Trump administration sued for arresting people at immigration courts
A coalition of immigrant advocacy groups – including the Refugee and Immigrant Center for Legal Education and Services (RAICES), National Immigrant Justice Center (NIJC), Democracy Forward and the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area (LCCRSF) – filed the suit on behalf of 12 plaintiffs, the majority of whom were seeking protection in the US from anti-LGBTQ+ violence or female genital mutilation.
In May, federal authorities began arresting people at US immigration courts from New York and Arizona to Washington state in what appeared to be a coordinated operation. The following month, New York City comptroller and mayoral candidate Brad Lander was arrested while attending immigration court with one migrant. Since then, the supreme court has granted the Trump administration permission to deport migrants to countries they are not from, including to conflict-ridden places such as South Sudan.
'The Trump administration has cast an unconscionably wide net to ensnare people and families who attend immigration court hearings in compliance with their legal obligations, only to face life-threatening imprisonment, swift removal and the prospect of indefinite family separation,' said Faisal Al-Juburi, chief external affairs officer at RAICES. 'The egregious and unprecedented coordination amongst government agencies that we are witnessing not only inflicts irreparable harm upon infants and adults alike for seeking refuge in the US, but also establishes a chilling precedent in which law and order are abandoned in favor of stoking widespread panic and fear – leaving the entire American public at risk, regardless of immigration status.'
The lawsuit asserts that the Trump administration 'stripped people of basic due process rights afforded under US immigration law and the fifth amendment in order to place them in expedited removal proceedings and deport them without hearings', the plaintiffs said in a press release.
All twelve of the plaintiffs were arrested at immigration hearings where they were requesting asylum or other legal protection to remain in the US. All but two remain in detention. One was already deported to Ecuador where he is now living in hiding due to his advocacy for LGBTQ+ rights.
Some of the plaintiffs had lived in the US for years, and have been separated from US citizen family members.
Their legal advocates say that homeland security and the justice department are pivoting away from a longstanding tradition of limiting arrests in immigration courts that could discourage people from appearing at their hearings.
'These directives forsake any notion of immigration courts as a neutral forum, weaponizing them into a trap for immigrants who show up in reliance on the American promise of a fair process before a judge, only to be met instead with handcuffs and shunted into a fast-track deportation process controlled by Ice agents,' said Jordan Wells, senior staff attorney at LCCRSF.
The case was filed in US district court in the District of Columbia. The plaintiffs ask the judge to declare Immigrations and Customs Enforcement and immigration court guidance 'arbitrary and capricious' and vacate those guidelines.
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The Independent
14 minutes ago
- The Independent
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The Guardian
14 minutes ago
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16 minutes ago
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Doesn't seem to have the skill set to be president. Just not a good fit, that's all.' He addressed his bosses at CBS—who he said 'have always been great partners'—before turning to Paramount's decision to cancel the show. 'How could it be a purely financial decision if The Late Show is number one in ratings? A lot of folks are asking that question, mainly my staff's parents and spouses.' He quipped: 'I could see us losing $24 million but where would Paramount have possibly spent the other $16 million, oh…'—naming the amount the company settled with Trump over his 60 Minutes lawsuit. He returned to mocking Trump and the recent news accusing him of writing a 'bawdy' letter to Jeffrey Epstein for his 50th birthday. 'I'll have more to say about all this after the commercial break. The only other story is a small one... the president is buddies with a pedophile.' Puck journalist Matthew Belloni revealed Colbert's 'lack of profitability' Friday, hours after CNN first broke the news that the show was canceled because it was in the red. Belloni outlined how The Late Show—whose cancellation was announced last Thursday—costs $100 million a year to produce, with Colbert getting paid between $15 and $20 million a year.
