US attorneys have been granted additional time by US District Judge Andrew Hanen to provide details about a contentious advisory to assess sanctions or redresses against them for misleading the states and the court in the legal challenge against President Obama’s executive action on immigration reform.
Hanen moved the deadline from April 21st to April 30th at the request of the government. In the legal challenge against the immigration executive action, which has taken by 26 states led by Texas, attorneys for the government claimed on numerous occasions that movement on deferred action applications would not take place before February 18th; Hanen prevented the program going ahead on the 16th of the same month via a legal injunction. Hanen was later provided with an advisory from government attorneys stating that 108,081 undocumented immigrants had been given three year-renewals and a further 55 applicants were given this benefit after the temporary injunction was issued. At a court hearing on March 18th Hanen told Kathleen Hartnett, attorney for the Justice Department, that he had been told that such applications would not be processed until February 18th and he believed he had been treated “like an idiot”.
“Fabrications, misstatements, half-truths, artful omissions, and the failure to correct misstatements may be acceptable, albeit lamentable, in other aspects of life; but in the courtroom, when an attorney knows that both the court and the other side are relying on complete frankness, such conduct is unacceptable,” Hanen declared.