Last night, the Old Bridge Township Council adopted legislation authorizing the township’s attorney to investigate and take legal action against New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy’s administration challenging the “Immigrant Rights Directive” that limits police cooperation with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and essentially deems New Jersey a sanctuary state. The Council Resolution states that Gov. Murphy and the New Jersey Assembly have enacted regulations and statutes that prevent local municipalities like Old Bridge from…

Apparently, in response to New Jersey’s sanctuary state policies, the Department of Homeland Security (the Department) has increased the number of worksite investigations and inspections. While the Department has not released inspection numbers since December of 2018, reports from those participating in immigration compliance, human resource departments, and other industry leaders indicate that New Jersey could see a nearly 1000% increase in the number of Notices of Form I-9 inspections from the 750% increase in…

I recently presented “EOIR (Removal and Deportation) and Immigration Courts” for the New Jersey Institute of Continuing Legal Education (NJICLE) seminar, “2019 U.S. Immigration Law: Basics & Beyond” hosted by the New Jersey State Bar Association (NJSBA) Immigration Law Section, Labor & Employment Law Section, and International Law and Organizations Special Committee. My presentation addressed what I like to call “CRIMigration.” Here are the top ten frequently asked questions: Who is CRIMigration applicable to? CRIMigration…

Young immigrants in Pennsylvania who were granted protection from deportation under the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program earned $247.6 million in pre-tax income in 2017, according to findings released yesterday by the immigration advocacy group New America Economy. From those earnings, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) collected $22.4 million in federal income taxes and Pennsylvania and its hundreds of municipalities collected a combined $20.7 million in state and local income taxes.…

Last week, the New Jersey Supreme Court updated the Statewide Judicial Policies to conform to New Jersey’s Immigrant Rights Directive. New Jersey Supreme Court Directive 04-79 stops court officials from collecting information about an individual’s immigration status unless it is absolutely necessary. Many of the state’s court forms will be updated to remove immigration-related questions. Additionally, the directive provides statewide rules for what are expected to be “rare instances” in which federal Immigration and Customs…

Between 2015 and the end of 2017, almost 90,000 undocumented immigrants who were deported had children who are U.S. citizens. The numbers for 2018 and this year are not available but are undoubtedly much higher. For many immigrant families, this is their worst fear – what will happen to their children if they are detained or deported? Last June, New York expanded its Standby Guardian law to allow parents to designate ahead of time the…