{"id":22528,"date":"2020-02-19T14:46:30","date_gmt":"2020-02-19T19:46:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/?p=22528"},"modified":"2020-02-19T14:46:33","modified_gmt":"2020-02-19T19:46:33","slug":"border-security-congress-illegal-immigrants-immigrationreform-com","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/2020\/02\/19\/border-security-congress-illegal-immigrants-immigrationreform-com\/","title":{"rendered":"Democrats Queue Up New \u2018Rights\u2019 at Ports of Entry"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Lengthy lines and hours-long waits at America\u2019s ports of entry could grow even longer if Democrats in Congress pass their Access to Counsel Act<\/a>. And that\u2019s just the beginning of the bad news.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Inventing a new right for\nthose seeking entry into the U.S., H.R. 5581 orders that people stopped for secondary\nscreenings have \u201ca meaningful opportunity to consult with counsel and an\ninterested party.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Secondary\ninspections are used at ports of entry to give Customs and Border Protection\n(CBP) officers time for additional screening of suspicious individuals. The\nprocess, conducted away from the main queues, can involve more in-depth\nquestioning, deeper database queries and physical searches. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nvast majority of people admitted to this country are not referred to secondary\ninspections, but annually more than 17 million are. H.R. 5581\u2019s\nright-to-counsel provisions would exponentially increase processing and wait\ntimes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Worse\nstill, logjamming the inspection system could undermine its effectiveness,\njeopardizing national security.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the bill\u2019s sponsor, Rep. Pramila Jayapal<\/a>, D-Wash., and 50 co-sponsors, all Democrats, are moving full speed ahead. They have yet to call experts from CBP or the Department of Homeland Security to testify on the bill\u2019s impact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under\nregulations in effect since 1980, applicants for admission to the U.S. are not\nentitled to representation during inspections unless they become the focus of a\ncriminal investigation and have been taken into custody. H.R. 5581 does not\nprovide government-paid legal services to aliens, but establishes for all\napplicants \u2013 including non-immigrants and lawful permanent residents \u2013 a new\nstatutory right to obtain legal counsel during \u201cremoval, exclusion, deportation\nproceedings, or inspection[s].\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDemocrats understand that it\u2019s a bridge too far to outright repeal the Immigration and Nationality Act provision prohibiting taxpayer-funded counsel during removal proceedings. H.R. 5581 is their way of testing how far they can go,\u201d said Rep. Doug Collins<\/a>, R-Ga., ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

FAIR seconds Collins\u2019s critique and sees\nadditional problems with the bill\u2019s loose wording. Citing one of its sections\non secondary screenings, FAIR\u2019s Preston Huennekens points out, \u201cThere is no real definition of what constitutes the \u2018briefest term\nand least restrictive conditions practicable.\u2019\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis could be used to\njustify the release of aliens [into the U.S.],\u201d he observed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That appears to be the\nbottom line in Jayapal\u2019s bill.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lengthy lines and hours-long waits at America\u2019s ports of entry could grow even longer if Democrats in Congress pass their Access to Counsel Act. And that\u2019s just the beginning of the bad news. Inventing a new right for those seeking entry into the U.S., H.R. 5581 orders that people stopped for secondary screenings have \u201ca<\/p>\n

Read More<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":14524,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[74],"tags":[140,1524,4759,3778],"yst_prominent_words":[7783,1985,4135,3028,2300,5586,3274,3557,3293,7785,6393,1994,6046,3945,2164,2165,7784,7782,2296,1939],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22528"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22528"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22528\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22529,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22528\/revisions\/22529"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22528"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22528"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22528"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=22528"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}