ACLU Comment on Biden’s Asylum Ban

Immigrants’ rights advocates sued the Trump administration over lack of access to legal counsel and violations of due process for people detained at Florida’s new, notorious Everglades immigration center, a hastily constructed facility on an abandoned airstrip in the middle of the wetlands in Ochopee.

MIAMI — Immigrants’ rights advocates today sued the Trump administration over lack of access to legal counsel and violations of due process for people detained at Florida’s new, notorious Everglades immigration center, a hastily constructed facility on an abandoned airstrip in the middle of the wetlands in Ochopee. The facility, cruelly dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz,” is built out of temporary tents, trailers, and chain-link fences with barbed wire. It is surrounded by alligators, pythons, mosquitos, and swampland, and is at risk of dangerous flooding. At least 700 people are now held at the facility, according to the lawsuit. This case is brought by detainees held at the facility, on behalf of a class, and legal service providers and law firms with clients held at the site, including Florida Keys Immigration, Sanctuary of the South, U.S. Immigration Law Counsel, Victoria Slatton of Sanabria & Associates, and the Law Offices of Catherine Perez, PLLC. They are represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of Florida, and Americans for Immigrant Justice. They challenge the government’s restriction of access to counsel, and their inability to file legal documents needed for detainees’ release from custody. The government has banned in-person legal visitation, any confidential phone or video communication, and confidential exchange of written documents. These restrictions violate the First and Fifth Amendment rights of people being detained, as well as the First Amendment rights of legal service organizations and law firms with clients held at the facility. Detainees and members of Congress who have visited the site report abysmal conditions, including searing hot temperatures, heavy mosquito presence, flooding inside the tents, lack of access to water, backed-up toilets and sewage (detainees have described being forced to manually unclog toilets using their bare hands), inadequate food, and denial of religious rights. “This facility opens another dark chapter in our nation’s history. Its very existence is predicated on our country’s basest impulses and shows the danger of unchecked governmental authority when combined with unbridled hate. It represents an attack on common decency, and in this case, its treatment of detained people is also unlawful,” said Eunice Cho, senior counsel with the ACLU’s National Prison Project and the lead attorney in the case. “The U.S. Constitution does not allow the government to simply lock people away without any ability to communicate with counsel or to petition the court for release from custody. The government may not trample on these most fundamental protections for people held in its custody.” According to the complaint, multiple attorneys have arrived at the checkpoint on the road to the detention facility to request in-person, attorney-client meetings, to no avail. Lawyers have been greeted at the checkpoint by armed members of the Florida National Guard and state police, who have said that requests for attorney-client meetings will be “communicated” to the facility, only to be told hours later that no in-person visitation would be allowed. In addition, the government has provided no information as to how detainees and counsel may have confidential telephone calls; the email address provided by Florida state officials to request attorney calls does not work. The facility requires reviewing the submission of any documents that attorneys plan to review with clients. “What’s happening here is not just a policy failure, it’s a moral one,” said Bacardi Jackson, executive director of the ACLU of Florida. “The state has hastily erected a costly and deadly shadow prison in the middle of the Everglades during hurricane season to warehouse human beings — stripping them of due process and dignity, cutting them off from their families and legal counsel, intentionally putting their lives in danger, and leaving them to suffer in silence. This is how rights are erased. But the Constitution doesn’t disappear in the Everglades. No amount of armed guards or government spin can shield this facility from legal scrutiny. We will use every tool at our disposal to end this cruel experiment and defend the rights of every person trapped inside of this unconstitutional abomination.” “Access to counsel empowers immigrants — and all people — to participate in their own legal defense, which has irreversible and lifelong consequences,” said Sui Chung, executive director of Americans for Immigrant Justice. “The conditions inside this facility are deeply concerning and paint a stark picture of the disregard for the well-being of individuals in custody. Such a facility, operating in near secret, and denying fundamental rights, is a stain on our justice system and represents a threat to American values and our recognition of human rights.” The lawsuit also seeks to force the government to provide timely and accurate location information about people being held at the facility and to secure confidential, in-person and telephonic attorney access for them. “This facility is a desecration to the Big Cypress National Preserve and a violation of Miccosukee and Seminole tribal land. Not only have we repeatedly been denied access to current and prospective clients, but after waiting for three hours at the site, it became clear that there is no plan or process to ensure any access to counsel or due process for the immigrants being neglected and abused there. We must act now before hurricane season is in full swing, which will only exacerbate the already deadly conditions for those being held there incommunicado,” said Katie Blankenship, founding partner of Sanctuary of the South. The complaint is here.  

