Law Commons^™

The conversation about immigration adjudication has shifted from one detailing shortcomings to one addressing solutions. When formulating solutions, it is important to look beyond any one contributor to the crisis and to promote a holistic view. Recent proposals for immigration adjudication reform acknowledge that fixing the system requires a multi-faceted approach. This article confirms the need for such an approach by showing how one popular cause of the crisis - a lack of decisional independence - only scratches the surface of what ails the immigration adjudication system. Along the way, the article uncovers and evaluates underappreciated crisis contributors.

While decisional …

Immigration adjudication is more diverse than it may seem. Scholars tend to focus on one aspect of administrative immigration adjudication, the decision-making process established to determine whether an individual may be removed (deported) from the United States. But there is a whole other function of administrative immigration adjudication that relatively is ignored in the legal literature. Immigration adjudicators are also tasked with determining whether to grant immigration benefits, such as whether to grant lawful permanent resident (green card) status.

Both types of administrative immigration adjudication, removal and benefits, are in crisis. This article explores the challenges facing each and argues …

Are too many individuals diverted from civil immigration adjudication? Each year, the government completes millions of diversions from civil immigration adjudication through explicit and implicit waivers, the expedited removal program and the increasing criminalization of immigration law.

By uncovering and analyzing this diversion phenomenon, this article exposes an important piece of the immigration adjudication problem that has been largely undiagnosed. While judges, scholars, government officials and practitioners have acknowledged serious problems within the civil immigration adjudication system, this article widens the view to incorporate the issue of whether too many are being sidetracked from the system altogether.

This article concludes …