It's been a day in immigration court land. 🤯Within hours of one another we got dueling decisions from 2 different courts in cases involving Title 42, an absurd, cruel policy that has made a mockery of our asylum laws. Here's a 🧵on what happened today. /1
This morning, the DC Circuit ruled in the Huisha Huisha case brought by a courageous group of plaintiffs & attorneys challenging the use of T42 against families. The decision was a win b/c the court said T42 should not be applied to expel families to persecution or torture./2
This merits a bit more explanation. 1st, the DC circuit said that the administration could use the CDC order to expel migrants. But, the court said that power was not unchecked--and migrants could not be expelled to places they would be persecuted or tortured. /3
The court did not spell out how the U.S. should conduct screenings if it choses to keep T42 in place to not send folks back to places they will be persecuted or tortured. This ruling is not effective immediately, and rather than fight more court battles, Biden should end T42. /4
In it's ruling the DC Circuit noted the absence of evidence regarding T42's efficacy as a public health measure, calling it “in certain respects like a relic from an era with no vaccines, scarce testing, few therapeutics, and little certainty.” WORD. /5
Hours later, just to make your head spin, a district court judge in Texas reached a very different conclusion in a very different case concerning T42. That case, brought by the state of TX, challenged the Biden admin's failure to apply T42 to unaccompanied kids. /6
Yes, you read that right, Texas sued in order to force Biden to expel children who arrive to our borders with no parent or legal guardians without allowing them to seek asylum. And a court today sided with Texas to block that very narrow exemption on the cruel T42 policy. /7
No unaccompanied kids will have T42 applied to them today or for the next 6 days b/c the court stayed its order to allow the U.S. to seek a longer stay from the 5th circuit. A hot idea: how about not seeking a stay & just ending this T42 policy once & for all @POTUS? /8
The gulf between the 2 decisions is vast: the DC circuit strongly suggests T42 is irrational, esp at this point in the pandemic & the TX court says its "baffled” there could be any disagreement current immigration policies should be focused on stopping the spread of COVID. /9
From there, the TX court says unaccompanied kids can also spread COVID, so the federal government acted arbitrarily & capriciously in carving out an exception from the T42 expulsion order for migrant kids traveling alone. So, what should Biden do now? /10
That answer has always been clear: end the hot mess dumpster fire 🗑️🔥of a policy that is Title 42 once and for all for all migrants--whether they are kids who have no parents or guardians, families, or single adults. It's way past time to get this right. #WelcomeWithDignity /end
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