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Publicly Charged: A Critical Examination of Immigrant Public Benefit Restrictions
Full text linkSince the early days of the Trump Administration, reports of the President’s controversial and dramatic immigration policies have dominated the news. Yet, despite the intensity of this coverage, an immigration policy with far broader implications for millions of immigrants and their U.S.- citizen family members has dodged the same media glare. By expanding the definition of who constitutes a “public charge” under immigration law, the Administration has begun a process to restrict legal immigration and chill the use of welfare benefits around the country. The doctrine of public charge exclusion developed from colonial times and has reemerged in Trump Administration policies as a means to curtail legal immigration through executive action. While other commentators have questioned the racial implications of welfare reform as they affect Black families, the discriminatory animus behind efforts to kick immigrant families off the rolls has yet to be explored. Drawing on critical examinations of welfare reform that locate race-conscious motivations in the figure of the “welfare queen,” the Article examines the rhetorical appeal of the “anchor baby.” By questioning the legitimacy of these children’s birthright citizenship and their use of benefits, proponents of immigration restriction reveal that their exclusionary policies are motivated less by concerns of immigration or economic status and more by fears of racial difference. When viewed in the context of political and demographic historical trends, the public charge doctrine emerges as a facially neutral pretext for legal discrimination that must be left firmly in the past
Book Review of Clamouring for Legal Protection: What the Great Books Teach Us About People Fleeing from Persecution
Full text linkPublicly Charged: A Critical Examination of Immigration Public Benefit Restrictions
Full text linkSince the early days of the Trump Administration, reports of the President’s controversial and dramatic immigration policies have dominated the news. Yet, despite the intensity of this coverage, an immigration policy with far broader implications for millions of immigrants and their U.S.citizen family members has dodged the same media glare. By expanding the definition of who constitutes a “public charge” under immigration law, the Administration has begun a process to restrict legal immigration and chill the use of welfare benefits around the country. The doctrine of public charge exclusion developed from colonial times and has reemerged in Trump Administration policies as a means to curtail legal immigration through executive action. While other commentators have questioned the racial implications of welfare reform as they affect Black families, the discriminatory animus behind efforts to kick immigrant families off the rolls has yet to be explored. Drawing on critical examinations of welfare reform that locate raceconscious motivations in the figure of the “welfare queen,” the Article examines the rhetorical appeal of the “anchor baby.” By questioning the legitimacy of these children’s birthright citizenship and their use of benefits, proponents of immigration restriction reveal that their exclusionary policies are motivated less by concerns of immigration or economic status and more by fears of racial difference. When viewed in the context of political and demographic historical trends, the public charge doctrine emerges as a facially neutral pretext for legal discrimination that must be left firmly in the past
Plenary Power: Teaching The Immigration Law Of The Territories
Full text linkImmigration law dominates national headlines and policy debates while immigrant communities struggle to secure legal representation. Law students are increasingly aware of these issues, often bringing lived experiences of the immigration system into the classroom. As immigration law professors seek to engage these students with doctrinal and clinical coursework, they often struggle to incorporate policy priorities and executive actions that shift with the political winds. In this tumult, many immigration law professors fail to realize that there is an entire body of U.S. immigration law they are not teaching-the immigration law of the U.S. territories. Indeed, many professors may not know that two of the five territories are not even subject to U.S. immigration law. Yet, the operation of immigration law in American Samoa, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands offers a wealth of examples that reinforce existing themes and concepts in immigration law. This essay lays forward some of the central concepts taught in immigration legal doctrine and describes the immigration systems of the U.S. territories, including those that are exempt from federal immigration law. It then ties the legal principles at play in each system, including the central concept of the federal political branches\u27 plenary power over the territories and noncitizens alike, to topics presently taught in immigration law coursework
Plenary Power: Teaching The Immigration Law Of The Territories
No full textImmigration law dominates national headlines and policy debates while immigrant communities struggle to secure legal representation. Law students are increasingly aware of these issues, often bringing lived experiences of the immigration system into the classroom. As immigration law professors seek to engage these students with doctrinal and clinical coursework, they often struggle to incorporate policy priorities and executive actions that shift with the political winds. In this tumult, many immigration law professors fail to realize that there is an entire body of U.S. immigration law they are not teaching-the immigration law of the U.S. territories. Indeed, many professors may not know that two of the five territories are not even subject to U.S. immigration law. Yet, the operation of immigration law in American Samoa, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands offers a wealth of examples that reinforce existing themes and concepts in immigration law. This essay lays forward some of the central concepts taught in immigration legal doctrine and describes the immigration systems of the U.S. territories, including those that are exempt from federal immigration law. It then ties the legal principles at play in each system, including the central concept of the federal political branches\u27 plenary power over the territories and noncitizens alike, to topics presently taught in immigration law coursework
Imperialist Immigration Reform
No full textFor decades, one of the most challenging domestic policy matters has been immigration reform. Dogged by controversial notions of what makes for a “desirable” immigrant and debates about enforcement and amnesty, elected officials have largely given up on achieving comprehensive, bipartisan immigration solutions. The lack of federal action has led to an outdated and impractical legal framework, with state and local lawmakers unable to step into the breach. Well over 100 years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court firmly stated that regulation of the U.S. immigration system is within the sole constitutional authority of the federal government.
