Becky Dernbach

3 weeks ago | sahanjournal.com | Becky Dernbach

A federal judge Wednesday ordered U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to immediately free a Marshall, Minnesota, man who protested police killings, citing concerns about retaliation for protected speech. “The Court finds that Mr. H has shown that he is in custody in violation of the First Amendment and is entitled to a writ of habeas corpus for his immediate release,” wrote U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez.

3 weeks ago | sahanjournal.com | Becky Dernbach

A University of Minnesota business student who has been in ICE custody since March — despite an immigration court judge ruling he cannot be deported  — brought his case to a federal judge Monday. Doğukan Günaydın is one of at least three Minnesota international students in recent months who remained in ICE custody after an immigration judge ordered their release, because DHS invoked a little-used stay to override the immigration judge’s decision.

3 weeks ago | sahanjournal.com | Becky Dernbach |Cynthia Tu

Joletta Edwards knows firsthand that school staff don’t always know what homeless students need. She recalls the moment when a staffer came into her son’s classroom, introduced herself as the caseworker in charge of the homeless and highly mobile program, and asked for her son by name — in front of all his classmates. “The next call I got was them trying to get him to come out of the bathroom because he was in there crying, because the lady set his business out like that,” Edwards said.

3 weeks ago | sahanjournal.com | Becky Dernbach

It’s 8 a.m. As usual, Marcia Howard is at George Floyd Square for the morning meeting. A group of eight neighbors has gathered at the People’s Way, a one-time Speedway gas station where they sip coffee on benches around empty gas pumps, as Howard delivers updates. Labor unions are planning rallies for May Day; a neighbor needs help moving bins out of her house; and the group will be repainting the long list of names of people around the country who were killed by police.

1 month ago | spokesman-recorder.com | Becky Dernbach

The Trump administration’s policy on international students is changing so quickly, its own lawyers are having trouble keeping up. News reports on April 25 indicated that the administration would change course on the mass cancellations of legal status for international students. But in a hearing Monday in St. Paul, a Trump administration lawyer told a federal judge that while he understood there was a new policy, he did not know what that new policy was.