A new report finds that nearly half of unaccompanied minors facing trial in immigration court don’t have access to an attorney, a problem that’s growing as case backlogs continue to soar. One expert who spoke to Fox News Digital said these numbers could be worsening as young people pose as minors to take advantage of scarce legal resources.
In some federal immigration courts, more than half of the minors who appear before them do so without an attorney, the research organization has reported. ABC News report.
The report highlights the case of 18-year-old Brian Arevalo, who arrived in the United States two years ago. Arevalo doesn’t speak English and told ABC News he was forced to flee his parents and siblings in Mexico because of rising violence in his hometown.
Thousands of migrants are smuggling themselves into the US every day despite President Biden’s border order
Young migrants wait to be tested for COVID-19 at a Department of Homeland Security detention facility in Donna, Texas, on March 30, 2021. (AP Photo/Dario Lopez Mills/Pool)
Arevalo went to immigration court in April and told the judge he had been unable to find an attorney after searching for months. He was granted a three-month extension and is scheduled to appear in court again in June, but he still has not found an attorney, he told ABC News.
Similar cases are becoming commonplace, with experts saying unaccompanied minors are often forced to navigate the court system on their own, even though they often don’t speak English.
“People who appear unrepresented in immigration court are often uneducated in our language, culture and laws, yet must present their cases independently, while the Department of Homeland Security is represented by skilled government lawyers,” former immigration judge Dana Lee Marks told ABC News.
‘Biden failed’: Democrats vocally criticize handling of border crisis for creating internal rift within party
But Alfonso Aguilar, director of Hispanic engagement at the American Principles Project, told Fox News Digital that many of the purported minors arriving at the border are not actually children.
“Right now, the majority of unaccompanied minors are not children. They are young people who have come to work and should be deported,” Aguilar said. “But they’re arresting all the immigration lawyers and putting at risk immigrants who actually have legitimate asylum claims and really need legal advice.”
Central American migrants wait for food inside an enclosure set up by U.S. Customs and Border Protection to process a surge in migrant families and unaccompanied minors in El Paso, Texas, on March 27, 2019. (AP Photo/Cedar Attanasio)
That reality actually puts unaccompanied minors at a distinct disadvantage, Marks added.
“How are they going to know, especially with only an elementary school education, about the situation in their country, the political struggle in their country, what dangers it poses to them, and how to corroborate their testimony?” Marks said. “All of these things are crucial.”
Complicating the problem is a surge in new cases, with immigration court backlogs expected to grow from 2.8 million at the end of fiscal year 2023 to nearly 3.6 million in fiscal year 2024. Judges are on pace to handle more than 500,000 new cases this year, a record, but still can’t keep up with the surge.
“Our system was not built to handle the numbers we’re seeing,” Aguilar said. “There’s no way we’ll have enough judges to handle these cases.”
According to ABC News, there is a shortage of lawyers along with a shortage of judges, even though some nonprofit law firms such as Kids in Need of Defense are offering free legal services to minors.
“Just as there are not enough immigration judges to process the unprecedented numbers of migrants arriving at our southern border in a timely manner, we should not be surprised that there are not enough lawyers to represent unaccompanied minors in immigration court,” Aguilar said.
On March 21, 2024, a large group of migrants surged toward the border wall in Texas, attempting to illegally enter the United States. (James Breeden for the New York Post/Mega)
“A lot of organizations are at capacity and can’t take on cases and have to put them on a waiting list,” Jennifer Podkul, vice president of policy and advocacy for Kids in Need of Defense, told ABC News. “We’re putting them through this complicated deportation process, and it just doesn’t make sense.”
Click here to get the FOX News app
According to a 2021 congressional research report, unaccompanied minors will be faced with the reality that having an attorney could make a difference in their case.
“Immigration judges are 100 times more likely to grant relief to unaccompanied children who have legal representation than to unrepresented children,” the report states.
