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Judge on Trial for Aiding Migrant & School Strip Searches for Minor Offenses · Bloomberg Law

0:02
Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Law with June Grosso from Bloomberg Radio.
0:08
Speaker 2: Heads Up dug, Heads Up, Heads Up Douge.
0:14
Speaker 3: A crowd outside the Milwaukee courthouse protested the trial of
0:19
Speaker 3: County Circuit Court Judge Hannadugan on two federal charges for
0:24
Speaker 3: allegedly obstructing an official Department of Homeland Security removal proceeding
0:29
Speaker 3: by helping a migrant evade arrest. It's a first of
0:32
Speaker 3: its kind case testing the limits for a judge interfering
0:36
Speaker 3: in the Trump administration's efforts to deport migrants. Here's Nick Ramos,
0:42
Speaker 3: executive director of Wisconsin Democracy Campaign.
0:46
Speaker 1: We are optimistic because we believed in the Constitution, We
0:51
Speaker 1: believe in the power of solidarity through working people.
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Speaker 2: But we are deeply concerned. We see the chilling effect
0:57
Speaker 2: that occurs when a federal administration attempts to consolidate power
1:02
Speaker 2: and move off impunity.
1:04
Speaker 3: It's unusual, to say the least, for the Department of
1:08
Speaker 3: Justice to prosecute a sitting state judge, But then this
1:11
Speaker 3: same Department of Justice sued the entire bench of federal
1:15
Speaker 3: judges in Maryland. My guest is Leon Fresco, a partner
1:19
Speaker 3: at Honden Knight. He was the former head of the
1:22
Speaker 3: Office of Immigration Litigation during the Obama administration. Leon tell
1:26
Speaker 3: us about the prosecution's case against Judge Dugan Well.
1:30
Speaker 2: The judges on trial for basically impeding and obstructing Ice
1:36
Speaker 2: in ICE's ability to arrest a person that they were
1:40
Speaker 2: looking for at that time who was going through criminal
1:44
Speaker 2: proceedings in the Milwaukee County Court. So this whole trial
1:48
Speaker 2: so far has been trying to determine that what the
1:51
Speaker 2: judge did in terms of letting this individual out through
1:54
Speaker 2: the back door, the jury dort that all of that
1:57
Speaker 2: was irregular, that none of it had ever been done
1:59
Speaker 2: by and that because of that, the judge's intent was
2:03
Speaker 2: clearly to impede Ice from arresting people in the court. Now,
2:08
Speaker 2: the problem is, because there's a trial, it's unclear if
2:12
Speaker 2: the judge will be able to take advantage of a
2:14
Speaker 2: lot of the legal defenses about control over their courtroom
2:18
Speaker 2: and ability to manage their proceedings and Ice interfering with
2:22
Speaker 2: all that. This seems to just now be a trial
2:25
Speaker 2: about whether the judge actually had the intent to block
2:29
Speaker 2: Ice from arresting this individual. And so we'll have to
2:33
Speaker 2: see if basically what the judge is going to try
2:35
Speaker 2: to do is a jur nullification play because the facts
2:39
Speaker 2: and the law are pretty clear here where the facts
2:43
Speaker 2: show that the judge acted in a way the judge
2:45
Speaker 2: had never acted before, and that the judge's intent was
2:49
Speaker 2: to have the individual floor as Ruiz not arrested by ice.
2:53
Speaker 2: So this may just end up being a pure jur
2:56
Speaker 2: nullification claim.
2:58
Speaker 3: Yeah. So the prosecution presented evidence that the judge had
3:02
Speaker 3: told a court reporter, I'll do it, I'll get the heat,
3:05
Speaker 3: and also audio tapes of what happened in the courtroom
3:09
Speaker 3: that day, and you could hear the judge talking to
3:12
Speaker 3: the court staff suggesting the defendant could quote go down
3:16
Speaker 3: the stairs away from the agents.
3:19
Speaker 1: Yeah.
3:19
Speaker 2: Absolutely. If the facts of this case are really what's
3:22
Speaker 2: a trial here and you have sort of what I
3:26
Speaker 2: would call robot jurors who are not trying to look
3:29
Speaker 2: at the whole issue from a three hundred and sixty
3:32
Speaker 2: degree perspective, they would probably find that the judge would
3:36
Speaker 2: be guilty here because the evidence appears to be overwhelming
3:39
Speaker 2: that the judge knew what she was doing was illegal
3:42
Speaker 2: and did it anyway, did not have this individual Eduardo
3:45
Speaker 2: Flores Ruiz arrested by ice. He's subsequently been deported already.
3:50
Speaker 2: But the question is, is the judge, like I said,
3:53
Speaker 2: trying to rely on juror nullification. And we've seen this
3:56
Speaker 2: in other contexts, in other prosecutions with the sign went
4:00
Speaker 2: guy here in DC and then with you know, potentially
4:03
Speaker 2: Jim call me or Latsia James. You know you're seeing
4:06
Speaker 2: juries not wanting to make these convictions, and so maybe
4:09
Speaker 2: this is what the judge is hoping for.
