Free Webinar: Implications of Matter of Cabrera-Fernandez

National Immigration Project

"Wednesday, September 20, 2023 at 1:00 pm Pacific/4:00 pm Eastern

Zoom Webinar

Duration: 1.5 hours   Cost: Free   CLE Credit: None

Program Description: 

Following the Supreme Court's decision in Jennings v. Rodriguez, 138 S.Ct. 830 (2018), immigration attorney Mark Prada spearheaded an argument that DHS was mispapering the releases of applicants for admission with “orders of recognizance” (Form I-220A) on the theory that the only lawful basis for release was humanitarian or public interest parole under INA § 212(d)(5). This argument was grounded in the Supreme Court’s holding in Jennings v. Rodriguez that applicants for admission in expedited removal under INA § 235(b)(1), as well as other applicants for admission processed for removal proceedings under 235(b)(2)(A), are subject to “mandatory” detention without eligibility for a bond hearing and can only be released if DHS exercises its discretion to grant them  humanitarian parole. Whether an individual’s release from custody by DHS is through a grant of  humanitarian parole under INA § 212(d)(5) or through another basis for release is crucial for noncitizens who are otherwise eligible to adjust their status to permanent resident, since one requirement for adjustment of status is that the applicant have been inspected or admitted or paroled. Across the country, many practitioners were successful in persuading immigration judges that clients who were released by DHS after having entered without inspection had been paroled for purposes of adjustment of status. One group of noncitizens in particular who benefitted from these arguments were Cubans seeking to adjust under the Cuban Adjustment Act. Meanwhile, in the Seattle region, Matt Adams and his colleagues at the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project (NWIRP) were seeing immigration judges deny bond to all individuals in removal proceedings who entered without inspection (regardless of whether they entered months or years before they were apprehended), based on a similar interpretation of Jennings as the one advanced by certain noncitizens seeking adjustment. NWIRP’s experience with this immigration judge position led them and AILA to file an amicus brief in a bond appeal arguing that INA § 236–not INA § 235–governed the custody determination in the respondent’s case and thus the immigration judge had authority to grant a bond. 

The BIA’s September 11 decision in Matter of Cabrera-Fernandez, 28 I&N Dec. 747 (BIA 2023) ruled that noncitizens released on recognizance by DHS after entering without inspection  have not been granted humanitarian parole under INA § 212(d)(5). In Cabrera-Fernandez, the BIA concluded that  Mr. Cabrera-Fernandez, a recent arrival who entered without inspection, was placed in INA § 240 removal proceedings, and whom DHS released on his own recognizance, had been released on conditional parole under section INA § 236(a)(2)(B), not humanitarian parole under INA § 212(d)(5). 

Join the National Immigration Project at 4 p.m. ET/1 p.m. PT on Wednesday, September 20, 2023 for a webinar during which Mark Prada and Matt Adams will discuss the path to Matter of Cabrera-Fernandez and the implications of this decision, including in the adjustment of status and detention contexts.

Speakers:

Mark Prada, Prada Urizar Dominguez, PLLC

Matt Adams, Legal Director, Northwest Immigrant Rights Project

You can register for this free webinar HERE."