Thursday, November 14, 2024

Immigration Article of the Day: Why US Immigration Officials Should Allow "Digital Nomad" Admissions"  by Angelo A. Paparelli, David J. Bier, Peter Choi, and Stephen Yale-Loehr

Angelo Paparelli

David J. Bier

headshot of Steve Yale-Loehr

All authors pictured but Peter Choi

Why US Immigration Officials Should Allow "Digital Nomad" Admissions by Angelo A. Paparelli, David J. Bier, Peter Choi, and Stephen Yale-Loehr

Abstract

Existing US immigration statutes, regulations, and policies do not expressly authorize the short-term admission of digital nomads: typically, college-educated professionals who use laptops, cell phones, and other digital technology to perform their occupations remotely while traveling. Nor do these rules explain how to manage the admission of noncitizens who are not digital nomads per se but who, while lawfully visiting the United States to see family or go to an industry conference, log on to their laptop or phone to review and respond to routine business matters such as replying to emails. To address the void, we propose that the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of State promptly formulate and issue policy guidance that authorizes the admission of certain digital nomads for up to six months as visitors under sections 101(a)(15)(B) and 217 of the Immigration and Nationality Act. Such policy guidance can help fill an emergent area of the ever-widening rift between facts of life and US immigration law in the absence of congressional reform. Carefully crafted, it can do so in a manner that conforms to existing legal requirements governing travel to the United States as a visitor and that allows the country to benefit economically from their lawful visits.

KJ

November 14, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wednesday, November 13, 2024

Immigration Article of the Day: Between a River and a Wall: An Impossible Choice for Migrants Living Under Operation Lone Star and S.B. 4 by Salimah Khoja and Paulina Leyva Hernandez

Salimah Khoja 

Between a River and a Wall: An Impossible Choice for Migrants Living Under Operation Lone Star and S.B. 4 by Salimah Khoja and Paulina Leyva HernandezCUNY Law Review | Vol. 27:185 | 2024

Abstract

In 2023 the Texas legislature passed Senate Bill 4 (“S.B. 4”), which empowers state and local law enforcement agencies to engage in immigration enforcement by arresting and deporting migrants who are suspected of crossing the southern border. Anti-immigrant state laws like Texas’s S.B. 4 and Arizona’s Senate Bill 1070 (“S.B. 1070”) were created to test the limits of state power and limit the reach of federal immigration enforcement within the states. Legal challenges to state laws like S.B. 4 and S.B. 1070 demonstrate the ongoing tension between federal and state governments related to authority over immigration matters, even though immigration has been within the federal government’s purview since the early days of the United States, as recognized by the judiciary for more than a century. This Note focuses on the immigration preemption doctrine and argues that the Supreme Court should declare S.B. 4 unconstitutional, while protecting states’ ability to continue creating humane, immigrant-inclusive policies without impermissibly disrupting the fabric of federal immigration enforcement actions.

KJ

November 13, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tuesday, November 12, 2024

Immigration Article of the Day: Accessing Justice: The Available and Adequacy of Counsel in Removal Proceedings by Peter L. Markowitz and Lindsay Nash

Accessing Justice: The Available and Adequacy of Counsel in Removal Proceedings by Peter L. Markowitz and Lindsay Nash, 33 Cardozo L. Rev. 357 (2011)

Abstract

The immigrant representation crisis is a crisis of both quality and quantity. It is the acute shortage of competent attorneys willing and able to competently represent individuals in immigration removal proceedings. Removal proceedings are the primary mechanism by which the federal government can seek to effect the removal, or deportation, of a noncitizen. The individuals who face removal proceedings might be: the long-term lawful permanent resident (green card holder) who entered the country lawfully as a child and has lived in the United States for decades; or the refugee who has come to the United States fleeing persecution; or the undocumented immigrant caught trying to illegally cross the border. By every measure, the number of deportations and removal proceedings has skyrocketed over the last decade. Between 2000 and 2010, the number of removal proceedings initiated per year in our nation's immigration courts increased nearly fifty percent, totaling over 300,000 last year. During that period, the representation rate of respondents in removal proceedings has remained relatively constant and abysmally low.  Correspondingly, the actual number of unrepresented individuals has virtually doubled.

