Susan J Cohen is an American immigration lawyer who has seen the last few decades of US immigration policy. She talks about the situation Joe Biden has inherited, after Donald Trump changed more than 400 immigration laws, rules and processes; why a record number of arrests has been made at the US Southern border; what is happening in Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala or Haiti that is making people move north; and what the impact of the Trump presidency has been on immigrants, lawyers and activists.
Cohen is the founding partner of the immigration law practice at Boston firm Mintz, an author and a songwriter. In 2017 she was part of a small band of legal minds who fought the so-called "Muslim ban" in court and won a short-lived victory.
📚 Journeys from There to Here: Stories of Immigrant Trials, Triumphs and Contributions. Susan J Cohen, with Steven Taylor. River Grove Books, 2021. Buy it here. (This affiliate link supports Borderline.)
🎶 Beyond the Bordersand Looking for the Angels, written by Susan Cohen and performed by students and alumni of the Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachussetts.
Show notes
[00:00:16] Intro
[00:01:32] The immigration situation Joe Biden inherited
[00:05:21] Title 42 and Remain in Mexico: How the US keeps lawful asylum-seekers at bay
[00:08:49] What it's like to wait at the US Southern border
[00:12:43] A historical record for arrests at the Southern border
[00:15:13] What's happening in Central America and Haiti to push people north
[00:18:42] The massive problems we'd need to solve to stem migration flows
[00:22:27] Patterns of discrimination and aggression at the border
[00:26:58] How the American public feels about immigration
[00:29:46] Changing the perception of immigrants
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