Loading tweets...
Trump watch – latest developments in US’ immigration arrangements
Afghan veteran dies in ICE custody
An Afghan man who fought with US forces and was legally evacuated to the US after Kabil fell to the Taliban died within a day of being arrested by federal immigration officers in Texas, according to reports.
The death is at least the 24th in ICE custody since October and the Trump administration is on track for the deadliest year in ICE detention in more than two decades.
Mohammed Nazeer Paktiawal, 41, was preparing to drive his kids to school in the Dallas area on Friday when agents in unmarked vehicles allegedly surrounded him and arrested him in front of his children.
Later that day, the former Afghan soldier contacted family members from ICE custody to say he wasn’t feeling well, the reports said. He was allegedly admitted to a hospital in Dallas and around noon the following day, family members said they were informed he had died.
Shawn Van Diver, president of #AfghanEvac, an advocacy group that’s been in touch with Paktyawal’s family, said in an interview with media that the incident was “Unacceptable”.
“This man fought our war for ten years,” Mr Van Diver said. “He had six kids, one of whom is an American citizen. He was brought here by the United States of America. He’s been working hard in Texas, paying taxes … He was doing everything right.”
Mr Paktiawal had been working at an Afghan bakery and had a pending asylum case, including a completed interview with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, according to #AfghanEvac.
Refugee truck drivers banned in US
About 200,000 migrant and refugee truck drivers in the US are about to lose their commercial driver’s licences under a new edict from the Trump administration.
A new rule from the US Department of Transportation means the drivers’ licences will begin to lapse without the ability for renewal.
The move has raised concerns that logistics costs in the US will be impacted at a time when fuel costs are also rising because of the US and Israel’s war on Iran.
It has also sparked concern in the trucking industry and a legal challenge from immigrant drivers and advocacy groups.
Under the rule, immigrants who are asylum seekers, refugees or recipients of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) will no longer be able to obtain commercial driver’s licences or renew existing ones once their licences expire.
The licences will not be cancelled immediately, but holders face losing their driving rights when their current licences run out.
The Transportation Department adopted the rule after several crashes involving immigrant truckers last summer with Transportation Secretary saying the America had allowed “dangerous foreign drivers” to abuse truck licensing systems.
But advocates say the administration has not shown that the targeted groups are less safe drivers than American citizens.
The Public Citizen Litigation Group, which is leading a lawsuit against the rule, told US media the administration “has conceded that there’s no empirical relationship between a person’s nation of domicile and safety outcomes”.
Somali rocket docket
In recent weeks, immigration lawyers in Minnesota and other states say scores of Somali asylum clients have had their hearings expedited, creating concerns over due process and access to attorneys, a phenomenon colloquially referred to as the “Somali rocket docket.”
Advocates also say that the majority of the hearings have been presided over by out-of-state judges in virtual courtrooms, raising questions about observer access to court proceedings.
During one week in late February one immigration lawyer was reported to have had 23 master calendar hearings, said to be an impossible number for an individual lawyer to handle.
The rapid-fire and unmanageable scheduling of cases is “an unprecedented assault against Somalis,” the lawyer added.
Trump accused of immigration fraud
President Donald Trump has been accused is allegedly prising large sums of money from would-be migrants that he has banned from entering the US.
According to the Cato Institute, an independent think-tank based in Washington, made the allegations and published figures on what it calls “the largest fraud in the history of the US immigration system.”
The not-for-profit group accused President Trump, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and outgoing Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem of charging a conservative estimate of $US1.3 billion to migrants in fees for visa processing and other services they have no intention of providing.
It said the administration is allegedly continuing to impose those costs on prospective immigrants from more than 90 countries despite the fact that they are, as a result of the Trump administration’s policies, effectively “banned from receiving immigrant visas and immigrating permanently to the United States.”