KJ

November 12, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sunday, November 10, 2024

Immigration Article of the Day: The Not-Smuggling Problem: The Effects of The United States' Overbroad Definition of Migrant Smuggling on Migrant Families by Valeria Martinez

Valeria  Martinez

The Not-Smuggling Problem: The Effects of The United States' Overbroad Definition of Migrant Smuggling on Migrant Families by Valeria Martinez, Wisconsin International Law Journal, volume 41, issue 3

Abstract

By signing and ratifying the United Nations Protocol Against the Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air, the United States promised to the international community and to its citizens that it would adhere to a legal criminal definition of migrant smuggling that protects migrant families by only targeting in its language the organized offenders that aim to benefit financially or materially. After it made this promise, the United States did not amend 8 U.S.C. § 1324 to conform fully with the protocol. Contrary to the demands of the protocol, the statute does not establish as an element of the base offense of migrant smuggling intent for financial or material benefit. Instead, a prosecutor can decide whether to charge as a migrant smuggler one family member who assists another in entering unlawfully to the United States. The repercussions of this overbroad understanding of migrant smuggling are felt most in the immigration context in which a mother entering unlawfully into the United States while holding her infant is barred from seeking legal admission to the United States. This Article analyzes the protocol and finds that the United States falls short of its promise. I argue for amending 8 U.S.C. § 1324 and I propose that the United States extend the protocol's targeted migrant smuggling definition to its immigration statutes.

KJ

November 10, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Saturday, November 9, 2024

Immigration Article of the Day: Comparing U.S. And American Samoa Entry Policy by Nicolas Garon

Nicolas Garon

Comparing U.S. And American Samoa Entry Policy by Nicolas Garon

Abstract

While immigration laws and policy exhibit uniformity across the U.S., with jurisdiction from USCIS, there is an exception. This paper draws attention to the unique case of American Samoa. Unlike any other inhabited part of the U.S., American Samoa maintains its own immigration system, among many other distinctive features.

The article compares the visa systems of American Samoa and the rest of the United States, highlighting significant variations between the two regimes. An insightful cost analysis reveals that American Samoa’s entry permits are notably more cost-effective than U.S. visas, both for regular entry and transit, and also offer the extremely useful feature of digital applications. Furthermore, the article delves into unusual layers of bureaucratic involvement in visa requirements and departure procedures.

The article serves as an illuminating resource for legal practitioners and all those interested in the nuanced distinctions between U.S. and American Samoa entry policies. It contributes to a deeper understanding of the legal and practical aspects of entry regulations, underscoring the significance of these disparities in shaping the experiences of travelers and residents alike.

KJ

November 9, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (2)

Friday, November 8, 2024

Immigration Article of the Day: A Different “Border Crisis”: Civil Remedies for Unlawful Detainment After Egbert by Aimee Hernandez

A Different “Border Crisis”: Civil Remedies for Unlawful Detainment After Egbert by Aimee Hernandez

Abstract

In 1971, the Supreme Court decided Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents where the court created an implied cause of action for a private citizen to sue a federal official for a Fourth Amendment violation. This began to be known as a Bivens claim. Later cases created two more causes of action for a Fifth and Eighth Amendment violations in Davis v. Passman and Carlson v. Green. Beyond these three instances, the court has declined to extend the Bivens claim any further. Most recently, the Court's ruling in Egbert v. Boule essentially closed the door to Bivens, and with it, civil relief for constitutional violations by federal officials. In Egbert, the court held an individual did not have a Bivens claim against a Border Patrol agent for the violation of his First and Fourth amendment rights. In refusing to extend Bivens to the facts in Egbert, the Court pointed towards Congress to create a cause of action to remedy private citizens. In recent years, there has been an extensive influx of immigration, causing an increase in border security efforts. Congress and the Court have recognized several exceptions to constitutional rights at the border in the name of national security. Exceptions such as the 100-mile Border Exception have given Border Patrol increased latitude in policing at the border and nearby cities where an approximated two-thirds of the U.S. population lives. This latitude at times results in the infringement of constitutional rights of U.S. citizens. In 2019, an 18-year-old Dallas teenager, traveling through a Border Patrol checkpoint, was held in Border Patrol custody for nearly a month. This teen was a U.S. Citizen and had documentation to prove it, yet he was detained for weeks unable to make even a phone call. After Egbert, U.S. citizens who are unlawfully detained for extended periods of time, and who suffer from other unconstitutional conduct during their detainment, have little to no relief. Private citizens should have access to an adequate civil remedy that works to both compensate and deter further unlawful detentions. Along with providing relief, officers should be deterred from further conduct that infringes on the fundamental rights of U.S. Citizens. This Article proposes a statute that mimics a § 1983 claim and sets out statutory language that is narrowly tailored to consider government interest while protecting individual rights.

