee from Cambodia. He came to the United States in 1981 with his parents. In 2006, his ass got busted with weed, and convicted of two misdemeanors as a result.

Because he’s a legal immigrant, and not a citizen, that immigration status can be revoked for certain crimes an immigrant pay commit, one of them being drug offenses.

But at the time, immigration authorities couldn’t be bothered, and did not detain him. Later, he was busted for battery, a crime that oddly does not qualify as a crime that gets you deported if you’re a non-citizen.

Thank about that. Victimless crime? “Fuck you, get out.” Straight up assault? “Nah, you’re good.”  America really needs to get its priorities straight. But back to Preap and others.

Once Preap was busted for battery, immigration decided to hold him without bail while they considered sending his ass back to Cambodia. But since the battery charge does not fall under the statute, they reverted back to his marijuana charges as justification for doing so.

Preap was like, “this is some bullshit” and filed for habeas relief, which means he wanted to be lawfully charged or released, not hanging out and chilling in jail for no good reason.

The Ninth Circuit agreed with Preap, that if the government were to hold Preap for deportation after his marijuana charge, they should have done so at the time of that charge, not years later.

The rule in question is 8 U.S. Code § 1226

Subsection C2 reads: The Attorney General shall take into custody any alien who is deportable under section 1227(a)(2)(A)(i) of this title on the basis of an offense for which the alien has been sentence [1] to a term of imprisonment of at least 1 year.

So now the SCOTUS is being asked to determine if ICE should have to detain these people immediately upon release, or if there is no such time restriction implied, and ICE can detain them whenever it decides to.

The conservative justices Roberts, Thomas, Alito, Gorsuch, and Kavanaugh didn’t give a flying fuck about Preap and his bullshit argument. They decided if Preap did the crime, that he can do the time, even if it’s years later.

I think everyone understands the opposition, here. A guy does a crime, and afterwards, goes back and largely lives a decent life, he shouldn’t have to live in fear the rest of his life that one day the government will roll up on his shit and be like, “Sorry sucker. You’re out!”

But nonetheless, the right wing five didn’t give two shits, and were not willing to prevent the government from doling out justice how they see fit.

Breyer wrote a dissenting opinion, essentially feeling that this interpretation opens up Pandora’s box for the federal government to use this tool down the road, to get rid of immigrants in general outside the normal scope of the law. He’s probably right, but he lost anyway. So it doesn’t matter.

Judgement 5:4 for Nielsen