Reforming America's Immigration Court
WASHINGTON, April 19, 2018 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on Border Security and Immigration examined reform of the country's immigration courts in a hearing Wednesday. The Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR), the Department of Justice agency responsible for the nation's 58 immigration courts, has lacked resources and guidance for years, making it difficult to fulfill its mission ? "to adjudicate immigration cases by fairly, expeditiously, and uniformly interpreting and administering the Nation's immigration laws."
Andrew Arthur, the Center's resident fellow in law and policy and past immigration judge, testified that "immigration judges now face a crushing caseload of more than 684,000 cases, not counting the 350,000 cases that are currently administratively closed . . . That the backlog has grown so large is bad for the parties, bad for the courts, and bad for immigration generally."
View Arthur's full testimony at: https://cis.org/Testimony/Strengthening-and-Reforming-Americas-Immigration-Court-System
Arthur addressed the negative implications of the backlog, including lost evidence, problems with witness availability, massive time wasted by judges having to repeatedly review voluminous records of proceedings, and removable aliens remaining the in the U.S. for lengthy periods of time during which they disappear into the U.S. interior.
Arthur spoke out strongly against placing the courts outside the executive branch. He pointed out the importance of having the Attorney General involved due to the role foreign policy needs to play and the likelihood that in the future Congress could cut resources if they disagree with its opinions. Rather, Arthur recommended improving EOIR, providing judges more resources and bright-line rules.
When asked by Senator Kennedy what would be the one thing he would do to improve the situation, Arthur responded that nothing would do more to help than having sufficient detention space to hold those in proceedings until their cases had been resolved.
Contact: Marguerite Telford
202-466-8185, [email protected]
SOURCE Center for Immigration Studies
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