The bleak state of the immigration court system

May 21, 2019 By

markus-spiske-1475927-unsplashA recent article by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) outlines the current state of the immigration court system and it is bleak: “In a report released earlier this year, the American Bar Association described the U.S. immigration court system as facing an ‘existential crisis,’ an ‘irredeemably dysfunctional’ system ‘on the brink of collapse.'”

The report notes a backlog of 900,000 cases quoting The Economist: “People will die of old age in America before they ever acquire the legal right to live in America. This is an extraordinary failure to govern.”

According to the article, Trump’s new regulations have just exacerbated the problem, comparing the complexity of the immigration courts system to the tax code. They also note that the massive backlog of cases “have led to judges rushing to complete cases, compromising their ethical obligations and violating immigrants’ due process rights…”

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The Southern Poverty Law Center and the Emory University School of Law are calling for an investigation

May 10, 2017 By
AJC File

AJC File

The Southern Poverty Law Center and the Emory University School of Law are calling for an investigation into the federal immigration court practices in Atlanta, alleging discrimination and noting outcomes that differ from the rest of the country’s immigration courts. Those “courts” are actually not part of the federal judicial system but are administrative functions of the U.S. Department of Justice – the judges work for the DOJ.

The SPLC, in a letter to federal authorities, said that the Atlanta-based court “… denies asylum at the highest rate of any immigration court – 98 percent. The average bond set by its judges is typically 41 percent higher than the national average ($8,200 versus $11,637).”

Read the Atlanta Journal-Constitution report here:
Your Daily Jolt: Emory law school wants probe of immigration court | Political Insider blog

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Public Interest Attorney Notes Amicus Role For Immigration

July 24, 2015 By

Writing for the “Above The Law” website, attorney Sam Wright makes a case for increasing the role that amicus briefs might play for immigration court policies. Sam Wright, described as “a dyed-in-the-wool, bleeding-heart public interest lawyer,” focuses on the specific case of Cristoval Silva-Trevino, the subject of a Texas-based case with national implications.

A federal circuit court recently issued the latest guidelines in a years-long struggle over the case, but Wright makes the point that amicus briefs played an important role. For example, the Southern Poverty Law Center offered its opinion, along with another organization that the Center considers a hate-associated group.

See how it plays out, read here.

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