Jordan Vonderhaar, Texas Observer, Nov. 21, 2023 "Forty miles south of Ciudad Juárez, protected from the glaring desert sun by a blanket tied to a ladder, a mother nurses her nine-month-old...
Miriam Jordan, New York Times, Nov. 28, 2023 "The story of the Miskito who have left their ancestral home to come 2,500 miles to the U.S.-Mexico border is in many ways familiar. Like others coming...
ABA "Four national immigration experts will discuss the changing landscape of border law and policies at a free Dec. 6 webinar sponsored by the American Bar Association Commission on Immigration...
Theresa Vargas, Washington Post, Nov. 25, 2023 "The Northern Virginia doctor was born in D.C. and given a U.S. birth certificate. At 61, he learned his citizenship was granted by mistake."
Cyrus Mehta and Jessica Paszko, Nov. 24, 2023 " This is the story of our client Nadia Habib who was in immigration proceedings from 18 months till 31 years until an Immigration Judge granted her...
TRAC, Sept. 18, 2020
"The partial shutdown of the Immigration Court in the wake of COVID-19 continues to impact hundreds of thousands of immigrants awaiting their day in court. The current active court case backlog as of the end of August 2020 has grown to 1,246,164—up 11 percent from the beginning of March when the backlog was 1,122,824. Average wait times have already jumped 12 percent just in the past 6 months. Cases currently in the queue have already been waiting on average over 26 months as of now, and may still have to wait years longer before their hearing is actually scheduled to occur.
Where in the country are most immigrants residing when their case first reaches the Immigration Court? Among states, California has had the largest number. But foreign addresses, including those assigned to the MPP 'Remain in Mexico' program actually dominated during August. Since March 21, using public health measures during the coronavirus pandemic, the Trump Administration has been turning away those fleeing persecution at the border. Few of these had been assigned to MPP since March, but that recently changed. During August, a total of 832 were channeled to MPP and proceedings started in Immigration Court. Most were Cubans (546) or from Ecuador (211).
Monthly case completions before the March shutdown were running over 40,000. In August just 6,113 cases were completed. Roughly half (52%) of these were ordered deported or given a voluntary departure order. Before the shutdown began, this deportation order rates were much higher. For example, back in January this rate was 75 percent.
Cases requiring more time, such as those filing applications for relief including asylum, have also slowed. There were only 1,424 asylum decisions rendered during August. On these 507 were successful and the judge granted their asylum request while 11 more received other forms of relief which allowed them to remain in this country.
While EOIR as a policy has tried to move forward on hearings for immigrants who are detained, detainees with pending cases now number 29,656. Bond hearings have also slowed. There were only 2,425 bond hearings in August and bond was granted in only 622 of these. The average bond set for these individuals was $7,500.
Delve more deeply into any of these trends—all updated with data through the end of August 2020—through TRAC's online query tools at:
https://trac.syr.edu/imm/tools/
If you want to be sure to receive a notification whenever updated data become available, sign up at:
https://tracfed.syr.edu/cgi-bin/tracuser.pl?pub=1
Follow us on Twitter at:
https://twitter.com/tracreports
or like us on Facebook:
https://facebook.com/tracreports
TRAC is self-supporting and depends on foundation grants, individual contributions and subscription fees for the funding needed to obtain, analyze and publish the data we collect on the activities of the US Federal government. To help support TRAC's ongoing efforts, go to:
https://trac.syr.edu/cgi-bin/sponsor/sponsor.pl"