Federal Funding Cut For Low-Income Legal Defense Program
Federal Funding Dries Up For Program Providing Defense Attorneys For Low-Income Clients
Throughout my entire adult life, I’ve held one truth in my heart: The Republican Party absolutely hates poor people. While the GOP has always found ways to undercut the lower and working classes, their war on the poor has been supercharged under the Trump administration. Due to a lack of action by the Republican-controlled Congress, federal funding has lapsed for the Criminal Justice Act, which provides defense attorneys for clients who can’t afford one.
According to CBS News, funding for the Criminal Justice Act lapsed in early July due to a funding shortfall. The Criminal Justice Act was signed into law in 1964 and ensured the right to an attorney if a defendant can’t afford one. According to statistics from the U.S. Courts, an estimated 90% of legal defendants receive representation through the Criminal Justice Act. While states have offices for legal defenders, Criminal Justice Act panels provide contracts for private attorneys to take on some of those cases.
The Trump administration has been incredibly willing to weaponize federal funding to force corporations, universities, and state legislatures to bend to its will. What makes the lack of funding for the Criminal Justice Act particularly weird is that it undercuts their immigration efforts.
Now, just to keep it a buck, I cannot for the life of me care about illegal immigration. I was raised and currently live in Arizona. I grew up with undocumented folks and my first serious relationship was with a DACA recipient. I can tell you right now, I’m more concerned about the growing number of incels and white nationalists than undocumented folks who are just trying to make a couple of dollars working jobs I don’t want.
With that said, if the Republican party is really serious about cracking down on immigration, wouldn’t it make sense to pay the attorneys representing undocumented folks to accelerate their trials and potentially get them out faster? By not paying these attorneys, the GOP is only getting in its own way when it comes to federal immigration cases.
Case in point: New Mexico.
The Trump administration has created a militarized buffer zone in New Mexico, which has triggered a lot of local confusion and led to over 550 people being charged with unauthorized entry into the buffer zone. The trespassing cases, along with the increase in immigration-related cases, have resulted in New Mexico defense attorneys being overwhelmed with work that they aren’t even getting paid for.
Several defense attorneys in the state have stopped taking cases until funding resumes, with it being unclear who’s going to represent the surplus of defendants in the interim.
From CBS News:
In one case brought against three men facing drug charges, lawyers for the defendants asked the court to postpone their trial, set to start next month, as well as all deadlines. All three defense attorneys were appointed under the CJA, and they said that a delay is needed for them to complete several tasks that they can’t at this time because of inadequate funding.
The lawyers wrote that experts, discovery coordinators and investigators are refusing CJA work in New Mexico’s judicial district because they can’t be paid yet, depriving their clients of the tools needed to mount their defense.
“[T]his is an intentional act by the United States Congress to deprive the judiciary of necessary funds to ensure Defender Services, most notably the Criminal Justice Act services, are able to operate in a constitutionally appropriate manner,” they wrote. “The failure to provide funding has forced a dangerous competition between defendants’ constitutional rights.”
“What might get Congress’s attention, or whoever’s attention you need to get, is the U.S. attorney or judges just dismissing cases because they aren’t able to provide counsel for defendants or timely trials. And that could happen,” Peter Wold, a Minneapolis lawyer, told CBS.
Just so we’re clear: The GOP had plenty of time to give billions of dollars to ICE aka the Bootleg Gestapo, but couldn’t set aside time to ensure low-income defendants, some of whom have been arrested as a result of the Trump administration’s actions, receive their fundamental rights to legal representation, due process, and a speedy trial.
That’s totally normal and a sign of a just legal system.
SEE ALSO:
DOJ Takes Aim At NY AG Letitia James, Claiming She Violated Trump’s Civil Rights
Federal Funding Dries Up For Program Providing Defense Attorneys For Low-Income Clients was originally published on newsone.com
