The DHS Has Been Using A Fake Mexican Constitution Article To Deport US Citizens For 35 Years
from the every-deportation-justifies-the-lie dept
We’re used to our government’s security and intelligence agencies telling lies in order to justify their actions. The Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, has achieved a sort of infamy for his “least untruthful answer” in response to questioning. (Not that this infamy has cost him his job…) Others have performed linguistic aerobics (“not under this program,” “relevant to…”) to stretch the truth just enough to give their activities a thin veneer of legitimacy.
The DHS does it, too. However, when it lies, it goes big, and it plays a long, long con.
For more than two decades, Sigifredo Saldana Iracheta insisted he was a U.S. citizen, repeatedly explaining to immigration officials that he was born to an American father and a Mexican mother in a city just south of the Texas border.
Year after year, the federal government rejected his claims, deporting him at least four times and at one point detaining him for nearly two years as he sought permission to join his wife and three children in South Texas.
In rejecting Saldana’s bid for citizenship, the government sought to apply an old law that cited Article 314 of the Mexican Constitution, which supposedly dealt with legitimizing out-of-wedlock births. But there was a problem: The Mexican Constitution has no such article.
NPR calls it an “error.” Jeff Gamso, public defender and former criminal defense lawyer, calls it something else.
Our government’s been lying to the courts about this since at least 1978 when the Immigration and Naturalization Service first invented Article 314 of the Mexican Constitution as a convenient way to deny citizenship to and thus deport American citizens.
The opinion from the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals isn’t as generous as NPR, either.
DHS officers and the Administrative Appeals Office (“AAO”) within DHS have relied on provisions of the Mexican Constitution that either never existed or do not say what DHS claims they say.
The DHS, however, was very generous towards its previously uninterrupted 35-year exploitation of a non-existent constitutional article.
Saldana’s case was finally resolved earlier this month, when the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed the government’s explanation of a “typo” and ruled that he had been a citizen since birth.
A “typo.” That sounds familiar. The NSA used the same excuse for its collection of tons of domestic data when it claimed analysts accidentally entered US area codes rather than codes tied to foreign countries. It was a “typo,” and the DHS never bothered to correct it for 35 years and then only because it was called out by a federal court.
And this isn’t the only lie/error in the DHS’ case. It also pointed to another article of the Mexican Constitution to deny Saldana’s claims of citizenship — Article 130. Fortunately, for the DHS, this article actually exists. Unfortunately for its hopes of barring Saldana from the country for the fifth time, what it says isn’t anywhere near what is claimed.
The AAO also cited Article 130 of the Constitution of Mexico for the same proposition that the Constitution requires that parents be married in order for children to be legitimated. However, Article 130 provides only that marriage is a civil contract, as opposed to a religious one, and says nothing about legitimation or children.
Why would the government repeatedly lie in order to prosecute and deport legal US citizens? Gamso answers this question very succinctly.
Because it can.
It got away with this one for 35 years. Why should it stop? Three-and-a-half decades of reliance on a wholly fabricated article of a constitution it (correctly) assumed no one would actually bother looking up. In retrospect, it seems audacious. But the reality of the situation is that the government got away with a lie for more than three decades and that fact alone is enough to encourage it to deploy useful lies in any situation where it thinks misstating the facts will give it an edge or help it achieve its aims.
Filed Under: deportation, dhs, immigration, lying, mexican constitution, mexico
Comments on “The DHS Has Been Using A Fake Mexican Constitution Article To Deport US Citizens For 35 Years”
Taking bets as to how many DHS officials will be punished. I offer 1 million to 1 odds that at least one will be, so get rich now!
*Minimum bet $10,000, there is no guarantee of pay-out, all bets must be made to a Cayman Islands account to be provided later*
Re: Re:
By “punished”, I presume you mean placed in charge of the review panel investigating how the department can avoid such mishaps* in the future.
* By “mishap”, I mean having the public find out what they did, not what they did.
The article almost makes it sound like lying to the courts means anything.
Re: Re:
Well it does mean something.
When YOU do it, you get the book thrown at you, along with the kitchen sink.
Whent the GOVERMENT or its affiliates do it, “meh.. they made a mistake” and “Ok, i’ll write that up as an easily circumvented (by the gov) law so we don’t have to bother about this again”
WHERE'S the tech or economics in this? Here's your charter:
“the Techdirt blog uses a proven economic framework to analyze and offer insight into news stories about changes in government policy, technology and legal issues that affect companies ability to innovate and grow.”
Becoming only political kibitzing in unfocused “NPR” style.
Re: WHERE'S the tech or economics in this? Here's your charter:
Well for one, I’d imagine this is enonomics related because US citizens with skills that businesses are looking for might think twice about coming back to live within the US, now that it’s known that the DHS will kick them out based on non-existent constitutional articles.
