Immigration Bill Hands White House The Leverage On Detention

LOADING ERROR LOADING As Congress debated the Laken Riley Act, a bill mandating stricter detention standards for migrants facing criminal charges, opponents criticized it as a frontal assault on due process and an unfunded mandate of impractical proportions. “I’m not aware of another, similar standing provision that would allow states to undo federal policy in the same way.” Some see the unusual standing provision as a way for Republican-controlled states to contest more permissive immigration policies that a future Democratic president might try to enact one day. The law requires federal courts to expedite those lawsuits “to the greatest extent practicable.” “When you look at how many cases are already pending and how many more people will be funneled into the deportation system, it’s really hard to imagine how much chaos that’s going to cause,” Nathan-Pineau said. The Laken Riley Act’s mandate “to prioritize these frivolous lawsuits that these state AGs are now going to bring” will likely invite legal challenges over the constitutionality of the standing provision, she said. “Congress can give people ways into the courts to sue, but the courts still have an independent duty to assess whether the harm the parties claim happened to them actually meets the constitutional minimum.” Legal groups also may challenge the constitutionality of the Laken Riley Act by contending that such broad mandatory detention standards run afoul of due process.