Liset Fernandez spent most of the summer worried about her father, Luis, after he was held in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) custody for weeks. An immigration judge in Texas granted him release on a $5,000 bond, but when Liset tried to pay it online, a message told her he was ineligible for release. She had to break the news that he would remain detained.
Luis, who came to the US from Ecuador in 1994, had been detained in Livingston, Texas, far from his home in Queens. His daughter, 17, took on extra work to support her mother and younger brother, and his co-workers raised more than $20,000. However, a new Department of Homeland Security (DHS) policy argues that all illegal entrants are ineligible for bond, regardless of their time in the US or flight risk.
In Fernandez's case, DHS used a rarely deployed manoeuvre to automatically stay the judge's bond ruling while it appeals. Federal regulations allow the agency to do so, effectively keeping him detained pending an appeal that could take months. Lawyers say the Trump administration is 'ratcheting up every aspect of the immigration system'.
Suchita Mathur of the American Immigration Council said officials are 'inflicting the maximum punishment on people' as part of an effort to make the process so punitive that people give up. The Justice Department adopted the automatic stay procedure after the 9/11 attacks, but lawyers say it was rarely used until this summer.
An agency official said DHS lawyers have been instructed to appeal every bond grant and automatically stay the ruling, with the threat of firing if they do not. DHS denied this, saying each appeal is based on facts. Federal judges in several states have ruled against the practice, citing due process concerns.
