Interim Rule from the @DOJ_EOIR rearranging EOIR's org chart to reflect changes made in the Trump era, plus some odd new changes to the BIA and to the Director's role.
@DOJ_EOIR The biggest new change to EOIR's organizational structure is the Office of Policy, created in 2017 and just now being formalized in regulations. This office has been the source of many of the Trump administration's worst changes to immigration courts.
@DOJ_EOIR Board of Immigration Appeals members, known since the creation of the Board as "Board Members," are now going to be officially also called "Appellate Immigration Judges."
The politics of that choice are... interesting.
@DOJ_EOIR The interim rule will also permit, in circumstances where an appeal hasn't been decided within certain time periods, for the EOIR Director to decide appeals!
The regulations previously allowed the A.G. to decide cases in those scenarios, and the A.G. says he's too busy.
@DOJ_EOIR Finally, because allowing the Director to decide appeals conflicts with a current regulation saying the Director cannot do that, the Interim Rule edits the old regulation to make the new delegation of authority permissible.
The rule goes into effect 60 days from Monday.
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Another HUGE increase would occur with ICE's Transportation and Removal Operations line item, which would get $14.4 BILLION dollars through FY2029 -- an increase of 400% over the current $721 million budget for the ICE component which is responsible for deportation flights.
By contrast, the bill provides the immigration court system just $1.25 billion over five years; a measly 30% increase by comparison.
Other line items include:
- $1.32 billion for ICE prosecutors
- $650 million for 287(g) agreements
- $600 million for immigration prosecutions
The reconciliation package would also charge anyone sponsoring an unaccompanied child out of an ORR shelter $8,500(!), of which $5,000 would be reimbursable if the child was not ordered deported "in absentia" for missing court.
That's a price that would stop nearly all sponsors.
Defending yourself in immigration court would become FAR more expensive.
- $100 fee for ANY continuance (except in "exceptional circumstances), including continues to get a lawyer.
- $1,050 fee for ANY waiver application
- $900 fee for all appeals except bond (currently $110)
NEW: In a SCATHING decision, Judge Briones in El Paso absolutely SAVAGED the government over this case, tearing to shreds ICE’s hearsay “evidence” that this husband and wife were in Tren de Aragua as “completely and wholly unsubstantiated” — and ordered their immediate release!
This is the first case testing ICE’s allegations that someone was in Tren de Aragua and thus subject to the Alien Enemies Act — and ICE utterly failed the test!
“This Court takes clear offense to Respondents wasting judicial resources to admit to the Court it has no evidence”
Briones didn’t even get to the question of whether the AEA was invoked lawfully — because ICE's hearsay evidence was so weak!
Briones ""The Court would not accept this evidence even in a case where only nominal damages were at stake, let alone what is at stake here."
NEW: Judge Xinis largely rejects DOJ's opposition to discovery requests in the Abrego Garcia case, accusing the Trump admin of "a willful and bad faith refusal to comply with discovery obligations," citing their continued denial to acknowledge what the Supreme Court ordered.
Judge Xinis also denies the government's invocation of various privileges, saying the DOJ has "stubbornly refuse[d] to provide any basis" for the invocation of privilege, and says the DOJ has lost the presumption of good faith due to "repeated refusals to meet and confer."
Judge Xinis UNLOADS on DOJ, saying that their time of offering only "boilerplate assertions" to justify claims of privilege "ends now."
She gives them 24 hours to assert any final privileges with "required detail" — or forfeit any further assertions of privilege in this case.
Occam's Razor suggests the Border Patrol agent lied. That's backed up by the fact that one claim made by the agent is provably false; that he was arrested near Nogales. That lie matters because this sworn statement claims he entered the day before, and Nogales is 70 miles south.
Border Patrol's clear lie on a sworn statement that the man was arrested "at or near Nogales, AZ" makes every part of the documentation of his arrest suspect.
In fact, if you read the whole sworn statement, much of it appears to be based off of that lie.
🚨UPDATE: New evidence filed by the ACLU last night shows that the Trump administration is going forward with more Alien Enemies Act deportations in seeming violation of the Supreme Court's clear command that people be provided a "meaningful" opportunity to seek judicial review.
Last night multiple people detained at the Bluebonnet ICE detention center in Texas were handed sheets of paper IN ENGLISH and told by ICE officers that they were required to sign the paper (even if they only spoke Spanish).
These were reportedly "Alien Enemies Act" notices.
One of the people that the Trump administration is seemingly about to deport to El Salvador as an "alien enemy" is an TEENAGER - An 18-year-old who is being accused of being in Tren de Aragua because ICE agents though a picture of a WATER PISTOL on his Facebook was an actual gun!