Again, I do not dislike the United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) on principle. I DO dislike how some Boarder Patrol Agents act, they have in effect become Trump's Storm Troopers treating all immigrants as criminals (5 year old children?!) just because they are seeking a better life in America.Asylum is the law and Asylum seekers should NOT be treated as criminals.
SUMMARY:A new report from Human Rights Watch finds that the Trump administration’s controversial “Remain in Mexico” policy forces asylum seekers at the U.S.-Mexico border to wait in crowded, unsafe and unsanitary conditions. Many said they lived in constant fear of violence, with some reporting that they had actually been attacked. Amna Nawaz speaks with Human Rights Watch's Michael Garcia Bochenek.
The real problem is Trump wanting loyalists, who will do his bidding, no matter what baggage they carry. Another 'temporary' appointment Trump uses to avoid Concessional oversight.
SUMMARY:The U.S.-Mexico border continues to drive political turmoil. After reports of miserable conditions for detained migrant children, John Sanders, acting head of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, resigned. Meanwhile, Congress is scrambling to reach a border funding deal. Lisa Desjardins talks to reporter Bob Moore of the digital news organization El Paso Matters [El Paso Community Foundation] about the problem's origins.
SUMMARY: The plight of migrant children held in U.S. detention centers continues to generate controversy. As Congress battles over emergency funding for care and resources at the border, medical professionals warn that even brief exposure to the current conditions could be damaging to children’s health. William Brangham reports and talks to pediatrician Julie Linton, who has visited some of the facilities.
SUMMARY:The Associated Press details grave conditions inside a Texas migrant detention facility where 250 infants, children and teenagers were being held without adequate food, water or sanitation during a recent visit. Warren Binford, a law professor at Willamette University, joins William Brangham to share her firsthand account, what Border Patrol agents think and what's next for these children.
Editor's Note: After our broadcast, CPB responded to our request for comment with the following statement:
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) leverages our limited resources to provide the best care possible to those in our custody, especially children. As DHS and CBP leadership have noted numerous times, our short-term holding facilities were not designed to hold vulnerable populations and we urgently need additional humanitarian funding to manage this crisis. CBP works closely with our partners at the Department of Health and Human Services to transfer unaccompanied children to their custody as soon as placement is identified, and as quickly and expeditiously as possible to ensure proper care.
All allegations of civil rights abuses or mistreatment in CBP detention are taken seriously and investigated to the fullest extent possible.
NOTE: This article was copied from the e-newspaper, therefore no article link.
"Photos of travelers taken in data breach" San Diego Union-Tribune 6/11/2019
U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials said Monday that photos of travelers had been compromised as part of a “malicious cyberattack,” raising concerns over how federal officials’ expanding surveillance efforts could imperil Americans’ privacy.
Customs officials said in a statement Monday that the images, which included photos of people’s faces and license plates, had been compromised as part of an attack on a federal subcontractor.
The CBP makes extensive use of cameras and video recordings at airports and land border crossings, where images of vehicles are captured. Those images are used as part of a growing agency facial-recognition program designed to track the identity of people entering and exiting the U.S.
The CBP says airport operations were not affected by the breach, but it declined to say how many people might have had their images stolen. The agency processes more than a million passengers and pedestrians crossing the U.S. border on an average day, including more than 690,000 incoming land travelers.
A CBP statement said that the agency learned of the breach on May 31 and that none of the image data had been identified “on the Dark Web or Internet.” But reporters at The Register, a British technology news site, reported late last month that a large haul of breached data from the firm Perceptics was being offered as a free download on the dark web.
SUMMARY:Federal immigration officials in El Paso say they're overwhelmed by a massive influx of families seeking asylum. U.S. Customs and Border Protection has responded to the surge by moving personnel in from other areas, but that could exacerbate the problem by further slowing processing of asylum requests. Amna Nawaz reports and talks to Bob Moore of Texas Monthly about the ‘completely new’ situation.
"Questions surface over asylum seekers’ screening" by Kate Morrissey, San Diego Union-Tribune 3/22/2019
NOTE: This was copied from the e-newspaper, therefore no link to article.
Customs and Border Protection officers have not consistently followed policies intended to protect Central American asylum seekers who are likely to be harmed in Mexico from returning there under the “Remain in Mexico” program, according to documents obtained by The San Diego Union-Tribune.
The program, known officially as Migrant Protection Protocols, sends certain migrants who ask for asylum at the southern border back to Mexico while they wait for their immigration court cases.