KJ

November 8, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Thursday, November 7, 2024

Immigration Article of the Day: Antitrust for Immigrants by Greg Day

greg day

Antitrust for Immigrants by Greg Day, Cornell Law Review

Abstract

Immigrants and undocumented people have often encountered discrimination because they compete against "native" businesses and workers, resulting in protests, boycotts, and even violence intended to exclude immigrants from markets. Key to this story is government's ability to discriminate as well: it is indeed common for state and federal actors to enact protectionist laws and regulations meant to prevent immigrants from braiding hair, manicuring nails, operating food trucks, or otherwise competing. But antitrust courts have seldom mentioned a person's immigration status, much less offered a remedy. 

This Article shows that antitrust's "consumer welfare" standard has curiously ignored the plight of immigrants. Part of the reason is that antitrust law is characterized as a "colorblind" regime beneftting consumers collectively, meaning that it isn't supposed to prioritize insular groups such as immigrants. Courts and scholars have also described matters of inequality and discrimination as "social harms" existing beyond antitrust's scope. In fact, antitrust lawsuits have successfully sought to drive immigrants out of markets, alleging that competitors gained an "unfair" advantage from employing undocumented workers. Under this view of antitrust law, the exclusion of immigrants is an appropriate way of promoting competition. 

This Article argues that anti-immigrant discrimination creates the exact types of harms that antitrust was meant to remedy. Since excluding immigrants can misallocate resources on citizenship or racial lines as opposed to their most productive usages, certain acts of discrimination should entail "conduct without a legitimate business purpose," even when based.

KJ

November 7, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wednesday, November 6, 2024

Immigration Article of the Day: The Second Amendment Rights of Undocumented Immigrants by Alan Mygatt-Tauber

 

Alan Mygatt-Tauber

The Second Amendment Rights of Undocumented Immigrants by Alan Mygatt-Tauber

Abstract

 

In 2008’s District of Columbia v. Heller, the Supreme Court, for the first time, held that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to bear arms. Challenges to various federal gun control laws immediately followed, including challenges to 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(5)(a), which prohibits possession by an undocumented immigrant. Between 2008 and 2022, courts faced with challenges to 922(g)(5)(a) universally upheld it. Then the Court decided New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen, in which it discarded the means-end balancing tests the courts of appeals had adopted, instead preferring a test focused on “history and tradition.” Under Bruen’s test, if a regulation was targeted at conduct protected by the Second Amendment, it was presumptively invalid, unless the government could identify an analogous law from the time of the Founding. New challenges were filed. Many courts have continued to uphold the constitutionality of 922(g)(5)(a), but others have found that it is unconstitutional. And at least two circuits have upheld the statute on the ground that undocumented immigrants are not part of “the people” protected by the Second Amendment.

This article is the first in-depth look at the application of Bruen’s test, as modified by the Court’s June 2024 decision in United States v. Rahimi, that addresses both the question of whether undocumented immigrants are part of “the people” entitled to Second Amendment protections and, if so, whether any of the historical analogues identified by the government serve to justify 922(g)(5)(a)’s complete ban on gun ownership. It concludes 1) that undocumented immigrants are part of “the people” because status is irrelevant to the question—it is physical presence in the United States that matters; and 2) none of the purported analogues support a categorical ban on undocumented immigrants possessing firearms. Instead, they support an individualized analysis where only the dangerous may be disarmed.

