DOJ Targets Slow Immigration Judges    05/07 06:17

   

   PHOENIX (AP) -- The Justice Department is aiming to weed out immigration 
judges who it feels are ruling too slowly or aren't following the law, acting 
Attorney General Todd Blanche said Wednesday, as the Trump administration seeks 
to remake the courts and cut down on the backlog of 3.7 million cases to ease 
its mass deportation push.

   Blanche was in Phoenix to address the Border Security Expo, a yearly 
gathering that draws top immigration officials, local and state law enforcement 
officers and representatives from companies doing business with the federal 
government. Blanche's appearance at the gathering reflects the way immigration 
enforcement and border security have become priorities throughout the Trump 
administration.

   Blanche, who has led the Justice Department since Pam Bondi was ousted last 
month, spoke to The Associated Press after his appearance at the conference. 
His comments were some of the most detailed on the changes to immigration 
courts since he took over the role.

   "You take an oath and you're not allowed to make decisions based upon what 
appear to be just sympathy or your whim," Blanche said.

   "If there's judges that are just not applying the law in the way that it 
needs to be applied, delaying inappropriately, have backlogs that are just 
unacceptable, they're the folks that we're going to try to find somebody 
different to fill that spot."

   The second Trump administration has made mass deportations a central 
priority and has launched an all-of-government effort to reach its lofty goals. 
To do so, it has cracked down on migrants in American cities, scaled up 
detention facilities and increased hiring of immigration officers.

   While the Department of Homeland Security is the Cabinet agency most 
directly responsible for carrying out President Donald Trump's mass deportation 
agenda, immigration courts, a key aspect of the immigration system, fall under 
the Justice Department.

   Dozens of immigration judges have been removed from their jobs during 
Trump's second term, with critics saying they were targeted because they were 
approving too many asylum cases. The administration has also directed masked 
officers to handcuff migrants at closed asylum hearings and sent memos 
instructing judges to fall into line. Many migrants and their advocates say 
that immigration courts have increasingly become traps -- they show up for 
routine hearings only to face arrest.

   Unlike federal courts, where there are strict rules of procedure and judges 
have lifetime tenure, the Justice Department runs immigration courts and the 
attorney general can fire the judges with fewer restraints.

   But critics take issue with how the administration is remaking the 
immigration courts.

   "Unfortunately, the Trump Administration is systematically dismantling due 
process protections in U.S. immigration courts, prioritizing speed and 
enforcement over fairness, accuracy, and fundamental justice," the American 
Immigration Lawyers Association wrote in a policy brief last fall.

   Critics also say that a board within the courts system that determines how 
immigration judges can rule on cases has issued a number of decisions under the 
Trump administration that have narrowed the pathway to asylum through the 
courts. Blanche brushed away the criticism, saying the decisions were 
consistent with the law.

   Blanche said there were problems with judges repeatedly delaying cases and 
other cases where judges weren't following the law "because of sympathy towards 
individuals."

   Flush with money from Congress last summer that empowered the department to 
hire more judges, the department is rapidly hiring new immigration court 
judges, sparking criticism that the judges do not meet standards.

   "We have a very rigorous process to get people interviewed, approved and 
then trained up. And then we'll watch them," Blanche said, expressing 
confidence in the new hires.

   Blanche also said the Justice Department has been prioritizing efforts to 
strip citizenship from people who the administration says have defrauded the 
system, a process known as "denaturalization" that between 1990-2017 was used 
in only about a dozen cases per year.

   "That's one of the tools that we are using aggressively that hasn't been 
used as aggressively in the past," Blanche said, without providing specific 
numbers.