4:11
Speaker 3: Here the fact pattern becomes a little better for the
4:14
Speaker 3: judge because the defense attorney, instead of taking his client
4:19
Speaker 3: out by the stairs, went into the hallway, which was
4:22
Speaker 3: less than twelve feet from the main door to the
4:25
Speaker 3: judges courtroom. And so the judges lawyer said in the
4:28
Speaker 3: opening statements, quote eleven feet ten inches, that's what she's
4:32
Speaker 3: on trial for. So is that sort of a way
4:35
Speaker 3: to give the jury and out correct?
4:38
Speaker 2: That's what they're trying to do, is they're trying to
4:39
Speaker 2: give the jury an ability to say, look, this is
4:43
Speaker 2: all so insignificant. Why are you going to throw someone
4:45
Speaker 2: in prison over this? And you know the subtext which
4:49
Speaker 2: obviously they're not going to be allowed to say, and
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Speaker 2: the court is prison is a place where you keep
4:53
Speaker 2: criminals who are going to endanger you, and so you
4:57
Speaker 2: really want to send this person to prison because there's
5:00
Speaker 2: not any danger to the community from having this judge
5:03
Speaker 2: outside of prison, and so that's what they're leaning for.
5:06
Speaker 2: They're definitely leaning for the journalification angle, and we're just
5:10
Speaker 2: gonna have to wait and see if that's what happens.
5:13
Speaker 3: So these ICE agents are stationed outside the courtroom, sometimes
5:17
Speaker 3: in the courtrooms, I mean, what's wrong with the judge
5:19
Speaker 3: saying go out this way? I don't think these ICE
5:22
Speaker 3: agents should be here.
5:24
Speaker 2: Well, I think the question is this, If the ICE
5:28
Speaker 2: agents are in a place where a warrant is required
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Speaker 2: and they don't have a warrant, then there's absolutely no
5:33
Speaker 2: problem with the judge directing ICE not to arrest people,
5:37
Speaker 2: or saying that ICE is in the wrong location or
5:40
Speaker 2: ICE needs to leave, or helping someone to maintain their
5:45
Speaker 2: rights in a situation where ICE is acting against their
5:48
Speaker 2: rights because ICE doesn't have a warrant. But the problem
5:52
Speaker 2: is here, ICE was trying to detain this individual in
5:55
Speaker 2: a public area where it they didn't need a warrant,
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Speaker 2: and because of that, the judge knew This is the
6:02
Speaker 2: problem with the recordings here. The judge certainly knew that
6:06
Speaker 2: the judge was impeding, and that the judge didn't actually
6:09
Speaker 2: have a great legal argument for why the judge was
6:14
Speaker 2: going to act in the manner to allow this individual
6:17
Speaker 2: to essentially escape the courthouse without Ice. It would have
6:20
Speaker 2: been one thing for the judge to confront Ice and
6:24
Speaker 2: say you're acting illegally and I'm using my authority as
6:28
Speaker 2: the judge to order you to leave the courthouse, et cetera.
6:34
Speaker 2: But the judge didn't do it that way. Perhaps the judge,
6:36
Speaker 2: had she thought it through, might have done it that
6:38
Speaker 2: way is to issue an order and order Ice to
6:41
Speaker 2: go leave and say they're acting illegally, and then they
6:44
Speaker 2: would have been a fight about who had jurisdiction over
6:47
Speaker 2: that courthouse. But that's not what happened here. The judge
6:51
Speaker 2: basically indicates through her speech that she knows she's acting
6:54
Speaker 2: unlawfully and does it anyway.
6:56
Speaker 3: Of course, the defendant does not have to testify the
7:00
Speaker 3: moment right not to you. But is this a case
7:03
Speaker 3: where the jury might say she's a judge, shouldn't we
7:06
Speaker 3: hear from her?
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Speaker 2: Well? I think absolutely this is the kind of case
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Speaker 2: where she doesn't testify, the jury will say, what the
7:13
Speaker 2: heck I mean, she must have had some explanation for
7:16
Speaker 2: doing what she did. We'd want to hear it. But
7:19
Speaker 2: of course they are not allowed to draw that in
7:21
Speaker 2: for into it's just something that human beings do again
7:24
Speaker 2: because they're not AI robots, but they're not allowed to
7:27
Speaker 2: say it anywhere. They're not allowed to actually base a
7:30
Speaker 2: jury decision on the fact that she didn't testify. But sure,
7:34
Speaker 2: I'm sure that I want to say, this is a judge.
7:36
Speaker 2: The judge should be able to explain why she did
7:39
Speaker 2: what she did and why her intent wasn't to evade
7:41
Speaker 2: the ICE agents. So all of that will accrue against
7:45
Speaker 2: her if she doesn't end up testifying. But she just
7:47
Speaker 2: may really be banking on the fact that, look, at
7:50
Speaker 2: the end of the day, I'm in a big city,
7:53
Speaker 2: and there's enough people in a big city who will
7:56
Speaker 2: not want to prosecute a judge and put a judge
8:00
Speaker 2: prison over something like this that I can get one
8:03
Speaker 2: or two holdouts and that'll be the end of the story.
8:05
Speaker 2: And I think, if I was a gambling man, that
8:08
Speaker 2: that's actually pretty likely, even if the facts and the
8:11
Speaker 2: law may not necessarily be on her side. I do
8:13
Speaker 2: think it seems pretty likely to me that you'll get
8:16
Speaker 2: one or two hold out, but just won't want to
8:17
Speaker 2: put this judge in jail.
