Immigration Law Commons^™

Enter At Your Own Risk: Criminalizing Asylum-Seekers, Thomas M. Mcdonnell, Vanessa H. Merton

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

In nearly three years in office, President Donald J. Trump’s war against immigrants and the foreign-born seems only to have intensified. Through a series of Executive Branch actions and policies rather than legislation, the Trump Administration has targeted immigrants and visitors from Muslim-majority countries, imposed quotas on and drastically reduced the independence of Immigration Court Judges, cut the number of refugees admitted by more than 80%, cancelled DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals), and stationed Immigration Customs and Enforcement (“ICE”) agents at state courtrooms to arrest unauthorized immigrants, intimidating them from participating as witnesses and litigants. Although initially saying that …

Rescinding Inclusion In The Administrative State: Adjudicating Daca, The Census, And The Military's Transgender Policy, Peter Margulies

Law Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Lawyers Weekly Newsmaker Reception : November 20, 2019, Roger Williams University School Of Law, Michael M. Bowden

School of Law Conferences, Lectures & Events

No abstract provided.

Severing The Connection Between Sex Trafficking And U.S. Military Bases Overseas, Anna Belle Hoots

Articles & Chapters

The sex trafficking of women and girls by US. military men remains an issue plaguing US. military bases overseas. While the US. government has offered several solutions to combat this specific niche of sex trafficking, the legislation and policy put forth are insufficient to eradicate the problem. After assessing the intersection of sex trafficking and overseas US. military bases, this Note both discusses why and proposes how, through the use of Status of Forces Agreements (SOFAs), all US. military bases abroad can and must commit to the prevention of this egregious human rights violation. Because SOFAs grant wide latitude to …

Legislating Morality: Moral Theory And Turpitudinous Crimes In Immigration Jurisprudence, Abel Rodríguez, Jennifer A. Bulcock

Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review

Congress could have framed the country’s immigration policies in any number of ways. In significant part, it opted to frame them in moral terms. The crime involving moral turpitude is among the most pervasive and pernicious classifications in immigration law. In the Immigration and Nationality Act, it is virtually ubiquitous, appearing everywhere from the deportability and mandatory detention grounds to the inadmissibility and naturalization grounds. In effect, it acts as a gatekeeper for those who wish to enter and remain in the country, obtain lawful permanent residence, travel abroad after admission, or become United States citizens. With limited exceptions, noncitizens …

Matter Of A-B-, Lgbtq Asylum Claims, And The Rule Of Law In The U.S. Asylum System, Nora Snyder

Northwestern University Law Review

On June 11, 2018, then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions released his decision in a case called Matter of A‑B‑, purporting to eliminate domestic violence and gang violence as grounds for asylum. The decision also cast doubt on the continued viability of asylum claims predicated on non-state actor violence, which alarmed LGBTQ advocates, whose asylum claims often involve non-state actor persecutors. In making this change, Sessions used a previously rarely used feature of the asylum system, the Attorney General’s self-certification power. This Note analyzes the potential impact of Matter of A‑B‑ on LGBTQ asylum seekers. Based on the text of the …

Human Rights, Economic Justice And U.S. Exceptionalism, Natasha Lycia Ora Bannan

Pace International Law Review

On April 5, 2019, PILR held their triennial symposium titled: Revisiting Human Rights: The Universal Declaration at 70. As a reflection of the event, a few panelists composed contribution pieces reflecting on the topic.

Reclaiming Refugee Rights As Human Rights, Roni Amit

Pace International Law Review

On April 5, 2019, PILR held their triennial symposium titled: Revisiting Human Rights: The Universal Declaration at 70. As a reflection of the event, a few panelists composed contribution pieces reflecting on the topic.

Should They Stay Or Should They Go: Rethinking The Use Of Crimes Involving Moral Turpitude In Immigration Law, Sara Salem

Florida Law Review

Although absent from modern English conversation, the words moral turpitude continue to carry devastating consequences for undocumented aliens living in the United States. Under federal immigration law, an alien convicted of a crime involving moral turpitude may be deported or denied entry into the United States. Perhaps most significantly, nearly all immigration relief is conditioned on an alien having never been convicted of a crime involving moral turpitude. So the question becomes, what is a crime involving moral turpitude? There is currently no clear answer. No one standard exists for determining whether a conviction qualifies as a crime involving moral …

President Trump Bars Uninsured Immigrants From The U.S., Peter Margulies

Law Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Department Of Homeland Security V. Regents Of The University Of California, Et Al.: Brief For Administrative Law Scholars As Amici Curiae In Support Of Respondents, Nina A. Mendelson

Appellate Briefs

Amici are professors of administrative law and related public law subjects at institutions across the United States. In their scholarship and their teaching, they have carefully considered the legal doctrines implicated by this case. They submit this brief to address arguments and precedent that are relevant to a central question presented by this appeal: whether the Department of Homeland Security's decision to rescind the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) policy is judicially reviewable. Amici join this brief solely on their own behalf and not as representatives of their universities. A full list of amici appears in Appendix A.

