Syed Ahmed Jamal, the Kansas dad and professor arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in his own front yard as he was taking his young daughter to school, was pulled off a plane in Hawaii earlier this week after he was granted a temporary stay of deportation. But while he has been returned to the mainland, he’s now in a Missouri jail and his “ultimate fate is still completely up to federal immigration authorities and could take months to resolve, his attorney said”:
While immigration officials could allow Jamal to return to Lawrence under orders of supervision, they also could keep him in the Missouri jail, or they could send him to any other detention center, [attorney Rekha] Sharma-Crawford said during a news conference outside the jail. She said supporters and his family were hoping he would be released while awaiting what could be a months-long appeal process before the Board of Immigration Appeals. She noted Jamal already was under a valid order of supervision when he was arrested, has job to return to, valid identification such as a Social Security number, and strong support from his family and many people in Lawrence.
According to the Kansas City Star, Jamal has been transferred five times during the past three weeks and had been “sent to Hawaii apparently without his lawyers’ knowledge … after a judge had dissolved the stay of removal that he had issued to Jamal.” His attorneys filed another motion that halted his deportation yet again. “[ICE] has the determination, the authority and the discretion to let him go home,” Sharma-Crawford said. “At this point, it makes little sense to keep him detained”:
Jamal was able to talk briefly with his family and attorney after he arrived at the jail and was happy but shocked by everything that had occurred since his arrest, although he didn’t know all the details, said his brother, Syed Hussein Jamal. The family was relieved that his brother was close enough to visit but are still hoping he will be allowed out of custody, Hussein Jamal said.
“We’re asking ICE to do the right thing, do the family thing, let the man out so he can at least be with his family and community,” he said.
Over 100,000 people have signed the petition calling on officials to halt the deportation of the researcher, who has lived in the U.S. for three decades. Jamal was ordered deported in 2011, but because he was considered low priority under Obama-era guidelines, he was issued a work permit and allowed to stay. But Donald Trump threw out those guidelines after taking office and the dad was swept up despite having no criminal record:
Cases such as Jamal’s have been on the rise. Shortly after taking office last year, President Donald Trump signed an executive order that widened the categories of immigrants in the U.S. illegally who could face deportation. The number of arrests by ICE surged almost 40 percent from the time of Trump’s inauguration to the end of September, compared with the same time period the year before. ICE has also detained or deported people who had received reprieves from the agency during the Obama administration, which prioritized deporting violent, criminal immigrants.
Republican Rep. Kevin Yoder of Kansas generally supports having ICE make deporting violent criminals a priority while keeping immigrant families together, spokesman C.J. Grover said Wednesday in an email. He said Yoder was “disturbed” by Jamal’s case, which he said ran counter to those goals.
But “disturbed” doesn’t protect anyone from mass deportation agents. What’s needed is action, and other bipartisan lawmakers, including Republican Rep. Lynn Jenkins and Democratic Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, have drafted a “private immigration bill” that could help Jamal. In the past, these sort of bills have provided some length of relief from deportation—but not always. Last month, Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan authored a “private bill” to protect Amer "Al” Adi Othman from deportation. The GOP-controlled House Judiciary subcommittee passed it, but ICE deported him anyway:
Sharma-Crawford said the appeals process before the federal immigration board could take several months and the discussion on Jenkins’ private bill proposal would take even longer “so this is not going to get resolved out very quickly.” ICE has the determination, the authority and the discretion to let him go home.