Long story short, shut the fuck up, quit complaining and come back if (and this is a big if) you’re hired to edit articles for Techdirt.
Re: Re: WHERE'S the tech or economics in this? Here's your charter:
Voted funny. Blue has already “applied” to TD for a remunerated writing position and been laughed off the comments section for her efforts.
Re: Re: WHERE'S the tech or economics in this? Here's your charter:
This explains ICE, Copyright, Patent law, several wars, financial system, energy policy, trade agreements, foriegn policy and pretty well anything else. Gulf of Tonkin, anyone?
“But the reality of the situation is that the government got away with a lie for more than three decades and that fact alone is enough to encourage it to deploy useful lies in any situation where it thinks misstating the facts will give it an edge or help it achieve its aims.”
Re: Re: Re: WHERE'S the tech or economics in this? Here's your charter:
I’d say that puts a serious chiller on innovation and business development!
What’s funny is that someone in the Deep South (Sheriff Joe?) will now probably invent an equally spurious Kenyan article to try and justify de-naturalising their favourite presidential straw man.
Re: WHERE'S the tech or economics in this? Here's your charter:
Fool!
There’s the NSA in this story, so that covers tech.
(But, notice that nothing in that sentence that you point out even hints that Techdirt is only about economics or tech…it covers much broader topics that, yes, may eventually have implications in the economy and the tech sector. But the scope of Techdirt is much broader. And, of course, such a broad scope makes your brain hurt, so you condensed it to “tech or economics”. Unfortunately for you, reality isn’t so simple.)
Re: WHERE'S the tech or economics in this? Here's your charter:
WHERE’S the tech or economics in this? Here’s your charter:
Wahhhh! Cry me a river, Blue.
It’s Mike’s blog and he has sole discretion over what it contains. Period. If you don’t like it, the door is over there and don’t let it hit you in the ass, k?
Re: WHERE'S the tech or economics in this? Here's your charter:
There. I fixed your typo for you blue… those sure are infectious.
Re: WHERE'S the tech or economics in this? Here's your charter:
You obviously skipped over the words “legal issues”.
Your brain has a limited hangout with reality, no?
I paid taxes on $1,000 income not $1,000,000 = typo.
Fortunately, now we have the internet those lies will be difficult to pull now.
This reminds me why the actions of Aaron Swartz God bless his soul, were/are so important, he put that knowledge into public domain so everyone could see it, we should do this to all laws in the world so everyone should be able to look up any law they are faced with.
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Swartz, Manning, Snowden … I’m sure there’s a few others that belong on this list. It would be a honorable list that most people, who believe in a free society, would admire.
Article 314
Article 314, the old pie in the sky..
DHS
The DHS has existed for only 11 years, so they can’t take all of the credit.
Re: DHS
The DHS has existed for only 11 years, so they can’t take all of the credit.
It’s ICE, which is part of the DHS, and INS, which is what ICE was called before.
Techdirt fucking sucks.. Opps, Typo I meant to say I love Techdirt!
My bad.
“Why would the government repeatedly lie in order to prosecute and deport legal US citizens? Gamso answers this question very succinctly.
Because it can.”
It’s a very charitable way of putting it. Charitable towards US citizens.
If I was about to be taken away from my wife and kids, I like to think I’d bother to check out the legal basis of my deportation. I don’t know, maybe show it to some lawyer.
35 years. Bonkers.
DHS
How the hell can DHS have been deporting people under this bogus legal theory for 35 years if DHS itself has only existed for about a decade?
Re: DHS
While I get the point that just saying DHS is perhaps poor form on OP’s part…come on, you know that immigration was not magically created in 2003 with DHS.
Mr. Cushing, please consider changing the title to “The DHS/INS Has Been…” since INS was the agency that handled immigration before DHS.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_and_Naturalization_Service
Created 1933, dissolved 2003, the very same day ICE was created under DHS.
Re: Re: DHS
Mr. Cushing, please consider changing the title to “The DHS/INS Has Been…” since INS was the agency that handled immigration before DHS.
We had discussed this internally. We left it as DHS because the court refers to DHS.
Re: Re: Re: DHS
Re: Re: Re: DHS
Hey Mike, not to be a douche bag, but you might want to re-read page 2 of the opinion before stating that the Court did not refer to Immigration and Naturalization Service.
Page 2, second paragraph, fourth sentence.
Re: Re: DHS
Created 1933, dissolved 2003, the very same day ICE was created under DHS.
They didn’t dissolve INS and create a brand new agency called ICE, it was just a rename.
Reminder
The government is allowed to lie to you.
It is a federal crime to lie to an employee of the federal government.