Under …

Preschool For All: Plyler V. Doe In The Context Of Early Childhood Education, Shiva Kooragayala

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

In its 1982 opinion in Plyler v. Doe, the Supreme Court held that a state could not deny undocumented children living within its borders a public and free K-12 education. This Note argues that Plyler’s protections extend to publicly-funded early childhood education programs that serve children between the ages of three and five. Due to the broad support of researchers, educators, and the general public, early childhood education programs funded by local, state, and the federal governments have become an integral part of a comprehensive public education today. While these early childhood education programs are nominally open to all students …

Children Of A Lesser God: Reconceptualizing Race In Immigration Law, Sarah L. Hamilton-Jiang

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

The increased public exposure to the experiences of Latinx unaccompanied children seeking entry at the United States southern border has revealed the lived reality of the nation’s pernicious immigration laws. The harrowing experiences of unaccompanied children are amplified by their interaction with a legal system plagued by a legacy of systemic racism and sustained racial caste. While immigration law currently affords minimal legal protections for these children, in application, the law continues to fall egregiously short of providing for the safety of unaccompanied children. Though critics have long attested to the legal system’s neglect of unaccompanied children, subsequent legal analysis …

Clark Memorandum: Fall 2019, J. Reuben Clark Law School, Byu Law School Alumni Association, J. Reuben Clark Law Society

The Clark Memorandum

• In Essentials, Unity; in Nonessentials, Liberty; and in All Things, Charity
• Choose to Trust the Lord
• First Amendment Harms
• "To Do Justly, and to Love Mercy"

Read on Issuu

The Myth Of Enforcing Border Security Versus The Reality Of Enforcing Dominant Masculinities, Jamie Abrams

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

This essay explores the masculinities underpinnings in modern immigration law, policy, and rhetoric. Existing analysis has captured the ways in which Trump-era immigration laws, policies, and rhetoric are explicitly and implicitly packaged in alarming racism and xenophobia. These critical lenses continue a long and deeply worrisome legacy of “othering” and dehumanizing immigrants and, more broadly, marginalizing communities of color in the United States.

Outside of the immigration law lens, separate strands of scholarship and media coverage have highlighted the toxic masculinities of the Trump era. These discussions have generally focused on President Trump’s treatment of women, the gendered campaign dynamics …

The Promise And Challenge Of Humanitarian Protection In The United States: Making Temporary Protected Status Work As A Safe Haven, Andrew I. Schoenholtz

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

The humanitarian program Congress created in 1990 to allow war refugees and those affected by significant natural disasters to live and work legally in the United States has only partially achieved its goals. More than 400,000 individuals have received temporary protected status (TPS). In many cases, the crisis ended, along with temporary protection. However, in about half of the designated nationalities—including the largest groups—conflict and instability continued, making this humanitarian protection program anything but temporary. Unfortunately, Congress did not provide the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) with the tools it needed to address such long-term crises. That was purposeful—Congress worried …

Private Prisons, Private Governance: Essay On Developments In Private-Sector Resistance To Privatized Immigration Detention, Danielle C. Jefferis

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

No abstract provided.

Dehumanization, Immigrants, And Equal Protection, Reginald Oh

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

This article is divided into three parts. Part I explores the concept of dehumanization and its central role in the subordination of marginalized groups. Part II discusses the equal protection doctrine of suspect classes by analyzing key decisions by the Court and its reasoning for whether or not to consider a particular group as a suspect class. Part II also argues that the decision in Brown v. Board of Education regards racial segregation in public schools as a form of racial dehumanization and provides the doctrinal basis to consider dehumanization a central factor in determining suspect class status. Part III …

Deconstructing Perceptions Of The Border Patrol At The U.S.-Mexico Border, Claire H. Woodward

Student Publications

The U.S.-Mexico border is a space for public debate on the legal and political aspects of immigration. Politicization of the southern border has resulted in polarized public opinion regarding immigration, leading to discrepancies between public perceptions of the Border Patrol and agents’ perceptions of their job. Agents’ work requires emotional labor, and lack of training for difficult encounters, pressure within the agency to detach from emotions, and public outcry lead to dissonance in agent perceptions of their own role in immigration enforcement. In addition, economic, ethnic, and gender-based factors contribute to agent identities, which intersect with perceptions of their roles …

Judicial Review Of Refugee Determinations (Ii): Revisiting The Luck Of The Draw, Sean Rehaag

Articles & Book Chapters

Refugee determinations—that is, whether a refugee can immigrate to Canada—are high-stakes decisions. For claimants facing deportation, the decision may be the difference between life or death. However, if applicants wish to obtain judicial review of a decision made by the Immigration and Refugee Board, they must first seek leave from the Federal Court.

In 2012, the author published the results of his first quantitative empirical study of over 23,000 leave applications for judicial review of refugee determinations decided from 2005 to 2010. The result was nothing other than shocking: above all else, an applicant’s likelihood of success rested on the …