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Immigrant Victims, Immigrant Accusers, Michael Kagan

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The U Visa program provides an immigration status to noncitizen victims of crime, which is essential to prevent unauthorized immigrants from being afraid to seek help from the police, and thus becoming easy prey for criminals. This visa falls into a category of immigration programs that grant benefits on the basis of victim status, rather than on family or employment connections to the United States. But the federal government structured the U Visa program so that in order to be protected as a victim, a person must also become an accuser. The U Visa thus implicates the rights of third …