2/28/20

By Josh Rubin

Let’s piece together the day. Its dramatic events began with a stunning ruling by a three-judge panel on the Ninth Circuit, one that lifted a stay on an injunction against MPP, Remain in Mexico. This was news that generated a lot of hope in the immigrants rights community, and among those in the the belly of the MPP beast itself.

So much hope in fact that over the course of the afternoon, more and more asylum seekers came to the bridges, some on the advice of counsel, and asked to pass into the United States, claiming that the laws that had held them in the squalid encampment of Matamoros, for one, were no longer in effect.

Many of us speculated about how this would all play out. Would those who had attended court today, and still with their feet in US territory, be released, or at least put on the road to release, to parole and placement with sponsor relatives? Or would detention lie ahead, for not only those still in the US but those in the migrant encampment?

How would US authorities respond?

Few of us asked how Mexican authorities would respond, perhaps still lulled into the belief that Mexico is a passive partner in this collection of persecutions dreamed up by Stephen Miller and his ilk. But we should have asked.

While the CBP seemed to bumble through its first few hours confronting this new reality, remaining impassive and stony in the face of asylum seekers’ and their lawyers’ demands on the bridge, the INM sent an official to demand they they get off the bridge, recording the faces of those who ignored him.

Meantime, the CBP started clumsily with a show of some officers in riot gear. Still, families remained, and in fact the lines grew. CBP, after a while, staged a drill, in gear, advancing with harrowing shouts in unison. And still the lines did not shrink.

Then it was Mexico’s turn. And they did not stint. Word was passed that Mexico was deploying the Marines. Now, some of you may not know that the Mexican Marines are the group with the reputation of being the most brutal force in the country, particularly in the handling of dissenters and migrants. Read: deadly.

And that, with a statement from the Port of Entry PR man, that nothing was going to move tonight, might have dampened the day’s promise, finally.

There are more discouraging words to come. Because, finally, a statement comes from Homeland Security, and it sharply attacks the Ninth Circuit ruling in a statement. But it is the tone of some of it given on background and then leaked, that seems to suggest that the response to the court ruling will be anything but compliant. In fact, it suggests that the response of this agency of persecution will be to drop all pretense of legal procedure (and indeed pretense is all it ever was) and just plain turn back people at the border, without even a nod to international norms for treatment of asylum seekers.

In short, they will do anything to keep from releasing these families. Anything.

Leaked to us, read it below.

And weep.

And UPDATE: The Ninth Circuit backs down, gives the government one more chance to make their case.