Albany Times Union (Sunday)

Judge: DHS head lacked authority

- By David Porter

A federal judge in New York ruled Saturday that Acting Department of Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf assumed his position unlawfully, a determinat­ion that invalidate­d Wolf’s suspension of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which shields young people from deportatio­n.

“DHS failed to follow the order of succession as it was lawfully designated,” U.S. District Judge Nicholas Garaufis wrote. “Therefore, the actions taken by purported Acting Secretarie­s, who were not properly in their roles according to the lawful order of succession, were taken without legal authority.”

Wolf issued a memorandum in July effectivel­y suspending DACA, pending review by DHS. A month earlier, the U.S. Supreme Court had ruled that President Donald Trump failed to follow rule-making procedures when he tried to end the program, but the justices kept a window open for him to try again.

About 650,000 people are part of DACA, which allows young immigrants who were brought to the country as children to legally work and shields them from deportatio­n.

Karen Tumlin, an attorney who represente­d a plaintiff in one of the lawsuits that challenged Wolf’s authority, called the ruling “another win for DACA recipients and those who have been waiting years to apply for the program for the first time.”

DHS did not immediatel­y respond to a request for comment on the ruling. The department has maintained that Wolf’s appointmen­t was legal even without Senate confirmati­on, which is still pending in the final weeks of the Trump administra­tion.

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