If migrants tell CBP officials that they are also afraid of going back to Mexico, CBP is supposed to send them for interviews with asylum officers who work under a separate agency, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, according to an agency memo [PDF]. Those officials are specially trained to weigh a person’s story about fear of returning against specific legal standards and definitions.
CBP documents detailing questions asked of individual asylum seekers who were returned to Mexico as part of the MPP program show that some migrants who expressed fear of being in Mexico were returned to Tijuana without talking to USCIS asylum officers.
Others returned under the program said that they had not been able to express their fear to CBP officials during processing because of the way CBP officials conducted their intake interviews.
The majority of those who spoke with the Union-Tribune after they had been returned under the program said they were afraid to be in Mexico, but few had been referred for the additional screening to determine whether they should be part of the program.
Juan Carlos, a Salvadoran man who came to the port of entry with his wife and three children, the youngest of whom is 10 months old, said that when he told the CBP official that he and his family were afraid to return to Mexico, the official asked how long they’d been there already. Juan Carlos responded three months.
“He said, ‘Well, they haven’t done anything to you yet,’” Juan Carlos recalled in Spanish.
While the document given to Juan Carlos is a summary of the questions and answers of their conversation rather than a full transcript, it does indicate that Juan Carlos said that he did not feel safe in Mexico and that he had a fear of being removed from the United States.
He was not given the opportunity to talk to an asylum officer about his fears.
“We’re human beings,” Juan Carlos said. “No one wants to die, not an American, not a Salvadoran, not a Nicaraguan. We’re looking for protection, for help.”
Karen, a 28-year-old woman from Honduras who came with her three children, similarly told CBP that she was afraid of being in Mexico. She had fled her country because of domestic violence and said she was afraid that the man who had abused her would find her in Mexico. He’d already been able to find her when she tried to change cities within her country, and she’d heard that he again knew her whereabouts.
(While there has been recent debate about whether claims of fear based on domestic violence should count for asylum, some survivors have been able to win their asylum cases and stay in the U.S.)
As she told her story to the CBP officer, documents show, Karen explained that she had been afraid to be in Mexico.
Instead of referring her for an interview with an asylum officer, the CBP officer asked, “Did anybody harm you or your children in Mexico?”
Karen responded, “No.”
“Did anybody threaten to harm you or your children in Mexico?” the CBP officer continued.
“No,” Karen said again.
Karen was returned to Mexico without being interviewed by an asylum officer. She said she cried when she found out she was going back to Tijuana.
Two Salvadoran men who were returned under the program said they weren’t asked if they were afraid to go back to Mexico. They said they weren’t able to bring up the topic on their own.
“They don’t let you express yourself,” the 18-year-old said. “They only ask their questions and nothing more.”
“They don’t let you talk,” the 29-year-old agreed. “We worried about them punishing us if we spoke out of turn.”
DHS officials said that a question at the end of CBP interviews asking if the asylum seeker has anything else he or she would like to say should serve as an opportunity for people to discuss such concerns.
Being interviewed by USCIS asylum officers is no guarantee that someone who expresses fear of being in Mexico will be kept out of the program. The Department of Homeland Security opted to use a higher legal standard for a person’s claim of fear in implementing MPP than the one used during credible fear interviews, the initial step in the asylum process if the person is not returned to Mexico.
Under the MPP standard, the official has to determine that it is “more likely than not” that the migrant will be persecuted or tortured in Mexico in order to prevent his or her return.
Gelin, a 29-year-old woman from Honduras who came with her 13-year-old son, was evaluated by an asylum officer after explaining to CBP that she had been robbed in Mexico two weeks before asking for asylum. She, too, was returned.
When asked about cases of those who had been sent back without referral to USCIS, officials with the CBP and DHS maintained that CBP officers refer migrants to asylum officers.
“Everyone’s trained to take very seriously our commitments under international treaties,” said a senior DHS official speaking on background. “We will never send someone back to a country where it’s more likely than not that they will be harmed or tortured.”
CBP said that it could not comment on specific cases but said that it “processes each case individually and with integrity.”
In recent weeks, the Trump administration has begun ramping up the MPP program, which began as a pilot at the San Ysidro Port of Entry in late January and sent back single adults from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador who had asked for asylum through the port. It later expanded to include families from those countries and then people from those countries who asked for asylum after crossing the border illegally.
Last week, U.S. officials announced that the program is also now operational at the port of entry between Calexico and Mexicali. According to the officials, 240 migrants had been returned through the program through March 12.
