Advice for Aliens on Amnesty Doesn’t Apply Along the Border

There will be no advice on possible amnesty given to illegal aliens apprehended in most of San Diego County, the Immigration and Naturalization Service has ruled.

The INS has exempted illegal aliens detained within 25 miles of the border from provisions in federal guidelines that went into effect throughout the rest of the country Friday.

The guidelines prevent federal agents in most parts of the United States from expelling illegal aliens if questioning reveals that they may be entitled to stay in the United States under the new law.

The decision by the INS on illegal aliens seized along the border brought an immediate flurry of protests from organizations dealing with immigrant rights.

Among the illegal aliens who may be eligible for amnesty are those who have lived continuously in the United States since Jan. 1, 1982, or who have spent at least 90 days doing farm work during the year that ended May 1.

The INS exemption to advice on amnesty stated that it will be “business as usual” along the border, according to Duane Austin, an INS spokesman in Washington. That 25-mile strip along the border includes most of San Diego, California’s second most populous city.

The INS actions are being challenged by immigrants rights lawyers, including Ralph Santiago Abascal, an attorney with California Rural Legal Assistance in San Francisco. He said the new rules would turn the border into a “delegalization zone,” where few people would qualify for legal residence.

“For them (INS officials) to write off the border area for application of amnesty is incredible,” Abascal said. “It’s not only a double standard, it’s a flat, gross violation of the law.”

Abascal represents plaintiffs in a U.S. District Court suit in Sacramento seeking to block the INS from expelling aliens who appear to qualify for amnesty. The lawsuit is the first of many expected to be filed against various aspects of the landmark immigration law--the most comprehensive reform of U.S. immigration laws since 1952.

“For reasons unknown to us, the INS has seen fit to act as if the word of Congress did not apply in border areas,” said Peter Schey, an attorney with the National Center for Immigrants Rights in Los Angeles.

INS officials contend that the guidelines merely recognize the reality that most aliens apprehended near the border are recent arrivals who are probably ineligible for amnesty. Border residents who do qualify for amnesty will not be excluded from gaining legal residence, INS officials say. If illegal aliens arrested in the border area assert that they may be eligible for amnesty, Border Patrol officials say, they will question them to determine if claims are valid.

“This law didn’t pass anything that gave the United States open borders,” Austin said.

However, those opposed to the INS guidelines say that Congress never meant to exempt border areas from the amnesty provisions.

“My position is that a person caught coming across the border might just as well qualify for amnesty as someone caught in downtown Los Angeles,” Schey said.

Attorneys point out that thousands of illegal aliens are believed to be long-term residents of border communities such as San Diego, Calexico and El Paso and Laredo, Tex. They said illegal aliens apprehended in border areas may have only left the United States for “brief” or “casual” periods and may still qualify for amnesty.

The lawsuit filed by the immigrants’ groups seeks to ensure that the INS will inform all illegal aliens arrested of any rights they may have under the new law. The new law bars the expulsion of illegal aliens who can demonstrate a prima facie case that they may qualify for amnesty.

However, since the new law went into effect, it appears that very few aliens apprehended along the border have been able to avoid expulsion by demonstrating a strong case for amnesty. U.S. Border Patrol officials in San Diego and El Paso, the two busiest crossings for illegal aliens, acknowledged that they generally didn’t inform illegal aliens about possible amnesty unless the aliens themselves asserted that they qualify.

The U.S.-Mexico border region accounted for 90% of the record 1.8 million apprehensions of illegal aliens by the INS in fiscal 1986. The majority were Mexicans who are quickly returned to Mexico.

“It’s business as usual here,” said Gus de la Vina, deputy chief for the U.S. Border Patrol in El Paso, where agents usually arrest 600 to 700 illegal aliens a day. Since Nov. 6, De la Vina said, not a single alien has avoided expulsion by showing a strong case for amnesty.

In San Diego, where the Border Patrol expects to apprehend more than 1,200 illegal aliens each day in November, about 30 illegal aliens have been given permission to remain in the United States because they may qualify for amnesty, said Gene Smithburg, assistant chief Border Patrol agent.