Enforcement

The immigration laws and regulations provide some avenues to apply for lawful status from within the U.S. or to seek relief from deportation.  The eligibility requirements for these benefits and relief can be stringent, and the immigration agencies often adopt overly restrictive interpretations of the requirements.  Learn about advocacy and litigation that has been and can be undertaken to ensure that noncitizens have a fair chance to apply for the benefits and relief for which they are eligible.  

Recent Features

All Enforcement Content

March 30, 2015

The New York Times published a series of maps illustrating the different ways in which states either attempt to welcome immigrants into their communities or go out of their way to make them feel...

March 16, 2015

A class action lawsuit was recently filed by three immigration attorneys and eleven noncitizens challenging U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) nationwide practice of failing to respond to...

March 10, 2015

The Los Angeles Times recently reported that since 2013, more than 7,000 immigrant children have been ordered deported after missing a hearing in immigration court, according to government data....

February 9, 2015

The New York Times details the government’s dangerous and expanding practice of detaining women and children who have recently crossed our southwest border in the magazine’s cover story this...

February 6, 2015

Since the government began “prioritizing” the deportation of unaccompanied children and mothers with children last summer, legal service providers and other court observers across the country have...

February 2, 2015

While some state attorneys general are suing to stop President Obama’s immigration executive actions, many state lawmakers are working to address immigration issues within their own states. New...

January 30, 2015

When the family detention center in Artesia, New Mexico, was hastily propped up by the U.S. government in order to detain and rapidly process women and children for deportation, immigration rights...

October 22, 2014

Each week, in immigration courts across the United States, hundreds of children, some as young as just a few months old, come before immigration judges and are called upon to defend themselves...

October 2, 2014

By Dree Collopy, partner at Benach Ragland LLP. The inhumanity of family detention and the danger of short-changing basic due process protections are on full display in the detention center in...

August 27, 2014

The lawsuit filed last week by the American Immigration Council, the ACLU, the National Immigration Project, and the National Immigration Law Center challenging government deportation policies at...

July 20, 2016
Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson released a statement on plans to make “substantial changes” to the agency’s family detention policies. The following is a statement, in response, from Ben Johnson, Executive Director of the American Immigration Council.
July 19, 2016
A class action lawsuit was filed by three immigration attorneys and eleven noncitizens challenging U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s nationwide practice of failing to timely respond to requests for case information under the Freedom of Information Act.
July 11, 2016

Last month, the Supreme Court announced that, in fall 2016, it will hear arguments in Jennings v. Rodriguez, a challenge to the prolonged detention of noncitizens in removal proceedings. At issue...

July 8, 2016

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Wednesday that the Flores Settlement (a 1997 agreement that set legal standards for the detention and release of immigrant children) applies to both...

July 7, 2016

This week, the Senate defeated cloture on motions to proceed—a motion to begin debate—on two “Sanctuary City” bills sponsored by Senator Pat Toomey (R-PA) and Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX). Both bills...

July 7, 2016
The American Immigration Council and the American Immigration Lawyers Association commented on the decision from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirming that the nearly 20-year-old Flores Settlement Agreement governs the custody and release of all immigrant children, and that the Obama Administration’s family detention practices violate that agreement.
July 6, 2016
he American Immigration Council (Immigration Council), represented by Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP, today filed a lawsuit under the Freedom of Information Act to compel the release of additional documents related to the complaints process at United States Customs and Border Protection.
July 5, 2016

In December 2012, then acting Commissioner of Customs and Border Protection (CBP) David Aguilar had announced a policy restricting his agencies’ officers and agents from acting as interpreters for...

June 30, 2016

A judge in Arizona unsealed photographs central to ongoing litigation challenging deplorable and unconstitutional conditions in Border Patrol’s short-term detention facilities in the Tucson Sector...

June 27, 2016
A federal district court unsealed some of the photographs central to ongoing litigation challenging deplorable and unconstitutional conditions in Border Patrol detention facilities in the agency’s Tucson Sector. The court also allowed the Arizona Republic newspaper to intervene in the case to argue for the release of the documents.

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