KJ

November 6, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tuesday, November 5, 2024

Immigration Article of the Day: Closing the Asylum Gender Gap: Why "Afghan Women" is a Compelling Particular Social Group by Mackenzie Heinrichs

Mackenzie Heinrichs

Closing the Asylum Gender Gap: Why "Afghan Women" is a Compelling Particular Social Group by Mackenzie Heinrichs, 57 Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law (2024)

Abstract

Afghan women are currently experiencing unprecedented levels of oppression and violence under the Taliban's brutal regime. Many Afghan women who flee the Taliban's tyranny must then deal with the byzantine reality of seeking asylum based on gender persecution. Because "gender" is not explicitly protected under the 1951 Refugee Convention (the Convention), women who fear gender-based violence are often forced to adapt their claims into a "particular social group" (PSG). Unfortunately, the convention does not define PSG, which has resulted in various interpretations across international jurisdictions. This ambiguity creates a gap in protection for women asylum-seekers, like Afghan women, who seek protection based on their membership in a particular social group defined by gender. Therefore, Afghan women face a significant barrier to obtaining asylum due to the lack of consensus worldwide regarding the lawfulness of gender per se PSGs.

Because of the horrific treatment of women in Afghanistan, the current need for courts to accept gender per se social groups—PSGs encompassing gender plus nationality—is pressing. Under both international and US asylum law, there is evidence that courts and administrative agencies are increasingly receptive to gender per se social groups. This has resulted in courts like the Court of Justice of the European Union finding that women from Afghanistan are eligible for asylum based solely on their gender. This positive trend in PSG jurisprudence, combined with the growing number of Afghan arrivals to the United States, presents a strong argument that US asylum law should recognize "Afghan women" as a PSG.

"Afghan women" as a social group avoids many of the pitfalls of other gender-based social groups commonly used because of its concise articulation. Further, "Afghan women" is distinguishable from other cases where gender PSGs were unsuccessful because of the extensive nature of the persecution inflicted on women in Afghanistan by the Taliban government. While Afghan women who fear gender persecution may be able to make asylum claims based on other protected grounds, the social group, “Afghan women,” directly addresses the reason for their persecution: gender. Because the gender gap in asylum protection is particularly acute for women in Afghanistan, “Afghan women” is a uniquely compelling PSG.

KJ

 

November 5, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Monday, November 4, 2024

Immigration Article of the Day: Administrative Violence in Immigration Law by Stephen Lee

Stephen Lee

Administrative Violence in Immigration Law by Stephen Lee, 66 Arizona Law Review 739 (2024)

Abstract

This Article is about violence in the administration of our nation’s immigration laws. More specifically, it focuses on the types of agency actions that might be characterized as “violent,” a key concept in separating legitimate and illegitimate agency actions. In this context, violence is commonly defined in terms of the use or threat of force against immigrants and immigrant communities—i.e., through apprehension, detention, and removal. This Article develops and defends a related theory of violence, what I call “administrative violence,” which focuses on benefits programs that offer relief from removal. Although these programs are often described in inclusive terms, this Article argues that they help normalize and reaffirm the legitimacy of enforcement programs most directly responsible for the use and threat of force. Notably, these benefits programs foist the burden of seeking relief on migrants; obfuscate the realities that relief is temporary, limited, and hard to get; and draw attention away from the ways that relief programs are intertwined—politically, legally, and administratively—with the enforcement programs most responsible for egregious harms in the immigration context. The theory of administrative violence makes two contributions. First, it provides descriptive clarity on the range of illegitimate harms experienced by migrants at the hands of both field agents wielding quasi-police power as well as bureaucrats processing papers in anonymous office buildings. Second, it provides a basic vocabulary for pushing forward current conversations about violence in the administrative state, a dynamic that is attracting increasing scholarly attention, but which remains overly narrow.

KJ

November 4, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sunday, November 3, 2024

Immigration Article of the Day: Administrative Arrest Warrants: Armed Encounters Outside the Judicial Process by Meg Mary Margaret Penrose

Meg Penrose

Administrative Arrest Warrants: Armed Encounters Outside the Judicial Process by Meg Mary Margaret Penrose, Cornell Journal of Law and Public Policy, Vol. 33, No. 3, pp. 389-435, 2024

Abstract

This Article considers three related questions. First, is a person “seized” under the Fourth Amendment when law enforcement restricts a person’s movements in their home and limits their ability to leave or go about their business? Second, does the answer to this seizure inquiry turn on the person’s citizenship status? And third, how do lawyers ensure that courts discard bad law? This last question is not a qualitative assessment— with good and bad law being tied to one’s legal ideology. Rather, certain legal holdings, dating back over half a century, have been whittled away if not entirely eroded. When this happens, how do lawyers ensure that judges do not rely on outdated law that has not been directly overruled? Worse still, how do lawyers ensure that judges avoid dicta from such cases when the entire case should be jettisoned for being at odds with current legal doctrine?

