The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals — which includes Arizona — has reversed a lower court’s decision that green lit refugee processing in the United States.
It’s the latest ruling in a case that began more than a year ago, after a Day 1 executive order enacted by President Donald Trump froze all refugee admissions and the funding attached to them.
Resettlement agencies filed suit on behalf of refugees who were in the final stages of resettlement and blocked from U.S. entry. A district court order sided with them last year and the ban was lifted. Mevlüde Akay Alp is a senior staff attorney with International Refugee Assistance Project, one of the groups filing suit.
“That was an incredible moment for many refugees who were on the verge of being resettled in the United States, because it required the government to re-open refugee processing,” Akay Alp said.
The new ruling reverses that order, she says, leaving over 100,000 new refugees blocked once again. A second portion of the appeals court order requires the Trump administration to keep funding services for refugees already in the United States.
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The ruling comes a day after news broke of the government’s plan to offer legal aid to detained immigrant children through a $150 million contract Burke Law Group — a small Texas-based firm with a co-founder who is a former Trump appointee. -
A notice posted on the Federal Register this week details a $150 million government contract with Burke Law Group to represent unaccompanied immigrant children. A multimillion-dollar contact with nonprofits across the country to do the work expired Friday. -
The Federal Emergency Management Agency is supposed to help people during disasters like floods and fires. But a new report finds the Trump administration diverted FEMA staff at key times to do something very different — help ICE in immigration enforcement. -
The DACA program turned 14 this year. The Obama-era initiative is supposed to give some undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. as children a work permit and temporary protection from deportation. But community members say that’s no longer the case under President Donald Trump. -
Some 20,000 children alone in the US receive legal aid through the contract — part of a federal program established by Congress almost two decades ago. The contract to do that work expires July 31.