Re: Reminder
Re: Re: Reminder
Okay, I’ll give you that one. Employee was the wrong word. But federal law enforcement officer is also the wrong word(s). Section 1001 deals with anything under the jurisdiction of the three branches of the federal government, which is a lot of latitude.
With that out of the way – Mr. Saldana’s immigration status is under the jurisdiction of the executive branch of the government, and I’m sure there is some case file with Mr. Saldana’s name on it, meaning there’s an investigation and his statements are material to that investigation. He is not allowed to lie to an ICE official – it’s a crime. But those very same ICE officials can lie to him about the Mexican Constitution and the legitimacy of his birth to his parents – and they commit no crime.
Re: Re: Reminder
18 USC ? 1001
(a) Except as otherwise provided in this section, whoever, in any matter within the jurisdiction of the executive, legislative, or judicial branch of the Government of the United States, knowingly and willfully?
(1) falsifies, conceals, or covers up by any trick, scheme, or device a material fact;
(2) makes any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or representation; or
(3) makes or uses any false writing or document knowing the same to contain any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or entry;
Seems to disagree with what you’re saying. There are some exceptions, but none that do your argument any good.
Re: Re: Re: Reminder
Re: Re: Re:2 Reminder
Check the comment below for some interesting court cases regarding Section 1001, where people were convicted without once ever talking to an employee of the federal government.
Re: Re: Re: Reminder
Whoa, it looks like this gets even better, btr1701. Here’s the US Attorneys Criminal Resource Manual regarding Section 1001.
http://www.justice.gov/usao/eousa/foia_reading_room/usam/title9/crm00906.htm
After reading this, I’m pretty sure lying to a Park Ranger is illegal. Section 1001 is so broad that it even encompasses any private entity receiving federal funds, or subject to federal regulation. So if you work for a bank, and someone lies to you, since banks are regulated by the government, you just violated Section 1001 – and the bank employee isn’t even a federal employee! From the link:
United States v. Green, 745 F.2d 1205, 1208-09 (9th Cir. 1984), cert. denied, 474 U.S. 925 (1985)(false statements to private firm constructing nuclear power plant regulated by Nuclear Regulatory Commission)
United States v. Wolf, 645 F.2d 23, 25-26 (10th Cir. 1981)(false statements to oil company subject to federal regulation)
United States v. Matanky, 482 F.2d 1319, 1322 (9th Cir. 1973), cert. denied, 414 U.S. 1039 (1973); (false statements to insurance company acting as payment agent for Medicare)
United States v. Mouton, 657 F.2d 736, 739 (5th Cir. 1981)(false time sheet submitted to accounting office of community organization receiving CETA funds)
United States v. Cartwright, 632 F.2d 1290, 1292-93 (5th Cir. 1980)(false statements to savings and loan association insured by FSLIC).
Re: Re: Re:2 Reminder
EDIT: sorry, if you work for the bank, and someone lies to you, that someone (not you) has committed a crime. And case law shows that people have been convicted over such things, like US v. Cartwright.
Seems like a massive fail on the part of several defense attorneys.
“You’re being deported under section 314 of the Mexican Constitution.”
Ummm. Let’s fight this on the basis of, I dunno, anti-graffiti laws. Or something. I won’t bother to actually look up the “law” my client is being deported under.
WTF, lawyers?
It’s not hard to see how this happens. When a suspected illegal is arrested they are not assumed innocent until guilty. They are not given rights as if they are US citizens. I think it’s frightening that this has been happening and I would be surprised that no one from INS knew about it long before now.
Bug stomping
Let us assume for a moment that the use of the non-existent constitutional clause in court pleadings is a bug. What changes to our political system would have made that bug shallow?
Wow, there goes their excuse to deport Ted Cruz.
Interesting...
Fabrications from the most liberal Administration prior to the current one. I’m shocked! Shocked, I tell you! Not so much….
Libs are well know for their flights of fancy and lies to further whatever cause they think is “right” at the time. This is just one more example. No doubt the citizens deported had voted the wrong way in 76.
Re: Interesting...
Libs are well know for their flights of fancy and lies to further whatever cause they think is “right” at the time.
Did you miss the part where this has been going on repeatedly for 35 years? This is not a liberal or conservative issue – law enforcement always tends to abuse their power if it’s not checked.
What other non-existent laws and regulations?
There is a serious problem for both the INS/IcE and the judiciary. I am appalled this could have happened for 35 years and never was caught.
A more general issue is how often are non-existent laws and regulations are used to convict people; particularly those who have to rely on public defenders. The total number of pages is so vast it is it impossible for someone to completely comprehend them all.
Ins/dhs
35 years and NO JUDGE checked this sh*t out?