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| Longtime Illegal Residents Lose Battle to Supreme Court |
| 2006-06-22 |
| The Supreme Court on Thursday dealt a blow to some longtime illegal residents, upholding the deportation of a Mexican man who lived in the United States for 20 years. By an 8-1 vote, justices said that Humberto Fernandez-Vargas, who was deported several times from the 1970s to 1981, is subject to a 1996 law Congress passed to streamline the legal process for expelling aliens who have been deported at least once before and returned. After his last deportation in 1981, Fernandez-Vargas returned to the United States, fathered a child, started a trucking company in Utah and eventually married his longtime companion, a U.S. citizen. But by the time he applied for legal status — after his marriage in 2001 — Congress had passed the Illegal Immigration and Immigrant Responsibility Act, which revoked the right to appeal to an immigration judge an order of removal. Fernandez-Vargas was sent back to Mexico in 2004, and wanted to return to his family in the United States. He argued that the 1996 law should not be applied to him because he last entered America more than a decade before Congress passed the statute. "Fernandez-Vargas continued to violate the law by remaining in this country day after day and ... the United States was entitled to bring that continuing violation to an end," Justice David Souter wrote in the decision. |
| Posted by:trailing wife |
| #10 He is a business owner. It is possible that he employs Americans. It is also possible he pays his employess at market rates, and that he has properly paid all federal, state, local and payroll taxes all this time. We've no way of knowing at this point, since the reporter didn't think to ask those questions. But, based on 30+ years of behaviour, he clearly feels entitled to live here, regardless of the will of any Americans he might encounter. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-06-22 23:01 |
| #9 "He is a business owner and he employs Americans." So do the drug lords. Maybe the U.S. should give them a pass as well. |
| Posted by: Fordesque 2006-06-22 21:45 |
| #8 Iblis, I forgot to mention. I totally agree w/the second part of your post - we do need to make it much harder to get in illegally. |
| Posted by: Broadhead6 2006-06-22 20:42 |
| #7 What Frank said. Iblis, what we need to do is make the process of "legal immigration" *better* for those foreigners who have higher education degrees (especially engineers, doctors, etc. &/or those who are willing to serve honorably in our military for at least 5 yrs). I think we have enough low wage earning immigrants coming in all the time. We also do not need to make it *easier*. Easier laws have led to folks bringing in their grandparents who paid very little into our soc/sec & medicare programs but had no problem getting the benefits of them once their kids brought them over. All this from those of us who have been paying into it for years. |
| Posted by: Broadhead6 2006-06-22 20:40 |
| #6 We need to make it easier to come here legally and much, much harder to do so illegally. Then this kind of thing won't happen. |
| Posted by: Iblis 2006-06-22 20:09 |
| #5 wow. A sensible response from our courts. Happy Day. We've entered a new century. The old days privilige status for criminals is over. |
| Posted by: 2b 2006-06-22 19:05 |
| #4 he broke the law repeatedly enttering illegally, knowing the penalty. F*ck him. If he comes in again and gets caught - it's 10 yrs. You think there wouldn't be a trucking company if he wasn't here? How many illegals did he employ or help ship? Who knows? You think he paid for an appeal to the SCOTUS on his own? Jeeesh. |
| Posted by: Frank G 2006-06-22 18:19 |
| #3 He is a business owner and he employs Americans. He is the right kind of person you want immigrating to the US. He was even able to appeal to the Supreme Court because he has a lot of money. I find it hard to look at this in any way other than man vs. bureaucracy, fighting over arbitrary rules, with bureaucracy winning. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2006-06-22 18:00 |
| #2 No. He had his chance and choose to violate our laws. Lifetime ban. Make his 'companion' join him in Mexico. |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2006-06-22 15:07 |
| #1 Get in line. |
| Posted by: DarthVader 2006-06-22 15:00 |