This Article proceeds in four parts. Part I restates the opening hypothetical by explaining how ICE officers are legally permitted to issue, without judicial oversight, administrative arrest warrants. This statutory authority should, nonetheless, be evaluated using Fourth Amendment doctrine that limits exceptions to judicial warrants when law enforcement acts in, or just outside, the home. Part II introduces Abel v. United States to explain how arrests for alleged immigration violations could occur prior to Katz. Part III provides an overview of how modern Fourth Amendment doctrine has eroded Abel and justifies its outright reversal. Part IV concludes by asserting that all law enforcement officers, including ICE, should be bound by traditional Fourth Amendment doctrine when conducting seizures in, or just outside, the home. The Fourth Amendment protects all people, not just citizens. And its text should be given the full effect the Framers drafted and intended. For this reason, the Supreme Court should take an opportunity to explicitly overrule Abel.

KJ

November 3, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (1)

Saturday, November 2, 2024

Immigration Article of the Day: The Afterlife of "Title 42": Autopsy and Reformation by Gerald L. Neuman

Gerald L. Neuman

The Afterlife of "Title 42": Autopsy and Reformation by Gerald L. Neuman

Abstract

From March 2020 to May 2023, millions of noncitizens were expelled from the United States without a hearing under the so-called "Title 42" process. The government claimed that an obscure public health law ousted all the substantive and procedural rights that normally constrain immigration enforcement, and used it as a pretext to rapidly eject refugees at the southern border. The CDC's "Title 42" orders have now expired, but the regulation that authorized them remains in force and could be reactivated at any time. Instead of treating this episode as closed, this Article closely examines the hasty rise and slow demise of the "Title 42" regime, and the litigation it spawned, in search of lessons for the future. The "Title 42" regulation invites abuse, and would distort even a well-intentioned response to the next major pandemic. The regulation must be repealed or rewritten, and the Article discusses how it should be reformed.

KJ

November 2, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Friday, November 1, 2024

Immigration Article of the Day: Banned In Florida: Progressive Politics, Academic Freedom, and Immigrant Justice by Rebecca A. Sharpless

Rebecca Sharpless

Banned In Florida: Progressive Politics, Academic Freedom, and Immigrant Justice by Rebecca A. Sharpless

Abstract

As Florida veers toward being an ultra-conservative state, educators, activists, and advocates struggle to preserve what's left of an open society in Florida. Headlines have focused on Florida's obvious, frontal attacks on communities and groups of people. Less in the spotlight are the more subtle, dog-whistle politics in play, such as the governor and Florida legislature's tactic of using a focus on crime and undocumented immigration as a proxy for xenophobia. This essay turns to an even darker chapter in Florida's history to draw a parallel to the present political moment. In what is known as Florida's "Little McCarthyism," the Florida legislature formed a committeeknown as the Johns Committee-to investigate NAACP leaders, LGBTQ+ university faculty and students, and liberal university professors. Through the 1960s, the Florida legislature continued to interfere in university governance and academic freedom, as illustrated by the political denial of tenure to an activist University of Florida professor. Comparing present-day Florida with a period of history generally regarded as a mistake unmasks the urgent nature of the threat now faced in Florida. Moreover, this history of discrimination correctly informs the equal protection legal analysis of Florida's anti-immigrant legislation. In the 2021 U.S. district court decision in City of South Miami v. DeSantis, the court drew on Florida's history of racism in law enforcement to understand the anti-immigrant dog-whistle politics of Florida's legislature and find that its anti-sanctuary city legislation violated equal protection. This rare equal protection victory was short-lived, however, as the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit reversed the decision on standing grounds and expressed "grave doubts about the merits." As progressive groups and advocates organize against Florida's turn to the right, they must remain cognizant of the reality that today's extreme conservatism stems from entrenched ideologies from the state's past. The Supreme Court's requirement of intentional discrimination and courts' narrow construction of standing limit the use of equal protection doctrine as a bulwark against invidious discrimination.