Court hearings also began last week for those enrolled in the program. So far, eight returnees have told judges that they are afraid to go back to Mexico.
A woman who had her first hearing on Thursday told Immigration Judge Scott Simpson that she wanted to come back as soon as possible because she was scared of spending more time in Mexico.
“I have problems being in Mexico,” she said. “I was kidnapped, and I was going through a very difficult time.”
“You were kidnapped in Mexico?” Simpson repeated.
“Yes,” the woman said.
Simpson asked the government attorney what would happen to her, and the attorney assured him that the woman would be referred to an asylum officer for further questioning.
Those who said they were afraid to go back were held in custody at the port of entry overnight before their interviews were conducted, according to Ian Philabaum from Innovation Law Lab, an organization that has been working with several asylum seekers in a class-action lawsuit over the legality of the Remain in Mexico program. Philabaum had not yet heard whether any of them had received decisions about where they would be released.
Philabaum said that many of the asylum seekers told him that they felt intimidated during their initial conversations with CBP officers. Several who spoke to the Union-Tribune described the officers’ behavior as “rude” and said they felt nervous while they were questioned.
Carolina Martin Ramos, an immigration attorney and former asylum officer, said she’d also observed issues with CBP’s questioning when she recently worked in Guatemala supporting deported parents who were separated from their children at the border by the Trump administration. From her interviews, she said it seemed as though CBP officers had started doing “mini asylum interviews.”
Sometimes the officer would tell the migrants that they didn’t have valid claims, she said.
“That wasn’t for them to determine,” Martin Ramos said.
Similar lines of questioning appear in many of the CBP documents obtained by the Union-Tribune.
“Have you or your children ever been persecuted because of your political party, religion, race, nationality, or participation in a particular social group?” an officer asked one of the MPP returnees, per CBP documents.
Many seeking asylum may not understand what those terms mean, Martin Ramos said. The woman who was asked this particular question told the CBP officer that she had a sixth-grade education.
Other questions to returnees documented by CBP included whether the person received any legal advice prior to asking for asylum.
“Knowing about asylum shouldn’t change the case,” Martin Ramos said. “It sounds like the government is trying to make a case against activists and attorneys who tried to help.”
When asked about the lines of questioning by its officers, CBP said, “Responses may open a line of questioning not readily apparent to a CBP officer and lead to additional questions clarifying the relevance of a prior response. Additionally, prior questions and answers to oral statements are often validated and documented in written format on sworn statements.”
Volunteer attorneys working with Al Otro Lado, a legal services organization in Tijuana, have stood in the El Chaparral plaza every morning for months trying to prepare asylum seekers before they’re taken in to the San Ysidro Port of Entry for processing.
The organization recently filed a complaint with Mexico’s National Commission on Human Rights after Mexican immigration officials blocked access to asylum seekers preparing to enter the port. According to Al Otro Lado, officials threatened volunteers with deportation if they didn’t comply.
“The targeted harassment of volunteers providing humanitarian aid and legal orientation to migrants to asylum seekers trapped in Tijuana is a coordinated effort between the U.S. and Mexican governments to trample the human rights of refugees,” said Nicole Ramos, an attorney with Al Otro Lado. “Unfortunately, most of the names of the migrants murdered in Mexico as a result these policies and shameful practices will never be known.”
Two attorneys with the group recently had their passports flagged and were blocked from entering Mexico, and Ramos appeared on a list of advocates, attorneys and journalists maintained by the U.S. to investigate people who had interacted with the migrant caravan that arrived in Tijuana in November.
A federal judge in Northern California will hear arguments today on a motion for a preliminary block on the Remain in Mexico program brought by several returnees and advocacy groups.
In fiscal 2017, the most recent year with government data available, immigration judges granted asylum in 20 percent of the cases that came before them. They denied asylum in 34 percent of those cases, and the remaining 46 percent of cases were closed without a decision on the asylum merits, according to the Executive Office for Immigration Review.
The agency changed the way that it calculates asylum grant rates in fiscal 2017. Under the previous method, which only looked at cases in which immigration judges made a decision on the asylum merits and is still used by organizations like Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse of Syracuse University, judges granted asylum in 38 percent of cases and denied asylum in 62 percent of cases in fiscal 2017. In fiscal 2018, TRAC’s calculated denial rate rose to 65 percent, meaning 35 percent were granted asylum.