Yet there is one place within the United States that has embraced an alternative. Though it has been under the control of the federal government for nearly eighty years, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) remains exempt from federal immigration law. As a territory of the United States, the CNMI has controlled its own system of immigration with little federal interference. At the time of this writing, Congress has approved a transition period further delaying the application of federal immigration law in the CNMI until 2029. This extension was made possible through bipartisan legislation signed into law by President Donald J. Trump in 2018. Not only did President Trump sign legislation giving continued federal employment authorization to the CNMI’s otherwise undocumented workers, but, in 2019, President Trump also approved a bill to give permanent resident status to over 1,000 individuals facing deportation from the CNMI. Both actions fly in the face of President Trump’s domestic immigration policy.
This Essay argues that this imperialist immigration reform reveals as much about immigration policy in the CNMI as it does about what is not happening in the rest of the United States. Numerous scholars have pointed to the racist roots of U.S. immigration policy typified by the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act. I suggest that the parallel system of immigration in the CNMI is the exception that proves the rule of racism in U.S. immigration law. The population of the CNMI is overwhelmingly Asian and Pacific Islander, with a white population making up less than 2 percent of the total. By looking at demographics, history, and constitutional law, including the law governing U.S. territories in the Insular Cases, I argue that the immigration policy of the CNMI demonstrates the federal government’s alternative approach when protection of “white spaces” is taken out of the legislative equation
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Publicly Charged: A Critical Examination of Immigrant Public Benefit Restrictions
No full textSince the early days of the Trump Administration, reports of the President’s controversial and dramatic immigration policies have dominated the news. Yet, despite the intensity of this coverage, an immigration policy with far broader implications for millions of immigrants and their U.S.- citizen family members has dodged the same media glare. By expanding the definition of who constitutes a “public charge” under immigration law, the Administration has begun a process to restrict legal immigration and chill the use of welfare benefits around the country. The doctrine of public charge exclusion developed from colonial times and has reemerged in Trump Administration policies as a means to curtail legal immigration through executive action. While other commentators have questioned the racial implications of welfare reform as they affect Black families, the discriminatory animus behind efforts to kick immigrant families off the rolls has yet to be explored. Drawing on critical examinations of welfare reform that locate race-conscious motivations in the figure of the “welfare queen,” the Article examines the rhetorical appeal of the “anchor baby.” By questioning the legitimacy of these children’s birthright citizenship and their use of benefits, proponents of immigration restriction reveal that their exclusionary policies are motivated less by concerns of immigration or economic status and more by fears of racial difference. When viewed in the context of political and demographic historical trends, the public charge doctrine emerges as a facially neutral pretext for legal discrimination that must be left firmly in the past
Imperialist Immigration Reform
Full text linkFor decades, one of the most challenging domestic policy matters has been immigration reform. Dogged by controversial notions of what makes for a “desirable” immigrant and debates about enforcement and amnesty, elected officials have largely given up on achieving comprehensive, bipartisan immigration solutions. The lack of federal action has led to an outdated and impractical legal framework, with state and local lawmakers unable to step into the breach. Well over 100 years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court firmly stated that regulation of the U.S. immigration system is within the sole constitutional authority of the federal government.
Yet there is one place within the United States that has embraced an alternative. Though it has been under the control of the federal government for nearly eighty years, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) remains exempt from federal immigration law. As a territory of the United States, the CNMI has controlled its own system of immigration with little federal interference. At the time of this writing, Congress has approved a transition period further delaying the application of federal immigration law in the CNMI until 2029. This extension was made possible through bipartisan legislation signed into law by President Donald J. Trump in 2018. Not only did President Trump sign legislation giving continued federal employment authorization to the CNMI’s otherwise undocumented workers, but, in 2019, President Trump also approved a bill to give permanent resident status to over 1,000 individuals facing deportation from the CNMI. Both actions fly in the face of President Trump’s domestic immigration policy.
This Essay argues that this imperialist immigration reform reveals as much about immigration policy in the CNMI as it does about what is not happening in the rest of the United States. Numerous scholars have pointed to the racist roots of U.S. immigration policy typified by the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act. I suggest that the parallel system of immigration in the CNMI is the exception that proves the rule of racism in U.S. immigration law. The population of the CNMI is overwhelmingly Asian and Pacific Islander, with a white population making up less than 2 percent of the total. By looking at demographics, history, and constitutional law, including the law governing U.S. territories in the Insular Cases, I argue that the immigration policy of the CNMI demonstrates the federal government’s alternative approach when protection of “white spaces” is taken out of the legislative equation
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2017 Symposium Discussion: The Life of an Immigration Attorney
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