KJ

November 1, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Thursday, October 31, 2024

Immigration Article of the Day: The Invention of Immigration Exceptionalism by Adam B. Cox 

Adam B. Cox

The Invention of Immigration Exceptionalism by Adam B. Cox 

Abstract

American immigration law is a domain where ordinary constitutional rules have never applied. At least, that is the conventional wisdom. Immigration law’s exceptionalism is widely believed to flow directly from the Supreme Court’s invention, in the late nineteenth century, of the so-called plenary power doctrine. On the standard account, that doctrine has long insulated immigration policies from constitutional scrutiny. The plenary power doctrine is thought to permit everything from President Trump’s Muslim ban to the indefinite detention of migrants at the border.

But the reigning historical account of immigration exceptionalism is wrong. Revisiting the field’s canonical cases, this Article reveals that the plenary power doctrine lawyers and judges argue over today was not created in a series of late-nineteenth-century cases. Far from being exceptional, those cases applied the then-standard framework linking due process and the separation of powers. By failing to understand that nineteenth-century immigration law was ordinary public law, scholars and jurists have, for decades, badly misunderstood immigration law’s foundational cases. We have also overlooked the role that immigration law played in the development of modern public law. At the turn of the twentieth century, immigration law evolved apace with the rest of public law as both underwent a dramatic transformation. In some cases, immigration law even led the revolution, driving the development of the legal regime we now call “administrative law.”

Immigration exceptionalism is thus a recent invention. Indeed, it might be more accurate to say that the immigration plenary power doctrine was invented in the Roberts Court rather than in the late nineteenth century. Once we locate immigration exceptionalism in its proper moment, we can better appreciate immigration law’s centrality to the development of American public law. We can also assemble new arguments against the modern exceptionalism that is responsible for the very worst parts of immigration law today.

KJ

October 31, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Monday, October 28, 2024

The Conversation: Trump’s anti-Haitian rhetoric reflects America’s long-standing racism against Haiti and its people

Photograph of Thurka Sangaramoorthy

In Trump’s anti-Haitian rhetoric reflects America’s long-standing racism against Haiti and its people byThurka Sangaramoorthy for The Conversation discusses how, as Black immigrants, Haitians are doubly marginalized by structural racism embedded in US immigration policies and the broader societal racism experienced by Black Americans:

"Trump’s inflammatory statements, which have included wrongful allegations of Haitians eating pets, are part of a broader historical pattern of racism and anti-Black xenophobia in the U.S. aimed at Haitians. Days after the debate, Trump further explained how he would start his mass deportation program in Springfield. “Illegal Haitian migrants have descended upon a town of 58,000 people, destroying their way of life,” Trump said.

The comments have not only stoked existing racial tensions but have also sparked racist discourse and violent threats against Haitians across the country."

KJ

October 28, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Thursday, October 24, 2024

Journal on Migration and Human Security: Special Issue: Forced Migration, Deterrence, and Solutions to the Non-Natural Disaster of Migrant Deaths Along the US-Mexico Border and Beyond


A new 11-paper special edition of the Journal on Migration and Human Security (JMHS) documents and reports on migrant deaths along the US-Mexico border. The special edition results from a unique collaboration between the University of Arizona’s Binational Migration Institute, the Center for Migration Studies of New York, and the Working Group on Mapping Migrant Deaths along the US Southwest Border. The Working Group includes medicolegal authorities, scholars, and practitioners from California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and New York who have met monthly since late 2021. The studies reported on in this special edition examine the primary causes of migrant deaths and provide data from every US state that borders Mexico. They document US border enforcement strategies and tactics, the inadequacy of official migrant death statistics, and the resource and capacity challenges faced by US counties along the US-Mexico border in investigating these deaths, including grossly insufficient funding for DNA testing of unidentified human remains.
READ & DOWNLOAD
KJ
 

 

October 24, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Conversation: Proof that immigrants fuel the US economy is found in the billions they send back home

 

Photograph of Ernesto Castaneda

In Proof that immigrants fuel the US economy is found in the billions they send back home in The Conversation, Ernesto Castañeda discusses a new study finding that immigrants contribute about $2.2 trillion annually to the US economy, and that might be an undercount.

The money sent back home by immigrants -- more than US$81 billion in 2022, according to the World Bank --, gives an idea of the huge economic benefits immigrants provide to the U.S. economy.  

