reichlinmelnick.bsky.social
Senior Fellow at the American Immigration Council. Commenting generally on immigration law and policy. Retweets =/= endorsements, views are my own.
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For that you want the other quick reference chart.
www.ilrc.org/resources/ac...
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Suffice to say that throughout history, nations have grappled with what to do with the children of soldiers born abroad, and created rules around legitimizing them which have changed over time.
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“The child of a citizen is a citizen” is not really right. US citizenship is derived two ways; by land (born here) or by blood (through parentage). Only the former is basically unconditional. The latter is subject to restrictions.
The rules on derivation of citizenship can be… complicated.
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An article on the incident is here: www.christianitytoday.com/2025/06/ice-...
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That said, it's possible that during Operation Wetback, the monthly arrest total exceeded 35,000.
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On your question as to whether this is in fact a record, we know that ICE administrative arrests peaked at 322,093 in FY 2011, which would average to 26,841 arrests a month. Given that, I think we can say with some degree of confidence that this is indeed a modern record.
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It was Congress that authorized these penalties in the first place, and Clinton who signed the law into effect in 1996.
The 1996 law is arguably the most harsh anti-immigrant law in the last 100 years. bsky.app/profile/medr...
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Interesting flag! Will have to think that one over.
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An example of this already being put into effect.
Many people ordered removed for missing a court hearing could face these fines — even if they didn't know about the hearing because the government failed to provide adequate notice (or they were kids).
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Now that's my fear too. 🙃
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A full link to the interim final rule is here: public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2025-11965.pdf
It will be formally published in the Federal Register tomorrow morning, going into effect immediately.
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There will likely be legal challenges to the regulation, as it has entirely skipped the normal "notice and comment" regulatory process.
It's clear that there was no emergency here; the current process did permit fines, just with more due process than the Trump admin wanted.
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We have already seen the Trump admin begin to use these fees, although it has previously done so on an individual basis.
With this new rule, they could potentially do this to hundreds of thousands of people. But the scale of this operation remains totally unclear. www.cbsnews.com/miami/news/s...
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DHS is now "streamlining" that process to eliminate most of those due process protections:
- No more notice of intent to fine—individual immigration officers can now impose the fine and mail the decision.
- Only 15 business days to file an appeal
- The appeal goes to ICE itself.
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Another reason the fines were not widely imposed is that the regulations required extensive due process.
- DHS had to send a notice of intent to fine
- The person had 30 days to contest the fine
- If the fine was imposed, they could appeal to the Board of Immigration Appeals.
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Despite these fines going on the books in 1996, they have essentially never been enforced.
Why? Immigration enforcement agencies generally preferred to carry out a deportation, rather than try to get blood from a stone and impose exorbitant fines on migrants who can't pay them.
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In 1996, at the height of the "tough on crime" era, Congress authorized INS (now DHS/ICE) to impose civil monetary penalties in three main circumstances:
- Entering unlawfully
- Failure to depart after a deportation order
- Failure to depart after a grant of "voluntary departure."
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I'm*
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Oh man I get this all the time. People thinking because I advocate for immigrants I'm either (1) making money off of repping the undocumented (lol as if) or (2) getting paid big bucks by George Soros.
I have to be like... come on man I turning 38 soon and still renting.
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Yes, and I think the most likely outcome is either a punt or a decision setting a new standard and finding that the injunction in the birthright citizenship cases meets that standard.
This is kind of the single best case in favor of nationwide injunctions, given the stakes.
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Agreed.
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Plaintiffs: We are concerned that the govt may try to remove Abrego over the weekend (if he's released from criminal custody on Friday). You maintain toehold jurisdiction—
Xinis: Then I suggest you speak to his criminal counsel, because I need to rule on whether I have jurisdiction.
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Abrego has a final order of removal w/ withholding of removal to El Salvador. So, he still can't be removed to El Salvador but could likely be removed to a third country.
But government's filings in criminal case have explicitly mentioned removing him to El Salvador, so..
bsky.app/profile/215p...