The deadline is this coming Monday, December 10, 2018 for leaving Comments on the Department of Security's proposed re-write of rules surrounding "who is likely to become a public charge" because they are "likely to receive public benefits" and should, the DHS says, be excluded from living in the United States. Because the deadline of December 10 is approaching, this article will be published as widely as possible including both on Claims and Issues Blog at https://claimsissues.typepad.com/ and Claims and Bad Faith Law Blog at https://insuranceclaimsbadfaith.typepad.com/.
At the end of a week of leaving Comments, and following weeks of reading and researching 183 pages of DHS statements about its proposed "Public Charge" rules changes to exclude immigrants, I have come away with many definite impressions. One of them is that the proposed rules changes and what the DHS says about them are really a manual for customs agents.
The DHS says that they wanted to "clarify" and standardize immigration determinations of who should be excluded from the U.S. because a person is likely to become a public charge if she or he is admitted, but that is not what these proposed changes do. They make it much more complicated for customs agents and officers at the border to do their job if they admit people into the United States but easier if they default to excluding them.
All because the DHS equates "likely to become a public charge" with "likely to receive public benefits." The DHS has invented many formulas which would have confused Einstein, let alone be confusing to officers at the border. Here are the 183 pages of what DHS says about its proposed "Public Charge" changes: Download DHS Proposed Public Charge Rule.101018..
It turns out that a manual is exactly what is being provided to other Federal bureaucracies including the State Department back in January. I found this out in November from reporting about a lawsuit filed by the City of Baltimore in Federal Court:
The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, challenges a change to the State Department’s Foreign Affairs Manual that took effect in January. The shift tells State Department workers evaluating visa applications abroad to consider whether applicants, their families or their sponsors have used a public benefit in the United States or might in the future.
Rewriting manuals and statutes. Changing rules and regulations. What is happening may sometimes appear in the light but it is done in the dark.
Lawsuits. Comments. We should not go quietly into their darkness.
There is no such thing as a free lunch, as they say.
It is December 7th. Remember Pearl Harbor!
Leave your Comments on the changes through the preferred submission Federal eRulemaking Portal: www.regulations.gov. The federal government has assigned the following numbers to these proposed rules changes to identify your Comments on these particular rules: DHS Docket No. USCIS-2010-0012; RIN 1615-AA22.
Please Read The Disclaimer. ©2018 Dennis J. Wall. All Rights Reserved.
Comments