KJ

October 24, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tuesday, October 22, 2024

Rutgers University Law Review/Center for Immigrant Justice -- Call for Papers: The Dual Role of Immigration and Citizenship Laws: Exploring Inclusion, Exclusion, and Reform for 2025 and Beyond

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RUTGERS UNIVERSITY LAW REVIEW

CENTER FOR IMMIGRANT JUSTICE

CALL FOR SYMPOSIUM PAPERS

The Dual Role of Immigration and Citizenship Laws:  Exploring Inclusion, Exclusion, and Reform for 2025 and Beyond

Historically and today, immigration and citizenship laws serve as two sides of the same coin in shaping the United States’ demographic and cultural landscape. On one hand, these laws create pathways for inclusion, allowing non-citizens to enter and become permanent members of the country. On the other hand, they also establish mechanisms of exclusion, setting barriers that prevent certain non-citizens from entering the United States and removing those considered ineligible or undeserving of membership.

The arrival of a new President in 2025 presents an opportune moment to examine and reconsider the dual roles of immigration and citizenship laws and reimagine a different framework for immigration law. Regardless of the outcome of the 2024 Presidential election, immigration and citizenship law will remain a significant topic of interest to community members, lawyers, policymakers, and advocates. This symposium will be an opportunity to critically engage with these topics and explore innovative legal frameworks for the future of immigration and citizenship laws.

In collaboration with the Rutgers Center for Immigrant Justice, the Rutgers Law Review is pleased to announce a call for papers for our upcoming spring symposium titled “The Dual Role of Immigration and Citizenship Laws: Exploring Inclusion, Exclusion, and Reform for 2025 and Beyond.”

The symposium is scheduled to begin on Thursday evening, April 3, 2025, and continue through Friday, April 4, 2025.

The symposium will also honor the contributions of Professors Linda Bosniak (Rutgers Law – Camden) and Alan Hyde (Rutgers Law – Newark), both distinguished scholars in the fields of immigration, citizenship, and labor, who recently retired from teaching at Rutgers Law School. The keynote speaker for the symposium will be Kevin Johnson, former dean of the University of California Davis School of Law and a leading and impactful scholar in immigration law. We invite papers that analyze, propose, and critically examine innovative immigration and citizenship policies, and that offer frameworks for envisioning the future of these laws. The symposium aims to create space for legal scholars, policymakers, lawyers, and advocates to discuss key questions, including:

What should immigration and citizenship laws look like in 2025 and beyond?

What values, interests, and needs should be prioritized?

Should these laws continue to serve as mechanisms of both inclusion and exclusion?

What might an inclusive immigration and citizenship framework look like?

We encourage contributions from lawyers, legal scholars, policymakers, and advocates across the political spectrum. We are particularly interested in the following topics (although we will also consider proposed papers and presentations that relate to the general topic):

• Use of Artificial Intelligence in Immigration Regulation: Exploring the advantages and drawbacks of the growing use of technology in immigration law, including in asylum applications, integration of immigrants, and immigration enforcement.

• Pathways to Citizenship: Examining the legal frameworks that offer or limit pathways to citizenship for legal permanent residents and undocumented individuals.

• Immigrant Workers: Addressing how to maintain the availability of immigrant laborers necessary for economic advancement, the provision of fair working conditions, and the protection of U.S. citizen workers.

• Immigration Sanctuary: Deciding whether and to what extent state and local governments, faith-based organizations, and private actors should have a role in regulating immigration law without conflicting with the federal government’s primary control over immigration regulation.

Paper proposals may be considered for inclusion in the Symposium Issue of Volume 77. Preference will be given to speakers who commit to publishing their article or essay with the Law Review. Special consideration will be given to submissions that engage with the scholarship of Professors Bosniak or Hyde or have some connection to New Jersey. More information on written submission requirements is provided below. The Law Review encourages those interested in participating in the symposium to reach out regardless of whether they would like to submit their written work. Invited and selected out-of-state speakers who require financial assistance to present at the symposium may be eligible for reimbursement of up to $1,000 for reasonable travel and hotel expenses.

IMPORTANT INFORMATION

Submission Procedure. Send your proposals by email, attached as a Word or PDF document, to Rutgers University Law Review at [email protected] by DECEMBER 1, 2024.

