Trump's re-interpretation of immigration law bumps up against the Laken Riley Act, thwarting his mass deportation scheme

[j brown's body]

"At the heart of the recent conflict are two related provisions of immigration law that have vexed courts for decades. One pertains to “arriving” immigrants who are “applicants for admission” and are also “seeking admission” to the United States. This has long been interpreted by immigration officials and courts to apply to people apprehended near the border right after they entered. Under this provision of law, detention is mandatory, with few exceptions, and those detained have virtually no ability to challenge their confinement while deportation proceedings are underway. The second provision permits — but does not require — immigration authorities to detain deportable immigrants who are already residing in the United States. It has long been applied to the millions of undocumented immigrants who have lived in the nation’s interior for years, often paroled into the country after encountering immigration officials at the border. Many have established deep roots, with U.S. citizen spouses, children and family members, as well as employment authorization and pending efforts to seek asylum or other pathways to remain in the country legally. Under this provision of the law, long-standing regulations permit those targeted for detention to challenge the move in immigration court — a distinct, executive branch-run network of courts meant to handle deportation matters.

But everything changed on July 8, when Todd Lyons, the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, issued a memo declaring the Trump administration had reinterpreted these provisions of law. From that point on, Lyons concluded, anyone in the United States illegally — no matter how long — would be deemed “applicants for admission” who are subject to mandatory detention. By classifying virtually all deportation targets as “applicants for admission,” the administration has attempted to eliminate their opportunity to seek bond. ICE recently got some backup from judges on the Board of Immigration Appeals, an executive branch court that sets policy for immigration courts across the country.

But the federal judiciary is not bound by the decisions of the executive branch immigration courts. And so far, judges across the country have decisively rejected the BIA’s interpretation of the law. One judge in Iowa recently took the BIA ruling head-on, saying she found the decision neither compelling nor persuasive and would not factor it into her consideration. Case law and history do not support “mandatory detention for all noncitizens present in the United States,” U.S. District Judge Rebecca Goodgame Ebinger, an Obama appointee in Iowa, wrote earlier this month. And on Sept. 12, U.S. District Judge Edward Chen, an Obama appointee from California, echoed Ebinger, finding that the BIA ruling “lacks persuasive power” because it improperly characterizes people who have resided in the United States for years as “seeking admission.” Many judges who have ruled against the administration in recent weeks have pointed to this discrepancy. And they’ve also noted that the legal interpretation by ICE and the BIA has another perverse effect: The Laken Riley Act’s changes to mandatory detention become superfluous, since there is no need for a mandatory detention scheme for those charged with crimes if anyone facing deportation could be detained anyway. “There would have been no need for the [Laken Riley Act] to create these additional categories because all noncitizens who are present in the United States and have not been admitted would have already been ineligible for bond,” U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Bryan, a Biden appointee in Minnesota, wrote in a recent ruling."

Link

So earlier this year, because he specifically did not see saw undocumented immigrants living here as "arriving," he put a provision in Laken Riley Act about holding those accused of violent crimes in captivity , but half a year later, he's decided that they are arriving because he wants to put everybody in captivity.

Now that Trump has passed the law, he sees it as pointless.

 

[Grizzly Adams]

As people love to point out, most illegal aliens didn't enter unlawfully, but instead overstayed their period of admission. This is an important difference. Someone who evaded inspection should always be considered an applicant for admission.

 

[j brown's body]

As people love to point out, most illegal aliens didn't enter unlawfully, but instead overstayed their period of admission. This is an important difference. Someone who evaded inspection should always be considered an applicant for admission.

It is a new way of looking at it, even for this administration that went to the trouble of passing the Laken Riley Act, which, in their eyes, is now moot.

Ironically, the administration is accusing the judges whose rulings against them on this, basing their decisions on the way the law has always been interpreted, even by the Trump administration itself, are labelked by the administration as "activists."

Another interesting point: the anti-immigration crowd has argued that Trump's mass incarcerations of undocumented immigrants is just following the law when, in fact, the law doesnt require it at all.

