GOP reps introduce bill to stop DOJ allowing judges to consider criminal illegal immigrants' mental health:
House Republicans on Thursday introduced legislation that would stop a Department of Justice move to allow immigration judges to consider the mental health status of an illegal immigrant convicted of an aggravated felony when considering their asylum claim or whether to withhold deportation.
The Asylum Claims Improvement Act, introduced by Rep. Troy Nehls, R-Texas, would block judges from taking the mental health of an illegal immigrant convicted of an aggravated felony when considering their asylum claim or a withholding of removal.
The Immigration and Nationality Act makes illegal immigrants ineligible for both asylum and withholding of removal -- where illegal immigrants are not returned because they have a fear of persecution if returned to their country of origin -- if they have been convicted of a "particularly serious crime" that constitutes a danger to the community.
Attorney General Merrick Garland last month overruled a 2014 decision by the DOJ’s Executive Office for Immigration Review’s Board of Immigration Appeals in which the board found that when judging that seriousness of the crime, "a person’s mental health is not a factor to be considered in a particularly serious crime analysis."
The case before Garland involved a Mexican national convicted in April 2017 of burglary in New Jersey and sentenced to four years in prison. He sought to block his deportation by claiming he would be persecuted because of his sexual orientation and a mental health condition if deported to Mexico. --->READ MORE HERE
Garland Allows Immigration Judges to Consider Mental Health of Convicted Criminals:
Immigration courts will now be allowed to take into account the mental health history of an illegal immigrant convicted of an aggravated felony when considering their asylum claim or whether to withhold their deportation, Attorney General Merrick Garland said Monday.
Garland’s decision overturns a 2014 Board of Immigration Appeals ruling that, when judging the seriousness of the crime, “a person’s mental health is not a factor to be considered in a particularly serious crime analysis.” Judges were not to consider a person’s mental health as not to overrule the decisions of the criminal judge and because mental condition does not relate to the conviction and the facts that make them a danger to the community, Fox News reported.
Yet Garland said Monday: “Going forward, immigration adjudicators may consider a respondent’s mental health in determining whether a respondent, having been convicted by a final judgment of a particularly serious crime, constitutes a danger to the community of the United States.”
The decision comes after Garland asked the board to send him a case for review involving a Mexican national convicted of burglary in New Jersey in 2017. The man, who was sentenced to four years in prison, argued that he should not be deported because he would be persecuted because of his sexual orientation and mental health condition in Mexico.
An immigration judge dismissed the man’s application because the judge did not take the immigrant’s mental health into account. Immigrants who have been convicted of a serious crime that represents a danger to the community are ineligible for asylum and withholding of removal under the Immigration and Nationality Act. --->READ MORE HERE
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