A directive from the Justice Department, which says the move is intended to reduce a backlog in immigration court, would result in rapid deportation orders in many cases.
A new Trump administration policy urges immigration judges to swiftly deny asylum to migrants whose applications they deem unlikely to succeed. The swift denials would circumvent the normal hearing process, which typically takes years to wind through the backlogged courts.
The guidance from the Justice Department, which took effect April 11, states that judges should consider dropping “legally deficient” asylum cases without holding a hearing. Doing that would keep some people who claim to be fleeing persecution in their home countries from having any opportunity to present their case to a judge.
“Adjudicators have the duty to efficiently manage their dockets,” Sirce Owen, acting director of the Executive Office for Immigration Review, which oversees the immigration courts, wrote in the policy memo. “It is clear from the almost four million pending cases on E.O.I.R.’s docket that has not been happening.”
The memo, sent to staff members, says that immigration judges should take “all appropriate action to immediately resolve cases on their dockets that do not have viable legal paths for relief or protection from removal.”
The new policy would inevitably result in judges issuing deportation orders before fully holding what are known as merits hearings, in which asylum applicants can present their claims in detail.
Immigration judges have the authority to decide whether an immigrant can remain in the United States or should be removed. The judges are employees of the Justice Department, not the federal courts, so they are expected to follow policies set by the agency.