 

[Grizzly Adams]

It is a new way of looking at it,

Treating aliens who are present without being admitted as applicants for admission when apprehended is not new. It's been federal law since 1996 (see: "SEC. 414. EXCLUSION OF ALIENS WHO HAVE NOT BEEN INSPECTED AND ADMITTED." on page 58 of the pdf.) It is currently codified at 8 USC 1225(a)(1). It makes no distinction as to length of time spent in the country.

 

[j brown's body]

Treating aliens who are present without being admitted as applicants for admission when apprehended is not new. It's been federal law since 1996 (see: "SEC. 414. EXCLUSION OF ALIENS WHO HAVE NOT BEEN INSPECTED AND ADMITTED." on page 58 of the pdf.) It is currently codified at 8 USC 1225(a)(1). It makes no distinction as to length of time spent in the country.

Check the thread title. The Trump administration itself says it is re-interpreting the law.

 

[Grizzly Adams]

Check the thread title. The Trump administration itself says it is re-interpreting the law.

I don't care about your thread title or what Trump says. And he's partially correct, if the administration is taking the position that anyone unlawfully present is an applicant for admission. The point I'm making is that the part of the article that says:

“Aliens … who surreptitiously cross into the United States remain applicants for admission until and unless they are lawfully inspected and admitted by an immigration officer,” the BIA panel ruled.

...is completely correct. Any judge who rules otherwise is replacing black-letter law with their personal opinion about what the law should be.

The law states at 8 USC 1225(a)(1):

An alien present in the United States who has not been admitted or who arrives in the United States (whether or not at a designated port of arrival and including an alien who is brought to the United States after having been interdicted in international or United States waters) shall be deemed for purposes of this chapter an applicant for admission.

 

[j brown's body]

I don't care about your thread title or what Trump says. And he's partially correct, if the administration is taking the position that anyone unlawfully present is an applicant for admission. The point I'm making is that the part of the article that says:

...is completely correct. Any judge who rules otherwise is replacing black-letter law with their personal opinion about what the law should be.

The law states at 8 USC 1225(a)(1):

So everyone says he's re- interpreting the law except you.

 

[Grizzly Adams]

So everyone says he's re- interpreting the law except you.

I cited the statute, and I gave you a link to the public law that enacted it. I don't know what you want.

 

[j brown's body]

I cited the statute, and I gave you a link to the public law that enacted it. I don't know what you want.

Apparently you are the only one who believes it.

 

[Grizzly Adams]

Apparently you are the only one who believes it.

Or, hear me out... I'm not.

USCIS Policy Manual from 10 January 2025 (before The Menace retook office): "A noncitizen who is present in the United States without inspection and admission or inspection and parole is an applicant for admission."

The (famously rabid, right-wing, Trump supporting) American Immigration Council thought so in 2022: "individuals who enter the United States without inspection are considered applicants for admission."

Here's a 1998 INS memo hosted by the American Immigration Lawyers Association: "aliens who are present in the United States without having been admitted or paroled are now deemed to be applicants for admission, id. § 235(a)(1), 8 U.S.C. § 1225(a)(1)."

This New York immigration law firm goes into more detail (emphasis added):

This rule is clearly defined in both statute — INA §212(a)(6)(A)(i) and regulation — 8 C.F.R. §235.1(f)(2), which declare that a noncitizen “present in the U.S. who has not been admitted or paroled (another form of temporary authorization to enter the country), or an alien who seeks entry at other than an open, designated port of entry” shall be considered an applicant for admission and subjected to the INA §212(a) where most grounds of inadmissibility are defined in the current version of the INA.

To address the issue of admission, after all a person cannot be inadmissible if she or he never asked to be admitted, the Congress included in the revised Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) section §235(a)(1) which resolves this issue. Pursuant to the section an ” alien present in the United States who has not been admitted, or who arrives in the United States (whether or not at a designated port of arrival and including an alien who is brought to the United States after having been interdicted in international or United States waters) shall be deemed for purposes of this Act [INA] an applicant for admission.”

Thus, under the current INA, where doctrine of admission is now the law of the land, an individual who entered without inspection is an applicant for admission at all time during that person’s presence in the USA, who is at the same time outright inadmissible by the operation of law.

The statute is clear. Any judge ruling that someone who has entered without inspection is anything other than an applicant for admission is ruling against the clear statutory language.