"The Voice of the New Due Process Army" ————– Musings on Events in U.S. Immigration Court, Immigration Law, Sports, and Other Random Topics by Retired United States Immigration Judge (Arlington, Virginia) and former Chairman of the Board of Immigration Appeals Paul Wickham Schmidt. To see my complete professional bio, just click on the link below.
GOVERNMENT BY MALICIOUS INCOMPETENTS: Trump Administration’s Latest “Backlog Reduction Plan” — Slow Down Hiring Of U.S. Immigration Judges & Support Staff — Abandon E-Filing (Again) — Barr Wins His First “Five Clown” Rating In Record Time! 🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡
The Trump administration will pause its hiring of immigration judges, slow its procuring of support staff, and cancel a training conference, dealing a setback to the government’s efforts to cut down on a crushing backlog of cases, according to a Justice Department email obtained by BuzzFeed News.
James McHenry, director of the Executive Office for Immigration Review, notified immigration court staff in an email Wednesday morning, advising that the timing of the 2019 budget process has left them “considerably short of being able to fulfill all of our current operational needs.”
McHenry cited increases in costs related to transcriptions, operational needs, and interpreters.
“This challenging budget situation has led us to a position where difficult financial decisions need to be made,” wrote McHenry.
As a result of the funding issues, McHenry said, the court does not “anticipate” it will be able to hire additional judges after an already scheduled class of judges is brought on board in April. The budget costs will also impact the court’s hiring of 250 attorneys needed to support immigration judges.
The pause on hiring delivers a blow to an administration that has long complained that the immigration court backlog, which has increased in recent years to more than 800,000 cases, has led to wait times stretching months and years.
The budget signed by President Trump this year had been described as a way for the immigration court to hire an additional 75 immigration judge teams.
A Department of Justice official, Steven Stafford, disputed the notion it would freeze hiring, arguing that it was simply not continuing to hire judges at the same pace. McHenry noted that the administration had hired 174 new immigration judges in the last two years and now has more than 400 judges on staff.
Rebecca Blackwell / AP
A migrant family enters the US near Imperial Beach, Calif., after squeezing through a small hole under the border wall.
The news comes a day before McHenry is set to speak before the House Appropriations Committee and as the court withstands criticisms from the union that represents immigration judges and moves to increase productivity, including quotas.
In recent months, many judges, who oversee asylum claims and deportation cases, have retired or resigned citing interference in how they were handling cases.
“This administration has justified so many of their more draconian policies in terms of ‘we have got to lower the backlog’ and then all of a sudden they don’t have the funds to hire more immigration judges,” said Jeffrey Chase, a former immigration judge. “If their true goal is to provide fair adjudications more quickly, then this is inconsistent with that. More people will wait longer.”
The nationwide rollout of a new online filing system, meant to help improve efficiency, will be frozen, McHenry said, and additional delays on new court spaces will also be possible this year.
“We are doing our best at headquarters to ensure that our funds are spent in the most fiscally responsible manner possible,” he said in the email to staff, “while consistently meeting the needs and mission of the agency.”
***************************************
Quick takes:
Duh! Who would have thought that hiring more judges would require more interpreters, transcripts, and “operational support.” Certainly not the geniuses at DOJ/EOIR;
After 18 years of fruitless effort, DOJ/EOIR fail yet again to deliver on e-filing (in and of itself enough reason to get this out of DOJ and “can” the EOIR ineffective management structure);
Apparently, building largely useless walls and wasting money on troops at the border are more important “priorities” for reducing the backlog than actually hearing and deciding cases;
Court morale is already at an all time low — this ought to send it even lower;
Count on this touching off yet another round of EOIR’s renowned “Aimless Docket Reshuffling” and more vicious and disingenuous “Victim Blame Shaming;”
Bad start for new AG Bill Barr — Sessions “set the bar on the ground,” but you still might not get over it;
On the bright side, since in the “wacky incompetent world” of DOJ/EOIR more judges actually = more backlog, perhaps fewer judges will = less backlog.
The Immigration Court system is a farce, and EOIR doesn’t have the faintest idea of how to fix it (nor does anyone else in the Trump Kaksitocracy for that matter). Unfortunately, lives are at stake here. To quote Casey Stengel again: “Can’t anyone here play this game?”
TODAY’S FIVE CLOWN AWARD GOES TO RECENTLY APPOINTED AG BILL BARR — SELDOM HAS SOMEONE LOOKED SO STUPID WITHIN SUCH A SHORT TIME OF TAKING AN OFFICE (THAT HE PREVIOUSLY HELD):