8:19
Speaker 3: Do you think it makes a difference that the migrant here,
8:22
Speaker 3: Eduardo Flores Ruiz was facing domestic battery charges.
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Speaker 2: I think it doesn't help her, There's no doubt about it.
8:31
Speaker 2: And the other thing that doesn't help is there's nothing
8:34
Speaker 2: that they can sort of put in there that mitigates
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Speaker 2: this individual or says why this individual was sympathetic in
8:41
Speaker 2: any way, shape or form, because none of that evidence
8:43
Speaker 2: would be deemed relevant to the criminal trial issue. So
8:47
Speaker 2: it's definitely not helpful. But to the extent that unfortunately
8:52
Speaker 2: you see this. I mean, the best example I've ever
8:54
Speaker 2: seen of this was the Johnny Depp trial, where the
8:59
Speaker 2: lawyers after lunch would respond to whatever was being made
9:02
Speaker 2: on social media because they would think that the jurors
9:05
Speaker 2: were looking at social media and they wanted to confront
9:08
Speaker 2: whatever was being made. Jurors are these days tending to
9:12
Speaker 2: take matters into their own hands, even if they're not
9:14
Speaker 2: supposed to, and so we'll have to see what they
9:17
Speaker 2: end up finding about this judge and everything else.
9:19
Speaker 3: So let's also talk about immigration judges. Eight immigration judges
9:24
Speaker 3: in New York were recently terminated in one day. A
9:27
Speaker 3: San Francisco judge was fired in the middle of a
9:29
Speaker 3: complicated asylum hearing. Overall, about one hundred judges out of
9:34
Speaker 3: seven hundred have been let go, and many of the
9:39
Speaker 3: cases involved judges with high rates of asylum approvals or
9:43
Speaker 3: even backgrounds representing migrants. Is this legal for them to
9:47
Speaker 3: fire the judges based on that?
9:49
Speaker 2: Well, the court so far have been very deferential to
9:54
Speaker 2: the Department of Justice in terms of their ability to
9:57
Speaker 2: fire these immigration judges. And in fact, there's been this
10:01
Speaker 2: case law about if the president and the Attorney General
10:05
Speaker 2: can't fire someone who's an inferior judge like this, then
10:09
Speaker 2: that judge isn't constitutionally appointed in the first place. So
10:14
Speaker 2: it appears in terms of if you were to take
10:16
Speaker 2: that case law along its logical conclusion, it appears that
10:20
Speaker 2: the firing of these judges is permitted for pretty much
10:23
Speaker 2: any reason, unless it's some discriminatory reason or something else
10:27
Speaker 2: like that. But if it's an ideological thing that that
10:30
Speaker 2: would be permitted. The problem that it's creating is it's
10:34
Speaker 2: taking a lot of experience away from the immigration bench.
10:38
Speaker 2: None of these judges had a one hundred percent approval rate.
10:42
Speaker 2: Many of them had let's say fifty percent approval rating,
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Speaker 2: forty percent, sixty percent, which may have been higher than
10:49
Speaker 2: their other colleagues on the court, but weren't one hundred percent.
10:52
Speaker 2: And the reason why I bring that up is, well,
10:55
Speaker 2: those other forty percent that they were deporting on a
10:57
Speaker 2: particular day now aren't being deported. There's no hearings for
11:01
Speaker 2: these people, and those people will have hearing scheduled one
11:05
Speaker 2: year or two years from now, and sure they may
11:07
Speaker 2: be in front of a new judge that may have
11:10
Speaker 2: a ninety percent refusal rate or a ninety five percent
11:14
Speaker 2: refusal rate, but it may still be a year or
11:16
Speaker 2: two from now. So those are tough sort of choices
11:21
Speaker 2: that the Trump administration is trying to make about short
11:24
Speaker 2: term versus long term. But I mean, you look at
11:27
Speaker 2: their social media advertising and they're saying, please come join
11:31
Speaker 2: the Immigration Court and be a quote unquote deportation judge,
11:35
Speaker 2: which is not their job. Their job is to look
11:38
Speaker 2: for the law and the facts and decide if deportation
11:42
Speaker 2: is the correct remedy or if giving asylum or cancelation
11:46
Speaker 2: of removal or something else is the correct remedy. And
11:49
Speaker 2: so the fact that they're advertising those positions as deportation judges,
11:54
Speaker 2: I don't know if there's going to be a long
11:55
Speaker 2: term negative connotation or inference that come from that, where
12:00
Speaker 2: those decisions that are issued by those judges may not
12:02
Speaker 2: have any force of law, or if an appellate court
12:05
Speaker 2: ends up saying that that judge was predisposed to grant
12:08
Speaker 2: deportation because that's why they were joining the court. So
12:11
Speaker 2: I don't know why that line of social media advertising
12:17
Speaker 2: is there, but nevertheless that's clearly what they're trying to do.
12:20
Speaker 2: There are some members of Congress that are trying to
12:23
Speaker 2: put in some basic standards for these future hires of
12:27
Speaker 2: immigration judges, whether it be a number of years of
12:30
Speaker 2: experience practicing immigration law or a number of years of
12:34
Speaker 2: experience on the bench or anything else. But we'll have
12:38
Speaker 2: to wait and see if any of that can actually
12:39
Speaker 2: get into an appropriations bill. But at the moment, a
12:43
Speaker 2: lot of these hearings, they're basically being done with judges
12:48
Speaker 2: that are not necessarily conversed in immigration law, and that
12:53
Speaker 2: creates its own problems because if they make errors, then
12:57
Speaker 2: you waste years on appeal, and then the bounces back
13:00
Speaker 2: and you've accomplished nothing anyway. So all of those things
13:04
Speaker 2: have to be weighed and considered together.