CONCORD, N.H. — A federal court in New Hampshire today blocked President Trump’s executive order restricting birthright citizenship and certified a nationwide class that protects the citizenship rights of all children born on U.S. soil. The case is Barbara v. Donald J. Trump. The ruling stems from a nationwide class-action lawsuit filed June 27, immediately after a Supreme Court ruling that potentially opened the door for partial enforcement of the executive order. The American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of New Hampshire, ACLU of Maine, ACLU of Massachusetts, Legal Defense Fund, Asian Law Caucus, and Democracy Defenders Fund brought the challenge on behalf of a proposed class of babies subject to the executive order. It seeks to protect all impacted families in the country in the wake of the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Trump v. CASA, which directed courts to consider narrowing nationwide protection that had been provided in the first round of challenges to the executive order attacking birthright citizenship. The groups were in court today successfully arguing for a preliminary injunction and nationwide class certification. The ruling was made from the bench. In granting the request, the court provided for a 7-day delay so that the government — which argued to the Supreme Court that a nationwide class was the appropriate way to seek nationwide protection in the birthright cases — could nevertheless try to get the First Circuit Court of Appeals to stay the relief, if it decides to pursue that option. Even with a 7-day delay, the ruling will go into effect well before July 27, when partial implementation of the unconstitutional order might otherwise have begun. “This ruling is a huge victory and will help protect the citizenship of all children born in the United States, as the Constitution intended,” said Cody Wofsy, deputy director of the ACLU’s Immigrant’s Rights Project, who argued the case. “We are fighting to ensure President Trump doesn’t trample on the citizenship rights of one single child.” “This morning, the federal court in New Hampshire agreed once again that President Trump's executive order to restrict birthright citizenship is a blatant violation of the U.S. Constitution. The executive order, which is now temporarily blocked nationwide in this class action lawsuit and blocked regionally in our January lawsuit, stands in flagrant opposition to our constitutional rights, values, and history. Our Constitution ensures that no politician can decide who among those born in this country is worthy of citizenship — a principle that continues to be ardently reinforced in court across the country and here in the Granite State,” said Devon Chaffee, executive director of the ACLU of New Hampshire. “Today’s decision is a powerful affirmation of the 14th Amendment and the enduring principle that citizenship in the United States is a right by birth, not a privilege granted by politics. By granting nationwide class certification and blocking the executive order from taking effect, the court has sent a clear message: all children born on U.S. soil are entitled to the full rights and protections of citizenship. This is a critical victory for families across the country, and we will continue to defend the constitutional promise of equal protection under the law,” said Morenike Fajana, senior counsel of the Legal Defense Fund. “Since the Supreme Court’s decision, parents have lived in fear and uncertainty, wondering whether they should give birth in a different state, whether their newborns would be subject to deportation, and what kind of future awaits their children,” said Aarti Kohli, executive director of Asian Law Caucus. “This court’s injunction protecting birthright citizenship for all affected children is a major victory for families across this country and for all Americans. This ruling reaffirms that constitutional rights cannot be stripped away by executive decree.” “Today’s decision is a victory for our plaintiffs, and millions of families across this country, who deserve clarity, and stability,” said Tianna Mays, legal director for Democracy Defenders Fund. “The fight to uphold the guarantee of birthright citizenship is far from over and we will continue to advocate to ensure we keep that promise.” “For the second time, this court has affirmed the constitutional commitment that anyone born in the United States is a citizen, regardless of their parents’ background. The U.S. has always been a nation of immigrants, and we are thrilled to be moving forward with this critically important case at a time when immigrant families across the country face increasing hostility, threats, and harm,” said Molly Curren Rowles, executive director of the ACLU of Maine. “Yet another court ruling affirms that the U.S. Constitution gives citizenship equally to all babies born in the United States — not only to those who can prove their parents’ citizenship or permanent status,” said Carol Rose, executive director of the ACLU of Massachusetts. “Birthright citizenship makes our country strong and vibrant, and denying citizenship to babies born in the U.S. is simply un-American. This ruling is a crucial step in stopping this attack on newborn babies and on the very fabric of our nation.” The PI order is here. The class certification order is here.