Due Process & the Courts
Attorney General Garland Brings Back Administrative Closure for Immigration Judges
Attorney General Merrick Garland vacated Matter of Castro-Tum on July 15, reviving a key tool to help judges prioritize cases in the overburdened immigration court system and allow people facing deportation to pursue all available paths to legal status. In Matter of Cruz-Valdez, the attorney general reversed a decision… Read More
Supreme Court Denies Bond Hearings to People Pursuing Protection Claims Who Have Prior Removal Orders
The Supreme Court issued a decision on June 29 in the Johnson v. Guzman Chavez case. The majority of the justices determined that people with prior removal orders are subject to mandatory detention, even while they pursue proceedings to stop their deportation to a country where they established they have… Read More
DHS Issues New Guidance for Government Attorneys in Immigration Court Proceedings
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Office of the Principal Legal Advisor (OPLA) issued a new memorandum on May 27 that provides guidance on how its attorneys can and should exercise prosecutorial discretion. In the memo, which was made public on Friday, the lead government attorney for the Department… Read More
New ‘Dedicated Docket’ Could Rush Asylum-Seeking Families Through Court
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced on May 28 the creation of a new “Dedicated Docket” in immigration court for the claims of asylum-seeking families. The goal of this new “rocket docket” is to complete most new cases within 300 days. A… Read More
Supreme Court Rejects Two Ninth Circuit Decisions That Protected Immigrants
In two unanimous decisions, the Supreme Court has rejected rules that provided protections for immigrants. The rejected rules came from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, a court with a reputation as a liberal stronghold. It is the largest of all the federal courts of appeals. In… Read More
First Round of Biden Immigration Judges Fails to Increase Diversity
The Biden administration announced its first round of immigration judge appointments on May 6. Unfortunately, the immigration court appointments do not show the commitment to diversity that President Biden has demonstrated in his federal court appointments. All of the new judges had received conditional offers from the Trump administration. The current administration was under no obligation… Read More
Supreme Court Rejects Government Practice of ‘Notice-by-Installment’ in Niz-Chavez v. Garland
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled this week in Niz-Chavez v. Garland that immigration law requires the government to give noncitizens complete notice about the initiation of their immigration court case at one time. The April 29 ruling denounces the government’s current practice of providing necessary information over time and in… Read More
The Supreme Court Makes It Harder for Immigrants to Fight Deportation
The U.S. Supreme Court published a new decision on March 4 that will make it harder—if not impossible—for many longtime immigrants to fight deportation. The case, Pereida v. Wilkson, abandons decades of Supreme Court precedent on the immigration consequences of criminal convictions. Undocumented immigrants and other noncitizens who are… Read More
A Federal Defender System for Immigrants Is Long Overdue
The stakes in immigration court could not be higher—many people face the possibility of being permanently torn away from their families and communities in the United States. Others seeking protection in the U.S. risk being forced back to dangerous conditions in their home countries. Despite these extraordinarily high stakes, immigrants… Read More
In a Win for Transparency, Court Orders Board of Immigration Appeals to Make Immigration Court Decisions Public
The Second Circuit has found that the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) must publish immigration decisions, reversing an earlier federal district court decision. The case challenged the Department of Justice’s longstanding practice of failing to publish immigration decisions by the BIA—the highest administrative court deciding immigration cases—in any… Read More
All gifts are matched dollar for dollar
No one should face the immigration system alone