13:06
Speaker 3: Coming up next, Why the case against Kilmore Abrigo Garcia
13:10
Speaker 3: is starting all over again? This is Bloomberg. The Homeland
13:14
Speaker 3: Security Department has leaned into a recruiting pitch that calls
13:17
Speaker 3: for candidates to bring down the hammer on criminal illegal
13:21
Speaker 3: aliens and quote, defend your communities, your culture, your very
13:25
Speaker 3: way of life. I've been talking to immigration law expertly
13:29
Speaker 3: on Fresco of Holland and Knight. I saw the numbers
13:32
Speaker 3: that only about thirty six percent of asylum cases were
13:36
Speaker 3: successful during Biden's last full year in office. That seems
13:40
Speaker 3: pretty low.
13:42
Speaker 2: Well, the problem is the large majority of people coming
13:46
Speaker 2: into the United States under the Biden administration, we're just
13:49
Speaker 2: trying to articulate on asylum case in order to get
13:53
Speaker 2: in the country. But they never had the expectation that
13:56
Speaker 2: they would actually ever have to show up in court
13:59
Speaker 2: any day and asked for asylum. A lot of these
14:01
Speaker 2: asylum cases were very weak at the end of the
14:05
Speaker 2: day because they were either in countries, for instance, if
14:08
Speaker 2: you were coming from El Salvador, or El Salvador has
14:10
Speaker 2: actually fixed a lot of its gang violence problems, and
14:13
Speaker 2: so it's very hard now to get asylum from a
14:16
Speaker 2: place like El Salvador. Or if you were coming from
14:21
Speaker 2: countries such as Venezuela. You know, you would theoretically easy. Okay,
14:25
Speaker 2: you have this maduro and so you might be a
14:28
Speaker 2: political dissident, but at the end of the day, you
14:30
Speaker 2: had to prove what were you doing in Venezuela that
14:34
Speaker 2: was noteworthy and famous that you would actually be persecuted
14:37
Speaker 2: as opposed to just coming for economic opportunity. So a
14:40
Speaker 2: lot of Venezuelan cases were being denied and all across
14:45
Speaker 2: the world. Basically people were getting into the United States
14:48
Speaker 2: with threshold cases, but when they were actually subject to
14:52
Speaker 2: scrutiny and evidence, nobody had actually done anything in these
14:57
Speaker 2: countries that had led them to be persecuted, and so
15:00
Speaker 2: that's why you saw the numbers so low. It's not
15:03
Speaker 2: that the adjudications were low because there was an emphasis
15:08
Speaker 2: on making these cases denied. It's that a lot of
15:11
Speaker 2: the cases shouldn't have been filed in the first place,
15:13
Speaker 2: but were filed as a means to remain in the
15:17
Speaker 2: United States.
15:18
Speaker 3: So, speaking of immigration, judges, Abrego Garcia, he was willing
15:23
Speaker 3: to go to Costa Rica. Why wasn't the government willing
15:25
Speaker 3: to send him here? Why they wanted to send him
15:27
Speaker 3: to someplace where he didn't want to go.
15:30
Speaker 2: This is a very complicated issue because this is why
15:33
Speaker 2: kill Maar Abrego Garcia is still in the country, which
15:36
Speaker 2: is there's a lot of machinations going on right now
15:39
Speaker 2: about what stage in his case. Kill Maar Abrego Garcia
15:43
Speaker 2: is in, because they just recently found out that they
15:46
Speaker 2: had never actually ordered him deported, so he never actually
15:50
Speaker 2: had a deportation order, and so he was deported without
15:53
Speaker 2: a deportation order, so no one knew what the reason
15:56
Speaker 2: was for his detention, and so they had to issue
15:59
Speaker 2: what was called the new protunk removal order, which means
16:02
Speaker 2: that it was back dated eleven years and now they're
16:05
Speaker 2: basically starting his whole asylum case again from the beginning
16:09
Speaker 2: from scratch. And all of this can be circumvented by
16:15
Speaker 2: the government of the United States sending Abrego Garcia to
16:18
Speaker 2: Costa Rica, and they just won't do it because they
16:20
Speaker 2: want to say that if you try to circumvent the
16:26
Speaker 2: United States laws in some manner contrary to what the
16:29
Speaker 2: US government wants. Then the US government will make the
16:32
Speaker 2: determination of where you go. And so they don't want
16:35
Speaker 2: Kimara Abrego Garcia going to Costa Rica. And this is
16:39
Speaker 2: one of those cases where I don't really understand it
16:43
Speaker 2: from the standpoint of if your view is that he's
16:46
Speaker 2: a threat to the American public, or that he's going
16:49
Speaker 2: to be a drain of taxpayer resources or something, then
16:53
Speaker 2: sending him to Costa Rica solves that problem. But nevertheless,
16:56
Speaker 2: we are where we are now.
