News Update - September 25, 2010Republicans Defeat Consideration of the DREAM Act; EOIR Allowing 1-800 Court System to Continue to be Accessed Without Additional RequirementsIn an almost straight line party vote on September 21st, the DREAM Act was deferred when Democrats were unable to pass a procedural vote requiring 60 Senate members voting "yes" to consideration of the Defense Authorization Bill to which they wished to attach the DREAM Act. The actual vote was 56 for to 43 against with all Senate Republicans voting "nay" except for the absent Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski, the two Democratic senators from Arkansas, Mark Pryor and Blanche Lincoln switching sides, and Speaker Harry Reid voting against in a procedural move to be able to bring up the legislation again in this Congress when it became clear that he did not have the votes for passage. The Democrats have vowed to bring up the DREAM act again. The Republican attitude towards such a noncontroversial immigration benefit bill should be a wake-up call to those who believe that sitting on the sidelines for the November midterm elections is the best way to express frustration with Washington. It is clear that the Republicans have great energy, an anti-immigrant platform, and will turn out en masse for the elections. On a brighter note, after hearing from so many advocates for keeping the 1-800 court line the same (including this attorney - See our article, "Immigration Court Online 1-800 System to be Severely Restricted to Users - Negative Ramifications for EOIR and Aliens" published in the Immigration Daily, 8/23/10), EOIR withdrew from its plan to require aliens and their advocates to enter the date of the charging document for aliens to go to court in order to access the system, and released an announcement on September 21st that it would resolve its security considerations operationally without the need for additional user requirements. This retrenching of position by EOIR is greatly appreciated by all parties.
† The author is a 30+ year practitioner of immigration law based in New York City. He was awarded the Sidney A. Levine prize for best legal writing at the Cleveland-Marshall College of Law in 1977 and has written extensively on immigration over the past years for the ethnic newspapers, World Journal, Sing Tao, Pakistan Calling, Muhasha and OCS. He has testified as an expert on immigration in civil court proceedings and was recognized by the Taiwan government in 1985 for his work protecting human rights. His article, "The Bush Temporary Worker Proposal and Comparative Pending Legislation: an Analysis" was Interpreter Releases' cover display article at the American Immigration Lawyers Association annual conference in 2004, and his victory in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in a case of first impression nationwide, Firstland International v. INS, successfully challenged INS' policy of over 40 years of revoking approved immigrant visa petitions under a nebulous standard of proof. Its value as precedent, however, was short-lived as it was specifically targeted by the Administration in the Intelligence Reform Act of 2004. ‡ This article © 2010 Alan Lee, Esq.
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Copyright © 2003-2012 Alan Lee,
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