Arrested by ICE in Ga., Iraqis get reprieve

If deported, some face ‘grisly fate,’ federal judge rules.

A federal judge in Detroit has once again temporarily halted the deportation of hundreds of Iraqi nationals, including some who were arrested in Georgia, Michigan and Tennessee this year.

In his 35-page ruling issued late Monday, U.S. District Court Judge Mark Goldsmith, a Barack Obama nominee, pushed back against the Trump administration’s arguments that he doesn’t have jurisdiction in the case and that such matters should be handled instead in federal immigration courts.

Civil and immigrant rights groups are suing to block the deportations. They argue the Iraqis — many of whom are Christians and Kurds — would “face grave danger of persecution, torture and death” if they are sent back to their native country, which is fighting to dislodge the Islamic State.

“The government’s view is inconsistent with the Constitution’s command that the writ of habeas corpus — the fundamental guarantor of liberty — must not be suspended, except in the rare case of foreign invasion or domestic rebellion,” Goldsmith wrote in his order.

“Without warning, over 1,400 Iraqi nationals discovered that their removal orders — many of which had lain dormant for several years — were now to be immediately enforced, following an agreement reached between the United States and Iraq to facilitate removal.

This abrupt change triggered a feverish search for legal assistance to assert rights against the removal of persons confronting the grisly fate petitioners face if deported to Iraq.”

A spokeswoman for the U.S. Justice Department said her agency was reviewing the decision and had no further comment. Acting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Thomas Homan objected to the judge’s last stay in the case this month, saying it did not “take into account the robust and already-existing procedural process to address petitioners’ claims as well as the clear public safety threat posed by these aliens — the vast majority of whom are convicted criminals.”

Goldsmith added that the Iraqis’ legal defense has been “significantly impeded” by the government’s decision to transfer many of them to detention centers across the country, separating them from their attorneys and families. Three Kurdish men who came from Iraq as asylees were arrested last month in Atlanta.

All three were ordered deported by immigration judges after they were convicted of aggravated felonies, according to ICE.

They have been moved from the Stewart Detention Center in South Georgia to the Florence Correctional Center in Arizona along with a fourth Iraqi national from Georgia, said one of the detainees, Rebwar Hassan of Norcross. Hassan said he is among about 100 Iraqis being held there.

ICE spokesman Bryan Cox issued a statement about the transfer of the Iraqis from Georgia to Arizona, saying: “ICE routinely transfers detainees to other detention facilities based on available resources and the needs of the agency.”

Hassan, a Christian, said he provided intelligence about then-Iraqi president Saddam Hussein in the 1990s to an opposition group called the Iraqi National Congress and now fears he could be harmed if he is deported to his native country.

“Life is too dangerous there,” said Hassan. Goldsmith has set the next hearing in the case for Aug. 31.