We’ve been a little busy and haven’t had a newsletter in a minute, but we’ve kept tracking, and a lot has been happening! In this edition, we cover what’s been happening with DACA, Keeping Families Together parole, and all that’s going to happen in New Orleans on October 10. See below and our microsite for recent developments.
New Keeping Families Together (KFT) parole process opened, blocked; Fifth Circuit to hear argument on intervention
On August 19, the KFT parole process opened to allow certain immigrant spouses and stepchildren of U.S. citizens to request parole-in-place (temporary permission to remain in the country), which would make it easier to get green cards that they are already eligible to receive. Texas and fifteen other states filed suit four days later, drawing a Trump-appointed judge who used to represent Texas in this type of case.
The next business day, eleven individuals and the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights (“CHIRLA”), represented by Justice Action Center and Make the Road New York, moved to intervene in the lawsuit as defendants, to help defend the legality of the parole and have the critical perspectives of directly impacted families considered by the court, similar to the reasons for intervention in the case defending the humanitarian parole processes for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans.) On September 3, Judge Campbell Barker denied the intervention motion, and the putative intervenors appealed to the Fifth Circuit the same day.
Intervenors asked the Fifth Circuit to expedite the appeal given the district court schedule; at the time, a hearing or possible bench trial was set for September 18. The Fifth Circuit granted that expedite request, but then later did three things sua sponte (i.e., on its own initiative, without anyone asking): it set oral argument for October 10, stayed (paused) the district court proceedings pending the intervention appeal, and indefinitely extended the district court’s unreasoned “administrative stay” of the KFT process itself (which halted any new grants of KFT parole but permits accepting and processing applications). Intervenors and the federal defendants have since moved the Fifth Circuit to vacate (undo) that extension; their motions remain pending.
DACA case also to be argued at the Fifth Circuit on October 10 in New Orleans
Like the KFT intervention appeal, the second appeal in Texas’s suit to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (“DACA”) will be argued (by MALDEF) on Oct. 10 in New Orleans––in fact, both cases will be in the same courtroom and presumably before the same panel of judges. On appeal is the district court’s decision holding that the Biden Administration’s codification of DACA into a regulation did nothing to alter his prior conclusion that the program is unlawful. For now, the status quo remains the same for the program: those currently with DACA can continue to renew for the time being. Following oral argument, a decision from the Fifth Circuit could come at any time—though it also could take months.
Both oral arguments on October 10th (on the legality of DACA and Keeping Families Together intervention) will be livestreamed and recorded; links to those will be made available at the Fifth Circuit website here.
Kansas goes to North Dakota to keep DACA recipients from getting healthcare
In early August, a Kansas-led group of states filed suit in North Dakota (where they were certain to get Trump-appointed Judge Traynor) to challenge a regulatory action that will go into effect on November 1 clarifying that DACA recipients are eligible to purchase health insurance through Affordable Care Act (ACA) exchanges—just like other deferred action recipients, who have long been eligible. The States claim that letting DACAmented individuals buy health insurance from an exchange conflicts with federal law, and they seek an injunction blocking their eligibility while the case proceeds to final judgment. Meanwhile, three DACA recipients and Maryland-based CASA, represented by the National Immigration Law Center, recently moved to intervene in the case. Judge Traynor has set oral argument on the States’ request for a preliminary injunction for October 15 in Bismarck.
As always, we’ll keep you posted on these and other cases.
Thanks for reading,
Esther Sung
Legal Director
