{"id":21495,"date":"2023-12-16T06:00:07","date_gmt":"2023-12-16T12:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=21495"},"modified":"2023-12-16T06:00:11","modified_gmt":"2023-12-16T12:00:11","slug":"our-immigration-courts-are-in-crisis-and-its-making-it-impossible-to-secure-our-borders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=21495","title":{"rendered":"Our immigration courts are in crisis \u2014 and it\u2019s making it impossible to secure our borders"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Biden <\/a>administration claims<\/a> its ability to secure the border has been impaired by Congress\u2019s failure to pass comprehensive immigration reform, but that it has done what it could to build a safe, orderly and humane immigration system.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In reality, the administration caused a border crisis by releasing unprecedented numbers<\/a> of undocumented migrants into the country \u2014 and Congress can\u2019t fix that.\u202f <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This has resulted in an immigration court backlog that is so large it severely limits the court\u2019s ability to adjudicate asylum applications, with some migrants waiting as long as 10 years<\/a> for a hearing. The right to apply for asylum is meaningless if the immigration court can\u2019t adjudicate their applications.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The backlog also severely limits the court\u2019s ability to conduct removal proceedings. Illegal border crossers are essentially safe from deportation once they have reached the interior of the country, and they can keep trying<\/a> until they succeed.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It will not be possible to secure the border until this backlog crisis is ended, and that can\u2019t be done by simply\u00a0reducing the number<\/a>\u00a0of new asylum seekers.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Border Patrol has apprehended\u202f5,815,600<\/a>\u202fillegal crossers since the beginning of Biden\u2019s presidency, and it released\u202fmore than 2 million<\/a>\u202fof them.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The administration also has created legal pathways to offer migrants an alternative to making an illegal crossing.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The main path is an expanded version of the previous administration\u2019s CBP One<\/a>\u202fmobile application program, which permits undocumented migrants to schedule an appointment to present themselves for inspection at a designated port of entry. From January 2023 through September, 225,000 undocumented immigrants were interviewed and 99.7 percent<\/a>\u202fof them were admitted.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Currently, around 1,600 migrants a day<\/a> are being processed and released under this program. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The administration also offers humanitarian parole<\/a> to nationals of Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua and Haiti who have a financial supporter in the United States. This program paroles up to 30,000 migrants per month into the United States.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Most of these migrants\u00a0file affirmative asylum applications<\/a>\u00a0at the\u00a0USCIS Asylum Office<\/a>. The applications are called \u201caffirmative\u201d because the applicants are not in removal proceedings. Asylum applications in removal proceedings are \u201cdefensive\u201d because an asylum grant will prevent the applicant from being deported.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As of Sept. 19, 2023, the asylum office had a backlog of 1 million<\/a> affirmative asylum cases, and it only has 760 working officers \u2014 72 fewer than in\u202fDecember 2022.<\/a> In his 2023 Annual Report<\/a> to Congress, the CIS ombudsman states\u202fthat affirmative asylum processing times are likely to reach a decade. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to TRAC Immigration<\/a>, the growth of the backlog has been accelerating at a breakneck pace<\/a> since the start of the Biden administration, which has buried the immigration court in an avalanche of cases. As of the end of October 2023, it was at 2,930,934<\/a> cases. This is more than double the number when Biden began his presidency. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The immigration court has more than 700 judges<\/a> and the administration has requested funding for 375 more<\/a>. But the Congressional Research Service estimated in a July 28 report<\/a> that it would take 1,349 judges 10 years to clear the backlog, which was only 1,979,313 cases when CRS made that calculation. It is almost 3 million now.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The backlog has gotten so large that the\u202faverage wait<\/a>\u202ffor an initial\u00a0master calendar hearing<\/a>\u00a0for pleadings and to schedule an\u00a0individual hearing<\/a>\u00a0on the merits of the case is four years. A\u00a0final decision<\/a>\u00a0frequently takes years after that. Moreover, a\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0from the DHS inspector general indicates that DHS isn\u2019t able to maintain reliable addresses for the illegal border crossers it releases.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Immigration expert Andrew Arthur says<\/a> migrants aren\u2019t necessarily coming to apply for asylum as much as to access the asylum adjudication process that makes it possible for them to enter the country without entry documents. He thinks they should have to establish<\/a> a credible fear<\/a> of persecution to get into the United States to apply for asylum and that the standard for passing that test should be raised. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This would reduce the number of frivolous asylum applications, but it wouldn\u2019t end the backlog crisis. The court only closed 671,966 cases in fiscal 2023; at that rate, it would take more than 4 years<\/a> to clear its 2,930,934<\/a> case backlog even if it did not receive any more new cases.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Paul Schmidt, another immigration expert, says<\/a> that migrants are so desperate they will come no matter what the government does in its attempts to deter them.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

They aren\u2019t all that desperate.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

They are coming from 160 countries<\/a>, not just from neighboring countries. For many of them, transportation costs and paying for assistance from smugglers are major expenses.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whether it is worth it depends largely on the likelihood that they will be able to stay if they succeed in getting into the country. The backlog has made this very likely. They can\u2019t be deported without a\u00a0final order of removal<\/a>\u00a0from an immigration judge, and the backlog has severely limited the court\u2019s ability to conduct removal proceedings.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The backlog has turned the right to apply for asylum into little more than a vehicle for getting into the United States and staying here without fear of being deported, and it has created a haven for illegal crossers who succeed in reaching the interior of the country. The border can\u2019t be secured under these circumstances. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I am afraid that if a solution isn\u2019t found soon, the only way to end the backlog will be to suspend consideration of asylum applications. Refugee admissions could be increased temporarily to provide refuge to migrants with a well-founded fear of persecution until a viable asylum system could be established.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

thehill<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Biden administration claims its ability to secure the border has been impaired by Congress\u2019s failure to pass comprehensive immigration reform, but that it has done what it could to build a safe, orderly and humane immigration system.   In reality, the administration caused a border crisis by releasing unprecedented numbers of undocumented migrants into the country \u2014 and Congress can\u2019t fix […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":21496,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[25062],"class_list":["post-21495","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-immigration-courts-in-crisis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21495","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21495"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21495\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21497,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21495\/revisions\/21497"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/21496"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21495"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21495"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21495"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}