The U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) has recently published a delayed update of the poverty guidelines for the remainder of 2010.  The poverty guidelines are usually published every year in late January or early February. The reason for the delayed update of this year’s poverty guidelines was due to legislation enacted in late 2009 and [...]

The New York Times reported yesterday that while the U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement (USICE) has been deporting record numbers of criminal aliens, the agency has been less focused on deporting undocumented immigrant students that were brought to the U.S. by their parents when they were children. In cases where immigrant students were identified and apprehended by immigration officials, the students were released from USICE custody and their [...]

The New York Times reported yesterday that Texas Appleseed, a public interest law center and Akin Gump, a corporate law firm co-wrote a report that is scheduled to be released today concerning the due process rights of disabled immigrant detainees facing deportation. The report shows that the detainees, mostly from New York and other areas in the northeast, even some from mental [...]

The Houson Chronicle reported that siblings Emilio and Analia Maya, are facing deportation after working as confidential informants (CI’s) for the U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement (USICE). The siblings came from Argentina in the late 1990′s and settled in Saugerties, NY.  A small town in upstate New York by the Catskill Mountains.  Over the years, the pair worked blue collar jobs [...]

The Los Angeles Times reported today that dozens of foreign national confidential informants (CI) who have helped federal law enforcement agencies such as the U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), have said that they have been led to believe that federal agencies would help them get permanent residence (green cards) in exchange for their cooperation in undercover investigations, [...]

Mr. Jack Townsend, a tax attorney from Houston, TX who has written numerous articles about federal tax crimes, reported today that the The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 2 days ago that Tax Perjury is a deportable offense.  That ruling was made in the case of Kawashima v. Holder, F.3d., (9th Cir. 2010). According to Mr. Townsend’s article, the Court ruled [...]

The Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) ruled recently and as a result clarified in the case of Matter of Martinez-Serrano, 25 I&N Dec. 151 (BIA 2009) that a conviction for Alien Smuggling is not necessary for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to charge a foreign national with a ground of deportability under section 237(a)(1)(E)(i) – (Alien [...]

The Orlando Sentinel reported today that agents from the U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement  (USICE) arrested 286 people in California  in a 3 day operation to apprehend suspected immigrants with criminal records and, undocumented immigrants without criminal records in California. This enforcement action was conducted by the USICE’s Fugitive Operations Program, which is responsible for identifying, apprehending, and deporting criminal aliens and immigration fugitives who have [...]

Human Rights Watch (HRW) headquartered in New York City, reported recently that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (USICE) has been increasing their practice of transferring immigrants facing deportation to remote detention centers thus hampering their ability to defend themselves against deportation. Human Rights Watch published an 88 page report titled, “Locked Up Far Away: The Transfer of Immigrants to Remote Detention Centers in [...]

The Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) ruled yesterday in Matter of Portillo-Gutierrez, 25 I&N, Dec. 148 (BIA 2009) that a step-child who meets the definition of a child under the immigration laws, is a qualifying relative for establishing exceptional and extremely unusual hardship for the purposes of cancellation of removal as a defense from deportation. The Immigration Judge who heard Mr. [...]