Groups Sue Trump Administration Over Stripping Bond Eligibility for Millions of Immigrants

Immigrants’ rights advocates filed a class action lawsuit against the Trump administration, seeking to strike down a new policy enacted by ICE ending bond eligibility for immigrants currently detained by the agency.

If the new policy – issued on July 8^th – is to continue, tens of thousands of immigrants would be jailed indefinitely while their immigration cases are considered for months or years on end. The new policy takes away immigrants’ ability to seek release on bond, regardless of whether they have been living in the United States for years, and regardless of whether they have any criminal record.

This filing amends an existing habeas petition filed on behalf of plaintiffs unlawfully detained in the Adelanto ICE Processing Center in southern California, who were denied consideration for bond by ICE and immigration judges in the Adelanto Immigration Court. The district court issued an order yesterday requiring that they be granted a bond hearing within 7 days. The plaintiffs now seek to represent a nationwide class of individuals subject to the ICE policy, as well as a class of individuals denied bond hearings by the Adelanto Immigration Court. The plaintiffs and proposed classes are represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California, the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project, and attorneys Niels Frenzen and Jean Reisz.

“This detention policy blatantly violates the immigration laws that have been in effect for almost thirty years,” said Matt Adams, legal director for Northwest Immigrant Rights Project. “Our clients are standing up on behalf of themselves and thousands of others like them, who have lived in this country with their families for years, and are entitled to individual custody determinations.”

“The Constitution guarantees all persons within the boundaries of the United States rights to equal due process under the law, full stop,” said Michael Tan, deputy director of the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project. “The Trump Administration seeks to rewrite our Constitutional bedrock, denying millions of immigrants in cruel detention facilities the ability to seek bond. With one memo, ICE hopes to keep people away from their families for months – or even years – before their cases are even heard.”

The advocates challenge the government’s attempt to override the immigration laws and regulations, which provide the right to request release on bond, deny fundamental rights to due process, and arbitrarily reverse decades of policy and practice of providing bond hearings. Noncitizens present within the United States have Constitutional rights, and the Due Process Clause applies to all “persons” within the United States, including undocumented immigrants. Denying eligibility to bail for these detainees and depriving them of a hearing to determine whether they are a flight risk or danger to others, violate these same rights.

“Indefinitely detaining people—especially but not exclusively those who have lived in this country for many years—is not only cruel, it’s against the law,” said Eva Bitrán, director of immigrants’ rights and senior staff attorney at the ACLU Foundation of Southern California. “This case seeks to vindicate the principle that people in our government’s custody deserve an opportunity to be heard about whether their continued detention is lawful.”

According to the complaint, ICE has adopted the position that noncitizens who entered the United States without admission are ineligible for immigration court bond hearings, despite federal courts’ continued rulings that immigration laws and the Constitution provide for such hearings.

“The Government’s no bond policy is a new component of the Administration’s mass immigration enforcement practice which is unlawful under the immigration laws and the constitution and, if not stopped, will result in thousands of additional people being detained in for-profit immigration prisons for extended periods of time,” said co-counsels Niels W. Frenzen and Jean Reisz.

The complaint is here.

The press release can be read here.