16:58
Speaker 3: The Trump administration is in increase the number of countries
17:01
Speaker 3: whose citizens face a full or partial travel ban on
17:05
Speaker 3: entry to the US from nineteen to thirty nine. And
17:10
Speaker 3: of the twenty countries facing new travel restrictions, sixteen are
17:14
Speaker 3: in Africa, and all thirty nine have majority non white populations,
17:21
Speaker 3: nearly half our Muslim majority countries. I mean, is there
17:25
Speaker 3: any logical reason?
17:27
Speaker 2: Well, the reasons that they cite in the proclamation, So
17:30
Speaker 2: let's go step by step. The reasons that they cite
17:33
Speaker 2: in the proclamation are ones related to an insufficient vetting
17:37
Speaker 2: that those countries have where they cannot give us enough
17:40
Speaker 2: information that we can decide if someone is safe or not.
17:44
Speaker 2: Plus they cite that each of those countries has high
17:48
Speaker 2: visa refusal rate. Now there are a couple of Caribbean
17:50
Speaker 2: countries in there, which is Antiguee, Barbuda and Dominica, where
17:55
Speaker 2: what they say about those countries is, look, we've been
17:57
Speaker 2: trying to tell you to knock it off in terms
18:00
Speaker 2: of selling passports from those countries, because what happened is
18:03
Speaker 2: people who were banned from other countries would get a
18:06
Speaker 2: passport from Dominica or from Antigua and they would say, hey, oh,
18:12
Speaker 2: I'm a member now of that country. I'm not a
18:15
Speaker 2: passport holder of you know, Syria or Iran or something.
18:19
Speaker 2: And they were circumventing US law through those passports. So
18:23
Speaker 2: now they've had to say is if you're not going
18:25
Speaker 2: to stop selling citizenship by investing in these countries, then
18:29
Speaker 2: we're going to ban you too. So that those are
18:31
Speaker 2: the two Caribbean countries that were banned. So they were
18:34
Speaker 2: not banned for visa overstay or for lack of vetting,
18:38
Speaker 2: but all the other countries were banned for visa overstate
18:41
Speaker 2: rates and lack of vetting. But there are countries and
18:44
Speaker 2: other places in the world that have hired visa overstate
18:47
Speaker 2: rates and have other vetting issues. And in the end,
18:50
Speaker 2: what you realize is there are some countries on these
18:53
Speaker 2: lists that the United States want something from, and they're
18:57
Speaker 2: using this to try to get those changes in whether
19:01
Speaker 2: it be that they accept people that the United States
19:04
Speaker 2: is trying to deport, or that they become third country
19:07
Speaker 2: places that the United States can deport people, or whether
19:11
Speaker 2: there's some other diplomatic agreement that they want to reach
19:15
Speaker 2: with some of these countries. You do see some of
19:18
Speaker 2: that here, but again most of this is related to
19:23
Speaker 2: visa overstate rates, lack of vetting, and then again the
19:26
Speaker 2: idea that the President has that the individuals coming from
19:30
Speaker 2: these places are not, in his view, on balance, helping
19:35
Speaker 2: the United States and its interests, as opposed to what
19:37
Speaker 2: he thinks they're doing, which is harming the United States
19:40
Speaker 2: and their interests. I would not. The most fascinating thing
19:44
Speaker 2: of this is that some of the countries that were
19:46
Speaker 2: banned actually are in the World Cup. Senegal is in
19:50
Speaker 2: the World Cup, Cope var is in the World Cup,
19:53
Speaker 2: and I wonder what's going to happen there because all
19:55
Speaker 2: the visitor visas have been banned. So are those fans
19:59
Speaker 2: not going to be allowed to visit the World Cup
20:01
Speaker 2: even if they're very wealthy and you know, prestigious people
20:04
Speaker 2: in those countries. So they do have an exception for
20:07
Speaker 2: the athletes obviously and the coaches, but they don't have
20:10
Speaker 2: any exception for the fans. So I do wonder what's
20:13
Speaker 2: going to happen with some of those individuals.
20:15
Speaker 3: And what about the requirement that tourists from forty two
20:19
Speaker 3: countries have to submit social media data?
20:23
Speaker 2: Well, this is going to end up being rolled out
20:26
Speaker 2: universally and it's part of Now what the issue is
20:30
Speaker 2: is this, we have something called the Visa Waiver Program.
20:33
Speaker 2: It's known as ESTA, but it's really the Visa Waiver Program.
20:36
Speaker 2: Esta's the name of the database. It's a travel authorization
20:39
Speaker 2: system that checks people to determine whether they actually need
20:43
Speaker 2: to go in and actually ask for a visa, or
20:46
Speaker 2: whether their background is clean enough that they can come in.
20:49
Speaker 2: And so what's happened is the government is trying to
20:53
Speaker 2: basically harmonize the current visa application system, which is if
20:59
Speaker 2: you apply for a visa anywhere around the world, in
21:02
Speaker 2: any country for any reason, you have to put in
21:04
Speaker 2: your social media background in order to get a visa.
21:09
Speaker 2: So now it's trying to say, is even for the
21:11
Speaker 2: people who are coming from Norway or Sweden or Denmark
21:15
Speaker 2: or wherever, they're going to have to put in their
21:17
Speaker 2: social media even though they're not applying for a visa,
21:20
Speaker 2: just for the electronic authorization to enter the United States.
