INS Ordered to Accept Late Amnesty Filings

In a decision that could benefit some 300,000 illegal immigrants, a federal appeals court Thursday ordered immigration authorities to accept and consider amnesty applications that were filed after a congressionally mandated deadline.

The ruling gives a new chance to hundreds of thousands of immigrants whose amnesty applications were delayed or turned aside because they had traveled outside the United States without first obtaining permission from the Immigration and Naturalization Service.

“This is really a long-awaited decision,” said attorney Peter A. Schey, who represented the amnesty applicants.

“The INS was eager for a decision, and the impacted community (the immigrants) has really been in a twilight zone and very eagerly awaiting this decision.”

Issuing a unanimous opinion, the three-member 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco agreed that two lower courts were within their jurisdiction when they extended the deadline for certain amnesty applicants.

The amnesty program, authorized under the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act, granted legal status to foreign-born nationals who had resided continuously in the United States since 1982. Those eligible had to apply between May, 1987, and May, 1988.

When the filing period opened, however, many applicants found they were being turned down because they had briefly left the country between 1982 and 1987 without INS permission. Others were discouraged from even applying because of that provision.

Schey and others argued that the advance-permission requirement was unfair because the act had not even been passed at the time many of the applicants had traveled.

Two organizations, the Catholic Social Services and the League of United Latin American Citizens, sued in federal court in late 1986 and 1987 to force the INS to accept these applications.

Both Catholic Social Services, which filed suit in Sacramento, and LULAC, which took action in a Los Angeles court, won their cases in November, 1988. The INS was ordered to accept and process applications from foreign nationals who made “temporary and casual” trips outside of the United States.

As part of the lower court ruling, U.S. District Judges William D. Keller in Los Angeles and Lawrence Karlton in Sacramento ordered the INS to extend the deadline for amnesty applications for another 120 days.

The INS agreed to accept the applications it already had on file from people who had briefly left the country. But the agency appealed the deadline extension.

Then, in a move that would swell the ranks of those applying for amnesty, Keller and Karlton ruled that immigrants here before 1982 could continue to file applications and receive temporary work permits pending the appeal.

That was 3 1/2 years ago; since then, pending the appeal, approximately 300,000 more people--half of them in Los Angeles--have applied for amnesty.

“If the INS had acted rationally three years ago, they could have cut their losses,” Schey said. “Maybe 20,000 (or) 30,000 people would have come forward, and it would all be over with. It’s a supreme irony (that the) more the INS fought the extension, the larger the population became taking advantage of the extension.”

Schey predicted another 200,000 people could seek amnesty once the 120-day deadline extension officially kicks in.

Thursday’s ruling does not mean the immigrants will be granted amnesty, only that their applications must be considered. It was not yet known whether the INS or U.S. Justice Department plans to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The 300,000 applicants represent diverse nationalities.

Ironically, people who left the country and returned illegally by sneaking across the U.S.-Mexico border did not see their amnesty applications rejected because there was no official record that they had traveled anywhere. Those who left and then returned with visas, usually through airports or seaports, were the ones who were penalized.

Consequently, most of the 300,000 are not Mexican nationals but natives of India, Pakistan, Europe, South America and other more far-flung countries and regions. The lead plaintiff, for example, is French.