Good day all. If it’s a day ending in a “Y”, then yet another COB judge has decided to usurp authority he or she doesn’t have and issue rulings designed to hurt the United States. Last January, the State Department suspended visas from 75 countries. The basic reason was that they were seen as high risk of becoming a burden on the taxpayers.
Now, most people aren’t aware that when someone wants to immigrate to the United States, especially when they are being sponsored, there is a section on the forms regarding the person getting the visa to have a way to support themselves, either through a job waiting for them or from a sponsor who is going to support them. I had to fill this section on, on pain of perjury, when I brought She Who Must Be Obeyed into the United States. SWMBO has never been a burden to the taxpayers. As soon as she was allowed to, she started working.
However, there are literally millions of foreign nationals who are collecting some sort of taxpayer benefits. We can’t afford this any longer and this is why the suspension was put in place. Now a leftist judge has decided she’s in charge of immigration and ordered the suspension lifted. Here are the details from Fox News:
A federal judge struck down the Trump administration’s freeze on immigrant visas from 75 countries Friday, ruling Secretary of State Marco Rubio lacked the legal authority to order denials for applicants otherwise found eligible to enter the United States.
U.S. District Judge Jeannette Vargas, a Biden appointee in Manhattan, vacated the State Department policy and any visa refusals based solely on it, directing the government to revisit those cases.
“The Court holds that the Policy is contrary to law and was issued in excess of Secretary Rubio’s statutory authority,” Vargas wrote in her 61-page opinion.
What a load of rotting horse manure. I did a quick check on this numbskull and found that she clerked for the “Wise Latina” justice Sonia Sotomayor, who was considered the dumbest member of the Supreme Court until the arrival of the Biden DEI hire, Ketanji Brown Jackson. She has a history of ruling against the Trump Administration, unless forced to rule in favor. Basically, she’s just another Democrat Progressive judicial tyrant.
The State Department enacted the policy in January, suspending immigrant visa issuance to nationals of 75 countries the department deemed at high risk of becoming dependent on public benefits. The list spans Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia and the Middle East.
I’m wondering about Eastern Europe being on the list. They’ve been generally building their economies rather well since they threw off the shackles of Communism and the Soviet Union. The rest? Yeah, I can see issues with a lot of them.
Rubio’s policy instructed consular officers to review each applicant individually. But even applicants who passed that review showed “additional evidence that demonstrates he or she overcomes the public charge refusal” and had no other reason to be denied were still refused visas if they came from one of the 75 designated countries.
The judge said the directive effectively imposed a nationality-based ban on immigrants from nearly 40% of the world’s countries and sidelined the consular officers Congress charged with deciding whether individual applicants qualify for visas.
So what? That was a directive from the Department of State. Those consular officers report to the Secretary of state, not the Congress, unless called before them in their oversight role and certainly not to some jumped up, self important judge.
The Trump administration argued the refusals were lawful because officers formally issued them under Section 221(g) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, an existing provision governing visa refusals. Vargas rejected that rationale, saying the government had failed to identify a law allowing an officer to deny a visa to an applicant already found eligible.
“The Government engages in what is best described as an exercise in Orwellian logic,” Vargas wrote.
First things first. I looked up the duties of a Consular Officer and who they report to using Grok. Congress was not mentioned. Here is what Grok reported:
A United States consular official (also called a consular officer) is a Foreign Service Officer in the Consular Career Track of the U.S. Department of State. These officers serve mainly at U.S. embassies and consulates abroad (with some domestic roles tied to passport and visa operations). They form the public face of the Department of State for millions of people and focus on protecting U.S. citizens while facilitating legitimate international travel and protecting U.S. borders.
The Bureau of Consular Affairs states that its highest priority is “to protect the lives and serve the interests of American citizens.” Consular officers deliver emergency and routine services during key life events and crises (births, adoptions, medical emergencies, deaths, arrests, and disasters), issue passports, and adjudicate visas.
Core Responsibilities
1. Protecting and assisting U.S. citizens abroad (American Citizen Services)
Provide emergency help for arrests or detention (visit detainees, ensure access to counsel, supply lists of local attorneys, and monitor welfare).
Assist with medical emergencies, crime victimization, natural disasters, political unrest, or evacuations; coordinate with local authorities and disseminate critical information.
Search for missing Americans, help next of kin after a death abroad, arrange for remains, and provide repatriation loans to destitute citizens.
Handle non-emergency services: issue or replace passports, process Consular Reports of Birth Abroad, perform notarial services, provide information on absentee voting, tax forms, citizenship matters, and local conditions.
Support international adoptions, child custody/parental abduction cases, and related family issues.
2. Adjudicating visas and protecting border security
Review applications, conduct interviews, and decide whether to approve or deny immigrant and nonimmigrant visas for foreign nationals seeking to visit, study, work, or reside in the United States.
Apply U.S. immigration law to assess eligibility, screen for security risks, and combat fraud.
Cancel or revoke visas when warranted and coordinate with other U.S. agencies (including law enforcement and intelligence) to prevent entry of ineligible persons.
A single officer may process thousands of visa applications per year.
3. Additional functions
Combat consular fraud and human trafficking.Facilitate legitimate trade, commerce, tourism, educational, and cultural exchanges while strengthening border security. Manage consular sections or units (especially at mid- and senior levels), supervise staff, respond to inquiries from attorneys, Congress, businesses, and host-government officials, and support crisis response or outreach.
Perform related administrative and notarial duties consistent with the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations and U.S. law.
Consular officers operate under the authority of the Assistant Secretary for Consular Affairs and apply U.S. law, regulations, and security protocols. Their decisions on visas are generally final (subject to limited administrative review), and their work requires judgment under pressure, knowledge of local laws and conditions, and strong customer-service skills. They are distinct from purely diplomatic officers (who focus more on political, economic, or public-diplomacy matters), though career officers may move between tracks and consular sections often sit within embassies.
In short, consular officials serve as the primary point of contact for Americans in need overseas and as gatekeepers who balance facilitation of legitimate travel with national security.
Where this judicial dimbulb came up with the idea that consular officers reported to congress is beyond me. Her use of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 was even further off the mark. She is, apparently, one of these Libtard Progressive moonbats who think that coming to the United States is a right and not a privilege.
The ruling does not invalidate visa denials based on other independent grounds of ineligibility, but it wipes out refusals based solely on the 75-country freeze and returns those cases to the government for further proceedings consistent with the decision.
Without question this is going to be appealed and will be overturned, again. It’s also flat out unenforceable.
The lawsuit was brought by the Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc. (CLINIC); African Communities Together (ACT), a Harlem-based immigrant advocacy group; five prospective employment-based immigrants; and six U.S. citizens seeking to bring family members to the country.
Of this group, I think only the ones who had jobs waiting and those looking to bring family members in have a legal leg to stand on and only for their individual cases. The families would be covered by the same rules I was, and the ones coming in for a job should be able to show that they wont’ be a burden to the taxpayers. The NGO’s? I think they went looking for anyone they could use to try and throw the borders open again.
Once again, we have a judge who has gone beyond her constitutional authority. We are long past the point were this can be tolerated and dealt with through the usual systems. Those systems are also not functioning. These thugs with gavels need to be put in their place and if that requires a president to pull an Andrew Jackson and wish them luck in enforcing their order, or even indicting some of them, then so be it.
Thatisall
~The Angry Webmaster~