21:25
Speaker 2: And they're obviously investing a lot of money on a
21:28
Speaker 2: lot of these software vetting programs and AI programs to
21:31
Speaker 2: try to determine if they can find something of note
21:35
Speaker 2: to reject people. But the more onerous that they start
21:38
Speaker 2: making these applications, you know, if it ends up being
21:40
Speaker 2: something that you have to fill out for two hours,
21:43
Speaker 2: which is essentially if all of the things that they're
21:46
Speaker 2: proposing to implement, all of the familials schedule and work
21:50
Speaker 2: schedule and education schedule and social media schedule and everything
21:55
Speaker 2: else you're supposed to write in there, if all of
21:57
Speaker 2: that ends up getting implemented, it might take you an
22:00
Speaker 2: hour or two, depending on if the system is functional
22:02
Speaker 2: or not. To have to fill out those applications, you
22:06
Speaker 2: may decide, you know, what, visiting the US isn't worth
22:08
Speaker 2: it for me anymore. I will go somewhere else. Why
22:11
Speaker 2: do I need to deal with all of this. Also,
22:14
Speaker 2: in addition, it's I think useful to note that it's
22:18
Speaker 2: different to say, if somebody's gonna come here and live here, well,
22:23
Speaker 2: maybe you want to be careful of what kind of
22:25
Speaker 2: person you're bringing in. But at the end of the day,
22:28
Speaker 2: I certainly am critical of countries when I visit them
22:31
Speaker 2: around the world. I say, look, this thing doesn't make
22:33
Speaker 2: any sense. What you're doing. This thing makes sense. We
22:36
Speaker 2: all are, we're human beings. It would be very strange
22:39
Speaker 2: if someone of wealth or of means or whatever, who
22:42
Speaker 2: just wants to take a trip and vacation for a
22:45
Speaker 2: weekend in the US suddenly can't come in because they've
22:48
Speaker 2: said something that is a normal criticism of the United
22:52
Speaker 2: States that you wouldn't care about because in the end,
22:55
Speaker 2: they're not actually posing a danger to the United States.
22:58
Speaker 2: That's the kind of thing that the very strange. I mean,
23:01
Speaker 2: our government currently has a policy that says we're very
23:05
Speaker 2: angry at Europe for patrolling it social media and saying
23:09
Speaker 2: that people don't have free speech in their social media,
23:13
Speaker 2: and then at the same time we're potentially doing the
23:15
Speaker 2: same thing here where if a European criticizes the US,
23:18
Speaker 2: we won't let them in. And so those are things
23:21
Speaker 2: I think we need to balance, and we need to
23:23
Speaker 2: do it the right way because travel is a very
23:26
Speaker 2: delicate ecosystem, and if people decide they're not going to
23:29
Speaker 2: travel to the United States, you start seeing things like
23:33
Speaker 2: you're seeing in Las Vegas, where nobody's showing up and
23:35
Speaker 2: the unemployment rate is skyrocketing and people don't want to
23:39
Speaker 2: travel there.
23:40
Speaker 3: It's great to have you as always, Leon. That's Leon
23:42
Speaker 3: Fresco of Honda Night. Coming up next. How strip searches
23:47
Speaker 3: in schools traumatize kids over minor offenses. This is Bloomberg.
23:53
Speaker 3: School should be a place where children feel safe. So
23:56
Speaker 3: you may find it surprising, perhaps even shocking, that public
24:01
Speaker 3: schools are strip searching children as young as five for
24:05
Speaker 3: allegations like pocketing a few dollars in change or carrying
24:08
Speaker 3: a vapepen. Studies have found that strip searches can cause
24:13
Speaker 3: long term psychological harm in children. The American Bar Association
24:18
Speaker 3: says that strip searching a minor is almost never appropriate
24:23
Speaker 3: and can result in long term negative consequences such as anxiety, depression,
24:29
Speaker 3: and phobias. Bloomberg Law investigation found that across the country,
24:34
Speaker 3: children and teenagers say their being strip searched at school
24:38
Speaker 3: by administrators and staff, often for vatepens and minor offenses.
24:43
Speaker 3: At least forty federal civil rights lawsuits since twenty seventeen
24:47
Speaker 3: claimed children were strip searched at school. Joining me is
24:51
Speaker 3: Bloomberg Law Senior reporter Emily Siegel, who was part of
24:54
Speaker 3: the Bloomberg investigation. Emily tell us about Kristin Yeckley and
24:59
Speaker 3: hert year old daughter. Sure So, we.
25:03
Speaker 1: Interviewed Kristin Yekli. She lives in Indiana and her daughter
25:08
Speaker 1: was in trouble at school for possessing a vape. She
25:12
Speaker 1: got a call from the principal telling them that her
25:15
Speaker 1: daughter was in trouble. She was pretty surprised by it
25:17
Speaker 1: because her daughter doesn't really get into trouble that often.
25:21
Speaker 1: And when her daughter got home, she said that she
25:23
Speaker 1: had been searched, strip searched by a nurse in order
25:27
Speaker 1: to see if she had the vape honor, which she
25:29
Speaker 1: did not have. So Kristin was very upset, obviously by
25:34
Speaker 1: what happened, and she filed a lawsuit. So what we
25:37
Speaker 1: found after that is that you know, she wasn't really
25:39
Speaker 1: alone in this circumstances. Is something that's happened all over
25:43
Speaker 1: the country.
