The Trump administration illegally appointed Ken Cuccinelli to be head of the government’s top citizenship agency, a federal judge ruled over the weekend, in a case that could undo some of the get-tough policies he helped put into place.
Judge Randolph A. Moss, an Obama appointee to the district court in Washington, D.C., said the law lays out how the duties of the director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services are to be performed when the post is vacant — and installing someone from outside the agency isn’t one of them.
And since Mr. Cuccinelli was not legitimately able to serve as acting director, his moves to constrain the time for someone to pursue an asylum claim are now invalid, the judge ruled in a decision Sunday.
Activists cheered the ruling, and said it calls into question everything Mr. Cuccinelli did since his June 2019 installment.
“This ruling is a big win that confirms Ken Cuccinelli’s installation and service as acting director of USCIS was unlawful,” said Anne Harkavy, executive director of Democracy Forward. “This is both a victory for the rule of law and a significant blow to the Trump administration’s xenophobic agenda.”
The immediate effect was to invalidate USCIS decisions against asylum claims from the plaintiffs in the case. Judge Moss ruled that since those decisions were made under rules issued by Mr. Cuccinelli, they couldn’t stand.
He ordered a redo at USCIS.
The Trump administration had tried to install Mr. Cuccinelli in a new principal assistant post to the director, and then changed the succession rules to make that person the one that took over in time of a vacancy in the director’s office.
Just Moss said that was unprecedented.
“There is no evidence that at any time prior to Cuccinelli’s appointment did Congress or the Executive Branch imagine that an agency could create a new position after a vacancy arose; could then alter the agency’s order of succession to treat that new position as the ’first assistant’ to the vacant office; and could further specify that all would return to its original state once the … vacancy was filled,” Judge Moss wrote.
Mr. Cuccinelli now serves as acting deputy secretary at Homeland Security.
The department said it disagreed with the judge’s ruling.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.