Read the Round Table amicus brief here:

Brief of Amici Curiae Retired IJs and Former Members of the Board of Immigration Appeals

Highlight:

As this Court has recognized, “when [an] alien appears pro se, it is the IJ’s duty to ‘fully develop the record.’” Agyeman v. INS, 296 F.3d 871, 877 (9th Cir. 2002) (quoting Jacinto v. INS, 208 F.3d 725, 733-34 (9th Cir. 2000)). Despite this long-recognized obligation, the record in this case demonstrates that this duty is not always fulfilled; and that the consequence may be unfairness and injustice to the pro se petitioner who is unable to develop the record without guidance and assistance. We respectfully submit that this Court should use this case to provide much-needed guidance to IJs on the scope of their duty to work with pro se respondents to elicit the information necessary to develop the factual record. Based upon our own extensive experience, we are of the view that this can be done efficiently and effectively by conscientious IJs, so long as the rule that they are required to do so is clear.

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Thanks so much to out “Team of Pro Bono Heroes” at Sullivan & Cromwell, NY: 

• Philip L. Graham, Jr.
• Amanda Flug Davidoff
• Rebecca S. Kadosh
• Joseph M. Calder, Jr.

This regime has appointed mostly judges lacking experience representing individuals in Immigration Court and then compounded the problem with:

• Mindless “haste makes waste” enforcement gimmicks (often supported by knowingly false or misleading narratives) imposed by political hacks at DOJ and Falls Church;
• A BIA lacking expertise and objectivity that instead of focusing on due process for those in Immigration Court, spews forth “blueprints for denial and deportation” without regard for statutory, Constitutional, and human rights;
• A system that has elevated “malicious incompetence” and “worst judicial practices” to a “dark art form.”☠️

TIME FOR COURAGEOUS NEW IMMIGRATION LEADERSHIP!

By Paul Wickham Schmidt

It’s time for the “EOIR Clown Show” in Falls Church to go! Bring in competent jurists and administrators from the NDPA: practical scholars and problem solvers with real life skills developed by saving lives from this broken and biased system. Real jurists with expertise in human rights and courage, who will make due process, fundamental fairness, humane values, and “best judicial practices” the only objectives of the Immigration Courts. Jurists who will courageously resist political interference and improper and unethical weaponization of the Immigration Courts by any Administration.

Let the incoming Biden-Administration know that you won’t accept failed “retreads” from the past and “go along to get along” bureaucrats running and comprising what is probably the most important and significant court system in America from an equal justice, social justice, constitutional development, and saving human lives standpoint. 

This is the “retail level” of our justice system: The  foundation upon which the rest of our legal system all the way up to a tone-deaf, flailing, failing, and generally spineless Supremes stands! This is a court system that the Biden Administration can fix without Mitch McConnell!

The members of the NDPA are the ones who have been fighting in the trenches (and at the borders) to save lives, advance social justice, insure equal justice for all, end institutional racism, and preserve our democracy in the face of a tyrannical, unscrupulous, corrupt, racially biased, anti-democracy regime and its enablers! Many have sacrificed careers, health, not to mention financial security in this fight!

Don’t let those who watched from the sidelines, above the day-to-day fray, or were part of the problem swoop in and take control after the battle has been won! 

Get mad! Get vocal! Get active! Call everyone you know in the incoming Administration! Demand that the NDPA and its members be given the leadership roles they have earned and deserve in remaking EOIR and reforming a thoroughly corrupt, politicized, and dysfunctional immigration bureaucracy across our Government! 

Don’t let the Dems turn their back on achievable reforms and “shut out” the reformers and problem solvers in the advocacy sector (who have “carried the water” for Dems for decades) as has been the case in the past! Don’t let the mistakes and short-sightedness of the past destroy YOUR chances for a better future!

Don’t let timidity, ignorance, indifference, and fear of “rocking the boat” in the name of justice, due process, and human dignity replace “malicious incompetence” in Government!

Due Process Forever! Same old, same old, never! It’s time for real change and reform! It’s YOUR time to shine! Let YOUR voices be heard!

PWS⚖️🗽🇺🇸👨🏽‍⚖️👩‍⚖️👨🏻‍⚖️

11-21-20