25:44
Speaker 3: And most of the time it's not weapons that they're
25:46
Speaker 3: looking for.
25:47
Speaker 1: We reviewed federal lawsuits for this, and in some of
25:50
Speaker 1: them they don't say what they were searching for. But
25:52
Speaker 1: we only found four instances where they were searching for
25:56
Speaker 1: a weapon, and they never found one. In those instances.
26:00
Speaker 1: Most of the searches were for things like vapes or
26:03
Speaker 1: drugs or even stolen money. And we also had many
26:08
Speaker 1: instances where they were searching for signs of abuse on
26:11
Speaker 1: the children as well.
26:13
Speaker 3: And when we're talking about strip searches, some of the
26:16
Speaker 3: descriptions of what went on, it's just hard to believe
26:19
Speaker 3: that people who are entrusted with children's care would subject
26:24
Speaker 3: them to these outrageous searches, sometimes in front of members
26:28
Speaker 3: of the opposite sex.
26:29
Speaker 1: Yeah, we found many instances, I think it was fifteen
26:33
Speaker 1: where they were searched by someone or in the presence
26:35
Speaker 1: of someone of the opposite gender. We created sort of
26:38
Speaker 1: our definition of strip searching, which was removal of clothing
26:42
Speaker 1: that would expose parts of the body that are not
26:44
Speaker 1: normally exposed. But we did have instances where children were
26:48
Speaker 1: required to remove all of their clothing, including their underwear,
26:52
Speaker 1: or were searched and had to remove most of their clothing.
26:56
Speaker 1: There were just a variety of different circumstances.
27:00
Speaker 3: Hio and Missouri lawsuits claim that school nurses perform vaginal
27:04
Speaker 3: exams on a five year old and an elementary school
27:07
Speaker 3: or they were searching for signs of abuse. Are there
27:10
Speaker 3: different rules when they're searching for signs of abuse?
27:14
Speaker 1: There is one state that does allow strip searching if
27:17
Speaker 1: it's for searching for abuse, but we spoke to experts
27:20
Speaker 1: and that's not typically what you're supposed to do. School
27:24
Speaker 1: employees are mandatory reporters, so if they see any signs
27:27
Speaker 1: of abuse, they are supposed to report it to child
27:30
Speaker 1: protective services. They don't need to do an investigation themselves.
27:35
Speaker 1: And for a child that might be going through some
27:38
Speaker 1: sort of abuse, it could be on top of that
27:41
Speaker 1: traumatizing to be strip searched. So it's not always the
27:44
Speaker 1: recommended approach for a school employee to be doing that.
27:47
Speaker 1: They don't need to be doing that.
27:49
Speaker 3: And in your article you talk about the long term
27:52
Speaker 3: effects of a strip search on a thirteen year old
27:56
Speaker 3: girl named Stephanie, her mother, said that she watched her
27:59
Speaker 3: daughter from being a happy, singing fairy child to one
28:03
Speaker 3: who threw up most days before going to school. Tell
28:06
Speaker 3: us what Stephanie said about the effects even today, years later.
28:10
Speaker 1: She basically said that for her at that young age,
28:14
Speaker 1: being forced to undress in front of her male principle,
28:16
Speaker 1: I think was a big part of the trauma. It
28:19
Speaker 1: was that made her very self conscious. She felt sort
28:22
Speaker 1: of grossed down and disgusted with herself having to do that.
28:25
Speaker 1: This is a male teacher that she had to do
28:27
Speaker 1: this in front of she was young, and then after that,
28:30
Speaker 1: you know, there was a lot of anxiety around being
28:32
Speaker 1: around him in school as well.
28:35
Speaker 3: Kids are so traumatized they don't even go back to school.
28:39
Speaker 1: Sometimes not all, but sometimes. I mean, I think it
28:42
Speaker 1: depends on the circumstance. But we did find that in
28:45
Speaker 1: some of the cases they ended up transferring, and according
28:49
Speaker 1: to studies some that have been done, that also is
28:51
Speaker 1: a common thing. They'll drop out or they will transfer
28:54
Speaker 1: as a result of the search. Yeah.
28:56
Speaker 3: The American Bar Association stance is that strip searching a
28:59
Speaker 3: mind is almost never appropriate. So the Supreme Court has
29:05
Speaker 3: ruled about when schools can conduct searches of students.
29:11
Speaker 1: So the Fourth Amendment says, you know, just in general,
29:14
Speaker 1: that you can't conduct unreasonable search and seizure. That was
29:17
Speaker 1: tested in twice in the Supreme Court. The first time
29:21
Speaker 1: was not regarding a strip search. It was in nineteen
29:23
Speaker 1: eighty five, I believe. Basically it also ruled that there
29:26
Speaker 1: are times when it is reasonable to search a student.
29:29
Speaker 1: And then in two thousand and nine a school strip
29:32
Speaker 1: searching case came to the Supreme Court, and that was
29:35
Speaker 1: when a young girl was strip searched at school because
29:38
Speaker 1: she had prescription ibewprofen on her, And they basically ended
29:43
Speaker 1: up ruling that the search of her was not reasonable.
29:47
Speaker 1: But they also ruled that the teachers involved were entitled
29:51
Speaker 1: to qualified immunity. So that is sort of a rule
29:54
Speaker 1: that's often applied to you know, police officers that protects
29:58
Speaker 1: them from liability in these like civil case situation.
