The Supreme Court yesterday sided with the Trump administration in ruling that an asylum seeker cannot challenge their removal from the U.S., reports Adam Liptak for The New York Times. The 7-2 decision, which held that “a law limiting the role of federal courts in reviewing those decisions was constitutional,” allows the administration to speed up deportation of asylum seekers and will make it harder to question the actions of officials at the border. I spoke to the Christian Broadcasting Network yesterday to explain the implications of this decision, which undermines America’s values by essentially removing the ability to protect those who are fleeing persecution based on their faith, nationality or political affiliation.
Nicole Narea at Vox reports that President Trump received a separate win this week from a D.C. federal appeals court, expanding the administration’s ability to expedite removals. That ruling “gives U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement a green light to sweep communities across the country for unauthorized immigrants and deport them quickly.”
To summarize: The Trump administration has slashed legal immigration, dismantled our asylum system and is moving forward with efforts to quicken the removal of undocumented immigrants, whether or not they pose a public safety threat. See “Aging,” below.
Welcome to Friday’s edition of Noorani’s Notes. Have a story you’d like us to include? Email me at [email protected].
CLOSED DOORS –The Trump administration has issued at least 48 immigration-related policy changes during the COVID-19 pandemic — and the fact that more than half have no expiration date proves he’s merely using the pandemic as an excuse to close America’s doors to the world, writes the editorial board of The Boston Globe. “If presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden wins the election, simply undoing the damage Trump has done to the immigration system will be one of his most urgent and daunting tasks.” And as I said in my conversation with the Globe for this editorial, it’s clear the president is trying to give his voters someone else to blame — immigrants — for what’s happening in their lives, when in fact the enemy is COVID-19. We talked about the impact of these orders more here.

KANSAS CITY – As we noted yesterday, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) said it may need to furlough more than 13,000 employees, or two-thirds of its workforce, beginning in August unless it receives emergency funding from Congress. The impact of those furloughs would be severe for cities like Kansas City, where more than 3,000 people work for USCIS either directly or through a contractor, Steve Vockrodt writes for The Kansas City Star. “What’s worse for these employees is the timing of the furloughs. USCIS said furloughs would begin on Aug. 3. That’s days after federal unemployment benefits, which provide $600 a week on top of what states pay out, are set to expire absent an extension from Congress.”

FAITH & SECURITY – National security and America’s standing in the world are at stake if the Trump administration neglects to protect Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients, writes former Secretary of Defense and Republican Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel in a column for the Omaha World Herald. “[N]early one in three DACA recipients is working in a front-line job that the Department of Homeland Security itself classifies as essential to the critical infrastructure of the nation,” Hagel writes. Meanwhile, Marv Knox and Isa Torres at the Baptist Standard report on a bilingual webinar hosted by the Hispanic Baptist Convention of Texas to discuss what’s next for DACA. Itzayana Aguirre, a health foundation fundraising coordinator and DACA recipient who has lived in the U.S. for 24 years, shared: “I’ve been blessed by a wonderful church, by incredible people who always have supported me. … I want to do that for others. I can do that best by staying here.”
FIRST STEP – Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Florida) yesterday introduced legislation to provide stimulus checks to some families with mixed immigration status under the CARES Act, Adrian Carrasquillo reports for Newsweek. The bill, cosponsored by fellow Republican Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, would amend the CARES Act to make U.S. citizens whose spouses do not have Social Security numbers eligible for stimulus money. “No American should be denied a federal stimulus check because they are married to a foreign national who is not a U.S. citizen,” Rubio told Newsweek. As the Forum said in our statement yesterday, this bill is a critical first step to ensuring all families, regardless of immigration status, get the support they need as we continue to navigate the coronavirus pandemic. But we must ensure that relief for U.S. citizen children does not hinge on the immigration status of their parents. Congress must recognize the contributions of immigrants who are paying taxes, with and without Social Security numbers, who’ve been on the frontlines of the nation’s pandemic response.

AGING – The non-working-age population in the U.S. is growing faster than the working-age population, according to data from Census.gov — a trend that could have drastic implications as the Trump administration seeks to remove more working-age immigrants from the country: “Over the last decade, the growth of the non-working-age (dependent) population — those aged 0 to 14 and 65 and older — has outpaced the growth of the working-age population.” According to the census, the non-working-age population “grew by 13.1 million, a 12.9% increase, while the working-age population increased by a modest 6.4 million or 3.1%.”
Thanks for reading,
Ali