Illegal immigrants exempt from DOJ’s vaccine mandate at deportation hearings

 

By Stephen Dinan

• The federal vaccine mandate will soon apply to Justice Department employees, contractors and visitors to its buildings. But one group it won’t apply to is illegal immigrants showing up for their deportation case hearings.

• The migrants are deemed an exception to President Biden’s mandates since they are seeking a public benefit or service. That means they will not have to prove they’ve been vaccinated or show a negative COVID-19 test from the previous three days. Their lawyers are also exempt.

  Those exemptions aren’t sitting well with immigration judges and other employees who will have to interact with the unvaccinated, and they say allowing them in defeats the purpose of the mandate.

  “Everyone coming to immigration court should be subject to the same rules,” said one Justice Department official. “A double standard undermines the rationale for the vaccine mandate and puts everyone at risk.”

  The department, in its August memo laying out its rules, said that all employees, on-site contractors and visitors needed vaccinations or proof of recent negative tests. The exception was for visitors entering Justice Department buildings “to obtain a public service or benefit.”

  The department’s Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) has determined that migrants showing up for their immigration hearings are there to get a benefit and are not subject to the mandate.

  “The Biden administration is requiring highly educated and skilled immigration judges to get the COVID-19 vaccine or risk losing their jobs. Meanwhile, the same administration is allowing unvaccinated foreign nationals to stream over our borders and remain in our country illegally,” an employee at EOIR told The Washington Times. “And nobody forces those immigration violators — or their attorneys — to get vaccinated before appearing in immigration court. This is patent absurdity worthy of a Fellini film.”