Immigration cases tossed in fallout from high court ruling
Ethics
Immigration courts from Boston to Los Angeles have been experiencing fallout from a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision that has caused some deportation orders to be tossed and cases thrown out, bringing more chaos to a system that was already besieged by ballooning dockets and lengthy backlogs.
The little-known ruling addressed what might seem like a narrow procedural issue over how to properly provide notices to immigrants to appear in court for deportation proceedings. But it is having broader implications in immigration courts that are in charge of deciding whether hundreds of thousands of people should be allowed to stay in the United States.
Since the decision was issued in June, immigration attorneys have been asking judges to throw out their clients' cases. Some immigration judges have refused to issue deportation orders for immigrants. And in a recent case in Washington state, a Mexican farmworker had an indictment for illegally re-entering the country tossed out.
It isn't clear how many people's immigration cases could be affected. Some immigration judges have denied attorneys' requests, but others in states including Tennessee, New Jersey and California have granted them.
"The potential consequences of the decision are massive," said Jeremy McKinney, an immigration attorney in Greensboro, North Carolina.
The Supreme Court's 8-1 decision focused on the case of a Brazilian handyman seeking to apply for a special green card given to immigrants who have been in the country at least 10 years, have good moral character and whose American relatives would suffer if they were deported.
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USCIS Will Begin Accepting CW-1 Petitions for Fiscal Year 2019
On April 2, 2018, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) will begin accepting petitions under the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI)-Only Transitional Worker (CW-1) program subject to the fiscal year (FY) 2019 cap. Employers in the CNMI use the CW-1 program to employ foreign workers who are ineligible for other nonimmigrant worker categories. The cap for CW-1 visas for FY 2019 is 4,999.
For the FY 2019 cap, USCIS encourages employers to file a petition for a CW-1 nonimmigrant worker up to six months in advance of the proposed start date of employment and as early as possible within that timeframe. USCIS will reject a petition if it is filed more than six months in advance. An extension petition may request a start date of Oct. 1, 2018, even if that worker’s current status will not expire by that date.
Since USCIS expects to receive more petitions than the number of CW-1 visas available for FY 2019, USCIS may conduct a lottery to randomly select petitions and associated beneficiaries so that the cap is not exceeded. The lottery would give employers the fairest opportunity to request workers, particularly with the possibility of mail delays from the CNMI.
USCIS will count the total number of beneficiaries in the petitions received after 10 business days to determine if a lottery is needed. If the cap is met after those initial 10 days, a lottery may still need to be conducted with only the petitions received on the last day before the cap was met. USCIS will announce when the cap is met and whether a lottery has been conducted.