Immigration judges under President Biden’s administration have dismissed deportation cases against nearly 200,000 immigrants because the Department of Homeland Security failed to submit required documents by a court date, according to a new report.
One report said courts lost jurisdiction to process deportation cases or adjudicate asylum claims after DHS failed to file thousands of notices of appearance by scheduled hearing dates. report It was announced Wednesday by Syracuse University’s Transaction Records Access Clearinghouse.
“These mass layoffs and their aftermath raise serious concerns,” the TRAC report, which includes data up to February 2024, said.
The nonpartisan research organization called the “almost complete lack of transparency about where and why these DHS failures occurred” “alarming.”
“Equally alarming is the lack of hard information about what happened to many of these immigrants when DHS failed to correct its failure to reissue and apply for new NTAs to reopen their cases. “This is a lack of,” the report points out.
A Notice to Appear (NTA) is issued when an immigrant who illegally crosses the border into the United States is apprehended.
Immigrants claiming asylum are assigned a hearing date, often years in advance, where they have an opportunity to explain to an immigration judge why they should not be deported.
However, the IRS must also file with the court and the individual must be directed to appear for a hearing.
“Nearly all immigration court cases are deportation cases, which require DHS to file an NTA in order for the case to proceed,” the TRAC report explains.
The number of lawsuits dismissed for not filing an NTA jumped from 6,482 in 2020 to 33,802 in 2021 after Biden took office.
The number of cases without NTA jumped to 79,592 in 2022, but decreased to 68,869 in 2023.
So far in 2024, 10,598 deportation cases have been dismissed for lack of an IRS, according to the report.
Between 2014 and 2020, less than 1% of deportation cases were dismissed because an NTA was not filed in court.
In Biden’s first three years in office, that figure was 8.4% of cases.
TRAC has only corrected dismissals for one in four immigrants for whom DHS did not file an NTA in immigration court, and in nearly 2,000 cases, a second NTA was also filed late in court. revealed that.
The report says immigration courts in Houston and Miami “clearly stand out” for not filing NTAs on time, with more than 50% of deportation cases dismissed for lack of an NTA since 2021. It was pointed out that
TRAC suggests the problem may be that Border Patrol agents and other DHS employees are given the authority to schedule their own immigration inspections.
“Ten years ago, it was rare for DHS to fail to file an NTA by the scheduled first hearing,” the report states. “However, their frequency increased after Border Patrol agents and other DHS personnel were given access to the Immigration Court’s Interactive Scheduling System (ISS).”
“DHS’ relatively recent access to the court’s scheduling system has created new administrative problems. DHS officials schedule immigration court hearings faster than the agency can file NTAs. ” TRAC found. “Indeed, this is what happened.”
“As immigration judges look at the 3.5 million immigration cases pending, every wasted hearing is a hearing that could have advanced or resolved another case.”
The Syracuse University-based group says the DHS disaster is also causing headaches for immigrants with legitimate asylum claims.
“Asylum seekers are generally unable to obtain work permits until a formal asylum application is submitted,” the report states.
“Thus, these layoffs can extend the time and hardship that individuals and their families face to secure food, shelter, and other necessities while awaiting work permits. In fact, their The lack of clarity in the case may only increase rather than alleviate their sense of legal impasse.”
DHS did not respond to The Post’s request for comment.
