Supreme Court asks whether Obama overreached with immigration program

President Obama announces his expansive executive actions on immigration in 2014. (Photo: Jim Bourg, Pool/AP)

The Supreme Court’s conservatives, led by Chief Justice John Roberts, seemed skeptical Monday of President Obama’s sweeping immigration executive actions that would shield 4.5 million unauthorized immigrants from deportation and make them eligible for work permits.

Two lower courts ruled that the “deferred action” programs were unconstitutional, and prevented them from being implemented pending the Supreme Court’s decision. The court, which lost its conservative firebrand Antonin Scalia in February, has been mostly kind to the president’s legacy — but it’s unclear if his luck will hold out in his final year in office.

In oral arguments in the case, Roberts asked Solicitor General Donald Verrilli to explain whether he believed a president could decide not to deport any immigrants at all. Verrilli said immigration law binds the executive to deport immigrants recently arrived at the border and those who commit crimes, but he stressed that Obama’s program, which is aimed at young unauthorized immigrants and the parents of U.S. citizens, is not that sweeping. “That’s a million miles from where we are now,” Verrilli said.

“It’s 4 million people from where we are now,” interrupted Justice Anthony Kennedy, one of the court’s conservatives who occasionally sides with the liberals. Kennedy added that he thinks the president is setting policy on his own, ignoring the will of Congress. “That’s just upside down,” he protested.

Both Roberts and Kennedy sided with the court’s liberals in the last major immigration case to reach the Supreme Court, over Arizona’s SB 1070 law. They affirmed the executive’s power to pursue its own immigration policies even when it inconveniences states.

But in Monday’s oral argument, both men asked questions that suggested they believe this case is different. If the court rules against the government, it could put in jeopardy Obama’s earlier program that has already protected from deportation 800,000 young unauthorized immigrants who came to the country as children. That deferred action program is not being challenged, but if the court issues a broad ruling, it may undercut its status as well

Mario Gochez of New Jersey joins other supporters of immigration reform in front of the Supreme Court, April 18, 2016. (Photo: Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP)

Verrilli maintained that Texas and 25 other states that joined its claim do not have the legal right, or standing, to sue the federal government. Texas is suing because the state allows people with deferred action status to apply for driver’s licenses. The state estimates it would spend millions of dollars if the estimated 500,000 people in its state who will be legalized under Obama’s programs apply for licenses.

The government says Texas could easily change its law, preventing people on deferred action from getting licenses. But Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito seemed to reject that argument, pointing out the government would probably sue Texas if it blocked immigrants from accessing licenses. Verrilli would not rule out that possibility, but maintained the state still did not have standing.

Justice Stephen Breyer made the most convincing argument for not granting Texas standing — a decision that would allow the eight-person court to dodge a contentious deadlock on a politically charged case. The liberal judge said the Supreme Court had already decided that states and taxpayers may not bring suits against the federal government simply because they do not believe their taxpayer money should be spent on policies they do not agree with. Allowing such suits to continue would make courts the referees in non-Constitutional disputes between states and the feds. “Before you know it, power will be transferred from the president and Congress, where it belongs, to a group of unelected judges,” Breyer said.

It’s unclear whether Breyer’s argument will sway his colleagues. In 2007, the court’s liberals allowed Massachusetts’ residents to sue the Environmental Protection Agency over its failure to enforce carbon emissions rules, which they argued was leading to the erosion of the state’s coastline. Breyer argued that case was different, because it involved the state’s land, not simply its taxpayer funds. At one point on Monday, Roberts said that the loss of the state’s money is “classic” injury, suggesting he may not share Breyer’s hesitation on standing.

It’s not just the fate of millions of immigrants that hang in the balance. If the court strikes down the president’s immigration actions, it will be a reversal of recent trends. “Historically, immigration is an area where the Supreme Court has given the president a whole lot of deference,” said Jeff Rosen, president of the nonprofit National Constitution Center. If the court decides Obama overreached, “that will be a really dramatic holding.”

A decision is expected in June.

Source: https://www.yahoo.com/news/supreme-court-asks-whether-obama-overreached-with-173151507.html

US authorities arrest 21 people involved in visa scam through fake college trap

University of Northern New Jersey was set up to lure criminals who defrauded over 1,000 foreigners, who now face deportation, in ‘pay to stay’ enterprises

 The website for University of Northern New Jersey, a phony university set up by US government to lure criminal who defraud student and exchange visitor program. Photograph: Brendan Mcdermid/Reuters

The US government set up a bogus college called the University of Northern New Jersey as a trap to arrest 21 people on charges they conspired to help more than 1,000 foreigners fraudulently keep or obtain student or work visas over the past 2½ years.

Now those overseas students face being deported from the United States for buying visas, in an alleged immigration scam worth up to $1m.

“They were all willing participants in this sophisticated scheme from the very beginning,” Will Skaggs, a spokesman for the US attorney’s office for New Jersey, said on Wednesday.

Federal agents created the fake University of Northern New Jersey more than two years ago and on Tuesday arrested 21 middlemen who operated from coast to coast running “pay to stay” enterprises that foreign students used to remain in America beyond their allotted legal study time.

The 21 have made initial appearances in court and are expected to be arraigned in federal court in Newark at a later date still to be scheduled, to face charges that include conspiracy to commit visa fraud and conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit.

Those arrested were mostly brokers who recruited foreign students, who were mainly from China and India and knew they were signing up for a university that was fake, according to the authorities, though not that it had been invented by federal agents in order to expose the scam.

The middlemen promised them study visas and visa extensions or foreign worker visas in a system of fees and kickbacks that netted the brokers as much as $1,000 per student, according to the US attorney’s office.

Further, some of the students used the visas issued through the bogus scheme to get jobs at companies such as Apple, Facebook and Morgan Stanley, as well as one who joined the US army, according to a report in the New York Times.

The students will not face further punishment beyond being thrown out of the country. But the middlemen who were arrested face potential maximum punishments of 10 years in prison.

In addition to brokers, the 21 defendants include recruiters and employers, both men and women, from a variety of locations in the states of New York, California, Georgia, Illinois and New Jersey.

Paul Fishman, US attorney for New Jersey, announced the arrests in Newark on Tuesday and said that the government had originally established the facade of the University of Northern New Jersey in September 2013.

He said the sting exposed the type of alleged criminal scheme that threatened not only the legitimate visa system but US national security.

The defendants had not conducted background checks on their student clients, the authorities said, although the individuals would have originally been screened by the government in order to enter the US in the first place.

The Departments of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement conducted the investigation and set up undercover agents to pose as staff at the fake university, which had its own website.

The UNNJ presented itself as a for-profit college located in Cranford, New Jersey.

“They did not even need to solicit anyone, the brokers came to them, bringing in students – who were looking for people to help them stay in the country,” said Skaggs.

The middlemen appeared to have years of experience and are alleged to have facilitated the creation of false student records and diplomas, “which were purchased by their foreign national conspirators for the purpose of deceiving the immigration authorities”, a statement from Fishman’s office said.

“This was not their first rodeo, as it were,” Skaggs said.

Source: http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/apr/06/fake-college-visa-scam-immigration-arrests-university-northern-new-jersey