30:01
Speaker 3: As I mentioned before, some of the circumstances are so egregious.
30:05
Speaker 3: I mean, you say strip search, but then what follows
30:08
Speaker 3: is so egregious? Are these cases often settled?
30:12
Speaker 1: So in the ones that we could see, because you know,
30:14
Speaker 1: settlements are not always revealed in the court docket we
30:18
Speaker 1: found I think around eleven cases had settled. Some could
30:21
Speaker 1: have settled, but it wasn't clear from the docket, and
30:24
Speaker 1: we couldn't confirm that some of the cases they sided
30:28
Speaker 1: with the defendants. There were those as well, so it's
30:31
Speaker 1: kind of a mixed bag. These are harder cases to
30:35
Speaker 1: work up because there's not necessarily a physical injury, so
30:39
Speaker 1: I think that does make it more difficult. And there
30:42
Speaker 1: is some case law on this, and these were just
30:44
Speaker 1: in federal court. We haven't looked at state court or
30:46
Speaker 1: anything like that, so it's possible there are more cases
30:49
Speaker 1: like this.
30:50
Speaker 3: Some states have laws that limit strip searching or prevent it.
30:55
Speaker 1: I think we had about ten states that have laws
30:58
Speaker 1: that prohibit strip searching or or limit them. So in
31:03
Speaker 1: Wisconstant school employees cannot do strip searches, but law enforcement
31:07
Speaker 1: are able to of miners. In another state it was
31:11
Speaker 1: allowed that they could strip search for signs of abuse,
31:13
Speaker 1: But in a lot of states there's no acknowledgment of this.
31:16
Speaker 1: Many states have search and feisure policies looking into when
31:20
Speaker 1: a student locker can be searched, when their backpack can
31:23
Speaker 1: be searched, but they don't really address strip searches directly.
31:25
Speaker 3: Are there any groups that are you know, working to
31:28
Speaker 3: try to stop these strip searches.
31:32
Speaker 1: We had about six cases in Indiana, so we talked
31:35
Speaker 1: to some state senators and state representatives there who get
31:39
Speaker 1: express interest in introducing some sort of law. We have
31:42
Speaker 1: reached out to other states as well, but we haven't
31:45
Speaker 1: heard anything yet. But there are groups that the American
31:47
Speaker 1: Bar Associations put together their own recommended policy on stript
31:51
Speaker 1: searches of miners and their hope was that that would
31:55
Speaker 1: be adopted in state law as well, and that hasn't
31:58
Speaker 1: happened yet, but we did highlight some of the work
32:01
Speaker 1: that they did and how they came to that policy.
32:04
Speaker 3: From your reporting, thirteen of the cases involved students with disabilities.
32:09
Speaker 3: Were the facts similar in those? Are there reasons why
32:12
Speaker 3: they're targeting students with disabilities?
32:15
Speaker 1: They were all sort of similar circumstances. We just found
32:18
Speaker 1: some instances where students had you know, had some sort
32:22
Speaker 1: of disability and so it was just another layer to
32:25
Speaker 1: what was going on. There might have been more confusion
32:27
Speaker 1: for the student as well. A couple of the students
32:30
Speaker 1: had autism or they were you know, had some sort
32:33
Speaker 1: of unspecified disabilities as well. So it was something that
32:36
Speaker 1: we noticed as we were going through it, and it
32:39
Speaker 1: was hard to figure out why that was. But there
32:42
Speaker 1: were a fair number of cases that have that.
32:44
Speaker 3: Are they searching their lockers first and you know, basics
32:48
Speaker 3: before they actually do the strip search.
32:50
Speaker 1: Sometimes they are. That's sort of what we spoke about
32:54
Speaker 1: with lawyer from the Juvenile Law Center, is that they
32:57
Speaker 1: should be taking other steps first to sort of talk
33:00
Speaker 1: to the student figure out what's going on. Also depends
33:03
Speaker 1: on the severity and seriousness of what they're searching for.
33:06
Speaker 1: In many of the instances we looked at, there or
33:09
Speaker 1: were not calling to parents ahead of time to let
33:11
Speaker 1: them know that they were going to be searching the student.
33:13
Speaker 1: In a couple of instances, the student would ask to
33:16
Speaker 1: call their parent and they were denied the ability to
33:19
Speaker 1: do that. So there are some steps that probably could
33:23
Speaker 1: have been in place where they were doing other sort
33:26
Speaker 1: of working their way up to strip searches, but it's
33:28
Speaker 1: sort of hard to say from a lawsuits. Sometimes they
33:31
Speaker 1: searched the locker first and didn't find anything, and then
33:33
Speaker 1: they would conduct the scriptures.
33:35
Speaker 3: The results you found are really shocking, as I said before,
33:39
Speaker 3: and it's so important to expose what's going on so
33:42
Speaker 3: perhaps other children won't have to suffer through these strip searches.
33:46
Speaker 3: Thanks so much, Emily. That's Bloomberg Law Senior Reporter Emily Siegel,
33:51
Speaker 3: and that's it for this edition of The Bloomberg Law Show.
33:54
Speaker 3: Remember you can always get the latest legal news on
33:56
Speaker 3: our Bloomberg Law podcast. You can find them on Apple
33:59
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34:04
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34:12
Speaker 3: I'm June Grosso and you're listening to Bloomberg