By Brian Freeman From Newsmax

A federal judge on Sunday ruled that Ken Cuccinelli was unlawfully appointed as the acting head of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) and invalidated policies connected to asylum seekers that he established during his tenure, the New York Post reported.

The lawsuit was filed last year by Democracy Forward, Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc. and Proskauer Rose LLP  soon after Cuccinelli took office, CNN reported.

Cuccinelli, an immigrant hardliner, is currently the acting Deputy Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees USCIS.

Policies that Cuccinelli enacted included a reduction in the time asylum-seekers have in credible-fear proceedings to obtain guidance from lawyers, and another preventing extensions to the time migrants are allowed to get ready for critical interviews.

The judge’s ruling also “calls into question any other directive Cuccinelli signed while purporting to serve as acting director, but given that most of the big policy shifts were approved higher up within DHS, the broader impact may be modest,” University of Texas School of Law Prof Steve Vladeck told CNN.

The judge ruled that Cuccinelli’s appointment violated the Federal Vacancies Reform Act (FVRA), which regulates who the president can place in certain Cabinet and agency roles, according to The Hill.

The Trump administration created Cuccinelli’s first title, principal deputy director, so that he could qualify to head the agency in an interim status, but the judge explained that “Cuccinelli may have the title … and the Department of Homeland Security’s order of succession may designate the office of the Principal Deputy Director as the first assistant to the Director. But labels — without any substance — cannot satisfy the FVRA’s default rule under any plausible reading of the statute.”

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