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By: Angelo A. Paparelli and David J. Bier

Seyfarth Synopsis: This is the final installment in a series of recommendations to the Biden Administration on immigration reform previously published by the Cato Institute in “Deregulating Legal Immigration: A Blueprint for Agency Action.”  Read the first, second, third, and fourth installments here.  In total, five installments have been published.

President Biden Should Require Immigration Agencies to Apply the Rule of Lenity to All Decisions

The President should issue an executive order requiring all federal immigration agencies to interpret ambiguous statutes and regulations with leniency in favor of the applicant or petitioner.

Immigration law is commonly referred to as “second only to the Internal Revenue Code in complexity.”[i] It is a convoluted morass of vague and poorly defined terms, making life‐​altering decisions hang on the meaning of unfamiliar and ambiguous terms like “moral turpitude” or subjective analyses about an applicant’s “credibility.”[ii] In the removal context, courts have dealt with this phenomenon by “construing any lingering ambiguities in deportation statutes in favor of the alien.”[iii] The Supreme Court has stated, “since the stakes are considerable for the individual, we will not assume that Congress means to trench on his freedom beyond that which is required by the narrowest of several possible meanings of the words used.”[iv] This interpretative method is referred to as “strict construction” or “the rule of lenity.”[v]
Continue Reading Require Agencies to Apply the Rule of Lenity to All Actions

By: Scott Hecker and Kevin Young

Post originally appeared as a Legal Update on Seyfarth’s News & Insights Page link here. 

Gone are the days when the U.S. DOL’s Wage & Hour Division (“WHD”) invited employers to proactively identify and collaborate with the Division to fix their wage and…
Continue Reading Preparing for WHD’s Less-Carrot-More-Stick Enforcement Approach

By Angelo A. Paparelli and Tieranny L. Cutler

At the urging of President Biden, two members of Congress – Senator Robert Menendez and Representative Linda Sanchez – introduced companion 353-page bills last month in the Senate and the House entitled the “U.S. Citizenship Act of 2021.”

Presented as a comprehensive modernization of our nation’s long outdated immigration laws, this proposed legislation – uniformly lauded by Democrats and opposed by Republicans – features many provisions that U.S. employers may welcome, including, as this White House Fact Sheet details, a path to legal status, employment authorization, and eventually, American citizenship, for some 11 million undocumented noncitizens; relief for Dreamers, persons in Temporary Protected Status, and immigrant farmworkers; and improvements to the legal, employment-based immigration system.
Continue Reading Beware the Employer Risks Nesting in President Biden’s Comprehensive Immigration Reform Bill

Seyfarth Synopsis: The Supreme Court allows DACA to proceed on the grounds that DHS did not meet the regulatory Administrative Procedures Act requirements in rescinding the program. The Court did not rule on the legality of the DACA program itself.

In the Supreme Court’s June 18th decision on Department of Homeland Security v. Regents of the University of California,  the Court rejected an attempt to dismantle the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program on the grounds that the Administration failed to abide by regulatory procedures.
Continue Reading A Win for Dreamers: Supreme Court Rejects Bid to end DACA

By: Randy Johnson and Scott Mallery

President Signs Coronavirus Legislation. Wednesday night, the President signed the “Families First Coronavirus Response Act” (H.R. 6201), which will require employers with less than 500 employees to provide two weeks of paid sick leave for six itemized categories of leave related to…
Continue Reading Seyfarth Policy Matters Newsletter – March 19, 2020

By: Randy Johnson and Walt Mullon

Senate Returns to Work. On Wednesday, the Senate returned from its nearly two-week recess to resume its rare August work period. The chamber has two more federal appeals court judges teed up for confirmation and could also consider a third spending package this week. These come on top of a record-breaking string of confirmations, as there have been 24 appellate judges confirmed by the Senate since President Trump was sworn in, the highest number for a president’s first two years in office. There are currently 13 remaining vacancies on the U.S. Court of Appeals.Continue Reading Seyfarth Shaw Policy Matters Newsletter – August 16, 2018

By: Randy Johnson and Walt Mullon

Rubio Introduces Paid Family Leave Bill. Earlier today, Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) unveiled new legislation aiming to provide paid family leave for new parents. The Economic Security for New Parents Act would allow parents to draw up to six months of early payments from their Social Security benefits. In return for receiving Social Security payments early, parents would defer their retirement benefits for three to six months, or the amount of time necessary to offset the cost of their parental benefits. The proposed legislation includes a 3-year sunset provision, meaning the program would expire if Congress didn’t renew it. The bill has already come under fire from Democrats claiming that the legislation does not go far enough to help working families while also placing additional strain on the Social Security system.Continue Reading Seyfarth Shaw Policy Matters Newsletter – August 2, 2018

By: Randy Johnson and Walt Mullon

OFCCP Director to Step Down. Earlier today, reports surfaced that the Director of the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP), Ondray Harris, would be stepping down from the role at the end of this week. Harris lasted less than 8 months on the job after being appointed to the position last December. Craig Leen, the deputy director at OFCCP, will serve as director on an acting basis. Leen is expected to continue the agency’s recent “business-friendly” approach when analyzing the pay practices of federal contractors as well as the office’s increased focus on apprenticeships.Continue Reading Seyfarth Shaw Policy Matters Newsletter – July 26, 2018

By: Randy Johnson and Walt Mullon

President Trump Signs Executive Order on Workforce Training. Earlier today, President Trump signed an executive order which aims to bolster vocational training, creates a national council for American workers, and establishes a workforce policy advisory board in a push to increase the number of skilled workers in the U.S. Alongside business executives, the President introduced the “Pledge to America’s Workers,” which commits employers to expanding on-the-job training and apprenticeships. The administration expects the pledge to lead to at least 500,000 new career opportunities for students and workers. Earlier this week, Ivanka Trump penned an op-ed in support of the new initiative, declaring that the administration hopes to “create a workforce culture that fosters and prioritizes life-long learning.”Continue Reading Seyfarth Shaw Policy Matters Newsletter – July 19, 2018

By: Randy Johnson and Walt Mullon

Trump Taps Brett Kavanaugh for Supreme Court Vacancy. On Monday evening, President Trump nominated D.C. Circuit Judge Brett Kavanaugh to replace retiring Justice Anthony Kennedy on the Supreme Court. Judge Kavanaugh is considered a reliable member of the Republican legal establishment with a solid record on issues from free speech, to religious liberty, to the Second Amendment. His credentials include clerking with Justice Anthony Kennedy, working for Kenneth Starr’s Whitewater investigation, and spending six years in the George W. Bush White House as a lawyer and eventually staff secretary to the president.

In his 12 years on the D.C. Circuit, Kavanaugh has cast dozens of votes to roll back rules and regulations. He has often concluded that agencies stretched their power too far and frequently found himself at odds with the Obama administration, including in dissents he wrote opposing net-neutrality rules and greenhouse-gas restrictions.Continue Reading Seyfarth Shaw Policy Matters Newsletter – July 12, 2018