Proposals must include (i) your name and contact information; (ii) the title of the proposed article; (iii) a brief (one-page maximum) description of the article or essay; (iv) commitment to publish with the Rutgers Law Review if accepted; and (v) a current curriculum vitae. Authors may submit more than one proposal.

Notification. Proposals will be accepted by DECEMBER 1, 2024. Authors whose submissions are accepted for presentation at the Symposium Conference and/or publication will be notified via email by DECEMBER 20, 2024. Preference for presentation will be given to those who commit to publishing with the Rutgers University Law Review. Acceptance for publication of any paper, proposal, or response to a presenter is at the sole discretion of Rutgers University Law Review.

Publication Commitment. First drafts of accepted articles and essays must be submitted by March 28, 2025, by 11:59 PM. Final drafts must be submitted by May 31, 2025, by 11:59 PM.'

Length of Final Submissions of Symposium Articles and Essays: The Law Review prefers articles between 10,000 and 14,000 words and essays between 4,000 and 6,000 words.

If you have any questions, contact the Law Review at [email protected]

Download RULR Call for Papers 10.22.24 RCV

KJ

October 22, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Immigration Article of the Day: Explaining the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Stalemate in Congress by Maryam T. Stevenson

Maryam T. Stevenson

Explaining the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Stalemate in Congress by Maryam T. Stevenson

Abstract

Historically, congressional policy goals on immigration have vacillated from open to restrictive as various micro and macro-level factors have changed both inside and outside the Beltway. While Congress has been subjected to some immigration lobbies over time, it has largely been isolated from a general public opinion on immigration policy until fairly recently. Specifically, while Congress was successful at passing a variety of immigration policies through 1990 without much regard to public opinion, it has since failed even amid bipartisan congressional and presidential support. This article will offer a number of theories in order to explain why Congress has been unable to pass immigration reform at a time when there was significant bipartisan support for it among policy elites. It begins with a legislative history of immigration policy, explains the current immigration system and categories of admission into the United States, and then offers an explanation for the failure of immigration policy. It also teases a subsequent article that offers a policy prescription to overcome the challenges to reform outlined in this article.

KJ

October 22, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)

Monday, October 21, 2024

Immigration Article of the Day: Borders: Exclude or Relate? by Josiah Heyman, Journal on Migration and Human Security

Josiah Heyman

Borders: Exclude or Relate? by Josiah Heyman, Journal on Migration and Human Security (2024)

Executive Summary

US political discourse characterizes the US-Mexico border as a site of threat and, of necessity, exclusion. This frame ignores the importance of borders to economies, families, and culture in our increasingly interconnected world. Moreover, it leads to policies that place people at risk of victimization and death. In conceiving of the border solely in terms of exclusion, nations forego the opportunity to strengthen relationships across borders. This paper argues that the politics of humane migration require a vision of borders as sites of encounter, engagement, and relationship, rather than solely exclusion.
This reconceptualization of the US-Mexico border, in particular, would strengthen relationships across borders, and prioritize cooperation between Latin America/the Caribbean and the United States, starting with regulated legal flows. It would also respond to the shared contexts of migration, including contraband in arms and drugs, criminal violence, and climate change. It articulates an alternative vision of borders as a “commons” in which mutual needs can be addressed (a commons is an issue or resource in which every one has access and involvement).
 
Migration itself provides a perfect example of such a need. It takes place in a political climate partially but powerfully shaped by racism and classism. Thus, it has become a polarized “issue” that appears insolvable. In fact, it may not be a problem at all. Rather, in our current demographic-economic situation, as well as for our cultural well-being, migration should be treated as an asset. Insofar as it needs to be addressed, this paper delineates many possibilities. The options are not perfect and magical — the challenges are hard and diverse — but they an advance a vision of a shared cross-border space on migration. That might be a crucial move, not only for migration, but along a path that recognizes relationships and commitments of many kinds across the hemisphere and world. Recognition is not enough; real change in resources and power needs to follow. But a vision of connection rather than exclusion provides the political starting point needed for change to happen. In every political instance in which borders are used to frame migration in terms of who, how, and how much to exclude, connectedness loses ground. A politics of humane migration can only emerge if rooted in a positive vision of borders as sites of engagement and encounter.
 
KJ

October 21, 2024 in Current Affairs, Law Review Articles & Essays | Permalink | Comments (0)