SUMMARY:National outcry over the separation of immigrant families at the U.S. Southern border grows with every new report. Democratic lawmakers have joined protests, and Republicans are increasingly expressing their outrage. On Monday, President Trump again falsely blamed Democrats for his administration's policy. Yamiche Alcindor and Lisa Desjardins join Judy Woodruff for more.
IMHO: My problem with Border Patrol Agents is not their job, but HOW they do their job. They are using the infamous Nuremberg Defense, "I was just following orders."
Excerpt
SUMMARY:The former commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the nation's largest federal law enforcement agency, says it’s not only heartbreaking that migrant children are being torn away from their parents; he’s also worried about how it affects Border Patrol agents. John Yang talks with Gil Kerlikowske.
SUMMARY:President Trump relented on the widely condemned practice of splitting up undocumented families on Wednesday, reversing his decision with the stroke of a pen while seeming openly conflicted about the decision. Instead, his executive order would detain families together, as Congress scrambles to craft long-term fixes. Lisa Desjardins reports.
SUMMARY:U.S. officials have maintained that potential asylum-seekers entering at legal border crossings will not be prosecuted and will be processed in turn. But the process isn't always that easy. In a cross-border report from Juarez [Mexico] and El Paso [U.S.], Amna Nawaz follows a grandmother and granddaughter who are fleeing cartel violence.
SUMMARY: For days, the public has seen images of shelters for the more than 2,300 migrant children who have been separated from their parents by the Trump administration. What do we know about the facilities and the conditions where toddlers and infants are being held? John Yang talks with Martha Mendoza of the Associated Press and Dr. Colleen Kraft President of the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Under contract centers = $Big-Money business. Is that good? Only if they are a non-profit.
SUMMARY:For migrants, many from Central America, the United States represents the opportunity for a better life, and sometimes the escape from mortal danger. Nick Schifrin revisits some NewsHour stories of those who made the difficult decision to risk the treacherous journey, then learns more from Jason Marczak of the Atlantic Council.
SUMMARY: President Trump's decision to sign an executive order stopping the separation of migrant families at the border met with mixed reactions. Advocates are deeply concerned that the order ignores the families who have already been split up, and fear children and parents will never see each other again. The legality of the order is also in question. Lisa Desjardins joins Judy Woodruff for more.
SUMMARY: Judge Robert Brack of the U.S. District Court of New Mexico says he hopes the moral outrage over the separation of migrant families will be the catalyst to fix the immigration system. Amna Nawaz sits down with Brack to discuss what he sees as broken, his own sentencing record and the heartbreak of deporting undocumented immigrants who have made lives in the U.S. for decades.
SUMMARY:Claims of severe physical and psychological abuse of immigrant teenagers at a juvenile detention facility near Staunton, Virginia, has prompted Gov. Ralph Northam to launch an investigation, hours after they were reported by the Associated Press. John Yang talks with the AP’s Michael Beisecker, one of the reporters who broke the story, about the troubling allegations and the child victims.
SUMMARY: While hundreds of migrant children have reportedly been reunited with their parents after being forcibly separated, the complicated and chaotic situation raises doubt and fear for many. John Yang talks with Wendy Young, President of Kids in Need of Defense, and Amna Nawaz, who updates the story of a grandmother and granddaughter who crossed legally to claim asylum, and were separated.
SUMMARY: President Trump’s executive order on Wednesday halts his policy of family separation at the U.S.-Mexico border, but 2,300 children have already been separated from their families since May. Lawyers who are working frantically to track down the children now say that the administration has done little to help reunite families.Washington Post’s Kevin Sieff joins Hari Sreenivasan for more.
I am Retired U.S. Navy (22yrs) and a Vietnam Veteran. After my Navy retirement I was in the computer related industry, now retired. In 2000 I was a registered Republican and voted for George W. Bush. Six months of having Bush in the Whitehouse forced me to re-evaluate my political stance. I had always thought of myself as a Moderate Republican, but was a Republican by "default" NOT because of close examination of the GOP. Due to what has happened in America since 2000, I now consider myself a progressive, and registered as a Non-Affiliated voter.
*Anti-First Amendment policies that attempt to turn America into a theocracy by enshrining ANY religious belief as law.
* Any attempt to suppress human or Constitutional rights.
* Any law or policy that supports discrimination based on religion, ethnicity, race/color, gender, sexual orientation, or any law that does NOT support Equal Treatment under the law.
*Any law or policy that attempts to suppress Freedom of the Press or Free Speech.
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